Hey everyone- I was going to leave this story for another month or so before I posted it, but I felt like I was doing really well, and so I said SCREW SENSIBILITY and I've decided to begin it now ^-^.
Just a note about the names of the chapters. They are all song names, but the content of the chapter has something to do with the lyrics of the song, and not just the song title. Just thought I'd drop that in in case they didn't make sense to people xD
Anyway, please rate and review- you don't know how much I'd love to hear what you think! (L)
Their mother screamed. It was easily one in the morning, but she hadn't checked in hours. Not that she cared about the time.
She had put the girls to bed as normally as she could, and tried to keep the fireworks to a minimum as her and her husband battled through their relationship with shouts and screams. They mainly screamed about why they were screaming; why one had wound the other up so much that to scream was the only thing either could do. The other thing that led them into these arguments was the girls. Beautiful twin girls. Meek and mild and almost six years old. The parents fought over what would happen to their children if, at the end of the day, the adults did what was best and separated. And although they tried to keep their volume down, it would inevitably raise and turn into a full-blown riot.
What they didn't know however, was that this night (and almost every night since they'd first argued) the twins, Tegan and Sara, sat on the stairs of their old house, holding each other in their blankets, using the other one's embrace to drown out the fight. Because even though they didn't like the shouts, the girls wanted to know what was happening to make their parents so upset.
Talks about the girls would always make their mother fall to tears, and when this happened, the girls had learnt to run back to their rooms in the absence of screams- as this meant their father was about to storm out of the lounge and up to his own bed, to leave his wife to cry.
This night however, as they sat, Tegan took Sara's trembling hand in her own and squeezed. Sara leant into her sister and stared down the staircase with wide, frozen eyes. She drew in a sharp breath.
"Shh." Tegan said softly. Sara shook her head and leant forward, lifting her feet up one step higher so that her stomach rested on her thighs.
"Why aren't they yelling?" Sara asked, bringing her floppy shirt sleeve up to her nose, sniffling into it. "What's happening?"
"Nothing." Tegan lied.
"Okay," Sara said in her simple way. "Nothing."
Tegan held onto Sara tight, both wincing as a door slammed.
"You'll wake the girls!" Sonia yelled.
"Don't bring the girls into this!" Their father shouted back. "You always bring the girls into this."
"You're never home!"
Sara smashed her face into Tegan's neck. "Make it stop, make it stop." She chanted unsteadily. Tegan squeezed Sara harder, not knowing how to stop it.
She forced her eyes shut and said, "Just close your eyes, like Mum says. No more monsters."
"I hear them." Sara whispered, terrified eyes still wide.
"I have reasons for never being home, you know that." Their father said loudly and sternly. "I work long hours so that you don't have to."
"I raise the twins!" Sonia threw her hands up. "I do so much more than you know. If you even bothered to talk to me, or even ask what I'm doing or how I'm feeling…"
"I would," He replied icily, "If you'd stop crawling up my arse about every little thing. Jesus Christ."
"When did you stop?" Sonia snapped. Her tone had lost its anger. "When did you stop being there for me, or the girls? Or our family?"
Their father was silent. "I don't know." Sonia let out a long breath. She wasn't expecting that.
Sara curled her toes into the hard stairs and never lost her stare; her father's legs had come into view. His shoes were on. He was putting on a jacket… he had a bag.
"Where's Dad going?" Sara whispered. Tegan stared, seeing the same thing. She knew their father was leaving.
"Nowhere." Tegan said confidently. She held Sara tighter. "No one's going."
"When are you coming back this time?" Sonia asked loudly.
Their father slung his bag over his shoulder. He didn't see his children at the top of the stairs staring down at them- one sniffling, and the other glaring with burning eyes and clenched fists.
"This time I'm not coming back." He said.
"You can't just-"
"Watch me."
One more door slammed and Sara hunched over into Tegan's lap, snot and tears running down her face. "He's gone, he's gone, he's gone." Sara found another chant to aid her tears.
Tegan stroked Sara's back, hands balled up.
"Sara, Sara," Tegan said. "He's not gone."
"He is."
More than six months later the girls were well into being six, their parents divorce finalised, and Sonia was dealing with the stressful experience of being a single parent. She had decided enough was enough, and that she would not only raise two girls alone, but she would educate herself. She would prove to everyone (but especially to him) that she could cope with being on her own, and so she enrolled in a night class at college, and hired a cheap, but reliable, baby sitter.
Three nights a week Sonia would disappear and leave Tegan and Sara with Ellen, and reappear at around eleven. She would pay the childminder and that would be it, the girls only seeing her the next morning.
Sonia would sometimes talk about her friends to the girls. The different people she was meeting at her evening class; and one name seemed to be coming up regularly.
Bruce.
To the girls he sounded like a really good guy. Sonia had told them about how he always made her laugh, and how they would spend hours talking. This night in particular their mother looked rather dressed up.
Sonia sat down in the living room and pulled both her children to her, seating them awkwardly in her lap. She'd perfected holding both of her girls years ago, but now it seemed that Tegan had perfected holding Sara, and nothing was going to get in the way of that. Sonia kissed both of their foreheads and sighed, her breath blowing their hair softly. "You know," she said. "I am really glad you have each other because I'm not always going to be here."
"Where are you-"
"Nowhere." Sonia said quickly. She ran a hand down Tegan's tense forearm and gently pulled it off of Sara. Sara gave a panicked look and Sonia placed her other hand on her back. "I want you two to take care of each other, always, okay?"
"I already do." Tegan said, puffing her chest out a bit.
Sonia smiled. "I know, Tegan, and you're a wonderful older sister."
Sara bit her lip and leaned into Tegan, still trembling slightly. "It's okay for you to go with your friend, Mum. Teetee has me."
Tegan nodded firmly. "Alright." Sonia said softly. "I'm going to kiss you goodnight, and tomorrow when you wake up, there'll be waffles."
"Yummy." Sara said, smiling a little.
"The good kind?" Tegan asked.
"The best kind." Sonia replied, kissing them both and standing up. "Do I look okay?" The girls nodded enthusiastically, smiling as Ellen's knock came from the door.