Eyes Closed

Two

My head collides against the vehicle door with a thud, jolting me awake from my nightmare.

Groggy, I hurriedly sit up and look around, expecting to find my mother standing over me with a bloody knife clenched in her fingers. My hand automatically moves to my thigh, but there's no blood. Not anymore. Only the raised scars beneath my jeans.

As I wake up fully, I take in my surroundings and realize I'm in the backseat of a car. Not the kitchen. Voices from the front of the vehicle carry back to me, keeping me cautious and making my muscles tense up. I silently reach for the door handle, ready for a quick exit.

"Edgar Allen Marley," my grandmother scolds. "You took that turn with no blinker." A slender hand appears from the passenger seat in front of me to swat at my grandfather.

He sputters out a laugh as she lightly smacks his shoulder. "I did not!"

My muscles immediately relax, and I sink back into the seat to watch this exchange play out between my grandparents.

"I might be getting older, but I'm certainly not deaf," my grandma tells him. "I'll have you know, I've still got the ears of a fox."

"You scream like one too." My grandpa mutters the words so quietly that his wife doesn't hear him, but I do. So much for those granny fox ears. In the rearview mirror, my grandfather's green eyes meet mine. He winks at me with a wide grin, and the corner of my mouth tilts up in a smirk.

It's been five months since I moved in with my Nan and Pop, though it took less than a week to realize just how much they like to mess with each other. I admit, their playfulness wasn't what I expected, but now it's one of the things I love most about them. Their teasing managed to pull me from the perpetual raincloud that had overtaken my life the moment my father passed. Still, the first few days I lived with them was far from easy.

After escaping the abuse that had been my reality for years, I refused to get close or feel any sense of attachment. I kept waiting for the day they'd decide they didn't want me after all. And when I wasn't worrying about that, I was terrified that my mom would show up in the middle of the night to drag me away.

Even hundreds of miles away from her last known location, I still refused to believe that I might finally be free. It didn't help that my grandparents never fully understood what I went through. Not that I ever gave them the chance. I just shut the world out like I always did, pretending I was somewhere else. Someplace safe. It was what kept me alive for all those years with my mom, and it didn't matter that for the first time in a long time, I actually was safe.

Sure, my Nan and Pop did their best to make me as comfortable as possible, but even that stressed me out. Just knowing how hard they were trying left me anxious and confused, and my mind kept reminding me of the past five years. I tried to drown it out, but it refused to shut up. I'm the reason my grandparents lives were flipped upside down. And that guilt led me to ask myself question after question, leaving me doubting everything.

I used to sit alone in the bedroom they gave me for hours at a time, wondering if my grandparents were somehow tricking me.

How long until they stop playing nice? When will they decide I'm not worth it? If my mom shows up, will they hand me over to her? Do they regret bringing me here?

Those questions kept me up at night. And on the rare occasion that I did manage to fall asleep, my nightmares left me screaming myself awake.

To be fair, I had just survived a nightmare that was all too real with my mother. And before my wounds were fully healed, I was forced to move across the country to an unfamiliar place. Add in the fact that I hadn't seen or spoken with my grandparents in five years, and I felt like I was stuck in a house full of strangers. So, I kept my distance and watched them, waiting for a sign that they were going to pass me off to foster care.