Not Poor Enough For Pity

CHAPTER 7:THE FAILED STITCHING

“WHAT IN THE GODS SEVENS NAME IS THIS!?”

The manor once bustling with activities, the lights colorfully bright and the atmosphere that whiffs of wine and lust now stands as the aftermath of the bird being uncaged. I stand before my mother. I caught the smell of her expensive perfume which made everything worse, everything reminds me of her. The lights on the ceiling seemed to stare at me with that accusatory glare investigators would give to heinous criminals. Except, the crime I had committed was not of anger and rebelling but that lump at the back of my throat that craved the freedom children my age had.

“Dress Muddy and tattered, hair undone like you’ve just come out of a scandalous newspaper and your face! Oh dear your face!” My mother cradled my face as if it were a personal treasure. Something to cherish and take care of. “it’s all blemished and hideous. You’re going to get acne with these.”

I couldn’t help but lean in to her touch, the false warmth was still warmth. I let out a trembling breath as she wiped my face. I could see the look of false righteousness but I couldn’t care less. Even if I hated her, I would still feel the warmth that is embezzled out of her body because she is my mother. With her warm hands on my face, I began to close my eyes. My eyes fluttering slowly and my breathing evened. To them, this was a simple interaction between kin; to me it was the warmth that I had been starved from my whole life.

In the corner of the room, Lazarus leaned on a wall, staring at the interaction between me and my mother. He knew I had dug too deep. He knew this was me being slowly stitched back together and he was too powerless to stop it in the midst of his father and my mother in the room.

“Lazarus.”

Lazarus didn’t bother with the etiquette that was forced upon him at a young age. His submission would only be their distant dream and he was sure he was going to find a way out of a life he didn’t want to watch crumble before his eyes.

“Lazarus!” His father shouted out, voice now so sharp it could cut through glass. It echoed like a snake wrapping around a human being and squeezing all of the air out. “I don’t need to shout your name for the third time, do I?”

“What’s the point of listening to you when you have that bald ass head?”

“H.. How dare you! Where are your manners!” his father hurled a vase at him. It missed him only by an inch and shattered by the wall, spilling water over Lazarus’s shoes. Lazarus kept a calm expression just staring his father down. He watched his father squirm and it thrilled him seeing this man filled with confidence slowly crumble beneath him. He wanted to crush this pedophile down.

“Silas. Calm your nerves, he’s not worth it. He is only a diamond that wants to be stone.” My mother said calmly as she tied my hair back while I slept soundly on her shoulder. Her voice then turned into something..unfamiliar. “For now, you have some arrangements with my beautiful porcelina and I don’t want it to be interrupted by your silly quarrels with this silly boy. ”

Lazarus stiffened at the topic she had mentioned. Arrangements… his father had arrangements with me… could it be… he wanted to throw up, to scream until his ears bled. He knew what was going to happen. If the clock kept ticking, I would be tied to his father for all eternity.

My mother grinned seeing his reaction watching his face go pale at the mention of the said arrangement. The sound in the room was only the grand clock at the side, ticking rhythmically as if to tell them that time was not their friend. Silas sighed as he walked towards Evelyn, he placed his hand on her shoulder with a firm pat as he stared down at my sleeping body on her side. Something predatorily sinister flashed through his face, a foreshadowing that Lazarus would bleed to keep away from me. For once, his rebellion was like a fleeting moment as he was hit by the bat of reality. He knew he could not escape. He knew it, and there was no stopping it unless he was willing to burn the dollhouse down with them inside.

“Look at how you smile. Look at how you sell your own daughter off like some cheap harlot, like a vintage car you’re tired of driving. Is this what you call love?”

My mother turned to him, her smile widening at his expression, the cracks were forming on his once cool aloof mask. She crossed her arms as she strode towards him, her heels clicked with an aura of a predator hunting it’s prey. She stood before him ,leaning in close and stroked his cheek gently as if he were a doll in need of restitching. Her voice filled with that prideful hiss. “silly boy, it’s all tough love. She only had herself to blame. If you’d been in my shoes, then you’d do the same. It is all for her.” Her voice became louder, echoing through the room like a Thunderbolt “everything is for her! For her future!”

My mother pulled away as she wiped out the imaginary wrinkles from her dress. She strode towards the center as she spun. “can you imagine the gala we will have!? A gala so fine even the gods would envy her. Oh my daughter! My sweet daughter!” she walked closer towards my sleeping form that the servant carried. She pinched my cheek gently and saw me stir from my sleep and pulled back. She was like a child opening a present on Christmas morning, a voice as high with chime and a look of excitement directed at the wrong thing. “the foyer will be filled with orchids—no lilies! Matching her skin to give her a glow compared to that of the gods!”

She was spinning around. Her face contorted into pure bliss just imagining me in a white dress with my red swollen eyes matching my makeup that she would personally do as per what a seamstress would do. She didn’t even notice Lazarus' knuckles turn white from the amount of grip he because of how tightly he clenched his fists.

Minutes went by, the silence stretched with only the sound of Evelyn pacing the room with wonder and daydream. But, the doll she had tried to stitch wasn’t properly closed. Instead, it ripped apart much faster and the hole became much larger.

“can you shut up?”