9 years ago
It had been nearly nine years since the Harper family's world got completely turned upside down. Nine years of Brinna Harper finding her way through a world that was never meant for her.
Mikey and Coco had been together since high school, and you would swear the world had never seen such a beautiful couple. The star baseball player and lead flutist were inseparable, practically bound by the hip. Everyone knew of them, and everyone knew they were sneaking off to be with each other in the night.
They were young parents, having accidentally gotten pregnant with their first child at the ages of 18 and 19. Their parents were all completely against the couple having a child. They hadn't even made it out of high school, after all. Word travels fast in a small town and soon enough the cute comments turned into hateful, ugly gossip.
No obstacle or cruel comment stopped the pair from loving each other deeper than the sea. They tuned out all of the negativity around them, being completely blinded by the baby growing quickly in Colette's stomach.
The two of them worked opposite shifts for the first few years of Brinna's life, making sure that her Christmases were always magical and her table never ran empty of delicious meals. She was dressed in the finest clothes while the two of them wore older, tattered-up articles. They never minded it, as long as she had the world in her hands, they were happy.
Mom and Dad were tired, but they were so madly in love that nothing was going to get in the way of them and their little family. It took a lot of late nights and time away from his family, but Michael ended up scoring an incredible job opportunity which meant the three of them would be moving to a new state.
They were so excited, Colette had always dreamed of being a stay-at-home mom to Brinna, and Michael made it happen for her. He loved how his chest swelled with pride at the sight of his beautiful wife and fast-growing daughter. He would move mountains for his girls. He had proven his parents wrong and provided them with a beautiful life.
Everything was finally good, money troubles were long gone and the family started to feel secure in the world, like every sacrifice had finally paid off. The pair loved to spoil Brinna with trips and toys, and when Colette presented the positive pregnancy test to her husband and daughter, they couldn't be happier to bring one more child into the mix.
They had so much happiness to offer that there was no doubt or deliberation about the newest family member.
Michael's thrill only enlarged when the days neared the birth of his son, Dallie Harper. It had been 14 years since the birth of their first child. He loved Brinna, but he always dreamt of having a son to keep the bloodline going.
He loved to take care of his girls. He made sure Brinna had the best teachers for whatever new hobby she embarked on and he made sure his very pregnant wife had a warm bath waiting for her every single night.
He wanted them to always be able to relax, never having to lift a finger. The hands-on dirty work of the real world was no place for manicured hands and pink dresses.
The Harper's had it all: a growing family, a brand new home, and a healthy marriage. They did it all together, blossoming from the love they had for each other, despite no one believing in them. They were picture-perfect and unstoppable.
The night their final missing piece was supposed to come into this world was going to be magical. Michael spared no expense to make sure Colette had everything she dreamed of when it came to taking care of a newborn, this being the first time they had money to blow. They had everything set up for his arrival and all that was left to do was for Colette to gift Michael his son.
But Dallie never took his first breath.
Colette had gone into labor just as she did with Brinna. Michael was quick to bring the car around and kiss Brinna goodbye, promising to come back with her new sibling. The entire neighborhood was buzzing with anticipation, they had been so fortunate to befriend so many people and build their own type of family.
Nothing had been wrong with Colette's pregnancy. In fact, it was almost boring with how easy it was. She had been very lucky to have two perfect pregnancies. Her favorite part was nearing, and she was glowing with excitement. It had been so long since they held their own baby, it was going to be unforgettable.
Her water broke on the way into the hospital doors and Michael demanded that the nurses take care of his wife and child. Although he had been intimidating to everyone else in the room, his arm never unwrapped from Colette and his hand never stopped rubbing her contracting stomach. He made sure they had the best team for the love of his life.
The pair were quickly ushered into a birthing suite. Colette dressed herself in the usual gown with the help of her husband and she was instructed to lay back on the bed so they could hook her up and monitor how Dallie reacted to her laboring.
Little did they know, he was already gone in his mother's womb.
The nurse kept a straight face as she tried to find a heartbeat and Colette's contractions were coming on stronger now. She writhed and moaned in pain atop the sterile bed, sounding like a feral animal. The pain was almost unbearable at this point, but she knew that meant she was close.
Her doctor soon came into the room to aid the nurse in her exploration of the baby's vitals. Colette begged the doctor to give her pain relief but when he checked her progress, it was time to push. There was no more time to waste trying to hook her up when the baby's dark hair was apparent now.
She held onto Michael's hand so hard he thought it might break, but seeing her in that amount of pain meant he'd do anything to ease her discomfort. She sobbed out a pained cry, telling him that she couldn't do it and that she was scared. His soft eyes were filled with nothing but love and adoration.
