CHAPTER 4: FORBIDDEN FRUIT
835 Words
Raul Confesses
I find him in the greenhouse at midnight, slumped against the glass wall like a broken statue. The moonlight cuts through the windows in silver slashes, painting his face in shadows and guilt. His shirt is torn, his hands shaking as he grips a bottle of whiskey that's already half empty.
The smell of alcohol and sweat fills the air between us. I want to run, but my feet stay planted on the cold stone floor. He looks up at me with eyes that mirror his father's hunger, and my stomach turns.
"Betty's the only one who sees me," he whispers, his voice cracking like glass. The words hit me like ice water. My son confesses his sin to the roses and expects them to absolve him.
I watch his chest rise and fall with each ragged breath. The greenhouse suddenly feels smaller, the walls closing in like a trap. Every plant around us seems to wither in shame. He reaches toward me with bloodshot eyes, seeking comfort I can not give.
The bottle slips from his fingers and shatters on the ground. Wine-dark liquid spreads across the stones like spilled blood, and I know our family is bleeding out drop by poisonous drop.
The scream tears from my throat before I can stop it. It echoes through the greenhouse, bouncing off glass and steel until it sounds like the wail of every mother who ever lost a child to evil. I launch myself at him, my fists finding his chest, beating against the bones that I once kissed when he was small and innocent.
"She's your sister!" The words come out broken, desperate, like prayers shouted into a void. My hands leave red marks on his skin, and I wish they could leave marks on his soul instead.
He doesn't fight back. He just stands there, taking my rage like he deserves it. His eyes are empty pools reflecting nothing but my own horror. When my strength finally gives out, I collapse against him, sobbing into the shirt I used to mend when he was seven.
"So are you to Majid," he says quietly, and the words slice through me cleaner than any blade ever could.
The truth hangs between us like a noose. I see myself in his face now, not just his features, but his brokenness. We are both victims wearing the masks of survivors, and I hate him for showing me my own reflection.
The smoke reaches me first, thick and black against the dawn sky. I run toward the east wing, my bare feet slapping against marble floors that suddenly feel like ice. The smell of burning fabric and melting plastic fills my nostrils as I throw open Betty's bedroom door.
She stands in the center of the inferno, still in her white nightgown, watching her childhood burn. The bed where Majid first touched her wrong dissolves into ash. Photo albums of family vacations melt into twisted plastic. Even her teddy bear, the one she slept with until she was twelve,feeds the hungry flames.
Her laughter cuts through the roar of fire, sharp and broken like wind chimes in a hurricane. She turns to look at me, and her face glows orange in the firelight. There are tears streaming down her cheeks, but she's smiling like she's finally found religion.
"It's beautiful," she whispers, spinning in the smoke like a dancer in hell.
The flames lick at the walls, reaching toward family portraits that show us all smiling lies. I grab her arm to pull her away, but she plants her feet firm as tree roots and refuses to move.
My hands shake as I write, the pen scratching against paper like fingernails on a coffin lid. The words spill out of me like blood from a wound that refuses to close. Each letter feels heavier than the last, but I can not stop writing the truth that burns in my chest.
My children are drowning. And I am the sea.
The ink bleeds across the page, spreading like the stain that Majid left on our family. I write about Raul's confession, about Betty's fire, about the way Aisha looks at walls like they hold secrets. I document every bruise, every broken smile, every lie we tell ourselves to survive another day.
The journal falls open to a page I wrote weeks ago, a list of ways to poison a man without leaving evidence. My grandmother's knowledge flows through my fingers, ancient wisdom mixed with modern desperation,nightshade,foxglove, and wolfsbane. Names that sound like poetry but promise death.
Outside my window, I see Majid walking through the garden in his silk robe, inspecting his roses like a king surveying his kingdom. He stops beneath my window and looks up, that familiar smile playing at his lips.
He knows I'm watching. He knows I'm planning. And somehow, that makes his smile grow wider.
The pen snaps in my grip, leaving my fingers stained with ink that looks exactly like blood.
- Writer
