Bonnie
My hands shake as I lift the coffee cup to my mouth and take a sip of the scalding liquid. It doesn’t settle my stomach, but then, nothing does. Apparently, a rejection on the level they gave me is one that changes your insides. My stomach feels nauseous all the time; I get startled so easily. I wake up in the middle of the night shaking like I’m having a shock reaction. I cry all the time with no warning, it just happens.
But it’s myself I hate the most. I take it all out on my body, and I torture my mind. Barely looking after myself. I can’t look in a mirror; I don’t have any interest in anything. I just exist in this bubble.
It’s been six months.
Six months of reporters combing through my family's life and history. Six months of watching people I trusted sell me out for a buck and a flashy story that made me out to be promiscuous, unhinged, or, if you ask one particular journalist, an alien.
I set the cup down and rub my temples. Each blow has been worse than their actual rejection. It’s the betrayal from family and friends that we trusted. The lies and tales they spun to the media for a few dollars.
I mark down every single name, vowing that I will never forgive them.
As for them, they live their lives.
If it were only that, it would be okay, but I get to see them splashed across the news with a different woman in their arms. They don’t look sick; they aren’t suffering. I can tell they aren’t waking up in the middle of the night sobbing as they curl into a fetal position and wish they could erase the last six months of their lives.
I got fired from my job at the doctor’s office I worked at. Apparently, bringing my own entourage of cameras isn’t a good look.
Beacon Falls has had enough of the journalists, but they are angry at me for not doing something about them. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to be doing; if my willing them gone would get them gone, I’m telling you, those media people would be in their own private suite in hell, burning.
I hear my dad stomp up to the door of the room. He stands there, and I can feel his pain, smell it in his thicker, cloying scent. I don’t feel easy around my family anymore.
Would it sound weird if I told them I miss them? I wish they weren’t so careful around me. I miss my dad's smile and my mum’s easy songs. My brother and sisters have been missing, too.
“Pack your stuff,” Dad says as he pushes the door wide open.
I turn my head to blearily gaze at my father. “Are you kicking me out?” I don’t even care if he does.
“I wouldn’t blame you,” I say listlessly. “I’ve brought nothing but trouble,” I whisper and sink lower in the chair. “I’m sorry, Dad, that it came to this.”
My father inhales, causing his chest to expand, and his brows go down, and I think that he looks like he might cry. I hate that I’ve done this to him. I hate that I've made him hurt.
I look out the window at the remaining journalists who linger on our front lawn. I’d rather stare at them than see the pain I’ve brought my father.
He clears his throat.
“Look at me, Bonnie.”
I shake my head, biting my lip.
“Look at me.”
No one could refuse the call of an alpha speaking the way he is. I turn my head and stare at him.
“What?” I ask in a rusty sob.
“No, I’m not kicking you out, not now, not ever. I’m going to teach you the family business. Now, get some clothes and what you’ll need for two weeks. Leave your phone. We’re going camping.”
My instinctive reaction is to vehemently reject the idea, but the sudden flash in my mind of wide spaces, air, no television, no radio. I will not hear their names or see them. I can just exist out there, and no one can see my agony and humiliation.
I can scream and let the sound out into the world.
It takes me a minute to get up, and when I do, I sway because I’m dizzy. My mother stands in my doorway waiting, watching the both of us with concerned eyes. She’s got a calm energy that spills into her appearance. I don’t know anyone that can panic when my mother focuses her attention on them. She doesn’t look old enough to have four children, but she’s one of the strongest people I know.
I pause, staring at her. “Nothing to say?” I almost want her to rail at me, to hate me, to curse me out for bringing this on our family.
“Oh, my sweet child, you know if you want something, I’ll always be right here. You say the word, and I will fetch you the moon,” she says as she steps into the room and wraps her arms around me.
