Scarlet scars

Scarlet I lay in the grass feeling the warm rays of the sun caress my face. I closed my eyes and breathed in enjoying the the fresh air. I felt at peace as I lay there listening to the chirping of the birds and with my eyes still closed, I decided to just push away all negative thoughts in hopes that it would numb away my everyday pain and sorrow. I knew it would only be a matter of time and they would return. I would go back to the pain, which I was well accustomed to, and to the torment that was my life. It hit different whenever I was alone with my thoughts and questions that would never be answered. I knew I needed to leave the garden I was currently in because I wasn’t allowed to be here. I had such a vile aura, such that, the beautiful flowers I touched wilted away and died. That was what I had been told by my family ever since I was young. "Scarlet! You will scare the birds and butterflies away" they would say. But they weren't at home so why wouldn’t I seize the opportunity to have one serene moment? I may have been a pushover but definitely not dumb. At least I thought I wasn’t. I’ve been living with my late mother's cousin , Aunt Brenda who has three children, Michael 24, and twins Emelda and Amelia 21, just like me. Amelia is the worst of the siblings to me. she has always treated me like a nobody ever since I moved in with them. She hated me to the bone and I didn’t understand why. I thought there could have been a reason why she treated me the way she did and maybe I just couldn’t remember it, because the hatred I saw In her eyes towards me sometimes was so deep. I mean, I don’t think somebody can just hate another person for no reason at all. Even though to be completely fair everyone in my family hated me, well except Micheal. Even calling them family was only just a formality, because they had never treated me as such. The only time they ever treated me like family was when my parents where still alive. I can vividly remember how my uncle and aunt used to love me so much when mom and dad were alive and each time they visited us, they would come with presents for me and if I remember clearly the twins were not always as cold as they were to me. We would share my toys whenever they’d come over and my mom would send them toys and sometimes during holidays, my dad would take us out for treats. As for Michael, he had always been cold when we were young but he had changed his attitude towards me, from the time I was 14. it's then we started talking more. I can say he was the only one who treated me better in that house. He wasn't always home, since he’d been in boarding school but, whenever he was, he would speak up for me when his sister would call me names. From my afro red hair,( I mean I have seen red but smooth beautiful hair on beautiful girls before, but my own which is long, curly and a bit rough, I felt like I looked like a red mop. My emerald green eyes and my brown skin tone which gave away my African descent. I sometimes felt that if I hadn’t gotten the rough hair and freckles, then I would have been beautiful maybe. I had a curvy body that I liked to cover up with baggy clothes. One more thing lowering my self-esteem. I ran my hands through my hair and slowly breathed in counting down the minutes till my cousins and aunt would return. I closed my eyes once more, under the clear blue sky, dozed off. A little girl with wild red hair came running through the door crying, she looked like she was not more than five years old. A woman with deep red hair was seated on a couch watching TV, her favorite soap serie. The girl ran straight into my mother's warm lap sobbing and sniffling. The woman lifted the girl up onto her laps and held her little face in her hands. "What's wrong with my princess?" she lifted her chin to look at her as she wiped away the tears on her face. "Mommy?" The girl said. "Yes baby? what’s wrong?" she asked again. "mommy, am I ugly?" The girl said looking at her mother. Her mom's expression twisted into that of pain when she heard the little girls question. It was as though she had heard that question before. She blinked back her tears and hugged the little girl tightly. "No! princess, no!” She let her tears fall as she hugged her daughter. “Where did you get that from? you are not ugly, you are beautiful, my little doll." She said patting her daughters back. "But mommy, Jay said that I am ugly ... and ..and that my hair is ugly and scruffy" she said in between sobs "and,and he said I look... I look like the chucky doll mommy.. mommy chucky is bad, I don't want to be chucky." The woman looked at the little in her arms, stroking her hair trying to calm her down. she was crying too but she didn’t want her daughter to see. "cally" she said, “I want you to always remember what I am going to tell you, even when I am not around.. you are very special and unique. you are not ugly but different." "But mommy, why does Jay and my friends tease me if I am beautiful?" The girl asked but before her mother could speak, a very tall man, dark skinned walked in. "My beautiful princess, don’t talk like that, do you want to know which doll you look like?" he said as he held her knelt before her, holding her shoulders. He opened his bag and brought out a bright pink wrapped box and gave it to the little girl. "wow! Wow! it's Merida daddy! mommy look it's Merida.." The little girl squealed after opening the box. She laughed holding the doll in her hands. It was from her favourite cartoon 'brave'. "Yes my brave little Cally, it's Merida, she has long beautiful curly hair like you and green eyes, she’s beautiful just like you my baby." he said kissing her on her little cheek and then leaned in to kiss the woman. " I love you daddy" the little girl said kissing her fathers cheek. "I love you too my beautiful Cally” "whoa! whoa! whoa! I see daddy is getting all the love now, Where's mommie' s kiss?" The woman said, feigning to be upset. They all laughed the girl got up and kissed both her parents and they all fell into a heap on the floor while the man tickled the woman and the little girl. I woke up crying for the little girl in that dream that me, wishing for a chance to go back in time and never come back. I was used to waking up in tears every single day since my parents died. I suddenly felt as though I was underwater. why was I feeling like l was swimming again? "Wake up b***h!" I jolted awake to find myself drenched and Amelia standing there holding a hose.