Vega's Captive Witness

1. Sonnet Ellison

SONNET ELLISON

“Happy birthday to me. Happy birthday to me...”

I leaned over the small breakfast Danish on my counter and watched the single candle flicker while I finished singing.

Buying an entire cake for one person felt wasteful, so every year I chose something small from the bakery section and pushed a candle into the center.

That morning, it was a cheese Danish with strawberry drizzle.

I closed my eyes, made a wish, and blew out the flame.

Singing happy birthday to myself had become a ritual when I was five years old.

That was the first birthday I could recall, and I remembered spending it alone.

On my birthday, it was more important that my mother work than celebrate it with me.

She was a struggling single mother that seemed to never be able to catch a break.

I never got birthday presents, let alone a birthday party.

She couldn’t afford daycare or babysitters, so that also meant that I was home alone on my birthday.

When my mother first surrendered me to the state, I believed she couldn’t afford to keep me and had made the hardest decision of her life.

The older I got, the less genuine that explanation felt.

Over the years, I’d watched single mothers online and at work struggle with more than one child and still choose to keep their families together.

That forced me to admit my mother hadn’t only been overwhelmed.

She’d also grown tired of the responsibility that came with raising me.

Even before she gave me up, I’d spent more time alone than with her. Her attention went to her boyfriends, friends, and whatever club she planned to be in that night. Once she realized men would give her the money she needed, keeping them interested became her priority. Not me.

Once she surrendered me to the state, the group home I lived in never celebrated my birthday.

I wasn’t even sure the people running it knew when it was, or if they knew and just decided it wasn’t important.

Either way, birthdays taught me early that waiting for other people to make me feel special was just a surefire way to end up disappointed. So, I made sure to celebrate myself.

I went from home to home until I aged out of foster care. By then, I had learned not to depend on promises or people. Stability was something I created for myself because nobody had ever handed it to me.

I wasn’t completely alone. I had Dior in my life now.

He made sure to call at midnight, sing badly on purpose, and show up later that day with balloons, liquor, and a gift.

He loved me in every way a best friend could.

But he wasn’t family. That absence always became more apparent on my birthday.

I had no parents, no grandparents asking what I wanted for dinner, no cousins filling a group chat, and no aunts and uncles insisting I visit so they could slip money into my hand.

My mother’s parents had died before I was born. She never told me who my father was. Conversations I’d overheard between her and her friends had led me to believe that my mother was with a married man who wanted nothing to do with her or me once I was born.

I cut into the Danish and lifted the first bite to my mouth.

I could feel the sadness ready to ruin the day if I gave it permission.

But I didn’t. My mother had already taken enough from me.

The foster homes had taken what was left.

I had decided a long time ago that I would be happy regardless.

I refused to let the circumstances of my childhood define me.

I wouldn’t surrender my happiness to the families who walked past me during open houses and chose another child.

I wouldn’t let abandonment decide what kind of woman I became.

Nobody had selected me. So, I selected myself. I earned scholarships, collected degrees like Pokémon cards, built a career, and created a home where I never had to wonder whether I belonged. Every good thing in my life existed because I refused to become what my past predicted.

I raised my coffee cup toward the empty kitchen. “To me.”

The smile that followed was real. I might not have been surrounded by family, but I was alive, accomplished, and happy, and that was worth celebrating.

“This is what you wear on your birthday?” Dior looked me up and down with an appalled frown as I walked towards him in the restaurant. He made no effort to hide his disappointment as he stood near the hostess stand.

I glanced down at myself. “What’s wrong with this?”

I wore an olive-green pencil skirt that hugged my wide hips and stopped below my knees, with a slit in the front that made it easier to walk.

I had tucked a white button-down blouse into the high waist and finished it with a slim brown belt, gold bracelets, hoop earrings, and brown heels. My structured handbag matched my shoes.

I thought it was a cute but professional look for my birthday. Yet, according to Dior’s expression, I had arrived dressed for jury duty.

“It’s giving regional manager,” he frowned.

I shrugged with a giggle. “Well, I am working today.”

“You could have still dressed like it was your birthday, instead of dressing like you’re about to give your dissertation." He stepped closer and attempted to unbutton my shirt.

