Chapter
1
Katelyn
Mitchell heard the back door fly open and staggering footsteps enter the
kitchen. She grabbed the remote quickly and turned off the television. Then,
she leapt up from the sofa in the living room and darted down the hall towards
her room, hoping the woman in the kitchen didn't see her. Too late.
"Kate!"
her mother yelled. "Get out here!" Katelyn knew her mother had been
drinking again. Her speech was slurred. She meekly walked back down the hall and
entered the kitchen. Her mother, Janet Mitchell, was slouched in a kitchen
chair. "You better have done all of your chores!" she bellowed when
she saw Katelyn.
Katelyn
gulped. "I did, Mom," she said. Janet looked around the tiny kitchen,
inspecting it.
"Go get
me two Tylenol's," she said wearily. "I have a pounding
headache."
Maybe if
you didn't drink so much, that wouldn't happen, Katelyn wanted to say,
but she held it back. She knew what would happen if she dared to mouth off to
her mother. She hurried down the hall and into the bathroom. She flung open the
medicine cupboard and rummaged around for the bottle of Tylenol. She found it
and shook two capsules out into her hand. Then she went back out into the
kitchen. She filled a glass with water and set the glass and the two Tylenol's
on the table in front of her mother.
Janet put the
pills in her mouth and took a long drink of water. She started to set the glass
back down on the table, but it slipped out of her hand and fell to the floor,
shattering into pieces, the water puddling onto the linoleum.
"Damnit!"
Janet yelled. She turned to Katelyn, her eyes blazing with rage. "Well,
don't just stand there! Clean that up!" she shouted.
Katelyn's mouth
dropped open. "Me? But you dropped it!" As soon as the words left her
mouth, Katelyn knew she had made a terrible mistake. Janet sprung up, her chair
falling over backwards, and grabbed Katelyn by the shoulders.
"Don't
ever talk back to me!" she yelled, shaking Katelyn hard. "You
ungrateful little bitch! You get down on that floor and clean up that mess or I
will slap you shitless!"
Fighting back
tears, Katelyn pulled away from her mother and dropped to the floor. She began
picking up the pieces of broken glass, knowing that her mother meant what she
said.
Janet watched
her for a moment, then uttered a sigh and stormed out of the kitchen. Katelyn
heard her footsteps going down the hall and the slam of a door. She sighed and
allowed her tears to spill over as she finished mopping up the water.
***