RECTIFY
A REDEMPTION NOVEL
MARLEY VALENTINE
Copyright © 2019 by Marley Valentine
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This novel is a work of fiction. While reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to people either living or deceased, business establishments, events or locales is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
Any trademarks, service marks, product names or named features are assumed to be the property of their respective owners, and are only used for reference. There is no implied endorsement if any of these terms are used.
Cover design by PopKitty Designs
Edited By Ellie McLove at My Brother’s Editor
Proofreading by Hawkeyes Proofing
Dedication
Team Sasha
“Broken girls blossom into warriors.”
— Unknown
“We’re a mess you and I, but the truth is, you captivate me in ways no soul ever will”
Perry Poetry
Contents
Prologue
1. Sasha
2. Jay
3. Sasha
4. Jay
5. Sasha
6. Jay
7. Sasha
8. Sasha
9. Jay
10. Sasha
11. Sasha
12. Jay
13. Sasha
14. Jay
15. Sasha
16. Jay
17. Sasha
18. Jay
19. Sasha
20. Jay
Epilogue
RECLAIM
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
REVIVE
PROLOGUE
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Prologue
JAY
Dropping the pen onto the pad of paper, I sink back into the rickety, wooden chair that accompanies the lone fold out table. The house is empty. Every surface scrubbed clean, the old, stale smell of alcohol and cigarettes is now masked by a pungent overdose of bleach and fresh paint.
While everything in my childhood home looks and feels different, the new sterile and lifeless walls aren’t able to erase the dark memories that still dance around like shadows taunting me.
It’s been years since I’ve had any reason to be here, and for a while, I convinced myself there wouldn’t be anything that could bring me back.
At twenty-five leaving this place was the easiest thing I’d ever done. Walking away from the cycle of failures that was my life, I became focused on the new possibilities. My future was a blank canvas. I made plans to fill the empty road ahead of me with experiences so different, it would be unrecognisable.
Here, at home, I was the guy everyone loathed. The guy everyone feared, and I loved it. When people said keep your friends close but keep your enemies closer, I was the enemy they were talking about. Loyalty came at a price, and lucky for me, everyone was willing to pay.
I thought there was nothing more important than being at the top of the food chain. I was drenched in hate and vengeance, convinced I was the only person who had the right to own those feelings. The only person who had earned the right to flaunt them. They were my signature. My armour. My motivation.
In these four walls insults hung over me like a black cloud, and out on the streets, I expelled them on to everyone I came in contact with. I projected whenever I could. Lying, teasing, and seducing, everything was a game; until I met someone who didn't want to play.
Life fooled me into thinking I was the king of my world, and whatever I laid my eyes on was mine. I was invincible. Untouchable. Unbreakable.
Until I wasn't.
With translucent skin and hair as black as night, she was the painful dose of truth that dusted my life of lies. With her, it wasn’t about how pretty she was, or how hard I fell. It wasn’t that she was an angel, and everything about me would taint her. It wasn’t even the fact that if I pushed hard enough, I could’ve had her. Lured her into hell and enjoyed it. It was the realisation that everything I’d done before her, was for nothing.
I wasn’t happy.
I wasn’t loved.
I wasn’t anyone that would ever be worth remembering.
Footsteps sound from the hallway, and the plethora of mispronounced words out of a child's mouth follow. I rise and watch the woman walking toward me. Her hand holding on to the centre of my universe, her face looking down at her in wonder. Meeting them in the middle of the hollowed out space, I crouch and open my arms. She looks up and leaps toward me. She’s all bouncing curls, and loud giggles, as she shouts, “New home. New home.”
I catch her and hold on tight. My lungs expand with the scent of innocence and love, while my eyes find those of the woman who lured me back to hell, and whisper into her hair. “I hope not, baby. I hope not.”
1
Sasha
“Dakota,” I shout out from the kitchen. “You better get up and start getting ready unless you want to miss the bus and be late for school.” I mindlessly stir the sugar into my tea while my other hand holds my Kindle, switching between reading and watching the minutes pass on the microwave clock. Every morning I wake up a little earlier than her, desperately trying to steal some quiet moments with my fast growing daughter. It’s subtle, or I hope to be, and more often than not, not very successful. I end up sitting alone in silence and eating up a few chapters of whatever it is I’m reading before work.
I don’t want to smother her, but I don’t want to miss one single moment. When I was her age I was already a mother, my childhood had come and gone faster than I had ever anticipated. And in the blink of an eye everything I thought I had planned out changed. While I don’t have an ounce of regret when it comes to my daughter and being a teenage mum, I believe I’m still entitled to want for her the simplicity of life that I never had.