I slapped his hand away. “Stop!”

“I’m trying to give the people something.”

“The people don’t need anything from me.”

“You have cleavage. You should acknowledge it occasionally.”

“My coworkers don’t need to see my cleavage.”

Dior rolled his eyes and linked his arm through mine. “I guess this is cute for somebody who plans to spend her birthday updating spreadsheets and pretending she doesn’t know what dick is.”

“I don’t update spreadsheets all day.”

“You analyze data. Spreadsheets gots to have something to do with that.”

I laughed as the hostess led us toward a table near the windows.

Dior had insisted that I take a long lunch so we could celebrate my birthday. I had already told him I planned to work overtime that evening, and he reacted as if I had announced that I was volunteering for prison.

The restaurant was my compromise. It was close enough to my office that I wouldn’t lose half the afternoon sitting in traffic. More importantly, they served strong cocktails.

Dior waited until we were seated before returning to the argument he had started through text that morning. “We’re going out this weekend, even if I have to drag you out.”

“No, we aren’t.”

“Yes, we are.”

I waved him off. “I don’t like clubs.”

Clubs had always felt like rooms full of people performing for strangers.

Everybody dressed to impress the opposite sex, hoping someone liked what they saw enough to take them home when the night ended.

I wasn’t interested in being some guy’s random hookup or story he told his friends the next morning.

“That’s because you’ve never been to the right club,” Dior tried to argue.

“I’ve been to clubs with you.”

Dior groaned dramatically. “Urgh, don’t remind me. You stood against the wall clutching your purse like somebody’s auntie.”

“I was protecting our belongings while you basically fucked strangers on the dance floor.”

He giggled devilishly. “I was networking.”

“You had your tongue in somebody’s mouth.”

He shrugged, still wearing that sneaky smirk. “Networking can be intimate.”

I opened the menu to hide my smile. “I don’t want to spend my birthday weekend in a dark room with sticky floors, overpriced drinks, and men pressing themselves against me without permission.”

“That is why we get a section.”

“A section is still inside a club.”

Dior leaned across the table. “Sonnet, you are twenty-three years old. You are supposed to be outside.”

I shrugged, smiling. “I leave my home every day.”

He rolled his eyes dramatically. “Work doesn’t count.”

“I would rather go to a nice restaurant, order drinks, and hear the person sitting across from me without screaming.”

“That is not a birthday celebration. That is a business dinner.”

“It’s what I enjoy.”

He scoffed, arguing, “It’s lame.”

I shrugged a shoulder. “It’s peaceful.”

“It’s geriatric.”

Dior and I had been best friends since college, even though we had almost nothing in common beyond loyalty and an appreciation for good food.

He had studied fashion design and treated every hallway like a runway. Dior believed clothes should announce who you were before you spoke. He loved crowds, attention, loud music, and any event that gave him a reason to put on something dramatic.

I majored in health informatics before earning my master’s in data analytics. I preferred numbers because they behaved logically. Data didn’t lie unless someone manipulated it, and even then, the inconsistencies usually left a trail.

People were less predictable.

Dior could enter a room full of strangers and leave with three invitations to some elite social events, two phone numbers, and enough personal tea to ruin somebody’s relationship. I needed time to observe people before deciding whether I wanted them near me.

Somehow, our differences worked, though.

He snatched the menu from my hands and placed it on the table. “You deserve to do something big for your birthday.”

“I’m having lunch with my best friend.”

He dramatically rolled his eyes. “That isn’t big.”

“It’s big to me.”

Dior’s eyes stayed on mine. He knew birthdays were complicated for me. He understood that celebration could make absence feel louder, and that I preferred keeping the day controlled rather than building expectations other people might disappoint.

Still, Dior never let me pretend the day didn’t matter.

“We can go to dinner this weekend,” I offered. “Somewhere nice. We’ll dress up, have drinks, and stay out past ten.”

His lips twisted. “Eleven.”

“Ten-thirty.”

“Midnight.”

“You’re negotiating in the wrong direction.”

He sighed dramatically. “Fine. Eleven.”

“And no club afterward.”

“I’m not agreeing to that.”

“Then dinner ends at ten.”

“You’re a bitch on your birthday.”