12. IN TEN YEARS TIME
IN TEN YEARS TIME
According to Olivia, mothers lie. They say anxiety isn’t real.
They use silence as a sword. They say you’re making it all up.
They compare your inescapable inner pain to theirs.
After you turn eight, they gawk at your body and prod at your arms and belly and squeeze at your face, pull at your hair.
They treat you like an inanimate object.
Not even a doll. You become a thing. A possession. A vessel. A void.
According to Olivia, the role of the daughter is to escape by any means necessary.
Ten more years until she gets to the magic number.
Ten more years until she can finally be free.
Olivia has learned that mothers are swarmed by outbursts.
She knows how to clean up after the violence to make it seem like it never happened.
She knows to stay silent. She knows to lock herself in her room under a blanket fort with her books and a flashlight.
Every so often, she begs the house to look over her, to keep her safe.
The house responds by dimming the lights and opening the windows to Olivia's room as if to say, you can go anytime you'd like.
According to Olivia, making a wish should be simple.
Olivia wishes for things like sour candy, ice cream, tres leches, and books on bird migration, portals, monsters, and more than anything she wishes she could understand why she feels a deep demoralizing fear when her own mother tells her stories about daughters who should be seen but not heard.