Consequences |LRH|

Chapter 22

Evie

Let's go home for Christmas, he says. It will be fun, he says. As much as I love my family, and the traditions we sort of, not really have, I knew the one day of kindness would be short lived. The bullying and degrading nature of my parents which was majority of the time directed towards me subsides for a day then is swung back in full force. They weren't bad people per say, just the kind that thought belittlement led to betterment. They were always nicer when we had company.

Our Aunt Olivia and her boyfriend Bailey were spending the day with us, normal but always fun. She was one of my closest family members, the only one who didn't make me think I was less than enough. She was always there for me, letting me spend the night when I would show up at her apartment in the city because I was just too tired of home. Then I left, moved to LA to get away and this year was different, the comments more focused on the things I couldn't change about myself and about the dreams I was already afraid of never achieving.

"Why can't you be skinnier like her?" "Why can't you be more successful like your brother?" "Why can't you-", is basically all I heard. Why couldn't I be enough written in their coded questions.

By the time we got down to playing around with our cricket set outside in the summer sun and were sitting down for dinner, I wanted to crawl under a rock and hide. Olivia and James had been running interference all day, taking the brunt of the hits and deflecting them away only for more to be thrown. We were exhausted. Then my mum just had to notice the pinking scar that reached out from under the many bracelets upon my arm.

"What is that? Are you so desperate to be a complete waste that you're harming yourself now too?" My heart practically fell out of my chest, Olivia gasping as she hit my dad in an a get her to stop motion but no one was paying attention, all eyes on the pink line. James reached out like he was going to push up apart the bracelets and I immediately ripped my arm away. They couldn't know of New York, not like this and certainly not right now. Not when panic was seizing in my chest and I felt like I was minutes away from passing out from the lack of oxygen; I couldn't cry if I held my breath.

"Ev," He whispered, eyes broken as he tried to reach for me.

"I can't do this right now." I practically yelled, shooting up out of my chair. I couldn't hear anything but the pumping of my heart, the feeling of my blood rushing to my cheeks. I had to get out of here, I couldn't let them see me like that.

Slamming the door to my bedroom, that had been converted to a guest room the moment I moved out, I slid down til my butt hit the floor. My tears fell the moment I hit the floor, shaking hands going to cover my mouth as I tried to keep from sobbing. I could hear my aunt whisper yelling at them, something about stepping over a line. Absentmindedly my hand reached for my phone before noticing the scar myself, and ripping my hand back.

I couldn't call Luke, he didn't need to deal with this days before going on vacation. He wasn't my boyfriend and even if he was, I wouldn't bother him with this. No, I could handle this like I had been for months, no years. I have to get through this, I have to know I'm strong enough.

The light knock on my door echoed throughout the quiet space around me, pulling me from my thoughts. I don't answer, knowing she'll let herself in anyway. I simply scoot over so she can get through. Her glowing green eyes met mine as she slipped through the door, a sympathetic smile on her face. She was petite with hair the same colour as mine, besides the light pink tips brushing her shoulder blades. She was pretty. Prettier than I could hope to be.

"I'm not going back out there, if that's why you're here." I sigh, glancing back out the window that led to the side garden by my house. That was always my quiet spot when I lived here, no one really went there so they could never interrupt me. I liked it like that, it was my escape.