(TW for verbal and physical child abuse.)
Strain
"Bye bye, Crystal!"
"See you tomorrow!"
"Bye, Clarissa! Bye, Deandra!"
Crystal waved over her shoulder as she gathered her belongings. As she passed down the bus aisle, children chattered and various beeps from flip phones drifted behind her. She said goodbye to the bus driver, who offered a tired smile. Crystal leaped down the steps, bobbing her head as she did so and jumped over a thick puddle. She wobbled but caught herself, hunching forward and gripping her backpack straps. Peering over her shoulder, she waved to her two friends smiling from the tinted window. She watched the bus pick up speed, turning back onto the main road with the line of cars slowly following.
She had an uneventful, yet calm day of school. Her third grade classes seemed to mesh together in a day full of lectures. From her English teacher discussing the importance of Charlotte's friendship with Wilbur to jotting down difficult notes on multiplying and dividing fractions, the day dragged on until the final bell.
Though, it was not entirely boring. She enjoyed chatting with her friends and skipping to each classroom. She was a busybody through and through, grinning at everyone and talking nonstop. It earned her disapproving looks from teachers and a few snappy remarks to be quiet from them, but her classmates enjoyed her company. Crystal loved spending her lunch gossiping with other girls and helping put her friends' hair in stylish ponytails. They highlighted her boring school day with upbeat laughter and memories.
Crystal slipped off her backpack, remaining still in front of the towering brick complex with five identical rows of housing, Each roof was pale gray, clashing with the deep red bricks, and Crystal noticed one of the drain pipes dangled off the side of one of the nearest complexes. Rustic water shot down from the dangling pipe into a thick puddle below that pushed apart the soil and grass. The muddy liquid rushed through the grass towards the walkway.
She unzipped the front pocket of her backpack, removing two silver keys and clutched her bag underneath her arm. She glanced around, staring the dead grass and rusted, black gate in front of her. The sidewalk stretched between the complexes, becoming colorless paths with dry dirt sliding onto the walkways.
Crystal approached the gate and unlocked it. She set her first key back into her skirt pocket and pushed open the gate. She creeped forward, glancing between the off-white doors and their splintery wooden steps. Crystal found the murky water sliding onto the walkway in thick rivulets, and she stepped off the path, hurrying around it to avoid mucking up her tennis shoes. She kicked up dirt and dead grass, jogging past identical doors only to stop at the apartment at the far left corner of the middle row of the complexes.
Crystal took out her second key and skipped up the steps. Taking a deep breath, she held it and closed her eyes. She waited, counting a few seconds, and then exhaled with a faint smile. She inserted the key into the lock, twisted it a few times, and when it clicked, she opened the door.
"I'm home!" she called with a toothy grin.
No one answered. Most of the lights were off, and she slowly entered her family's apartment. She slipped off her shoes and crossed the wooden floor towards the living room. The bare thread loveseat had seen better days, fixed with impressions of bodies and patched armrests. The TV guide set on top of the couch was pressed open with a marked circle for a news segment on war. The time was marked for 8:30 pm, the hour in which her older sister usually watched a reality show. The ashray in the center of the coffee table had a lingering scent of smoke, and cigarette butts remained in the tray.
Instead of a usual note with her daily chores, the coffee table was empty. She tilted her head. Her mother normally had her chore list ready when Crystal arrived home and afterwards, she would do her homework. As she mulled over the possibility of being free for the day, the abrupt sound of a hair dryer caught her off guard.
Paperwork littered the hallway as she went to investigate the noise. Each paper was dated from months ago in sharp black ink. Advanced words raced across the pages, but she caught sight the second eviction notice, and she swallowed, clenching her fist to her chest. That word had been thrown around her apartment lately, forcing her to understand its importance.
Approaching the bathroom, she noticed the paint peeling off the door. The temptation to peel the remainder of it flickered in her thoughts, but she quickly banished it. The hair dryer blared, mingling with the day's pop song from a radio. She raised her knuckles, offering a hesitant knock.
A befuddled curse answered her, and Crystal mulled over the word under her breath, Her mother recently used the same word as part of her daily vocabulary, but Crystal never asked what she meant. The word "fuck" remained foreign to her, but she sensed nothing good coming from it.
The hair dryer immediately cut, and the door ripped open. The young teenager standing in the doorframe immediately groaned when Crystal smiled. She rolled her eyes, holding the hair dryer like a makeshift weapon.
"What the hell do you want? Didn't Mom leave you chores?" Pearl Snagrash demanded, hunching forward. Her wet magenta hair fell over her shoulders in curled tresses. She wore a simple tank top and shorts with popping makeup. Her large cobalt eyes scanned her sister, and her accentuated, stiff eyelashes seemed almost like sharp, black knives.
