My Mother's Secret

My mother was always there for me, no matter what the circumstances were, whether that was when I was sick, in love, heart broken or just in pain. Unlike my father who was never there for me while growing up, my mother never told me what happened to him or where he went. I just assumed she didn't know either and he just left without telling anyone, but little did I know my mother was hiding a big secret from me and that secret was going to change my life forever.

I was only about 2 years old when my father left the house, we never had any sort of contact with him since then. We live on the end of Pearl Street, in which my dog named Skittles loved to run around barking and playing with the younger kids who lived near us. We've been living here for a long time now since I was only a baby. I was all grown up now and was 19, still living with mother who I dearly care about and will help her in any way possible. My mother and most of my friends would call me Ollie since my name Olive, and over the years I've noticed that my mother has changed a lot over the years but not in a good way. She's got a lot more curious and cautious of what I do around the house. Normally she would let me freely walk around the house and not watch me. I never really knew why she did that. Surely she wasn't hiding anything from me to make her act like this. I always wondered why she acted like this, she never told me why though and kept it to herself.

My dog Skittles was a very curious and hyperactive, he never seemed to calm down or take a break. However, I did notice that in our garden he always seemed to go to the same spot, which was on the side of our house, and tried to get underneath. Of course I had to stop him from doing that, otherwise he would dig up the garden that was along the house. One day my mum went out into town, so I took my chance to look around the house and see if I could find anything misplaced or unusual. At first I didn't see anything that was out of the ordinary, everything seemed to be normal. Until I felt one of our floorboards loose, so of course I checked it out. I pulled up the floorboard and there laid a machete, under the floorboard with a picture next to it. The photo was slightly faded, with the top of it ripped off. I checked again in the space but there was no sign of the other bit of the photo. From what I could see in the photo someone was laying on the ground with slash marks over his chest and a pool of blood surrounding him. The sight of that horrified me when I looked closer at the picture and in the corner of that photo was my mother's signature.

The fact that my mother would do such a thing put me into shock and made me wonder, how a sweet, caring mother would do that. My perspective on her changed from being a caring mother to a murderer. I also started to get worried, what if she finds out that I know about this? Will she kill me as well? How many other people has she killed?

I had packed everything up and called the police, my mother still hadn't got back from town yet, so I thought this would be my best chance of doing that. Once I had got off the phone with them, I went outside and over to where Skittles always tried to dig. I was digging when I saw some sort of box, it looked quite small, but I still dug it up and put it next to me. I examined the box, then opened it slowly. Within the box was a few belongings and photos of my father. There were glasses, a watch, a wallet with nothing in it, a small chain he use to wear around his wrist and the rest were photos. When I picked up the photos, they were covered with dirt and were old. Once I looked through the photos I realised these used to be in the house when I was younger and now there were no photos of him in the house, only myself and mother.

The police had arrived, mother still hadn't arrived back from town. This got me concerned, she was never out for this long unless I was with her. Did something happen to her? Can she track my calls? Does she know the police are here?

By the end of it all, they had found a secondary weapon in my mother's closet with another half of a photo. They put the two-photo half's together and they matched. The photo was of my father, he was the person laying on the ground with slash marks on him. They had also found human bones in the garden where Skittles use to dig. Turns out they were my father's bones, my mother had buried him in the garden where she thought no one could find them, but Skittles did. My mother never returned home from that day when I called the police. Turns out she had tracked who I called and left the city, away from home...away from me.

It's been 8 years since I saw my mother, everything is peaceful and gone back to normal, but sometimes I wonder where she could be. Is she still alive? Does she still live in the state? Or has she moved? Does she know where I live? Sometimes I try and forget about her, she's not a part of my life anymore, but in some way, she still is. She's still my mother, we're still blood, but I'll never be able to forgive her after what she did. I've moved on though, living my own life, with my own rules and of course Skittles. Skittles was a real-life saver; I would have never known unless he was there and dug up the garden. I'll always remember that.

It's been a long 8 years since I last saw my daughter, she nearly got me caught for her father's death. How could she, she's going to have to pay the consequences for that day. I've been tracking her movements since I left her, all alone without me, so I know where she is, though she think's I don't. It's been too long since I was last visited this area, not too much has changed over the past few of years. I've arrived at her house, pistol loaded, ready for her. I see she's home, car parked in the drive-way. Getting out of the car and walking to the front door, I look around to see if there's anyone around to witness the event that's about to happen.

Walking to the front door, "knock knock"