He kissed her forehead and ran his hand through her hair. It's me and you, Coco. I'm right here. I won't leave your side. You're a strong woman, Colette. You're about to change the world. I love you more than life itself. Let's do this, baby, you're going to complete our family.
He coached her but his words were cut short by a blood-curdling scream. The doctor was between Colette's legs, guiding her through her pushing. Michael kept his eyes where his son was slowly emerging from, a smile full of nerves and excitement plastered on his face.
Most men would look away, but he was so fascinated by the beauty of what a woman's body could do. He was so proud of his wife for being so strong that he was glowing.
Nurses were gathering blankets and suction for the life ready to come Earth-side. The baby's cot was brought over, and a tiny diaper and hat were laid out waiting to be filled. A card sat proudly on the back of the cot, displaying the baby's name written in Michael's handwriting. One final push and he was here.
The room fell silent and all of the air turned cold. No nurse rushed to wrap the baby or clear his lungs. Excitement turned to sorrow. There was no cry. No noise to alert the world that a new soul had entered.
Dallie was born still.
His lifeless little body was gray and his chest was unmoving. The world at that moment stopped. What's wrong with him? Why isn't he crying? Colette's shrill voice was the only sound Michael could hear. Her sobs filled his chest with a feeling he hadn't experienced in a long time: desperation. Everything slowed and he couldn't look away from his son.
His once healthy, alive son. He felt him kick just last night. He talked to him every chance he got, telling baby Dallie about his big sister and the room he painted just for him. He even bought matching baseball jerseys for the two of them to wear together. He had so many plans for his son. He had so much love to give him.
Why weren't they helping his son? Why wasn't he moving? Why aren't they wrapping him up? He's going to get cold. He needs to eat soon. Was his sister so quiet too?
Tears pricked Michael's eyes and the entire world crumbled beneath him. Earth-shattering screams brought him back to reality. The nurses were trying to calm Colette down but Michael couldn't move. His limbs were completely frozen. He hadn't even noticed when he stopped holding his wife.
His son was dead. They wouldn't be leaving the hospital with a baby. Their family won't ever be complete.
Michael felt sick to his stomach. His ears rang and his hands were clammy. Was he having a heart attack? Was his heart actually shredding itself to pieces at the chaos in front of him? Was this a cruel joke? Did his lungs forget how to breathe?
He looked to his wife who was now being held down by two nurses, a sedative slowly pushing into her arm. Her movements halted and her face relaxed but the tears didn't stop pouring out of her eyes. She looked soulless. She was so pale and clammy, nothing like the beautiful woman who walked into this room.
Michael was suddenly aware of everything in the room. The white lights illuminated the blood underneath Colette and the smell made his stomach turn. He had seen plenty of blood in his life but none had ever felt so fatal. There was so much of it, he thought she was going to leave him too.
A nurse was behind him now, pushing him down by the shoulders to sit in a chair. He didn't even see her behind him before she touched him. He saw mouths moving but no sound came out. The baby was wrapped up now. Is he fine? Did everything get fixed?
Michael? He heard a soft male voice. Mikey, can you look at me? A light was shining in his eyes. Michael's body was working faster than his brain now. He stood up from the chair, the old wood falling back and clattering to the floor. His feet carried him to the hallway in search of an exit.
The floors were so white. The walls were so white. The bright lights were so fucking white. Did he die too? Is this heaven? It feels like hell.
Cold air smacked his face and he was now knelt over the sidewalk in front of the hospital, emptying the contents of his stomach. His throat burned from the intensity and he couldn't catch his breath. The vomit kept coming until he was practically choking on it.
His vision was spotty when he finally stopped throwing up. He sat back on his shins and screamed into the night sky, cursing the heavens for stealing his son away from him. Why Dallie? Why would an innocent baby be taken away from his family?
The next two days were spent in complete silence. Colette had been bed-bound by endless monitors and IV ports and she hadn't said a single word. Not that Michael had been trying to make conversation, either. No words needed to be said between them. They had always felt a soul connection, so right now they just needed to be together.
He sat in the corner of her recovery room with his head between his hands. The tears had stopped but his mind seemed to be going faster than it ever had been before. His wife was refusing to eat and stayed curled up on her side, going between complete silence and loud sobs that crushed him more than he already had been.
He didn't know how to fix this. No amount of money could make this better. No amount of pleading could bring Dallie back to them. How had this gone so wrong? How do you move on from heartbreak like this?
The Harper family had completely crashed within 72 hours and it felt like a billion lifetimes of heartache at once.
The mourning couple left the hospital babyless and traumatized. Colette still hadn't said anything and Michael was now in the anger stage of his grief. He didn't understand how a healthy baby died so suddenly and he blamed his wife. He tried to make sense of it, but nothing made him feel better.
