Thrust Into His Arms

*****Song Recommendation; "When the party is over" by Billie Eilish

GWENETH

FOUR MONTHS LATER

CHRISTMAS DAY

"Guess what?" Mom asks cheerfully. I look up from my phone to her with a blank neutral expression. She is sitting on the edge of my bed. I’m not the least bit curious of what she wants to say. She is all sparky and excited. I should be hella curious and interested but I’m not just feeling it. Nowadays there is not much difference between me and a gloomy weather.

This Christmas is so quiet for me compared to the ones I have had. It might as well just be the funeral of a loved one instead of a day of celebration.

I used to laugh out loud. Be internally vibing with Mariah Carey’s "All I want for Christmas"

Run around tirelessly writing wish notes that I hang on the Christmas tree. It’s not the Christmas itself. The song has been going on repeat downstairs. The Christmas trees are in the living room. The Christmas meals grander than ever. But I’m here in my room with my knees pulled to my chest, hair unwashed.

Last year was spectacular. One of the few papers I had taped to the shiny balls on the Christmas tree was that I’d ace the scholarship. I had pictured this Year’s own to be a bang because somehow then, I knew that it would come true.

That I would go all out for it. But I’m on a standstill watching the cool, un-snowy St John’s County weather outside my window and like a wilting flower in need of sunlight, I’m wistfully waiting for the clock to strike 2pm so I can go to one of my many part-time shifts and stay there until late evening to avoid my Dad’s family members who would be coming later as per the tradition.

I really do not have to go ’cause it’s Christmas’ but I will. The Grocery store is the only place I can just be like a stillwater because it’s unlike my other two waitressing jobs at the big, fancy restaurants that involves sharing a space with other workers like me.

"We are moving. Hurray!" She joyfully announces. "We’re what?" I ask.

"We are moving." She repeats.

"Moving as in. . . Away from here? Permanently?" She hums, and nods. "Your Dad suggested it. And I think it is a really great idea. I’m sick of this place anyway." She says with a dramatic eye roll and a silent huff. "What about you?" She extends.

"That. . . Would be good. But what of you and Dad? You both have your jobs here." I reason. That is what is stopping me from being happy at the news. The mere words alone is giving me a burst of energy and I’m trying to contain it. Moving away, that means new home, new space. I would be away from here where I’m infamously known as the girl who—

The girl who some people whisper loudly about. A dirty, soiled piece of gossip. "It’s her!"

"Do you hear what she did?"

I didn’t do it. He did. But no one would believe that.

I had wanted to leave home and run away again after what happened at West hill. But I did not have the strength to. Grief is wierd.

Now I know that it does not always look like crying. Sometimes it looks like sitting very still in a cold room and realize that no one can save you.

I was holed-up in here for one whole month that came to feel as though I am still living in the day it happened. The only thing I do all day is stare into space or scribble my life away on a blank paper mindlessly attempting to draw which only comes out as stupid lines. At night I come out to eat my dinner when everyone is asleep because I want real quiet.

After that one month, I decided to put myself into other things into working and making a little bit of cash for myself. That is all I can do now since school is out of the question. But if we are indeed moving, then maybe, just maybe. . . . .

"I will be going back to the Alaskan branch by next year. And your Dad would also be transferred. He is thinking of opening up a local pizza restaurant like your aunt Piper. It would be so fun don’t you think?"

"Yes. But where are we moving to?"

"We’re moving to. . . ." Everything in me expectantly follows that drawl, but then she burst the bubble. "Not telling. Secret. It should be a surprise to you."

I wear a suspicious frown. "Is it true, or are you just trying to get me excited up my toes?"

"Come on now. Would I be lying about this? Can you not see how happy I am right now? That is because I won’t be seeing the Bradley’s any longer. Especially Leah. I was hoping for her to just die or disappear." She spits.

I caution with a sigh. "I know she is really unlikeable, but that’s bad mom." Hoping for someone to die and physically taking a gun or a knife to kill are about the same thing, no?