She shuffles out of her bedroom with her eyes barely open, her hair a bird’s nest, and the legs of her pyjama pants rising to the middle of her calves. I smile at her as she walks toward me, a dishevelled mixture of somewhat tired and refreshed. Like she’s still wearing yesterday’s experiences, but eager for those of today. I count my blessings that I haven’t raised her to be too naive, but she’s unflinchingly inquisitive, her fear radar almost non-existent, and that’s what scares me the most.
Sliding on to the stool on the other side of the counter, she burrows her face in her hands and groans. “I can’t wait to never have to go to school again.”
“I thought you loved school.”
“I do, but sleep is coming in a close second.”
“Spoken like a true teenager.” Placing down my Kindle, I pick up my tea and take a quick sip before turning my back and getting her breakfast organised. “You’ll realise soon enough that sleep’s overrated.”
She scoffs, “You’re obviously doing it wrong.”
One by one, I place the bowl, cereal, and milk in front of her. Opening the cutlery drawer, I grab a tablespoon and hand it to her. “Are you ever going to get sick of eating this stuff?”
She takes her first mouthful with an exaggerated crunch before swallowing and answering. “That would be a negative.”
Dakota has eaten that stuff every morning for five years straight, her answer not
surprising me in the slightest. Even her food choices make her the easiest child that ever walked the earth.
“You coming home normal time today?” I wait for her to talk in between mouthfuls, fitting in as much conversation we can before we both run off for the day.
“No, I’m going to go to Emma’s after school today.”
“You guys have a project together?”
“No, I’m going to listen to her whine about her mom and dad’s divorce.”
“That’s nice of you.” I take the last sip of my tea and rinse the cup off in the sink. “But don’t get behind in your school work, okay?”
“I know. I just feel bad for her, and we do have a few group projects that we need to finish.” Holding up the bowl to her mouth, her eyes look over at me before she drinks the leftover milk. “If I don’t make sure she doesn’t fall behind nobody will.”
The next eighteen months is all Dakota has left of school. Just under two years worth of assignments, exams and crazy deadlines she needs to meet in order to graduate, and somehow she still manages to make her friends a priority.
In our house, finishing school has always been non-negotiable, and one of the very few expectations I place on her. It’s not enough to stay there ’til the end, she has to put her all in it.
Amongst all the chaos of falling pregnant with my best friend's baby, school was a constant for us. As parents, we started off hell-bent on not using our baby as an excuse, and my mum made sure we didn’t veer off the plan.
The most supportive parent a broken down, pregnant teenager could ever ask for, my mum made sure Jagger, Dakota’s father stayed in school, while I worked my arse off and graduated via correspondence. I owe the first few years of Dakota’s life to my mother, and even after when Jagger went to jail; she was there, picking me up whenever I wanted to fall.
There’s no way I could’ve set myself up without her. The life I’ve so proudly given Dakota never would’ve happened without my mum.
“Honey, I’m sorry to cut you off, but I have to go,” I say, twisting my wrist so my watch faces up. I quickly check the time anticipating that I’m seconds away from having to leave. “Call me when you get to Emma’s okay. I’m not sure if I have to stay back at work or not, but I’ll speak to your dad and let you know who will pick you up.”
“I can catch the bus home.” Hopping off the stool, she makes her way around the bench and into the kitchen. Placing her empty bowl in the sink, I hear the water running from the tap just as I’m about to remind her to rinse the milk out.
“You know the rule, no public transport after the sun goes down.”
“I’ll be eighteen soon.”
A small huff leaves my mouth. “Dakota, you just turned sixteen.”
“Fine.” She shifts up beside me and gives me a quick peck on the cheek. “I’m going to get ready for school, have a good day at work.”
“You too, baby girl. I love you.”
She raises her hand over her head and waves me off as she walks away. “Love you too, Mum.”
* * *
Arriving ten minutes early, I sit in the waiting room of what I hope to be, my new counsellor’s office. It’s not the first time I’ve considered going to see someone, to have an objective set of ears to listen to the things that bother me, but it’s the first time I’ve gotten this far.
I haven’t told anyone that I’ve decided to seek help, purely based on the fact that my relationship with everyone important in my life has deteriorated to the point where it’s almost non-existent. So much has happened, that for the first time ever, I’m at a loss at how to repair it. I need help, and I really hope, here is where I find it.
An older woman with a perfectly styled, grey coloured bob looks up and in my direction. “Mrs. Allman?”
I catch her gaze and give her a tight smile. “It’s Miss Allman.”