She must have done something wrong. He gave her the world and she took his away. He hated her at that moment. He couldn't even look at her. He didn't feel any compassion for the woman who took away his only son. How could she fail him so miserably?
The street was no longer buzzing with excitement. It was dreary and the air felt empty. Birds didn't sing and the sun had gone away behind clouds of sorrow. Home felt like a punishment.
He parked the car in front of their house and got out without making sure Colette was behind him. A neighbor rushed to the car and helped her walk along the gravel and into the house. She was still recovering from the birth and blood loss and hadn't been up walking in days.
Many of Colette's friends were waiting at the home upon their arrival. Brinna was being held close to one of the older ladies, Maria. Her mother's sobs soon filled the echoing corridor and it was a sound that would haunt her forever. The ladies tried to explain to Brinna what had happened, but no one was brave enough to say the words.
Michael walked past each and every pair of wandering eyes without so much as a glance towards them. He reached the top of his grand stairs and disappeared into his office without a single word. He needed to grieve alone. No amount of love could help him right now.
Colette had spent her every moment in Dallie's nursery. She sat in the rocking chair that had been passed down to her and stared out of the window. An older woman had brought her a baby doll in hopes it would bring her some comfort, saying how it helped some of her dementia patients feel grounded.
Michael tried to take care of his sweet Coco the best he could, but the guilt of blaming her for something so awful was eating away at him. He was a logical man, and none of this made sense, so he didn't know what to do for his wife or daughter. He was getting hopeless that his family would never be fixed.
Colette was put on an abundance of medications, including painkillers after Michael had found her cut up and covered in blood, pictures of Dallie in her belly scattered all over the nursery. She tore the place completely to shreds, angry and in pain. She truly felt animalistic, a piece of her soul was forever lost and her grief wasn't getting any better.
There is no pain like a mother losing her young. She gave her entire body to grow a healthy baby and her hard work was greeted with every mother's worst nightmare. Her soul left with Dallie's that day. She didn't want it back. She wanted to be with him. She didn't care about the life she had on Earth, this was no place for her anymore.
Young Brinna spent a lot of time having sleepovers with the neighbor kids. Her dad worked a lot more hours, trying to occupy himself in any way he could. There were no more expensive holidays, no more hot meals on the table, no more playing catch in the yard. No one noticed Brinna's absence because they were too caught up in the child they never brought home.
Colette got hooked on her pills. She was taking so many that she slept pretty much all day, every single day. That mixed with the alcohol, she turned into a raging monster, screaming and fighting with Michael every chance she got.
He would try his hardest to calm her down, telling her that he loved her and they could get her help. He wanted his wife back, he needed Colette. It had always been them against the world, but now they were against each other.
She blamed him for leaving her when she needed him the most, and he argued back that someone had to keep their family afloat. Their hurt over the mutual loss turned into petty disputes.
They had forgotten about Brinna weeks ago, she stayed around other kids because the fighting made her anxiety spike and she didn't like the way panic attacks made her feel. She never had them before she experienced the pain of losing a whole family in one shot.
She missed her parents. She missed her mom's hugs and her dad's smile. No one smiled anymore. She felt guilty for being alive, and she didn't understand why it felt like they were angry at her for being the one to survive.
That's all she did now, survive. She wished she could trade places with Dallie so her parents would love each other again. She hadn't been told I love you since the night they left for the hospital.
The arguing soon turned into full-on fighting, Michael trying to force Colette off of him until eventually, he hit her back. She would beg him to hit her, to make her feel something again.
She screamed that it was the only way he would touch her anymore, and even though Brinna didn't entirely understand what that meant, she did notice the times Michael came home with lipstick stains on his shirt.
This became a nightly occurrence, the two of them arguing, and then beating each other, and then drunkenly crying together. Their love burned so hot but eventually, even the brightest stars combust. They were definitely wilting away.
He started drinking too, and that made it very hard to focus on his work. He didn't have the same drive he once did. He didn't care about his family like he did when Dallie was a promise and not an open wound.
Brinna locked herself away, only dealing with the aftermath. The nights she couldn't find somewhere to stay were the worst. She couldn't focus in class because the hunger mixed with the anxiety made her unbelievably nauseous.
She usually made dinner for herself late at night after the both of them passed out. Sometimes she would be lucky enough to find scraps of takeout her parents ordered. She put out cigarettes that were lit in ashtrays and she threw away the glass beer bottles so her parents wouldn't try to stab each other again.
She tried to clean the best she could, but no one ever showed her how to wash her clothes properly or which setting the dishwasher needed to be on.
