4. Mia
4
MIA
W e are now orphans. We are completely and utterly alone. I sigh at the reminder. Mom went first, and now dad is gone too. Orphans, the last of our bloodline, and we are currently holed up in a halfway house in some obscure suburb sitting on the edge of insanity. We will probably die here. The monsters will come eventually, and it will be a fight to the death.
I won’t let them take us. I won’t let them split us up to defile and destroy us any way they wish to do so. If I have to drive a knife through my own sisters’ hearts to avoid the monsters when they come, then that’s what I will do. I will not let them suffer the fate awaiting them if we are trafficked.
My sisters are all I have left of my family, and I’d do anything to protect them. The same way I’ve nurtured and protected them throughout their nineteen years. I’ve dedicated my life to looking after them, and I will go on doing so, and God help anyone who gets between us or tries to take advantage of their naivety.
At the moment, they are restless as they pace around the room. I’ve tried my hardest with them, but I’m quickly losing patience and I’m simultaneously about to lose my shit when they won’t listen and don’t sit down. Their pacing back and forth is giving me whiplash, and their complaints are causing my brain to short circuit.
We’ve only been here five days, but in that time, they’ve driven me literally crazy with their demands and never-ending whining. I love my sisters to death, but they’re social butterflies, and they don’t do so well in confined spaces. I would’ve thought that being faced with such a disaster, they’d rise to the occasion and assist wherever needed to make sure we are going to be-and stay-safe. But I may have overestimated their willingness to participate in keeping us all safe and supporting us in what could only be described as one of our darkest hours. Because it looks like we may very well end up killing each other.
“How much longer will we have to stay here?” Maxine whines, while Sophia flicks at her nails and reminds us that she’s overdue for her manicure.
I peek out from beneath the lace cloth acting as a curtain against the window, the grime caked to it literally making my skin crawl. The street outside is deathly quiet, not a soul in sight. I’m still a little uneasy about being here, although Uncle Mason insisted that staying in the seediest side of town was the best camouflage for us.
My mind is still spinning with the events of the past few weeks. My father’s death, then the constant phone calls with the breathing down the line. The house was ransacked - twice - before Uncle Mason bundled us up and brought us to this derelict house on the outskirts of the city, where he promised us we’d be safe for a while until he figured out a more permanent solution.
Every couple of days, he comes by with supplies. Food and drinks, enough to sustain at least our stomachs, but what did a man - let alone a much older one - know about a woman’s self- care? What would he know about which shampoos to use, and the creams and the cleansers that we had become accustomed to using? What did he know about the creature comforts that sustained us and the things that kept us thriving?
I could go without - all that excess material stuff never really meant anything to me, but I turn toward my sisters sullenly and almost give up on the world. They’re twins, and at nineteen, they’re in the prime of their lives, and they don’t know any better. They’re a little materialistic. That was my father’s doing. He spoiled them silly after my mother’s death; he raised them without drawing any boundaries, and they had gotten all too comfortable with the good things in life. So very unlike me. I’d had more time with my mother, so I was more grounded. More like her. More down to earth. My sisters were all about the good things in life, just like our dad had been. Maybe a little too much.
After much pestering, I finally got the full story out of Uncle Mason, who isn’t really our uncle, but he’s been around longer than any other blood relative we have. Apparently, my father had been caught dipping his fingers into funds that were not his for the taking. That ultimately got him a one-way ticket out of our lives, and I find that more than anything, I’m mad at him for leaving us. And especially for leaving behind this mess to clean up. Even if we sold every last asset we had, down to the clothes on our backs, it would never be enough to repay what my father has stolen.
“Mia, come on!” Sophia sulks, stomping her foot like an errant child. I sigh and shake my head in exasperation. Children, the both of them.
“The alternative is to be killed or sold into sexual servitude,” I remind them. “I don’t know about you, but I quite like it here.”
I’m so casual about the matter that my sisters fix me with their doe eyes, almost as though they wish they could strike me down.
“You’re so fucked in the head, Mia,” Maxine says. “That’s one easy way to meet a billionaire.”