"Nope! I did all of them yesterday, so I think I'm all set for today," Crystal replied, smiling, and Pearl scoffed.
"Don't bother me right now. I'm fixing my hair." Pearl reached for the doorknob when Crystal leaned forward, setting her foot against the doorframe.
"U-um, how was school, Pearl?" she asked, her ponytail shifting to the side as she cocked her head.
"Not now. Do your homework if there's nothing for you to do," Pearl ordered, nudging Crystal away and immediately slamming the door shut.
Crystal remained still. The radio continued softly playing only to be overpowered by the hair dryer. She sighed, hanging her head and carefully tiptoeing through the strewn paperwork. She approached the coffee table once more and tossed her backpack onto the couch. She rummaged through her backpack, pulling out her math homework and the novel, Charlotte's Web.
She was thankful her workload was light. A simple math sheet and one chapter from the novel were due the next day, and she set to her fractions. She took out a pink gel pen from her bag and some scrap paper, proceeding to do her homework.
Crystal listened to the sounds from the bathroom. Her sister's voice grew louder with occasional laughter and curse words. Pearl's conversations with her friends had always been boisterous, filling the entirel apartment with raunchy gossip and crude comments about other girls. Crystal pursed her lips, attempting to concentrate on her fractions when Pearl mentioned a classmate's weight, saying they were a hog.
Crystal winced, rubbing her forearm and peering at the bathroom door. Middle school was certainly the world of young teenagers exploring the faults of their classmates. Compared to the kindness of her own classmates, Crystal wondered what kind of people her friends would become upon entering the malicious middle school realm.
Her sister, always the trendsetter, seemed to dominate that world as the princess of eighth grade. Ruthless, often malicious remarks slipped out of her mouth more often than they would when she was a sixth grader. The thirteen-year-old, seemingly miles ahead socially of her eight-year-old sister, had a clique of classic mean girls as friends. Crystal was glad to steer clear of them whenever they came over. She coiled up in her younger brothers' room, keeping the door locked as they descretated her heart with severe, unwarranted mockery of their classmates.
She had always been sensitive. She tended to hurt classmates whenever someone made fun of them, offering her kindness and heart to them. It was how she came to be naturally liked. Children in her grade saw Crystal as a genuine person. A cruel bone never existed in her body. She was always grinning and inviting everyone, even nerdy or unpopular children, to join in on gym activities. She cultivated a peaceful palace for herself while her sister created discord on her own turf.
The bathroom door slammed open. Crystal yelped, her pen skirting across the scrap paper through other scribbled problems. She jerked her head over to Pearl, finding her wincing at the peeling paint sliding down the door. Shrugging, Pearl shoved the door shut and entered the living room.
"I'm going out. Don't ask where," Pearl said, stomping on the paperwork.
"Um, didn't Mom say you couldn't go out tonight? I-I think she said that before you left for school," Crystal said.
Pearl's eyes widened. "Oh, yeah? Are you gonna tell on me?"
Crystal flinched. "Uh, I-"
Pearl stomped over to the couch, her hand slowly rising. "I said, are you gonna tell on me?"
Crystal broke into a smile, waving her hands. "I-I mean, I'm just-!"
"Crystal, you better be quiet! I'm not even going out for too long, so just shut up! Don't even think about telling Mom about this. Do you understand?" Pearl snapped, and Crystal nodded, raising her knuckles to her chin.
Pearl snarled, hovering over Crystal, but the patched couch was between them. Crystal felt her the backside of her knees press against the coffee table, and she squeezed her eyes shut. She hitched down a breath when Pearl gasped, and Crystal opened her eyes, peering around Pearl.
The front door opened. A tired, languid woman with two twin boys dressed in soccer uniforms behind her raced inside. She scanned the girls with dead eyes. Her body seemed drained of energy like a robot prepared to shut down. A coffee stain blemished her white blouse, and her apron was wrapped under her meaty arm. The boys scrambled, laughing away and shooting towards their room.
"Going out, Pearl?" she asked, stomping into the apartment. She kicked the door shut behind her and quickly locked it with her own key.
"Y-you're home early, Mom! Welcome home! H-how was your day?" Crystal chirped, but her mother's severe glare silenced her, and she dropped her chin to her chest.
Pearl gawked, blindly looking around. She became a fish out of water as her mouth flapped open. Crystal willed herself to look at Pearl, wringing her hands by her stomach.
Teresa Snagrash, a divorced mother of four children, dominated the apartment. Her graying hair was up in a tight bun, revealing the stressed veins on her brow and the thinning hair by her temples. Her dried orange skin was muddled with the appearance of varicose veins on her feet and legs. Her lips drew in a tight line, and she surveyed her stuttering older daughter before pointing at the wall.