"I know. I know. She is unlikeable, yeah, you just admitted that too. Fucking bitch." She curses under her breath.

"You know I prefer it when people just come out for who they are, you know?"

"Why would you pretend to be sympathetic and concerned when you’re not? She likes rubbing it in so much!" Mrs Bradley, mom never liked her right from when we came to this neighborhood seven years ago. I first thought that she was just being bitchy because she never really likes anyone. Especially women who smile too much when Dad’s around.

If Dad happens to really have another woman on the side, I so much pity her because my mom is villainous. Like a snake and scorpion at the same time. Maybe I should have told her that I was being bullied then. There is a big chance that she could’ve burned down Lamont’s car, house or he himself like she said. Back to Mrs Bradley, she came by some time ago with some brownies that she said she made which Mom had generously given to the trash right after she left.

I was at home because that was during my one month grief period. Knowing she that she was around, I had come out of my room discreetly, perching low by the stairs so I would hear what they were speaking about as I find her gossips a little bit interesting—not that I like them, but it never hurts to know what is going on as she always knows what’s secretly up.

And I needed something to chew on other than my lovely misery. Most of her gossip turn out to be true. She sees everything. And once she does, it is game over. She was the first person to find out that the wife of a former neighbor who used to live on the beginning of the street was cheating on her husband with the mailman. She said she had seen them getting intimate in a car right outside their house and that the mailman dropped by frequently when the woman’s husband is not at home.

Somehow, the news spread around the neighborhood and finally reached the ears of the woman’s husband who watched and found out it was true.

Then a messy divorce followed that caused the woman to lose custody of her two kids to her ex-husband. Jeremy and Jessica.

They were sweet little kids. The divorce had a catastrophic effect on them. They were cheerful, sweet, playful. . . Everything a kid should be. But during and after the divorce process, they suddenly became like adults with troubled lives.

The woman always came around to see her kids even when she is not supposed to according to court procedures. The man did not like it and filed for a restraining order. Stopping her from seeing her kids when it’s not yet time. The woman defiled the restraining order and was dragged away by cops like a criminal when she only just wanted to see her kids.

It happened so frequently that she was given jail time. She came right back after that, and found out that her ex-husband had moved to London with her kids. I had watched her cry her eyes and heart out in front of the house that day and I felt really aggrieved. Feeling that the law was unnecessarily ruthless to her when she was only acting based on maternal instinct.

It was not a good thing that she cheated. But she did not have to suffer the loss of her children.

Basically, in all ways it was too much. I thought, and still think that the court was unfair to her. Her cheating has nothing to do with her ability to raise her kids.

The man must have influenced that custody decision. Most times it is better to just leave things as they are and pretend that you don’t see it even though it is right in front of you—Pertaining to gossip, and not physical harm of course.

It all started with "idle Mrs Bradley" like mom calls her. None of that would have happened if she had just kept her big mouth shut and turned a blind eye. It would not have happened that way if she had. Telling Mrs Leah Bradley to turn a blind eye to something apparently is like telling her to die. She had been the one who had also went around with the gossip that I was driven home in a Porsche by my "boyfriend"

I was expecting to hear a hot gossip and have something fresh to run my mind over. I never knew that she was about to dish out to me my misery on a fresh plate. She first asked if I was home, how I was doing before she veered into the topic of whether or not I am still attending Krohns. Mom replied saying I was doing fine and that nothing happened and made it seem like I was still going to Krohns. But she kept pushing. Even bringing up the video. She must have watched it too apparently. Mom had sent her away with the excuse of having to meet with someone.

I had no doubts that she would’ve committed murder if she had delayed.

Mom lost herself in bottles upon bottles of alcohol. I had watched her angry and disappointed face as she did.

It made me hate myself. Knowing that I was the reason for it.

It is my greed. My life was going right, but I wasn’t satisfied. Perhaps that had been my punishment for wanting more than I am allowed to have.