I love my sisters. I really do. But sometimes I have to wonder about their intellect. I know it’s only a result of losing dad and being holed up here that’s making them crazy, but they really need to consider the alternatives carefully before running their mouths.
“A billionaire who needs to buy a human is not the sort of human you want to be associated with, Maxine.”
She scoffs, twirls a strand of her lovely strawberry blonde hair around a finger, then shoots me a pout. I just want to slap her upside the head, but I have neither the energy to expend, nor the desire to deal with her tongue in the aftermath.
“You’re going to end up a spinster, you know,” Sophia tells me. I raise my eyebrows, not even in the least bit curious as to how she came to that conclusion.
“What’s the bet she marries before us?” Maxine sighs, frowning at me, like she didn’t even expect the words to come out of her mouth.
“Why is that a bad thing?” I ask.
They look at each other, purse their lips and swear themselves to silence. There’s more brow raising from me before I shake my head and turn away from them, looking out the window again.
“What’s so interesting out there, anyway?” Sophia asks.
“No billionaires out there,” Maxine adds, her small laugh tinkling through the room. They’re truly beautiful, my sisters. Beautiful, but irritating. They get this way when they get anxious, which is quite often when they’ve missed salon appointments.
“Sometimes I wonder about you two,” I mumble. “I could swear that either you or I were adopted and we’re not biological siblings.”
“OK, Miss Hoity Toity, Miss I’m so good it hurts,” Sophia spits. “Always thinking you’re better than us. “Look at you ! You’re the ugly version of us. Of course, we’re siblings!”
It’s all I can do not to really lose my temper at them. We’re really sisters, I know we are. It’s just that sometimes, I want to hurt them as much as they hurt me when they’re being childish. I want to give back as good as I receive. And this is one of those times.
I know I’ll end up saying or doing something I’ll inevitably regret, so instead of sticking around to make things worse, I pull the curtain back until it’s covering the window again and turn to face them.
“You know what, I’ve had all I can bear from you two. Watch some TV while I go rest for a while.”
I switch the ancient set on and turn the dial. The house is a forgotten bastion from the eighties. Everything inside it, from the wallpaper to the carpet, to the kitchen and the furniture, reeks of a bygone era. There’s no cable TV, and we’re lucky to have hot water. It truly feels like we’ve stepped back in time, and even though the last inhabitants may have been here before I was even born, I know from a dusty stack of newspapers and magazines in the corner of one of the bedrooms that the house has stood empty since at least 1986. I don’t know whose house this is, but if I had to guess, I’d say it’s Uncle Mason’s.
“A cartoon? Really?” Maxine’s high-pitched screech follows me down the hallway before I shut the door to the room I’ve been sleeping in and inhale the quiet solitude.
The house is quiet when I wake. Too quiet. Not even the sound of the TV echoing through the walls. I walk down the narrow corridor to the bathroom, wash my face then look at my reflection in the mirror. I feel like I’ve aged a few decades in the mayhem that has scorched us recently, and I guess judging by the way I look, the bags under my eyes are rather telling also.
The responsibilities of being the oldest sibling always feel like a heavy weight on my shoulders. Every decision I make, every action I take, has to take into account the needs and well-being of my younger siblings. My entire life has been dedicated to looking after my twin sisters, playing the role of the protective older sister they rely on. And in this moment, that role continues without hesitation.
The fear of losing them gnaws at me every waking moment. They are not just my sisters; they are the fragments of a home I cling to, the family I vow to protect at all costs. My only remaining family. I would martyr myself to keep them safe, to keep them from the harsh reality of a world that seeks to destroy us. I would do whatever I need to in order to protect them from all the ugliness of this world.
I dry the water from my face, smooth my hair back, then go in search of them. They’re not in the living room, where the TV is still on, but has been muted. They’re not in their room either. I go from room to room searching for them, panic starting to claw its way up my throat. It’s an acidic poison that travels upward and threatens to explode from the inside out.
“Damn it!”