"In the corner. Thirty minutes. Reflect," she ordered, "or you'll be punished."
Pearl wasted no time spinning on her heels. She briskly walked to the corner of the apartment, setting her forehead to the wall and began muttering to herself. Crystal could not hear what she was saying, but she managed to strain out a few apologies.
"Crystal," her mother said, and Crystal immediately whipped her gaze and smile to her, "did you finish your chores?"
Like a crashing anvil, Crystal's heart plummeted into her stomach. Her cheeks flushed with hot pink but immediately paled, chilled with her mother's words. Heat surged in her blood only to immediately freeze in her limbs. The homeostasis of her body rapidly fluctuated as she screamed at herself. She moved her lips, and her mind moved a mile a minute, desperate for words to emerge from her mouth.
"I-I'm sorry. I-I, um, d-did I miss it? Did I miss your note somewhere? Oh, uh, uh, I'm sorry. I-I-I was stupid," Crystal shakily offered, and Teresa hummed, stepping around the couch to the coffee table.
She plucked Crystal's math sheet and novel, setting them onto the couch. Tereza gazed at the table, muttering she had left a note on the table. Crystal's body burned, eyes widening as her mother knocked over her backpack to search for the note. She watched her pens and folders topple out with the pens vanishing within the springy couch cushions.
"Where's the note? I had a note here. I left it right here," Teresa hissed, digging her finger against the coffee table. Her teeth gnashed together, and she shot her glare at Pearl with a bullet's fury. "Did you move it, Pearl? Answer me."
"I-It wasn't Pearl's fault, Mom! H-h-honest! I mean, sh-she even asked me if I had chores to do today, and th-there…" Crystal swallowed, raising her shoulders to her ears. "...there wasn't any note on the table. M-m-maybe it was misplaced?"
Teresa stared at Crystal. It was as if she had become a blank slate. No emotion existed on her face. Her finger remained pressed against the coffee table with the tip of her finger burning red. Crystal trembled, her arms and legs tense like a statue. The air around her soured, and she could not breath. She tried to reply when Teresa stabbed her finger into Crystal's chest.
Crystal yiped, blurting out an apology. A few hollow, boyish chuckles echoed behind her. She heard her brothers, Aidan and Jackson Snagrash, sneer that she was in trouble. In front of her, Pearl resumed her apologies.
"Corner. Now. Reflect on your mistakes," Teresa snarled, gripping Crystal's shoulder, "or face punishment."
Crystal nodded, stomping over to the adjacent corner from Pearl and began her own whisperings. She murmured her inability to locate the note. She must have not looked hard enough. Perhaps it sunk into the couch cushions like her pens or fell underneath the couch. It could have been in a separate area like the kitchen, which was filled with unwashed plates and greasy takeout containers. Even from the corner, she smelled rotten ketchup and expired milkshakes.
Crystal clasped her fingers together, murmuring about her own stupidity. She wanted to sob, but her mother would only increase her punishment if she did. To her mother, silence and obedience were her golden rules. Crying only accelerated Teresa's fury, and Crystal grit her teeth to prevent her whimpering from becoming audible.
As the corner's shadows made her eyes cross, she listened. Her mother's tone turned jovial, and her brothers' voices echoed. Aidan and Jackson laughed, finishing each other's sentences and amusing their mother with their six-year-old charm. They jeered about beating the other soccer team, scoring the winning goal together as Teresa fawned over them, commenting that they were good boys, her favorite children.
Crystal's heart constricted. It felt as if her ribs clenched around her heart, and each time she took a breath, her ribs squeezed her heart. Her heart threatened to burst, spilling out blood and ending it all. Every breath felt like torture. Her mind stormed with apologies to nullify her pain as she continued breathing them out.
Slow tears dribbled down Pearl's cheeks. Black mascara tumbled down her round face, and Crystal flinched. Her heart incessantly pounded, feeling as if she could sense her sister's despair. A budding headache formed, and she pried her gaze away from Pearl, focusing on her mantra.
"Crystal," Teresa called, and Crystal straightened, "the note was on the kitchen counter. You did not see it? How did you not see it? You're not blind, you idiot."
She felt her mother's presence hovering over her. The immense shadow coated her body in chilling darkness. Crystal swallowed, offering another apology without looking at her.
"You're so stupid sometimes. If your father were here, he'd make you see that. He'd make you realize that you can't be stupid anymore," she said, and Crystal's eyes widened, trying desperately to not cry.
"But he's not here. He's gone."
Crystal looked over to Pearl as if Pearl had casually commented on the weather. Her mouth fell open, and she wondered if she and her mother had matching expressions. She dared not look up to Teresa.
