Chapter Six - The Things We Leave Behind
1289 Words
Something was shaking my shoulder.
Gently at first. Then again, a little firmer.
I wanted it to stop.
The floor beneath me was cold, but the darkness behind my eyes was softer than anything waiting in the real world. In the dark, there was no broken glass. No whiskey on Dad’s breath. No strangers watching while I stood there and tried not to fall apart.
There was no Dad at all.
I tried to stay there.
“Arielle.”
The voice reached me through the fog.
My head rolled against my arm. Every part of me felt heavy, like my body had been filled with wet sand. My cheek ached. My shoulder hurt from where I had hit the door. My clothes were still damp against my skin, and a violent shiver moved through me before I could stop it.
“Arielle, sweetheart. Wake up.”
Mom.
The word pulled me upward.
I opened my eyes slowly.
The bedside lamp was on, filling my room with a weak amber glow. For a second, I did not understand why I was on the floor. Then memory came back in pieces.
Dad’s glass breaking.
Damon’s hand around Dad’s wrist.
Mom saying, She is your daughter.
My lungs tightened.
“Mom?” My voice sounded rough.
She was kneeling beside me in her blue dress, though the hem was wrinkled now and one pin had slipped from her hair. Her face looked different without its usual calm. Her mascara had smudged beneath her eyes. Tears shone on her cheeks.
She pressed a hand to my hair. “I’m here.”
I almost cried just because she said it.
Instead, I pushed myself upright too quickly and the room tilted. Mom caught my elbow before I fell sideways.
“Easy,” she whispered. “You fainted.”
“I did not.”
“You were unconscious for twenty minutes.”
That was close enough to fainting that I did not argue.
My phone was on the floor near my knee. The screen was dark. I remembered the messages. I remembered the growl downstairs.
A cold knot formed in my stomach.
“Where is Dad?”
Mom looked toward the door.
“Downstairs.”
“With Damon?”
Her hesitation was answer enough.
“What happened?”
“Damon stopped him from coming up here.” Her voice shook. “Your father told him to leave. Mr. Valtierra did not.”
The name sounded wrong in her mouth, too formal for the man with gold eyes.
“Is he hurt?”
Mom’s expression changed.
“No,” she said carefully. “Your father is not hurt.”
That did not answer my question either.
Before I could ask again, I noticed the suitcases.
Two of them sat on my bed, zipped shut and waiting. A third rested beside my desk. My backpack had been placed on top, dry now, with my phone charger tucked into the front pocket.
I stared at them.
Then I looked around my room.
My dresser was empty. The little framed photo of Mom and me at the beach was gone. My books had disappeared from their shelf. The wardrobe doors stood open, exposing bare hangers and empty drawers.
My chest went hollow.
“Did he do this?” I asked.
Mom followed my gaze. “No.”
The answer did not make me feel better.
“I did.”
I turned to her.
She took a breath that trembled at the edges. “I packed what I could carry. Clothes. Your documents. The things that matter.”
“What are you talking about?”
“We’re leaving.”
The room went quiet.
For one second, I thought I had heard her wrong.
Then a laugh broke out of me. It was small and ugly and completely out of place.
“We cannot leave.”
“Yes, we can.”
“Mom.” I pushed damp curls from my face. “He will find us.”
“Maybe.” Her eyes held mine. “But he will not own every road we take.”
I had never heard her speak like that.
Not once.
The mother I knew chose her words carefully. She apologized to furniture when she bumped into it. She softened every sentence before it could become an argument.
This woman looked terrified.
And determined anyway.
My throat tightened.
“What changed?”
Mom’s hand shook as she reached into the pocket of her dress. She pulled out a folded piece of paper and gave it to me.
It was a business card.
No logo. No address. Just one name embossed in black letters.
Damon Valtierra.
On the back, someone had written a single sentence.
Take your daughter and go.
I looked up.
“He gave you this?”
“He gave me a choice,” Mom said.
The rain tapped steadily against my window.
“But he is Dad’s guest.”
“I do not think your father invited him,” she whispered.
A chill moved across my skin.
Downstairs, something crashed.
Mom flinched.
So did I.
Then, from somewhere below us, came a low sound that did not belong to any man I knew. It rolled through the walls, deep enough that the lamp on my bedside table trembled.
My pulse started racing.
“What was that?”
Mom did not answer.
She had always protected me by staying quiet. Seeing fear written openly across her face made the room feel unfamiliar. I wanted to ask whether she had seen Damon change, whether Dad had finally met someone he could not control. But the questions lodged in my throat. Some answers were too large to carry once you heard them.
I was not ready for any of them. Not tonight. Maybe not ever.
That scared me more than the sound itself.
I pushed myself to my feet, though my knees threatened to fold. “We have to get out now.”
Mom’s eyes filled again. “There is a car waiting behind the garden gate. Malcolm will drive you.”
“You.”
“I will follow.”
“No.” The word came out sharp. “I am not leaving you here.”
“Arielle—”
“No. I spent my whole life thinking I had to stay because you were here.” My hands curled into fists. “I am not running away alone.”
For a moment, Mom looked like she might argue.
Then her face crumpled.
“I was hoping you would say that,” she admitted.
My breath caught.
She pulled a small key from her pocket and pressed it into my hand. “The back stairwell leads to the laundry room. From there, the garden door. Do not let anyone see you.”
“What about Dad?”
Mom glanced at the closed bedroom door.
“Damon is keeping him occupied.”
The phrase should have made me feel relieved.
It did not.
Damon was a stranger. A dangerous stranger. The kind who spoke like he knew things nobody had told him and looked at me as though he could see every lie I had ever used to survive.
But he had stopped Dad.
No one had ever done that.
My phone lit up in my hand.
A message from Damon.
The back gate opens in three minutes.
Below it, another message appeared.
Do not wait for me.
I looked at Mom.
Then at the suitcases.
Then at the room Dad had tried to turn into proof that I belonged to him.
For the first time, I did not feel erased.
I felt like I was standing at the edge of something terrifying.
Something that might finally be mine.
- Writer
