Chapter Five
The Control
A
s heavy as home feels, my friends are the light I cling to. Malaysia, Jordan, Samantha, and Jessica—are the reason my life feels livable. We wander the mall for hours, slipping through stores, scoping out cute boys, letting it wash out everything else.
They look like the kind of girls parents brag about—polite, respectful, good in school. So my mom never questions them; they breeze right through her ‘are they going to get pregnant in high school’ inspection.
If she knew the truth about them, she’d loose her mind so fast she’d need a second one as backup. They are not as innocent as they look, I mean they are my friends.
Nothing pulls me in like the makeup counters—it’s always my little escape. The tall sleek chairs, the huge mirrors, the women dusting new shades across our lids, lining our lips in colors we’re too scared to buy ourselves but bold enough to try just for a few hours.
In those moments, I get to see that girl I wish I could be
all the time—bold and unapologetically me.
The only problem is I never have any money to buy anything. My friends live these TV-perfect lives—two parents, reliable jobs, no stress about bills. They swipe their Amex cards without blinking, sometimes they’ll even grab something for me too.
Other times, it’s on me. Heart hammering, fingers shaking as I slide a gloss or mini palette into my bag when no one’s looking.
They never make me feel guilty—they just let me live without apology.
What really surprises me is how all their moms adore me. Even Jordan’s mom loves me like she raised me herself.
She’s always giving me an allowance whenever I stay more than a couple days. She even told me once she wanted to adopt me.
I wish my mom would just let her.
But knowing how controlling she is, she’ll never let that happen. She can’t stand the idea of anyone stepping in where she won’t.
Jordan’s mom is always hugging me and calling me beautiful like it’s a fact, not a question.
My own mom never even calls me beautiful. But her mom buys me stuff like I live with them—she even takes us out to dinner over an hour away, just because.
She always makes love look so easy and natural. The exact opposite of what I get at home.
A part of me wants to be jealous—of their bigger houses, their moms; the stability they don’t even realize is gold.
But I shove it down.
I’m just grateful I get to even taste what it would be like to live their shoes, even if I can’t.
? ? ?
Makeup started out as fun, but then quickly became therapy before I even noticed—color, glitter, and control wrapped around the parts of me that feel shaky.
I can spend hours blending shades until they melt together just right, painting a version of myself the world can’t recognize.
My friends know it too—they always beg me to do their prom and formal looks, and I never say no. Even on nights out, I’m the one with a brush in hand, turning all of us into something bold and untouchable.
There’s something about that moment—when the liner’s razor-clean, the gloss hits right, and I see the final look—that makes me feel powerful.
Like I finally control something.
Makeup lets me decide how the world sees me, even if my world at home refuses to.
And my mom hates it.
Every morning, like clockwork, she pushes her head through my doorway, just staring at me until I notice her. And before I can say anything to she shuts me down every time.
“Your makeup doesn’t match your skin. It looks caked. You think that’s going to make you look better and it’s not.”
She never wears anything more than mascara and lipstick, but suddenly she’s a beauty expert when it comes to makeup.
It’s not just her words—she’ll just snatch my makeup away whenever she feels like it. Like it’s her personal sport, to strip me of the anything that makes me feel good about myself—tearing me down, piece by piece, until all that’s left is whatever version of me she can control.
It’s never about eyeliner or foundation.
It’s about power. Control.
And I’m getting tired—tired of her stupid fucking rules, tired of her trying to erase the one thing that’s actually mine.
? ? ?
This summer is brutal—103 degrees, the kind of heat that sticks to your skin like punishment. And while everyone else is living in their pools, I’m stuck in summer school.
Three straight weeks of intense workouts that feel like boot camp. Thankfully I only have three days left. One more regular year before graduation.
School and happiness never belonged in the same sentence for me, but the closer I get to finishing, the closer I get to leaving this house.
And I can’t wait to get out of this hellhole.
That’s the only thing I’m chasing—freedom and happiness.
I push through the front door, passing the glowing TV in the living room, sitting between two stiff white leather couches. Down the hall, my room is the first on the right, mom’s at the end, Sonny’s room off to the left, and the bathroom smack in the middle of us all like a battleground.
