A/N: It came to me. I wrote the entire chapter in one night.
Disclaimer: If you're looking for Stephenie I suggest two universes over.
CHAPTER ONE:
CRUEL
I hesitantly got in the car with my mom after fighting forever about what this was doing to my non-existent life. She told me I was being ridiculous.
I wasn't the one with the baby bump. The one who cheated. The one who had lied.
My mom lied. A lot.
We were going to leave my dad today. Forever. I love my dad, kind of, he at least wasn't there enough for our indifference to count as neglect. I used to love my mom, a bit.
Used to.
You see my parents got married early. Scary early. Okay, whatever, eighteen... but when you're seventeen and have only ever had a crush or two, never an actual boyfriend, it's really scary. I was born shortly after the marriage. Shortly after, where a divorce should have taken place, not a baby shower. I took my first breaths to the sound of them fighting. My first word was disguised by screams. They never could seem to get along. Not even to feed the baby.
Child Protection Services have been called multiple times by well-meaning, nosy, old lady, knitting, and cat-loving type neighbors. There was nothing to charge my parents on. As soon as I could walk I was getting my own food. Creating my own toys. My own friends. To the CPS I was taken care of. Just not by a parent. But they were left out on that teensy-weensy detail.
When I was old enough to start school my parents signed me up immediately. Not that they thought an education was important. Just to get me out of the way.
When I walked out onto the bus the first day of school I realized I was the only kinder-gardener on board. The other parents drove their children to school. I wore a dress my grandmother sent me, my erratic mother had tossed it at me. She said 'fetch'. Like I was a dog. I carried an old, used, cheap, make-up case my mother had gotten sick of as a lunch sack. I clutched it in my hand. The ugly pouch containing not a sandwich, but a microwavable TV dinner, cut apart so it would fit in the bag, and a used spork I had scavenged. The last of my stash I had stolen from the ice-box that worked as our refrigerator.
The other girls had princess backpacks. Not fanny-packs their father had abandoned. They all had their hair in pig-tails. Some lovingly braided by their mother's tender hands.
My parents were not poor. Though I heard the teacher talking to the councilor, she thought the school should start charity drives for the poor... she mentioned my name. My mother just never remembered to pay the bills. She always remembered to give out money at one of her many churches. She had a new purse. And more clothes then would fit in my room. Which was a closet. Her clothes were in the spare bedroom. She said that if I could fit she wasn't waisting valuable room.
My father is a cop. He never notices the state I'm in due to never being home. When he is, and I've waited on the porch for hours for him he'll mess up my hair and tromp up to his room. He leaves first thing in the morning. And eats at the station. He comes home late. So he doesn't notice that the light switches never work. That the water runs dirty. He's never noticed.
Now in high school I flatter myself in saying I'm one of the smartest people in my grade. I don't lie when I tell you that people turn up their noses when they see me coming. They have a right to. I'm dirt compared to them.
Gross, worm infested dirt. A rotten apple even the raccoons won't touch.
It's alright. I'm ugly. I deserve it. I'm not even cool enough to have ever had a friend. Even Molly, my imaginary pal now shuns me.
And as we drove to the airport I felt even the light posts on the hot Phoenix side-walk bend away from me. The rejected girl. The freak who knows no love, no happiness. That not even one person has ever dared smile at. Only once (once!) has a person even slightly been turned up at the tips of their mouth while looking straight at me. And that was a women at a convenience store counter who I had run into that one time I used that dollar I had found on the street for gum. It was more like a smirk though. They knew they were better than me.
When we boarded the plane it was at different times. I was in business class. My mother was pampered in first.
The man seated my me was a plain looking guy in a gray tailored suit. He also carried a briefcase, which he opened the second he sat down and stayed engrossed in its contents the entire way to SeaTac. I entertained myself by reading one of my mothers many gushy romance novels. Looking outside the window occasionally to see the mountains and orchards. The lakes and the trees. So many trees...
I had never once left Phoenix before.
Even if I was upset with my mother I could not pass up the chance to see these marvelous new things.
ƀπεѦϗ
As I got off the plane I had to look around for a while until I saw my mother at baggage claim. She had said that we must leave immediately and not to bother with clothes. Of course that means she brought five, very large and very expensive, suitcases full.
You may wonder why I ever even slightly liked my mother. It was for the rare moments that she was vulnerable, instead of bossy. Like when she came home drunk and was out cold on the porch. At that moment their had been nothing about her to dislike, except her drunken tendencies. And when she cried.
Besides she was my mom.
Though at the moment I admit, that was even too much for me to handle.
We rented a car. Her jewelry bag got front seat of the rental sedan. I was squeezed between two suitcases in the back.
When I asked exactly where we were going she scowled and said to see an old friend from high-school. In a little town, called Forks.
ƀπεѦϗ
As we walked from the car to Jen's home we were unexpected guests. As a woman with a baby at her hip answered the door we were strangers. Well of course I was. I never knew about this person until today. The lady didn't seem to recognize my mom at all.
"I'm sorry." She cooed. "But I don't let strangers use the bathroom. Goodbye..." And she began to shut the door on us.
"Wait, Jen." My mother (shudder) spoke as she used a hand to block the door. "It's me, Renée, remember?"
"No." She said, briskly and shut the door on my mom's face. And in turn she got mad at me.
"You stupid kid!" She yelled as she walked down the driveway, kicking rocks as she went. Not a thing she normally does when wearing designer heels. "If you had stayed in the car as I had told you to!"
She lies. She said clearly to come.
"You were the worst mistake of my life! Argh! I'm going back to Phil." And she hopped into the drivers seat as I stumbled around the car to the back. She floored it out of the driveway of Jen's home. Gravel shot up from the road as her screeching tires left the previously serene neighborhood.
As she left me.
