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I should feel some type of sympathy for her. Something inside of me should tell me to back off now. But instead my heartache, my pain, my rage urges me on. Tell them. Tell them it all.
"You knew. There's no way you didn't. If I could hear her cries in the night, so could you. If I noticed the days she stayed home from school, in bed all day, then so did you. If I saw the cuts on her arms and the dark circles under her eyes, then so did you. You can lie to yourselves and say you didn't know all you want, but I will not let you stand here and feed that lie to me. You knew. You looked away. You willfully blinded yourself to your own daughter's pain, her anguish, and I will never see you the same for what you did."
My father grabs my crying mother to him, pushing her head to his chest. "She was our daughter. We did what we felt was right. Did you want her labeled crazy for the rest of her life?"
"At least she would have had a life," I shriek. "Can't you see that? You were worried about what people would see her as, see you as, but she was worried about the walls that were crushing in on her. The light that was disappearing."
"We thought it was for attention, Jolie.” My mother cries. “You have to believe us. If we had known there was something really wrong..."
"Then what? You would have gotten her all the help you so insistently offer me? Even if you felt it was for attention, then you should have given that to her. You should have given her something. Instead you gave her empty words, clenched hands, and cold hearts. You gave her hopelessness when she already had too much of that. You taught her that all you wanted was her silence. And she gave it to you, in the most permanent way possible.”
"She choose to kill herself," my father states. "We didn't shove those pills down her throat."
"No, but you didn't give her any reason not to either."
His face falls at those words and only the sound of my mother's cries fills the room.
I look at my parents one last time. All I see are hypocrites. All I see are two people who broke my sister's heart. And maybe I'll always wonder if I did enough for Callie. But I know I'll never forgive them for not doing anything for Callie.
"Come on, Elijah."
I reach back, and he links his hand with mine. We begin to walk past my parents, but my mother turns towards me.
"No." She shouts. "You can't have this."
She pulls on the photo album and I yank it right back.
"No. That's Callie's." She screams.
"Me and Callie made this together." I yell as I struggle against her grip. "These are our pictures. These are the daughters you never took the time to know. I'm taking it. This is me and my sister, my friend. You didn't know this girl. You chose not to know her."
My mother cries out again, and I pull as hard as I can until her hands slip off of the photo album.
"Harold." She turns to him again.
He shields her, arms wrapped around her, in a way he, nor she, has ever shielded us. Not from the world. Not from them and the burden of their expectations. Not from the way they chose to control instead of love.
"You are a hateful, spiteful thing," my father spits.
"I am my parents’ daughter then," I croak.
Elijah gently pulls on my hand, and I look over at him. He nods his head towards the door. "It's time."
"I know," I whisper.
The anger in me wants to let every ounce of it out on them, keep beating them down with words until my parents understand how badly they hurt Callie, how badly they hurt me. Until they fully comprehend their part in her misery, in her death. But the rest of me, it just wants to go. Wants this to be over. To leave this house and never look back.
So I tuck the photo album to my chest and tighten my hold on Elijah's hand and leave the room. I don't look back, not even when my mother pleads for me not to do this. Not when my father yells what a mistake I'm making. I keep my eyes forward, on Elijah's back as he leads me to the front door and opens it.
The sun shines through it, and I squint for a few seconds as we walk to Elijah's car. My father's shouts follow us, telling me never to come back. Never to come to them for any help when I fall. That he never wants to set eyes on me again.
On this one thing, we agree.
I get into the car and Elijah closes my door. My father begins rushing towards the car, but Elijah moves his body in front of the window, blocking my view.
"Enough," Elijah snaps. "You don't want her in your life, well she's going. Leave her be. Don't you think you've done enough damage, hurt her enough already?"
"You little rotten nobody. You don't know the first thing about raising children."