She picks up a clipboard off her desk and skillfully lays a pen in the middle, careful it doesn’t roll off. “Well, Miss Allman, here are a few questionnaires Dr. Kingsway would like for you to fill out before your appointment. She won’t be too long.”
Rising, I walk to the desk and take the papers off her. The questions range from what’s my medical history to what my goals are for coming to counselling. I fill it all out with as much honesty as I can and wait to be called in.
Fifteen minutes after my original arrival time, I’m walking into Dr. Kingsway’s office and introducing myself to the hippie-looking woman sitting on a purple coloured bean bag.
“Hi,” she greets. Her smile takes up her whole face, and it’s impossible not to reciprocate her friendliness.
“Come, sit down,” she gestures to a matching bag. “Get comfy.”
The room and the counsellor are not at all what I expected. Dr. Kingsway has gone out of her way to make everything seem less clinical and more friendly.
She herself is a young, petite brown-haired woman, who looks like she’s too young to offer you advice, but too nice for you not to sit down and give it a go.
Recommend to me by my General Practitioner, I figure I’ve got nothing to lose by trying.
Dropping my bag to my side, I awkwardly manoeuvre myself on the pile of foam. It’s unusual, but it does the job.
The room and counsellor are not all what I expected. The rest of the space is set up like it belongs on a hipster commune. Candles, incense, tribal music, I'm almost surprised there's no massage table in the middle of the room. Dr. Kingsway has gone out of her way to make everything seem less clinical and much more friendly.
“You must be Sasha.”
“Hi.”
“You can call me Claire. Dr. Kingsway makes me sound old as hell.”
I nod. “No problem.”
She flicks through my recently filled out paperwork before looking back up at me. “Ok, so the form asks for you to list five significant life events that you believe have impacted your life the most.” She scribbles on her papers while she’s talking. “This is my idea of getting to know you. The rest, as you’ll see, will just fall into place.”
“But before I start, you need to know that these sessions are confidential unless any of the information you provide me leads me to believe you would harm yourself or others. Then their will be third parties involved.”
“That sounds fair,” I acknowledge.
“Perfect. Now there’s a colouring book beside you. Pick it up and start.”
My eyes narrow together, and she just gives me a knowing smile. “Trust me, yeah?”
I choose a few colours and lean the book on my thighs. I guess there are worse things.
She waits for me to be halfway into the drawing and doodling that’s taking place before she says another word.
“You’ve got here you fell pregnant at fourteen. By the looks of it, you kept the baby, so tell me about that.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Whatever you’re willing to share.”
I think back on when I was finishing up school, and how unprepared I was, and how hard life slapped me in the face. Unlike what I preach to Dakota about thinking of her future, I had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up. Not only did I think that a broken heart was my only problem, but I thought I had time. Time to apologise. Time to forgive. Time to grow up.
“I was fourteen and I was in love with my best friend. He was perfect. Literally, in every way a young girl wanted the boy she’d dreamt about, to be.”
She continues to furiously move the pencil over paper and I get distracted by what she could be writing. Realising I’ve stopped, she notices my gaze alternate between what’s on her lap and her.
She picks up what’s in front of her and shows me a sketch of a cat.
“I’m just listening, Sasha. There’s no right or wrong here.”
I exhale loudly, ridding myself of worry. Who cares what she thinks of me anyway, it’s not her opinion that matters. I’m here to heal.
“So,” I continue. “What do you do when you and your bo
yfriend are the envy of all your friends? You break up with him.”
“Why?”
I give her the simple version. “I didn’t feel like enough for him.”
“And what happened after you broke up.”
“I went on a very creative, and memorable path of destruction.”
Breaking up with literally the only boyfriend I’ve ever had, seemed like my biggest mountain to climb. Wearing rose coloured glasses I never really understood the meaning of the saying ‘actions speak louder than words’ until I fell pregnant with a baby that wasn’t his.
She shifts on the bean bag while looking over at me, waiting for me to finish.
“I broke up with him under the pretense that everyone our age was having sex, and I wasn’t ready.”
“Did he pressure you?”
“I fucking wish, because then it would’ve made me feel better.” I swap out coloured pencils for textas and re-immerse myself in this strange activity. “I was hasty in my decision. I wanted to break up with him before he realised I wasn’t as great as he thought.”
“Do you do that a lot?”
“What?”
“Make rash decisions based on how you’re feeling?”
“With Hendrix. The high school boyfriend, yes. My whole life I just projected every shitty feeling onto my interactions with him.”
“You spoke past the breakup?”
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