Punk 57(105)

Yeah, I might’ve convinced myself that I came here to collect the photo album of my sister’s school pictures and newspaper clippings Annie said she mailed her here that I found in her file cabinet and my grandfather’s watch, but really, part of me had a shred of hope. Part of me thought she might still be a good person and have an explanation. A way to tell me why—even in death—Annie’s mom still didn’t come for her.

“I want you to tell me you don’t regret leaving and you haven’t thought about us a single day since you left,” I demand. “You were happier without us, and you don’t want us.”

“Misha—”

“Say it,” I growl. “Let me leave here free of you. Give me that.”

Maybe she missed us and didn’t want to disrupt our lives. Maybe she missed us and didn’t want to disrupt her life. Or maybe that part of her life is broken and over, and she doesn’t want to go back. Maybe she doesn’t care.

But I do know that I can’t care about this anymore. I stare at her and wait for her to say what I need to hear.

“I wasn’t going to look for either of you,” she whispers, staring at her desk with tears streaming down her face. “I couldn’t stay. I couldn’t go back. I couldn’t be your mother.”

I slam my hand down on her desk, and she jumps. “I don’t give a shit about your excuses. I won’t feel sorry for you. Now say it. Say you were happier without us, and you didn’t want us.”

She starts crying again, but I wait.

“I’m happier since I left,” she sobs. “I never think about you and Annie, and I’m happier without you.” She breaks down as if the words are painful to say.

The sadness creeps up my throat, and I feel tears threatening. But I stand up, straighten my spine, and look down at her.

“Thank you,” I reply.

Turning, I walk for the door but stop, speaking to her with my back turned. “When your other daughter, Emma, turns eighteen, I will be introducing myself to her,” I state. “Do yourself a favor and don’t be an *. Prepare her before that time comes.”

And I open the door, leaving the office.

I step into the empty hallway and make my way for the entrance, the distance between my mother and me growing. With every step, I feel stronger.

I won’t regret leaving, I say to myself. I won’t think about you a single day from now on. I’m happier without you, and I don’t need you.

I’ll never look for you again.



“Did you ask her why she left?”

“No.” I sit against the wall in Annie’s room with Ryen resting against me between my legs.

“You’re not curious about her reasoning?” she presses. “How she would justify it?”

“I used to wonder. But now I… I don’t know.” It’s not that that I don’t care, but…“If someone doesn’t want us, we need to stop wanting them. I used to tell myself that, and now I believe it,” I tell her. “It’s not so hard, facing her and walking away. If she wanted to explain, she would’ve. If she could’ve, she would’ve. She didn’t chase after me. She knows how to find me if she wants to.”

Ryen smoothes her hands down Annie’s blue scarf. “So that’s why you were in Falcon’s Well.”

“Yeah. She had the watch. An heirloom gifted by my father’s father for her and my dad at their wedding,” I say, burying my nose in her hair. “Family tradition dictates it goes to the first-born son. She took it when she left—maybe to spite my dad or pawn it for money if she needed—but somehow she ended up giving it to Trey.”

“You must’ve hated her for that.”

“I already hated her,” I shoot back. “That hurt, though. She’d already abandoned us. How could she steal one more thing—especially something that rightfully belonged to me?”

She was selfish and spiteful, and maybe she isn’t the same person now that she was then, but I’m not waiting for her like Annie did. I hug Ryen close. This, right here, is everything. I can’t wait to live all the days I’m going to live with her. We’re going to have a hell of a lot of fun.

Especially since I no longer have to worry about that cocksucker at school with her for the rest of the year. She got a text from Ten earlier, saying he heard that the superintendent stepped in and forbade Trey from stepping foot on school grounds until everything clears up. And since a few students are pressing charges, for the photos and various assaults, it looks like the next several months of Trey’s life will be spent in court.

Ryen stands and pulls me up, both of us trailing out of the room. I’d come in here to put Annie’s locket and photo album back. There had also been letters with the album in the envelope I’d taken from our mother’s office, too. Annie didn’t tell me she’d written her, just that she’d sent her a photo album of her pics and stuff. She made sure to leave photos of me out of it, though. She knew I wouldn’t have liked that.

Maybe I shouldn’t have taken the album and letters. After our mother never showed up to the funeral, though, I just didn’t want her to have anything of Annie’s.

But Annie gave them to her, I guess. It was her wish our mother have those things.