Sharing one bathroom is hell, but at least I’ve got my own room. We only moved into this house a year ago, and already it feels like a cage that I’ve been locked in forever.
I drop my backpack on the bed, kicking off my Vans, just to stand back up to line them neatly in the closet—right next to the mirror that never lets me forget anything.
And today, I’m drained.
Summer school is five hours a day, five days a week and it’s eating me alive. Not just the workouts, but the fake small talk and pretending to care students I won’t care about a year from now.
I barely let my head hit the wall before my door flies open.
My mom stands, leaning on the frame of my door, arms crossed like a cop waiting to interrogate me. “Do you have anything to tell me?” She demands, her lips pressed tightly, eyes locked on me.
Frowning, I think fast, because I’m really not in the mood for her bullshit today. “Uhh… I don’t think so?”
I already know the drill. She snoops through my phone whenever I’m asleep or in the shower, always looking for something that has to do with boys.
I swear it’s like she wants me to like girls or something.
But as long as I’m not knocked up, locked up, or strung out somewhere, she has no reason to worry.
“Are you sure?” Her voice sharpens. “Because I saw the shit on your phone last night. And I could’ve sworn I already told you no boys until you’re eighteen—but here you go again, thinking you can do whatever the fuck you want.
How many times do I have to keep telling you the same thing, you’re not going to get it until I beat it in you huh? ”
I roll my eyes—she’s so delusional. Nobody my age waits until they’re eighteen. If she had any clue of what I’ve already been doing, she’d be dragging me out by my hair right now.
She thinks she knows me—but she has no idea who I am outside these walls. And if she ever found out, it’ll ruin her and her precious image.
“I thought so,” she snaps, charging at me before shoving me onto the bed. Then she’s on top of me, pinning my wrists down with all her weight. My arms burn under her grip.
I jolt, pushing my knees up, and shoving against her stomach until she stumbles back into the dresser, barely catching herself before my TV tips toward her.
Her face shifts—and I know that look.
To her, I just hit her. I can’t even defend myself without her twisting it into me being the problem starter.
I sit up, my chest heaving, when her fist slams into my eye. The world flashes white. Pain rips through me, hot and blinding, and tears spring before I can even register the sting.
I’ve been whooped before—plenty of times—but this? This isn’t that.
This is the type of shit parents get arrested for.
Fucking child abuse.
My brain can’t catch up to what my body already knows is coming. The shock hits first, but I’m not even sure why I’m shocked. There’s been too many times she’s told me she’ll fight me outside like I’m a bitch off the street.
I guess I just never expected it—like I still hoped, somewhere deep down, we wouldn’t never get to this point.
But it did.
I clutch my eye, body shaking as I try to hold back the sobs clawing their way out of me. But the pain’s too much—the hurt runs deeper than I can swallow—and the tears won’t stop.
She storms out, only to come back with a cold towel seconds later.
Without a word, she presses it against my eye, my bruised skin throbbing from the pressure. I can feel the puffiness building around my eye as I blink, trying to see through it.
I’ve never been punched in the face before—let alone in the eye. And for the first time in my life, she’s silent—and that alone tells me she knows she went too far.
She slumps into the chair in the corner of my room, her shoulders heavy, the weight of it all finally catching up to her. No screaming, no blaming—just one tired sigh.
“I hope you know you’re not going back to summer school,” she states, like she’s half trying to convince herself.
My chest tightens. “But I need those credits. If I don’t finish, I won’t graduate early.”
Her gaze flicks over, stern and worn. “You’ll still graduate. Just not early. You’ll walk with your class like everybody else.”
“I didn’t start summer school to not finish.
” My voice shaking with fury. “I’ve been working my ass off just trying to get ahead.
All my friends are graduating together—I don’t want to be the only one who isn’t.
And now I can’t because you want to fucking hit me and then act embarrassed by it—I can just say Sonny and I were fighting. ”
“What the hell did I say! I’m not going to have the school calling me or the police coming to my fucking door acting like you’re getting fucking abused.”
But I pretty much am.
She perches on the arm of the chair, her tone low yet sharp. “Graduating early doesn’t change shit. You just can’t stop trying to be like everyone else can you? God how did I raise such a fucking follower.”