Chapter 7
Chapter seven
Haelyn
The chill bit through my thin jacket as I stepped off the bus and crossed the parking lot toward the grocery store, but I didn’t complain. It was the kind of cold that reminded me that I was free.
It was September. I made it home just in time for the holiday season. I had no family to visit, no one to greet me with sweet potato pie or wrap me in a hug, but it still felt better than being trapped behind Willowgate’s sterile walls during the holidays.
In there, we got turkey loaf and watery mashed potatoes served on beige trays.
A dusty tree sat in the corner of the day room, decorated by staff who didn’t care and patients who couldn’t.
They played the same scratched-up CD every year—off-key carols echoing through the halls like a bad joke.
And if you were lucky, your meds would hit early enough to knock you out before the melancholy settled in too deep.
Now the cool air didn’t come with locked doors or mandatory group therapy; it came with possibility.
And that was more than I’d had in years.
I pushed through the sliding doors, and it was strange how something as simple as a grocery store could feel like a new planet. The smell of produce, the hum of refrigerators, and the sound of kids whining for cereal all felt too alive… too normal.
I stood in front of a shelf of pasta sauce, trying to decide between marinara and three-cheese when I realized my hands were shaking.
I took a slow breath and whispered under my breath, “You’re fine, Haelyn… just shop like a regular person.”
A voice cut through the air behind me. “Haelyn? Haelyn Thibodeaux?”
My spine stiffened.
For a second, I thought I was hearing things.
Maybe someone from Willowgate… maybe my own memory playing tricks.
But when I turned around, I froze.
The woman standing there had disbelief painted all over her face, mirroring mine. It took me a second to match the voice to the face.
“Oh my God! It is you!” Talia shrieked, pushing her cart closer. “Haelyn, girl, where have you been?! You just disappeared off the face of the earth!”
“T–Talia?” I breathed, the name slipping out like a memory I hadn’t dusted off in years.
Talia Pippin.
We’d lived in the same foster home in Baton Rouge, back when I still believed in happy endings and new beginnings.
She grinned wide, eyes full of warmth and curiosity. “Girl, it’s been forever! What… fourteen years? You look good! I can’t believe this!”
I smiled, but it didn’t quite reach my eyes. “Yeah… it’s been a minute.”
Talia glanced down at the modest basket in my hands filled with bread, bacon, eggs, fruit, and a pack of instant noodles.
The kind of groceries that whispered, “I’m starting over.”
“So, where you been hiding, girl? You dropped off the map! Nobody knew what happened.”
Lots of people knew, sis… just not you.
When I was sixteen, our foster mom died, and after that, we got separated. Talia went one way… I went another… and somewhere along the road we lost connection.
I hesitated. My mind raced for a half-truth that didn’t sound broken.
“Well, after we got separated, I moved in with a family that stayed in Breaux Bridge.”
That was the truth.
“That far?”
“Yeah… just an hour away.”
“Were they good to you?” she asked cautiously, her tone soft.
“Much better than the one we had.”
A knowing silence fell between us, like we were both standing in the same haunted hallway of our past, peeking into rooms that still held echoes of our childhood fears.
“But once I turned eighteen, I met someone and moved in with him. Unfortunately, things didn’t work out with us so now I’m here… for good.”
“What made you want to move here, though?”
Damn… why is she asking so many questions at once? I wasn’t prepared for this kind of reunion.
My pulse spiked.
What should I say?
Like old friends with bad timing, the voices eased back into place as if they’d been on lunch break and just clocked back in.
Keep it simple and soft. People don’t need your truth.
No, keep it quiet! Too many questions mean she’s fishing! Don’t give her anything she can use! Protect yourself, girl.
But it’s Talia.
And? People switch up every day, Haelyn!
It’s been fourteen years since y’all last seen each other, so imagine how much has probably changed about her.
Just lie cute and keep it moving, babe.
I inhaled slowly and nodded like I agreed with myself because I did.
The truth was messy, complicated, and dangerous in the wrong hands.
“Just a change of scenery,” I lied smoothly.
Talia tilted her head, studying my face as though she could see the pieces I didn’t say out loud.
