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Will she be comfortable here?
Will she find it lacking?
Most importantly—why the fuck do I care all of a sudden?
It all goes back to my past and how much damage was caused. It was ingrained in me at a young age that I’m not good enough. I pushed against that with everything I had, but that little voice in the back of my head, that sounds a little too much like my mother, still whispers you’re not enough. You’re not normal.
My head is buried in my hands as I try unsuccessfully to push down the stress consuming me.
It feels like I’m drifting in the ocean, but I can’t swim because the weight of the world weighs me down like an anchor. The need to get out of here presses against my chest, making it hard to breathe.
I’m almost eighteen, how is this my life?
Every day, I’m surrounded by kids my age with a world of opportunity, but not me.
I’m so close to my dreams but still stuck here because she won’t let me leave.
Sitting here at the kitchen table, my hands tremble as I try to focus on my homework.
It’s pointless.
I don’t know why I bother.
The sound of my mother’s steps has my back going ramrod straight.
I brace for her ridicule, knowing full well that whatever barb flies from her mouth will cut me like a sharp knife. Turning over my shoulder, I meet her gaze, and there’s a disapproving frown already etched on her face despite me not even speaking.
But that’s not what has her on edge. She’s watching me…work.
Cringing over the kitchen being spotless. Because it is, not counting the makeshift desk I’ve set up on the kitchen table.
She’s fuming over my assorted pens. The things I can’t stop. The things she wants me to.
“You’re such a mess, always obsessing over the smallest things,” she sneers, her voice dripping with disdain. “Why can’t you just be normal?”
I clench my fists under the table, my heart sinking with each word she utters. I know she couldn’t possibly understand the constant battle that wages inside my mind.
I don’t want to be this way. I don’t want to need to have everything the way I do…
I want to defend myself, to explain it isn’t a choice, that it isn’t something I can just turn off.
But I can’t.
The last time I tried to argue, she threatened to send me away.
Until I’m eighteen, I’m not safe. I need to apply to college. I need to get in, get a scholarship…
I’m stuck until I’m an adult. I can’t risk her wrath.
Nobody realizes how hard I worked to get here. The obstacles I had to overcome.
“Wow,” Cassidy says, taking a few steps into my place and turning in circles.
It’s a top-floor penthouse with an open floor plan. A wall of windows lines the back and gives a perfect view of the town below.
Off to the left is the hallway leading back to my suite and the two guest rooms. One has been set up already with Cassidy’s things. I allow very few people into my home, and none of them are there for long. One woman who was vetted by Mike. She cleans once a week, not good enough, in my opinion, and delivers food that she’s prepped for the week when I’m in town. She also picked up and dropped off my laundry and, on this one occasion, prepared a room for Cassidy.
Now that I have an executive assistant, I can let her go, which will allow me more privacy in my own home. Not that she’s ever here when I am. That’s always been the rule. She’s in and out before I get home. I’ve never met the woman, and that’s the way I like it.
