Cordelia didn't feel sad. She had a wonderful girlfriend who was loving and caring as she could and understood what she had been through, and that was enough for the headmistress. But when her mother slapped her she felt empty. Her mother's words had stopped upsetting her long ago. She knew Fiona had never loved her, and if she did she hadn't showed it. Cordelia had always been taken care of by other persons – her old nanny, the maid of the academy or Aunt Myrtle – and though she had always seen the redhead as a motherly figure and loved her with all her heart, it had never been enough to compensate the fact that she had been alone, abused and humiliated for years.
"You can't help me," Fiona yelled, infuriated. And though Cordelia had been yelled at by the woman for years, she had never seen her mother act like that, except for one time many years ago. "You can't help anyone. You're worthless." Cordelia couldn't stand it anymore. She wanted to go to her bedroom, pack her stuff and run away with Misty, who was waiting for her in the living room. She covered the pink mark of her cheek with her hand, her eyes burning from containing her tears. "Hopeless." and that was the word that made Cordelia explode.
"Don't you dare to touch me ever again!" she yelled, standing up furiously and walking to the woman. "I am not worthless, I am not hopeless! I am not a child anymore, mother! You can't abuse me, and you can't ignore me either!"
"I have never abused you, imbecile!"
"Oh, yes you have!" Cordelia felt the rage run through her body. She had felt weak for years, unconsciously stopping herself from killing her own mother, but she had had enough. She didn't know how, but she was making the woman levitate in the middle of the kitchen. Fiona, astonished by her daughter's reaction, didn't do anything to escape. "You have insulted me and humiliated me every time you could. Any little mistake that I did was a punishment from you." Cordelia stated.
"Be careful, little girl, I've only slapped you twice in my life, and I won't doubt to do it again!" the woman yelled. Cordelia sent her flying across the room, the Supreme hitting the wall hardly and falling to the floor. Cordelia knew what her mother meant. That wasn't the first time Fiona had hit her.
"Cordelia!" her mother's voice yelled up the stairs, full of anger and hate. Thirteen-year-old Cordelia lay on her bed, pulling her pillow over her face. She knew this routine. It was the same thing, day after day. Before her mother's boyfriend arrived home, her mother's true colors began to show.
"Coming!" the blonde teen groaned, rolling herself off the bed and trying to work out what her mother could possibly be angry at her for today. It had been this way as long as she could remember. Any little thing could trigger her mother's wrath, and for years Cordelia had been hiding bruises from her aunt, her friends and her teachers. She'd started to hate the woman, hate her situation, but she doubted anyone would believe her story if she told them, so what could she do? To the world, Fiona Goode was a doting mother with a luxurious life, friendly and admired by everyone. "Yes?" Cordelia said when she reached the bottom of the stairs, her eyes scanning over her mother. Cordelia's eyes glanced at the clock; her mother's boyfriend was going to arrive in half an hour.
It didn't take long for Fiona's hand to meet the tender flesh of Cordelia's face. It was the only time Fiona had hit her daughter in her lifetime. She began dragging her daughter towards the front door. Cordelia shuddered as her brain tried to block out the pain searing through her face, she whimpered softly, tears building in her eyes, but she'd decided a long time ago that she'd never cry in front of the woman. Never again. Her mother's humiliations were never physical, but they were far worse than all of the woman's boyfriends' beating. She specially remembered one day when she was seven, when her mother had cut off most of Cordelia's hair as punishment for her getting cooties in the summer camp. Cordelia remembered watching her beloved long white blond hair falling all over the floor and then crying herself to sleep for so many nights, remembering how glad she had been that it was the beginning of those summer holidays. By the time she went back to school, her mother had taken her to the hairdressers, and had the mess put into some semblance of style.
"Look at that." her mother hissed, pushing Cordelia's head in the direction of the doormat. "Mud. Everywhere." Cordelia's eyes glanced over the mat. There was hardly any stain. Her mother was making a mountain out of a molehill again. Yet Cordelia internally cursed herself, hating herself for the mud that may have come from her shoes. "Clean it, you useless girl!"
Once she arrived to her bedroom she buried her face in her pillow and cried silently. "One day," she promised to herself, "I'll get out of this place."
"You have abused me for years." Cordelia explained. Their yelling had not only brought Misty back to the room, but the entire coven was there, including Myrtle. Cordelia looked at her with teary eyes, finally confessing the truth she had been hiding from the redhead for many years. She looked at her mother again, who had already got up and looked at her daughter with a cold expression. "Every single day of my life you have had some kind of way to humiliate me. You've insulted me and you have let me suffer in silence. You don't know how many times I've cried myself to sleep at the end of the day. And you don't know how many bruises I've had to hide from everyone thanks to your neglects."
"What do you mean?"
"Remember that boyfriend of yours, the one who you dated when I was twelve? Remember the one that was with me at the house when I 'accidentally' fell down the stairs? Remember the one who loved to get drunk in the morning, hit me and then made me cook dinner when you arrived late at night? Remember the endless list of men, mother, and tell me you never suspected anything."
Cordelia's breath caught in fear as he heard the front door of her home slam. Her mother's boyfriend had arrived from his night work. Cordelia heard her mother greet her boyfriend enthusiastically and she stifled a sigh. The teenager dragged herself off of her bed and went to the door.
