Athazagoraphobia

Ignored: Ava Mills

"No one hears me anymore and I'm afraid that I'm going to be ignored forever," she held back her screams, but burying her emotions only made her feel worse.

She laid her head on the mound of dirt, underneath which her father slept, without caring that there were insects, worms, and other tiny animals rolling around in there with him.

"Daddy, please come back. Make a deal with God or do something. I can't take this anymore," she said with the naivety of a child.

She was quiet for a few minutes; her throat had clogged up and choked on tears, heart ache, and unhealed wounds.

"I'm going insane. I just know it Daddy. There's something wrong with my head, but Mom doesn't care anymore."

She caressed the mound of dirt.

"She threw away all of your pictures, but I hid one. Remember the one we took with just the two of us at the beach," she waited for an answer, one that never came and never will, "I stored it underneath my mattress."

The wind howled around her, but it no longer terrified her. She was with her father and she knew that there was no other safer place for her to be because he would protect her. At least that's what he promised.

"She brings home crazy men Dad but we both know that they will never be like you."

Her clothes were drenched, hanging on her skin, and they were weighing her down, but the load that she carried on her shoulder each and every day was heavier.

"All those men ignore me too. I yell at them and tell them to leave, but they look past me as if I'm a ghost. They don't care about me daddy and they never will as long as Mom continues to act like this."

She closed her eyes. Her body shook as she cried out, in pain, in misery, and even though she poured her heart out, she still felt her soul weighing her down.

"No one loves me daddy."

With those words, she broke down again. She was hysterical, borderline insane, and she thanked heaven that there was no one around to see her. For the first time in that year, she felt happy that she was constantly ignored because at least she had the time to break down. She just hoped that when she ran out of tears, she'd be able to put herself back together. After all, it was easier to destroy something than to fix it.

Ava looked at her father's tombstone. At least someone had the decency to write him an epitaph, she thought, because given her mother's and her mental state at the time, Ava didn't think she would've been able to write down beautiful words in the memory of her father.

"Here lies Jonathan Mills. 1965 - 2015. A loving father, a generous man, and a doting son, watches his family from the skies and smiles."

Her father was loving, he spared no expense for Ava and showered her in fatherly love while he was alive, and he had been a generous man. Ava vividly remembered the days and nights her father had spent, cooped up in his study, sewing clothes for the homeless and the needy. As far as Ava could recall, she had only seen love in his eyes for his mother and each time her grandmother became sick, he had been her shoulder. Perhaps, that is why it was so hard for Ava to believe that her father could've committed the heinous crime.

Having no one besides her to calm her, to pacify her, she leaned forward and hugged her father's tombstone. The headstone was rough, cold, and wet but she didn't care. To her, it was the only tangible object left for her to touch.

Ava stayed in that position, hugging a slab of inscribed stone, for a long time before the chill in the air began to numb her limbs. She moved back and rubbed her hands together, creating friction which provided temporary heat, but she stopped and sat still when her hands became tainted red.