Pearl glared at Teresa, saying, "Dad's not here, and he's never coming back. Maybe you should open your own eyes and see that." Pearl crossed her arms and smirked. "I bet Dad wouldn't like what you're doing. He might've been strict, but he was never as bad as you. Maybe that's why he left for the war and-"
What happened next was almost a blur of flashing colors in Crystal's perspective. A massive beast stormed at Pearl, and the next thing Crystal knew was that Pearl was slumped on the ground. Aidan and Jackson stopped their cheering about their soccer game and yelped. Crystal finally offered a confused hum.
Teresa's knuckles pressed against her daughter's head. Pearl cried out, kicking her legs and arms out like a dying spider working all of its limbs. Her fist drove into Pearl's skull, and she snarled, demanding Pearl repeat what she just said. Pearl apologized, slapping at her mother's hand while Aidan and Jackson fled for their room.
"S-stop it," Crystal whispered, but Teresa kept hitting her screaming sister.
Her heart ached, feeling as if she had swallowed stones and was drowning. Her body tensed, filled to the brim with helplessness as her mother's blows rained down on Pearl. Crystal flinched each time and could not tear her eyes away. Every hit followed a yelp or wince from Crystal as she desperately tried to unglue her sealed lips.
"St-stop it, stop it, please! Stop it!" Crystal cried, hobbling forward, but Teresa grabbed her face, shoving her into the couch.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" Pearl wailed only to be silenced by another slap to her bruised face.
Her mother's ranting continued, and every word stabbed into Crystal. The hatred and despair swarmed around her like an endless fog, and she could not find her way through. Crystal clutched her head, breaking into sobs and biting her lower lip in hopes of finding some solace.
She needed anything to block out the noise and feelings from entering her body. She wished she was back at school braiding Clarissa's hair. She wanted to be in the hallway with Deandra going over last-minute problems for their science test. Back to lunch with chattering friends or doing gymnastics or cheerleading in gym class or even sitting through a boring American history lesson would have been a paradise compared to home.
School was her haven filled with happiness and glee. Her home was her personal hell filled with nothing but misery.
Her emotions boiled over, and she did not notice the odd aura swirling by her forehead. The chaotic crying and disordered roaring from her sister and mother clashed in her mind, and she clutched her head. Her body felt ready to explode like a mangled fireworks display. Her eyes slammed shut, and she raked her fingers against her arms as words bubbled up from her throat. They crested on her tongue as the aura came to a singling point, collecting like a ball of energy, and she burst.
"Stop it now!" she cried, and her mind fired.
The PSI blast slammed into her mother's back, propelling her into the wall. Teresa had no time to scream, and neither did anyone else. A sizzling sound popped in Crystal's ears, but it was the last thing she had heard. Her vision fogged, suddenly seized with weariness. She fell backwards into the couch, rolling her head forward as darkness claimed and comforted her.
She was not sure how long she was out. She did not dream or even feel rested. Her lips squirmed, and she uttered a hollow hum. Crystal rubbed her eyes and slowly opened them, staring vacantly at the same ceiling that had sheltered her for years.
She gasped. Her body shot up like a rocket, and she groaned, holding her head as sounds slowly entered her ears. She could not fully make out what was being said around her or what was happening, but the gentle hand on her shoulder made her squirm.
"Are you okay?" Pearl asked, her face covered with bandages.
Crystal broke into a wide smile. "P-Pearl! You're-!"
"-you're psychic just like dad," she said, silencing Crystal.
Crystal gasped. "Wh-what? What are you saying?"
"That thing you did? It was a PSI blast. It's what Dad did all the time when he was around. You were too young to remember him doing any of that." Pearl looked over to the wall, and Crystal followed her gaze. The wall was cracked with scraps of muted floral wallpaper left on the floor. A chair blocked the hole where their mother's body impacted from the blast.
Crystal breathed out, "I did that?"
Pearl nodded. "Yep. You did. Thanks, Crystal. Thanks a lot."
"Pearl, I-"
Pearl walked off, almost slipping on the forlorn paperwork. Gratitude or malice became lost to Crystal as Pearl went into the bathroom. Other voices made themselves known as Crystal listened to her mother sobbing and her brothers comforting the beast from the boys' bedroom.
Left alone, Crystal remained on the couch. She trembled, her lips quivering and eyes welling up with tears. She hunched forward, clutching her face and breaking off into sobs. The dam of heart burst, and she wailed, feverishly wiping her eyes. Tears continued streaking down her face and plopping on her knees and skirt. Her glass soul, fragile and tender, cracked, and in time, it would fully shatter.
She was psychic. She was like her absent father, and she was alone in the poor confines of her home.