"Cordelia!" her mother called.
"Coming, Mother!" she called back, and hurried down the stairs and into the kitchen. "Hello." she said to the man, not raising her gaze to look at him.
"Hello, Cordelia." he said with a satisfied smile, running his eyes up and down the girl's body. Cordelia swallowed hard, the skirt of her school uniform making her feel exposed now. The young girl didn't say much during breakfast. She always tried to be as quiet as possible, knowing that the man hated when she spoke without being spoken to. Halfway through dinner, the phone rang. Cordelia rose to answer it.
"Hello?" she said politely into the phone, feeling the man's stare on her back as she talked. "Aunt Myrtle, hi."
"Hi, dear. Is your mother home?"
"Yes. One moment, please." Cordelia said before turning to her mother. "It's Aunt Myrtle." she stated, holding the receiver out to her.
"She's not your fucking aunt." Fiona barked, rising and taking the phone. "What do you want? What a shame, the council has problems… again. You're lucky that I don't have anything to do today. Expect me soon." she hung up and turned to the other two. "Those idiots can't manage a house of witches without having someone killed." was the only explanation she gave them as she grabbed her purse. "You," she said to her daughter. "Don't dare to wake your father up today."
"Okay, mother." Cordelia replied. 'He's not my fucking father,' the teenager thought.
"And watch your language."
"Bye babe." he said, pressing their lips together in a hungry kiss. Cordelia's gaze focused again on her cereals.
"Goodbye dear." she said to the man before walking outside the enormous house. Once the woman had left, he turned to Cordelia with a feral grin. Cordelia felt her insides curl with fear and apprehension, knowing what was going to come next.
"Did you have fun yesterday, little bitch?" he snarled at the blonde. Cordelia didn't answer. The night before she had attended a friend's birthday party and Hank had driven her home. She had thought that everyone was sleeping when she kissed the boy in the front door.
"No."
"Don't you fucking dare lie to me!" he snarled, his hand whipping toward Cordelia's face. The girl gasped in pain when the hand crashed against her cheek. She stumbled backwards a few steps before regaining her footing, but then a fist hit her in the stomach, doubling her over and making her cough hardly. The man's fingers knotted in her white blonde hair and yanked her upright again. "Don't forget your place, Cordelia. Don't you talk back to me again, you got it?" he snapped at her.
"Yes, sir." Cordelia gasped. One of the man's knees connected with her groin, but the grip on her hair didn't allow the girl to fall to the ground. She let go a small cry.
"Now, you know I didn't want to have to hurt you, but you just don't learn that quickly," he whispered almost lovingly into the girl's ear before dropping her. Cordelia landed on the floor with a muffled groan and wisely stayed down. The strong man sauntered into the kitchen and retrieved a beer from the refrigerator before sitting down on the sofa and turning on the television. Cordelia crept upstairs and back into her room, wiping the blood that had stained her cheeks with her sleeve. The cut that the man's ring had left on her cheek would stay for days. She managed to shut the door and lock it before crawling up onto her bed and curling up in a fetal position. She couldn't go to school that day, not looking like that. That afternoon she had PE and the other girls would see the bruises that covered all her body when they changed. She closed her eyes, tears streaming down her face as she slowly fell asleep.
She woke two hours later, a loud banging on her bedroom door. "You bitch, open this damn door right now!" the man bellowed. Cordelia started to shake from fear. She knew the lock wouldn't keep the man out for long. From the sound of it, he was also exceedingly drunk. And when her mother's boyfriend drank, he got mean. Soon, the banging stopped and Cordelia shook worse. Either it meant he was passed out, or he had found an alternate way to enter the girl's room. For the third time that week, Cordelia wished her mother wasn't out and was here to protect her. Soon the door to Cordelia's room swung open.
"Now, now, little Delia, why would you lock the door and not let me in? That's a bad girl," he growled sadistically. Cordelia whimpered softly and tried to back away from the slowly advancing man, but he was fast and grabbed Cordelia by the throat, slamming her backwards into the wall behind her bed. "You've been a bad girl, Delia. It's time you learn your place," he snarled, dragging her off the bed. He ripped the girl's uniform off quickly, digging his fingers into Cordelia's slender and bruised neck. The teenager tried to get away, to fight, to do something with the powers she didn't have. He unbuttoned his pants as he threw Cordelia to the bed, the girl trying to dislodge the much larger man, but he was faster and stronger. He always was.
"Cordelia, I…"
"No, mother. I'm not going to listen to anything else you say." she turned around and grabbed Misty's wrist, dragging the stunned swamp witch upstairs to her bedroom. Misty opened her mouth to complain, but here still not said words were interrupted by the headmistress' lips melting with hers in a burning kiss. "Pack your stuff." Cordelia commanded.
"What? Why?"
"We are moving to the swamps, Misty. It's going to be you, me, the hut, the gators and whatever kind of animal that can be there, I don't care. We're leaving this coven." And though Misty was still puzzled by the woman's confessions and reactions –she had never expected that Cordelia would kiss her like that, and even less to tell her that they would run away together-, she turned around and grabbed her dresses with a smile on her face. Of all the witches I've met, she thought, I have had to fall in love with the most wonderful one.