“What about you? How did you end up here?” I asked, hoping to shift the spotlight.
“Well… I ended up getting adopted, girl! Lucky me!”
Yeah, lucky you, I didn’t voice the words; I just swallowed the small lump that rose in my throat.
“Oh, my God they were the best parents ever!” she continued bragging. “I wish they could’ve been my birth parents!”
“Wait… you said, were. What happened to them?”
A solemn look washed over her face like a storm cloud crossing the sun.
“They were in a terrible accident two years ago. I’d give anything to still have them here with me, ya’ know?”
I nodded slowly, offering sympathy I couldn’t quite feel.
I didn’t know what it was like to mourn real, unconditional love. My last foster parents were gentle, respectful, and generous with food and clothes, but there were two other kids in the house also. We all had to share the same love, attention, and space. Nobody was mine.
“Well, look, I gotta run,” she announced. “But we gotta talk soon! I wanna hear more about this ex of yours, and how life has been treating you since we last spoke. We need drinks, food… a whole catch-up session. Actually, are you free tomorrow?”
I blinked, surprised by how natural the invitation felt… and how badly I wanted to say yes.
“Tomorrow works,” I finally replied, forcing a real smile.
“Bet.” Talia pulled her phone from her purse. “Let’s exchange numbers before you vanish again.”
We traded phones.
That little phone was charging back on the counter when I arrived at the apartment Dr. Loomis ‘temporary’ gifted me.
The phone felt like a lifeline. Now, standing in the middle of a grocery store exchanging numbers with someone who used to braid my hair and steal my socks, it felt like a bridge back to being… human.
“Okay, Miss Haelyn, tomorrow… noon… my treat! And don’t you flake! I’ve been dying to know where your pretty self has been!”
I chuckled softly. “Wouldn’t miss it.”
We hugged briefly. It was awkward, warm, and full of unspoken things.
“It’s so good to see you, Haelyn. Until tomorrow, take care.”
“Likewise.”
When Talia walked away, I just stood there, hands gripping the cart handle.
Normal people make plans. Normal people have friends. Normal people aren’t haunted by what they’ve done.
I stared down at the jar in my hand—three-cheese, I’d decided—and whispered, “I guess I can pretend to be normal for one more day.
***
The clinking of silverware and low hum of conversation filled the small diner as R it just means quiet.
I blinked twice, steadying myself as the chatter in the diner seemed to fade, replaced by the soft hum of fluorescent lights; a sound that always reminded me of Willowgate’s hallways.
Talia leaned forward. “You ever think about… Dottie?”
My expression hardened as I lifted my palm, signaling for Talia to stop.
“Don’t,” I said quietly. “Just… don’t.”
But the damage was done. My mind had already gone back there… back to that house.
Dottie was our foster mom, and she ran that house with the strictness of a prison warden and the judgment of a church mother. We were up by five every morning for prayer, and breakfast was eaten in complete silence like talking over grits was a punishable offense.
“Idle tongues breed demons,” Dottie called herself preaching while smacking her wooden spoon against the counter.
No TV was allowed unless it was gospel, no music unless it was hymns, and no food unless it was earned.
Baths were timed, sheets were inspected, and smiles were optional…
but obedience was mandatory. And when we disobeyed—oh, when we disobeyed—she had that little closet in the hallway that was dark and damp with tons of bible verses taped to the walls like wallpaper.
“Read until you remember who you belong to,” she would say before locking the door.
Talia and I would sit there for hours, whispering verses we barely understood, voices shaking, and stomachs growling. Sometimes Dottie forgot us in there overnight. Then there were other times, I don’t think she forgot, she just wanted us to think she did.
The woman was evil wrapped in holy words… but she was sloppy, too.
The house had a big rat that ran throughout the kitchen every night with the confidence of a man late for absolutely nothing.
Dottie kept a box of rat poison on the top shelf and would always warn us, “Touch that, and I’ll feed it to you instead.”
One night, while we listened to the rat knock over something in the pantry for the third time, I whispered, “Maybe we should stop trying to kill the rat and start aiming higher.”