Trust me, Kitty

Chapter 19

Kathryn

Shouting. Two figures in a dark room shouting at each other. My heart beating out of my chest as I held my breath and listened at the familiar voices.

"You can't force me to stay, Michael!"

"But your whole life is here! You can't leave all this behind!"

"My life is where I want it to be! You and Kathryn can't tie me down!"

"Jocelyn, please. We need you. Kathryn needs you! She needs a mom!"

"She'll be fine. It's not like she's the only child in the world who has to grow up without a mother!"

"But what about our wedding?"

"I don't want to get married to you, Michael! I don't want to commit my whole life to someone when I'm only twenty-one! I don't want to be stuck here with you and her for the rest of my life only because I made one mistake as a teenager!"

"Don't you love your child? Is Kathryn just a mistake to you?"

"What else would she be? We didn't plan on having a child, did we?"

"Jocelyn, please. Think about what you're doing!"

"Trust me, Michael, I have thought about it long and hard. There's nothing for me here! I want a new life and there's no place for you and Kathryn in it!"

The sound of footsteps across the floor and Dad's voice shouting Mom's name. Then the thud of a door being slammed shut.

I woke up in a cold sweat. I was tangled in my sheets and my heart was beating like I had just been running. It was still dark outside so I assumed there was plenty of time until morning. Untangling myself from the sheets, I took a few deep breaths trying to calm down.

It had been a while since the last nightmare which had made me forget what it felt like to wake up in the middle of the night feeling like I was three all over again. Ever since Mom left, that event had been a recurring subject in my nightmares. And every time it was exactly the same. The same feeling of fear and the same lines. I wasn't sure how accurate my nightmares were, but I had always assumed at least parts of them were true. And it made me feel horrible.

The last memory I had of my Mom was her shouting at Dad about how we didn't have a place in her life. And how she thought of me as a mistake. I was never meant to be born.

Sometimes I wished I hadn't been born. On nights like this it was normal. After waking up to this nightmare I usually didn't sleep for the rest of the night. Instead I lay awake in bed crying and staring at the ceiling while thinking about Mom, my life and sometimes deeper stuff my mind wandered to in the middle of all the confusion and sadness. One night a few years back I nearly had a panic attack as I started to think about what happens after death and it had been too much for my stressed and anxious brain.

I walked over to my window and opened it, letting the cool night air in. I took a deep breath as the cold air hit my face. Leaving the window open I crawled back under covers and hugged my stuffed panda. Mom's parents had bought it for me from a zoo's gift shop when I was little. Ever since it had been very important for me and I used it to comfort me whenever I needed comforting. Mom's parents were the only ones who had made me feel loved and cared for as a child and therefore a gift from them reminded me I was loved. The panda had also always been my comforter as when I hugged it, I felt less alone.

I rolled over to face the wall as my mind wandered back to the nightmare. The same questions as always started to pop into my mind. The same things I had been wondering ever since Mom left. And yet my mind still went back to them after each nightmare.