Moiety (Camren)

Prelude

Camila's POV

Dragging my penitent feet through the gates, I scroll through the menu of dispositions I have to use, deciding on my Stoney, blasé identity. I plug in my tunes, Elton John drowning out the murmurs of students. I look to my right and see students comically opening their mouths and closing them, like demented fish on dry land. I recognise a few but make no effort to contact them, like normal people do, I just keep walking, ignoring them. That's what the stone façade is for, ignoring people and acting distant, its better than engaging in such boring vanilla conversation that's slowly but surely fizzles my brainwaves away.

I find my friendship group and switch to a mildly happy face, greeting all my 'friends' with a broken smile, which is basically the only type I have at my disposal. As they continue their discussion of Pretty Little Liars, I put my virtual hood up and once again become invisible. My eyes flicker from speaker to speaker as they take turns putting their two cents in on a hardly entertaining show, now aired for seven years. I turn my music up slightly louder to drown out the bleak conversation that literally makes me lose faith in humanity. I found myself thinking, we can be more than this, we should be more than this. We should have something more important and meaningful to talk about than some goddamn teenage drama tv show. Their unstimulating conversation returns to fish-mouth movements once again.

The bell rings and we all gather our things, saying goodbye to each other like we won't be back for a thousand years when In reality it's like an hour. 

I carry myself like a defeated soldier, trudging to History class as if I was walking those last steps of a marathon, regretting having to unplug my earphones. I have been told is like I was born wearing them, now I actually have to sit through a class, free of a soundtrack to drown out the dreariness of life. 

I drag along the sidewalk, headphones turned up to a volume deafening to most people. I strain my neck, searching for my shadow. But it has gone AWOL, an unsubtle sign my soul has been rendered to a half. I now function with part of a heart, the other half pulsing in someone else's hands. This initiated the day my parents split, I woke to disarray, beads of sweat gathered on the crease of my forehead. Breathing felt like the most impossible task, but I didn't know then what had been taken from me. Taken by the greedy hands of my mum. Writhing and screaming in her arms was my shadow, a part of my pneuma, calling out after me as I was subdued by my father, earning a few slogs for my insolence.

I lodge that memory back into the darkest depths of my brain and latch onto another disturbing thought, the newfound monotony of humankind. 

How we find a hospice in the dullest topics. Any attempts to have a deep meaningful conversation with someone is met with foolery, them being too afraid to discuss real issues, they are ignorant of the past and present, outside of social media. Like worms underground never able to picture the vast sky just out of their reach, too preoccupied with their own universe pacified by the current of the mainstream. Or is it that their words get stuck in their throats and all that comes out is "omg, did you watch the bachelor last night!". Perhaps I'm right in that, all these years of social media and bland entertainment have left our brains like mashed potatoes and words spew out of us like gravy. We were lions once and now we're kittens, afraid of our own thoughts or opinions being shot down like a Bristol F.2 fighter.

The day drags on, like a child annoyingly clinging to your leg. The last period bell rings out and I am free to return my earphones to their rightful place as I break down my facade I had been holding up all day, to my usual one, which is a look almost catatonic, like a child who witnessed their house being blown up or has their father waiting at home belt in hand, ready to blame something on his disappointing daughter. With misplaced anger for his wife Sinuhe who abruptly left them, without a word, taking my sister Sofi with her.

Once i reach home i sprint up my staircase and into my room, diving into the safe haven of my bed.

I scramble around the sheets looking for my beats headphones, finally finding them and attaching them to my head where they belong, after about ten minutes of listening to music I fall asleep, tired from school and life in general.

I awake to bang coming from my door and an angry mumble audible through Asap Rocky's 'everyday' playing in my headphones. shit, I forgot, I locked my door.

I open my door to my dishevelled looking father, chest heaving and angry eyes trained on my scared ones, fists balled at his sides. his mouth opens and he's saying something to me but I forgot to take off my headphones.

"What", I ask moving my hands up to remove my headphones, but before they can his arm flies up and smacks them off my head, his fingers dragging through my hair as well and getting caught in it. I wince in pain as he sticks one fat finger in front of my face, between my eyes.

"What did I say about locked doors", his voice booms as his finger shakes with anger.

"Sorry Papa", I reply like a little mouse apologising to the cat about to eat it. He blows out a puff of breath out his mouth, along with some spit hitting me in the face.

"Sorry papa", he mocks in my pretend voice, which doesn't sound like me at all.

"dinner's ready you sorry bitch", he spits out. turning his back and leaving down the corridor.

I've learned to ignore the insults he says to me, he doesn't mean them, or well I hope he doesn't.

Dinner is as silent as it usually is, my father Alejandro sitting in his armchair watching t.v with his microwave dinner, while I sit on the ground against the wall the opposite his chair and read my book, which is currently 'To Kill a Mockingbird', one of my favourites.

My t.v dinner consisting of microwaved corn and grey looking meat sits next to me, untouched.

I gather my fathers empty food container and mine careful to not let him see I hadn't eaten any, and dispose of them in the trash. I run back upstairs to my room and fall down to my stomach, looking through the stacks of books I have stashed under my bed, some of the library books. Definitely overdue, oops.

I pull a book titled 'The chaos of stars' from a pile and a piece of paper falls out of it landing face down. I pick it up but can't make out the figures in the photo, which I'm sure it is.

I turn the lamp on the side of my bed on and stare down at the photo paper I have in my hand, the air instantly knocked out of me once my brain registered what it had displayed on it.

A/N  hey, this is my first story I've ever published, so please go easy on me, or don't, it's up to you. I originally wrote this for a school project but decided to transform it into this wonderful thing, also I'm from Australia so excuse the weird language you might find throughout, like for example mum, instead of mom. I thought I would change it to mom but i'm sure i'd just forget to...so I didn't bother.

Anyway, i hope you enjoyed it!

:) - Emily