24. NIGHTMARES
NIGHTMARES
Isela thinks about death after minor inconveniences.
It used to happen with the eldest child and the chillona child on a daily basis.
After feeding the girls dinner, when she finally sat down to eat, both girls watched her with a needy hunger in their eyes, they prodded at her food, asked for a bite, asked why they couldn’t have any.
Their insatiable greed made Isela want to puke.
Isela imagined her head exploding, leaving pieces of her brain all over the kitchen walls.
A splash of red to go with the winter dining set adorned with paintings of male cardinals.
When Isela craved one minute of quiet to herself, one of the girls inevitably interrupted her.
A guarantee of the day. No moment left unbothered.
Isela imagined taking a screwdriver to the middle of her forehead until she reached her meaty brain and then picking at the bleeding hole until she blacked out. There was not a day where she was not interrupted in some capacity.
It all adds up.
The seconds lost.
The hours warping together.
The fleeting thoughts.
Forgetting the little things.
Over and over.
Every single day.
Thoughts lost forever because children don’t have the ability to understand what wanting peace is.
They just want.
They just take.
These girls were leeches.
Bloodsuckers.
Isela’s nightmares have returned. Ever since she found The Inflorescence, she has night terrors.
Maggots invade every crevice of her body.
Little red foxes consume her face. Her so-called abandoned daughters gnaw at her toes and then eat her bit by bit.
She wakes up sopping in sweat. She wakes up screaming.
Or she thinks she’s screaming, but no one ever hears her.
The only time she feels some type of peace is when she’s inside of The Inflorescence.
It’s a rough trade off but she does it anyway.
The Inflorescence treats her as though she were a pest. She hasn’t slept well in months.
It all adds up.
The brain fuzz.
The memories she isn’t sure are real anymore.
The dreamscapes lost.
The Inflorescence gives and takes and gives and takes and Isela doesn’t know how to stop it from ravaging her mind.
Isela wanders through the backyard and into the darkness of the forest behind the house.
Lightning streaks the purple sky and Isela’s frantic.
She’s sprinting along the river’s course with wind bursting through her hair and into her ears.
In a lavender nightgown, she stumbles over her feet and finds a peculiar tree with ribbons tied around the trunk and bells jingling from the branches above.
She crawls to base of the tree and sees a pile of envelopes and strange ceramic creatures.
She recognizes the writing. A hard pain radiates in her guts.
Letty has been writing to Olivia. About what?
The letters are soggy from the rain. Isela crushes them in her hands until they become mush.
She runs back toward the house. She imagines the house filled with splatters of Olivia’s blood. The tension in her chest eases up at the thought of a bloodied girl.
What is the purpose of a daughter who will only end up hating you?
She wants to strangle her.
She wants to make her disappear.
She wants Olivia to repent.
As Isela steps inside the house, covered in rain and mud, she can feel The Inflorescence calling to her.
It beckons her with red and orange light and a trail of marigold petals leads her to the mossy door.
As she follows the trail, she pauses for a moment at Olivia’s door and the urge to wake her up makes her tremble.
She clenches her jaw and balls up her fists.
She wants nothing more than to make Olivia suffer for the secrets she’s hiding.
Betrayal from a daughter is imminent. Isela knows this. Instead, she chooses the moss and spends the rest of the night inside of The Inflorescence surrounded by fog.