𝗣𝗥𝗢𝗠 𝗤𝗨𝗘𝗘𝗡, 𝙅. 𝙈𝙖𝙮𝙗𝙖𝙣𝙠.

𝟬𝟬𝟱 carried by the current

There was also a lot of dishonesty.

See, it was no secret that her parents' relationship lacked honesty. With the lack of communication in their marriage, cheating was bound to happen at some point, and that it did...multiple times, actually. It had gotten to the point where Annabelle didn't have a sufficient amount of fingers to count the faces that ever so casually strolled in and out of her home every few months (disgusting, right?). I mean, you'd think that the Monroe's would, at the very least, have the decency to book some hotel room and arrange their not-so-secret affairs to take place there, but no, that was far too much work apparently. Instead, they dragged their dirty little 'secrets' through the front doors of the Monroe Estate, staining the floorboards with these cowardly acts. It wasn't like the mansion provided any sort of comfort, but still, it was wrong in so many ways.

In all the years that Annabelle had spent alive, she had very few good memories that she reminisced about whenever she was feeling down. None of those memories involved her mother, but her father...he wasn't equally as bad as Sandra Monroe. Now, don't get it twisted, he didn't exactly have any of the qualities required to be a qualified father of the year, but he had his moments. Rarely, but he could be a decent guy whenever he wanted to take on the role of a father, instead of the classist multi-millionaire that everyone knew him as.

Even though Sebastian had hardly been present in Annabelle's life when she was growing up, due to the fact that he was still in the process of completing his residency at the time, he would still make the times they spent worth remembering. She was convinced that if he, and only he, had raised her, he might've actually developed a relationship with his youngest child, or any of his two children for that matter.

The thing about Sebastian Monroe was that despite him being absent for most of Annabelle's life, he still treated her like a daughter whereas Sandra went through great measures to ensure that the youngest child of the Monroe Clan endured this never-ending pain that would stay with the girl for a lifetime, which left the idea of never being good enough engraved in Annabelle's mind, playing in an endless loop that would surely drive her mad at some period in her life. The sixteen-year-old had never understood why her mother resented her to such a great extent. She'd absolutely demolished most of the humility that her body obtained and even then, it wasn't enough for her to be painted as that picture-perfect daughter.

And, boy, did it fucking suck.

"This is cute. Where'd you get it?" Genevieve suddenly spoke up, stepping out from the walk-in closet with a pink, backless top that hardly covered up anything.

With her entire world quite literally flipped upside down due to the fact that her body was hanging from the queen-sized bed, Annabelle raised her eyebrows. She couldn't exactly tell what clothing item her friend was holding up, so she quickly pulled her body upwards, squirming at the sudden blood flow that seeped from her head and into the rest of her body. Her head immediately began pounding at the sudden motion, but she tried to shake it off, parting her lips to speak. "Uh, Zara?" She took a wild guess, not knowing where she'd purchased half of the clothing items that were lying around in her ginormous closet. Buying clothes was an obsession of hers and the emotional attachment that she'd managed to develop towards certain pieces didn't make it any easier. "It's all yours . . . if you want it." She made sure to add, not at all caring whose hands that shirt landed in next. It wasn't her style anyway.

Grinning widely, Genevieve gave her a grateful look, already beginning to picture all the outfits she could make with that single top. "Cool. Thanks."