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.

***

 

 

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