I grit my teeth as my jaw locks back and forth in anger. They’re nowhere in the house. I push back the curtain and the darkness outside greets me. There’s no movement anywhere. No sound, no living breathing thing to prove that I am not entirely on my own. I bang my knee on the way to the door, cursing and muttering under my breath as I go. This is disaster personified. Uncle Mason warned us not to leave the house. We were all there for the lecture, all told the danger of us being seen out and about, and although we didn’t like it, we knew what had to be done. I really thought my sisters had come around; that they were scared enough into knowing we couldn’t step outside the confines of these walls without getting hurt. But obviously, I was wrong. And obviously, I was most likely the only one listening and the only one truly on board with Uncle Mason’ plan to keep us safe.
“Stupid bitches,” I mutter, as I run out into the night, looking up and down the dark street. Too late, I realize they may have left hours ago and they could be anywhere by now. I slap an exhausted hand to my forehead, a scream threatening to erupt. My eyes scan the nearby houses, all dark with overgrown hedges and trees at the front. The houses all appear to be empty. This really is like the town that time forgot. Time and space carried on, but this little slice of earth somehow got left behind. Knowing Uncle Mason and his penchant for all things nostalgia, I can only guess that this is just the way he wants it.
Uncle Mason hasn’t left any electronic devices with us, but he’s given me explicit instructions if I ever needed to contact him. Only in the event of an emergency, I was to go to the nearest mom and pop store two blocks down and call him on the number he made me memorize. He wouldn’t let me write the number down; I’d had to memorize it and now had to rely on memory muscle alone.
I start to run. I don’t even go back inside the house to get my shoes. The more time I lose, the further they get away from me. The more chance there is that they’re walking straight into the arms of the enemy. My father coddled the twins so much that it’s going to take years to undo the damage done to them in terms of self-preservation. They are too inside their own little bubble and have no concept of the dangers that inhabit our world. The thought of them being out there on the streets, vulnerable and at the mercy of the cruel world, threatens to strangle me. I can’t think of all the bad things that could possibly go wrong, all the bad things that could possibly happen to them.
I realize I don’t have any money as soon as I step inside the store and a little bell tinkles above the door. An elderly man and woman sit behind the counter. The man looks up from his crossword with watery eyes. The woman stares at me even as she continues her knitting, watching me curiously, before she stands and looks me up and down, noticing my bedraggled state and bare feet.
“Are you alright, dear?” She has a Southern twang I can’t quite place.
I shake my head. They continue to watch me, although I don’t know who’s afraid more of the other. It could very well be that I am the one that’s more afraid of this odd, elderly couple.
“I…” I stammer. “I…don’t have any money. I need to make a call.”
The old man says nothing as the old lady angles her head, as though trying to figure something out.
She lifts a phone from somewhere below and sets it on the counter, pushing it toward me. It’s an old rotary in a sage green color. I look down at it in disbelief. There’s only one reason I know how ancient the phone is; we once took a field trip to the Historical Artefacts Museum and learnt all about the devices and systems that existed before our generation. All the things our parents grew up with that we had no concept of. All the things our parents insist we missed out on, because life was simpler then. Innocent. Beautiful.
I grab the receiver, fumble my way through the digits, starting once, twice, then a third time when I realize I’m dialing the wrong numbers. There’s a click on the other end of the phone when Uncle Mason answers, his terrified voice screeching down the line, like he has the number on speed dial and he already knows something bad has happened. He must know, because he tells me to stay precisely where I am and out of sight, before he hangs up.
The old lady moves the phone away and points to a door at the back of the store, her eyes slowly following the movement of her finger.
“Best you stay back there,” she says. “That’s your safety until your carer arrives.”
I almost stumble over my own shadow as I turn away. My actions are automatic, my mind numb as I force myself to walk towards the door. Nausea threatens to overwhelm me, but I push it down with determination.
“This is not real,” I repeat to myself as I step into the room and look around. “This can’t be real.” The small sitting area is a carbon copy of Uncle Mason’s living room. I feel like I’ve stepped into an alternate universe and all I’m waiting on now is for daylight to come and my father to wake me and tell me this was all just a bad dream.
Pacing back and forth, my anxiety consumes me. Thoughts of revenge flood my mind as I plan how I will make my sisters pay for what they've done. They will suffer as I have suffered. I will cut their hair, break their nails, and force them to wear hand-me-downs to teach them that there are consequences for their actions. I will wring their grimy little necks once I get my hands on them.