Tangled desires

Chapter3: Shackles of Yesterday

The dull fluorescent lights of the corner store buzzed overhead, a constant hum that seemed louder than the footsteps of customers dragging across the tiled floor. Selene stood behind the counter, her chin propped in her hand, staring blankly at the register screen. The store smelled faintly of disinfectant and overripe bananas, the kind of scent that clung to her clothes long after her shift ended.

It was just another evening. Just another shift. But her mind wasn’t there.

Her body was in the store, but her thoughts had wandered miles away, slipping into the dark recesses of memory. She barely noticed when the door’s bell jingled again. The world around her blurred until all that remained was the heaviness in her chest and the sharp sting of the past.

She hadn’t always been this girl with tired eyes and calloused hands, punching keys on a cash register to keep the lights on. Once, there had been laughter, warmth, and the smell of her mother’s pancakes filling the kitchen.

Her parents had been everything. Her father, gentle yet strong, worked long hours but always found time to kiss her forehead before she left for school. Her mother had a way of making the world feel softer, safer, even on the hardest days. Selene remembered sitting on the couch while her mother hummed songs that carried her into dreams. She never thought it would end.

But it did.

That morning had been so ordinary. Her mother teasing her for being late, her father reminding her to grab her homework. The memory was etched in cruel clarity—the way sunlight had streamed through the curtains, the way her father’s laughter had filled the room. She hadn’t said goodbye properly. She hadn’t known it would be the last time.

The phone call came hours later, while she sat in a sterile classroom with a notebook open before her. “Accident. Immediate. Gone.” Words that sliced through her like glass.

At sixteen, Selene buried her parents and with them, the girl she used to be. She wandered through the small apartment that now felt like a mausoleum, her mother’s scarf draped across the couch, her father’s shoes still by the door. She waited days for them to walk back in, but the silence only grew heavier.

Mina had been her lifeline. Her best friend held her hand through the endless nights, whispered comfort through Selene’s sobs.

And that was when Ethan came into the picture.

She met him outside a run-down diner on a cold evening, her stomach gnawing with hunger and her pockets nearly empty. He was leaning against a wall, smoke curling lazily from the cigarette between his lips. Dark hair, easy smile, the kind of boy who looked like trouble but carried it in a charming package.

“You look like you could use a laugh,” he’d said, holding the cigarette out like it was an invitation.

Selene should have walked away. But loneliness gnawed deeper than hunger, and his voice offered a distraction. She coughed on her first drag, earning his grin, and something inside her cracked—grief momentarily blurred by recklessness.

Ethan had money then, or so it seemed. He took her places she had never been, bought her greasy burgers, slipped coins into jukeboxes to make her smile. He called her “special,” told her she was stronger than the world gave her credit for.

For a girl drowning in loss, his attention felt like air. She mistook his chaos for passion, his arrogance for confidence. And when he asked her to stay with him, to be his partner, she clung to the offer as though it were a lifeline.

At first, she believed they could make it. She dropped out of school, picked up jobs that barely paid, and poured herself into building something stable for them. Ethan praised her, kissed her forehead, told her she was his “queen.” For a while, she believed it.

But the cracks showed soon enough.

The casinos became his haunt. Selene would wake in the middle of the night to find his side of the bed cold, his laughter echoing in her mind even though he wasn’t there. She found crumpled betting slips in his pockets, the smell of whiskey on his breath when he returned.

She confronted him once, her voice trembling.

“Ethan, this isn’t working. You can’t keep gambling—what about the rent? What about us?”

He had smiled, that infuriating, lazy smile.

“Relax, Selene. I’m gonna hit it big soon, and when I do, you’ll thank me. You’ll see,we’ll be living like kings and queens.”

“And until then?” she’d whispered, holding back tears.

“Until then,” he said, stretching across the couch like he owned the world, “I love you baby,u're the best woman in the world".

But over time, the Ethan she had clung to disappeared completely, replaced by a manipulative, lazy shadow. He no longer hid the way he drained her paychecks, no longer pretended he cared about her dreams. Whenever she spoke of leaving, he turned it back on her.

“You’re selfish,” he’d accuse. “After everything I did for you, you’d really abandon me? You’re all I have, Selene. You think Mina or anyone else would’ve put up with your baggage?”

And she would fall silent. Guilt chained her tighter than any lock.

Now, years later, Selene found herself behind this counter, scanning barcodes for strangers and stacking boxes in the back. Her youth had slipped through her fingers, traded for exhaustion and a life that felt more like a prison.

She thought of her parents often—what they would say if they saw her now. Would her father’s disappointment be quiet or sharp? Would her mother’s gentle hands reach for her, urging her to leave?

Selene swallowed the lump in her throat, blinking at the shelves across from her. Rows of snacks and canned goods stared back like lifeless companions.

She had dreamed of painting once. Her mother used to say her art could tell stories without words. Now the brushes gathered dust in a box under her bed, forgotten beneath Ethan’s clutter and her endless shifts.

The storm inside her roared louder with each passing day, demanding freedom, demanding change. But change felt impossible. Where would she go? How would she survive?

The bell above the store door chimed again, pulling her halfway back. A man shuffled past the counter toward the refrigerators, but Selene barely registered him. Her gaze was fixed on the rain streaking the windows, her reflection faintly visible—a pale girl with tired eyes who no longer recognized herself.

She didn’t notice the footsteps approaching until a sharp tap on the counter jolted her.

“Excuse me,” a customer said, eyebrows raised. “You okay? I’ve been waiting.”

Selene blinked, heart leaping as if she’d been caught doing something wrong. She straightened quickly, forcing a smile that didn’t reach her eyes.

“Yes, sorry,” she murmured, scanning the items with trembling hands.

As the machine beeped, she realized how long she had been lost in her memories. The past had pulled her under, but the present was no better. Still, she forced herself to breathe, to keep moving, to keep living.

Because what else could she do?