Reasons for Recovery
Page 7
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The dinner table was quiet as Mama handed me a bowl of soup. Of course, she did not cook the soup. It was the cheap soup you can get from the dollar store. Mama believed it was cheaper to eat that every night, rather than cook. It made me wonder why I was a size five if that was all we ate.
Mama began to shake and hyperventilate, as I did not look her in the eyes. “Are you going to speak to me at all?” she said.
“I’m not intending to,” I said.
“Listen Cassie, I’m sorry about everything…”
No, she is not! She wants you dead just like me. I want you dead. Cassie, do not listen to Mandy.
“I don’t know how the gas was on. I would never do anything like that to us,” she whispered. “I love you.” She does not love you; no one loves you, Cassie.
“Mama, I know you're lying because for a fact you don't even use the stove!”
“Exactly, then why would I turn it on?”
“I mean, you don't ever use it to cook, so you couldn't happen to leave it on by accident. I never touch the stove, so I couldn’t leave it on. It was you!”
Ha, you guys are such losers!
I began to breathe heavy as the voices got louder. Mandy’s voice was the loudest and strongest. It seemed like she was right there in my ear, shouting until she couldn’t shout anymore. And daddy’s voice always stayed the same, faint but very hearable.
“Mama, I can’t talk anymore. I’m sleepy.”
“But you didn’t even eat—”
“Just let me sleep.”
“Okay…”
I walked into my room and sat on my mattress, tracing my finger over the cut that was already healing into an ugly scar. It would just be another scar that had a bad memory written all over it. It was right beneath the tens of cuts where I nearly ended it all. It was there because of guilt...
About a week ago, the police had came to my house and told me Mandy’s body was found. At first, I thought they were going to tell me Mama was killed. She didn't come home that night, which made me worry, so when ten policemen came to my door and took off their hats—I had the worse feeling.
They broke the news to me slowly, first hinting that Mandy was okay—as if they found her alive. Then, they began to speak of her in past tense and then I realized she did not make it.
“Mandy is dead,” one of the cops finally said after minutes of sidetracking. “We need you to come down to the mortuary. Her family needs you there—this is too hard for them.”
My heart had dropped to my feet because all I could remember was her voice on the other end of the phone, telling me to pick her up because she had a bad gut feeling.
“Pick me up now! Greg is going totally psycho on me. He bit me just a second ago. Now, he is in the bathroom doing god knows what—”
“I’m busy,” I had snapped.
“But, Cassie…I really need you.”
“Well, be a lot nicer next time,” I said and hung up the phone. And that would be the last time I would hear her angel-like voice.
That phone call had police all over my nuts because Mandy had called me from her cell phone just minutes before she was decapitated. Of course, I looked guilty because I couldn't tell the police what out last phone call was about. I didn't want to tell them the truth, how I ignored her.
I shiver just thinking about how she was murdered. She didn't leave this world at peace. Word is, she died a gruesome painful murder—a murder that may have been avoided.