My Golden Life

Chapter 4

Six years passed, and everything was bliss—just me, mum, and Daniel. I was growing into a more robust and happier person with no one to pull me down. School was going great too. One of my teachers even told me that if I kept up the excellent work, and my grades stayed high that I could have a bright future. That was all I longed for. Where I could put the past behind me with no worry. We were all happy and had no problems coming our way. That is until mum started to get sick. 

At first, it was just a simple cold, but then it started to get worse. Much worse. She grew pretty weak; it got so bad that she wasn't able to do the housework, anyone. I noticed that she was starting to sweat profusely and have dizzy spells that lasted several minutes. I knew then that something serious was wrong with her. I didn't want to believe it was anything too bad. I kept telling myself that she was going to be ok and that it was just some kind of flu.

Sadly that was the case.

Mum had contracted this weird bug that was affecting her immune system; none of the doctors knew how or why she had it. I felt that it was because of me, that was the world's way of punishing me for my past behaviour. I paid my debt, so why was this happening to me? The doctors told us that she had to spend most days resting, which meant that no one would be able to properly look after Daniel and me. 

As much as I protested, mum argued that there was no way that I could look after things around the house, go to school and look after Daniel who was now ten at the time. She said it wouldn't be fair or morally right. So she had written a letter to someone who would come and help us out. Needless to say, when she told me who it was, I was livid. Of all the people she could have asked, why in the world would she pick him?

That's right, she had written to my dad. After six years of no communication with each other whatsoever, she turned to him as her only option. Why would she go to him after all that he had done to our family? To me? As much as I hated her decision, I wasn't going to argue with her over it.  I had no choice. Daniel wasn't at all happy with this either.

"I don't see how having him back here will make things better," He said to me as we sat on the hill beside our house. "He sure as hell doesn't care about us."

"Language, Daniel!" I said sternly.

"Sorry, " sighed Daniel. "It's just... him coming back after all these years makes my blood boil."

"He won't be pleased to see me. After all, it's my fault that he got kicked out."

Daniel turned to me, shaking his head. "No, it's not Katie, he got himself kicked out when he forced you to become a thief."

"And made me into a fairytale character," I added. "I heard from someone that there are now stories about how I went into the three bears house."

Daniel looked at me for a brief moment before looking back out to look at the view in front of him. "Yea, I heard about that. Goldilocks and the Three Bears is what they're calling it."

I sighed to myself, not wanting to be bothered by any more nonsense about my Goldilocks status or the pending arrival of my dad. At that moment in time, I was just enjoying the peace before the storm arrived back into my life. What I didn't know was that his return would bring misery and pain, but he also came with adventure. An adventure that would force itself onto me and change my life forever.