The house was disgusting despite her efforts, it began to gather dust and ash. The air was always grimy with tobacco smoke and sometimes Brinna would step on broken glass after a bad fight. She didn't know how to get the pee stains out of the carpet after her dad got so drunk he would urinate on the floor.
Michael lost his job when he showed up to work plastered, having only been wearing one shoe and dress pants. They lost everything when they lost Dallie, including the passion they had for Brinna. The house was foreclosed on, forcing them to move back home where they were shunned and ridiculed with a plethora of I-told-you-so's.
Brinna was the only sober one in the house. They could barely afford to put food on the table, much less take care of her when they were out buying more pills and alcohol than you'd need in a lifetime. Not a day went by that the house was quiet, not until Colette and Michael finally consumed enough poison to knock them out for a few hours.
But the drugs weren't enough, soon those highs didn't feel good and the couple found a new hobby to share, something that brought them back together. It made them feel so good that they started calling each other Coco and Mikey again like they did when they were kids.
They helped each other tie bands around their arms. They always shared the needle when they did it, and even passed a cigarette between their lips. One held the lighter and the other held the spoon. They loved to shoot up anything they could get their hands on. They almost seemed as in love with the drug as they once were with each other.
Brinna had resorted to stealing money from her parents to pay bills and buy food. She was entirely on her own, and her addict parents were too far gone to be saved. She knew if she told anyone she would be taken away, and even though the yelling scared her, she loved her parents and she didn't want them to be alone.
She was scared they might overdose, and she wouldn't be able to live with herself if she wasn't there to save them.
She started showing up to school dirty after the water got cut off. She lost a noticeable amount of weight from food spoiling or being too bug-infested to eat. She was ashamed of her life which meant she had no friends to turn to. No one wanted to associate with the dirty daughter of two heroin addicts. No one knew just how bad she had it, but bullies don't care about things like that anyway.
When she was finally old enough, she got a job and worked as much as she could to pay bills. Her father didn't like the fact that his own child was showing him up, and eventually, Michael lashed out when she refused to give him drug money.
He beat Brinna until her face was swollen and bruised. He took every cent she had hidden away for her future and left her crying on the floor of her bedroom. That day shattered her. She was completely, entirely drained.
Brinna left the day she turned 18. She found a roommate and applied for community college. It wasn't much, but it was better than falling into the hole her parents had dug. She lost countless hours of sleep and had many breakdowns between the bus ride from her work to her school.
She nearly gave up when she started getting invited to her roommate's parties, but the voice in the back of her head guilt-tripped her until it was a constant shout of anxiety, screaming at her to not fuck it up. Do better. Behave. Don't turn out like your parents.
She had so much to prove, she was more than her addict parents, more than the dirty kid that skipped school so she could work, and more than all the bullshit the world threw at her. She didn't want to be pushed around and used anymore. She wanted security and simplicity. She knew she wouldn't find that with her family, so she cut off all contact with them.
It hurt her soul for a long time. She didn't want it to be like this, but the longer she held on, the more they dragged her down. She moved as far away as she could in search of job opportunities, hoping her parents wouldn't be able to find her.
She never stopped loving them but loving them hurt. She couldn't stand to watch them kill themselves instead of trying to get clean for the child they still had.
She never got over the feelings of abandonment her parents instilled in her after her brother died. She hides it well, but she feels expendable. She couldn't let herself rely on anyone else, she didn't even want the responsibility of a pet because that would probably run away from her, too. If her parents couldn't love her, how could anyone else? They chose drugs over her, they chose each other over her.
I guess that's the worst part of it all. They left her for each other. Their love knew no bounds and that included forgetting about their daughter. She was a side quest on their journey, a distant memory replaced by a dirty syringe and an addicting high.
She landed a job in a city full of scum like her parents, but that only determined her more. She saw what happens when you give in to temptation and she wasn't going to let herself indulge. She knew her addictive personality would get her in trouble if she let it.
As sad as it is, her work ended up being the same cycle as her parents. Brinna was once again taking care of her own bully, scampering around to fulfill their needs before her own. She had toughened up from her own parents, but it hurt a piece of her that she had worked so hard to bury.
She turned cold, only letting a few people in and shutting the rest of the world out. She liked her little bubble. She liked not having to worry about the things she was missing, but rather filling her small world with trinkets and art that fixed a piece of her broken childhood. She thrived on consistency and there's only one person you can truly rely on for that: yourself.
Easy was good. Simple was good. She pushed down all of her hurt feelings with a good-girl grin plastered on her face and thrived in that environment for a long time.
That is until she French kissed the devil and tasted the sweet release of alcohol-induced ecstasy. Brinna broke all of her own promises and she really liked it. She loved it.
It scared her to know what it felt like to have fun, but it was even worse when she found herself craving more.
There's no going back once you sign away your soul.
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