Cold Cereal

Lana did not sleep well. She rarely does. This fact makes getting a nine year old prepared for the day’s mundane adventures harder than it would be normally.

She scans the kitchen; she sees how badly it needs cleaned. As she prepares Abby’s lunch, a delectable PB&J, she sighs. It’s a heavy sigh, a sigh not fit for a woman of her years. Life has had a habit of overwhelming her lately. It seems to have become quite adept at swallowing up time. Lana has become unacquainted with relaxation time, and chore time. Free time no longer even recalls her name.

Its seven thirty in the morning and Abby still isn’t up. “Abby,” she hollers upstairs in that demanding way that only mothers seem to be able to vocalize. Lana makes one child’s name into a full set of instructions. Get up. Get ready. And get down here to eat.

No response…

Lana yells again, expecting to hear a pleading Aww Mom, five more minutes cry back down the stairs. Still nothing.

She throws down the knife she had been using and it clatters across the laminate counter. Lana immediately marches upstairs in frustration.

A cat that looks like Garfield on a strict diet passes Lana as her feet hit the landing. It meows, and pays her no mind other than a flick of the tail. “Thanks for your help Addison,” she states sarcastically as she bursts into Abby’s room.

The current vision of her daughter disturbs her. “Abby?”

There sitting up in bed, back pressed flatly against the pale pink headboard is Abby. Or at least it looks like Abby. The girl’s dirty blonde hair is slick with nervous sweat. Her eyes are drawn wide, and apparently have been for quite some time, for runnels of sharp red run through them both. Dried snot trails from her nostrils. It’s plain to see where the excess has run off her chin sometime ago, and landed in what’s now a dried stain against her blue pajama top. The rest of her is covered, as Abby has drawn her blankets tightly around her. The girl’s hands are clenched white, holding the fringe against her neck. From the form in the bed, it is apparent the girl’s knees are drawn up against her chest.

“Abby what’s wrong?” Lana goes to her, “Are you sick? It looks like you’ve been up all night. Why didn’t you come get me?”

The girl’s first response is distant, her normally energetic voice flat, dry. “I couldn’t.”

Lana’s eyes turn to the nearly-new vanity in the corner of the room. The reflective glass has been completely broken out of the frame. Its remnants scattered, strewn across the pink carpet, and refracting jaded pieces of the pink, red and white from throughout the room’s color scheme.

“Abby…” Lana is speechless, angry and speechless, “Did you break your make up mirror? Oh my God. I knew you were too young for it.”

“He broke the mirror because he didn’t want to see himself.”  Abby’s words were quick, cold and spoken with barely a break between them.

Incredulously, Lana asked, “What?!”

Abby didn’t answer she just stared towards the vanity. Her eyes seemed to be focused on where the mirror had once been.

Lana was trying, trying to figure out what the hell her daughter was trying to prove by way of this outburst. On the inside she was furious, but there was certainly something off about Abby this morning. In a voice that belied composure she gave Abby three commands, her words coming through clenched teeth in gusts of hot breath. Get ready, get dressed and get downstairs and eat.

Abby responded, snapped awake by the thought of food, “What’s for breakfast?”

“Cold cereal.” Lana waited for Abby to leave the room. Tears fell hard. She tried her best to stifle her sobs.

Lana was so angry and emotional she didn’t see Abby leave the room.  Had she bothered to look, she would’ve noticed the young girl’s pajamas sticky with sweat and clinging to her body.

Lana walked to the hall, after she heard Abby enter the shower. She headed downstairs and was about to grab the broom and a dustpan, when she decided the broken mirror would still be upstairs when she got back from dropping Abby at school.

Shit, she may leave it up there for seven years Lana thought.

Instead of heading back to the second floor, she poured herself a cup of coffee and loaded it to the brim of the cup with extra sugar and creamer. As the sugary, warm liquid passed her lips she forgot how awful the morning had started.

She was able to finish the cup before Abby could be heard on the stairs. Lana watched her daughter traipse into the room. The shower had done her good; she looked nearly normal, save for the bags of unrest underneath her eyes.

“Feel better.” Lana smiled, and meant it.

“Yes.” Abby was curt, but Lana felt that now it was likely because she knew she’d be punished for destroying the vanity. 

“Tell me what happened to the vanity.” Lana’ words left her mouth, and instantly Abby’s body language changed. Abby became tense, rigid while sliding into the chair. She bumped the table, rocking the half gallon of milk, glass of OJ and the box of honey nut Cheerios. Abby appeared not in full control of her own body.

Still fatigued Lana suspected, 24 hour bug, no sleep. Maybe I should let her stay home. Lana waited for Abby to answer.

“Well?”

Abby shook the box, knocking a few pieces of cereal from the box into her bowl. With much trepidation Abby spooned a mouthful of o’s and slurped them down. The look on her face was not a pleasant one. The girl’s head turned at an odd swivel, “He’s still here you know.”

Lana peered into her daughter’s eyes, seeing nothing familiar she pulled away from the gaze. “That’s it,” Lana (barely) restrained herself from chucking the empty coffee cup from the counter to the wall. “You think because you were up all night fooling around you’re getting to stay home? No, no way. You’re going to school. You’re not sick at all. I think this is all an act to get out from under your punishment for the vanity.”

Lana turned to refill her coffee mug, adding even more sweetened creamer, and sugar.

With her back turned she heard the shattering glass and she jumped out of her skin. Turning and cringing at the same time she was greeted by Abby looking pleasantly over a ruined glass, and the orange juice it once contained flowing out over the sides of the tables.

“Get your book bag and get in the car! NOW!” Lana pointed, and perhaps to her surprise Abby did as she was told.

Without the typical defiance of an insolent pre-teen girl, instead with a slow, calculated air of confidence Abby pushed away from the table and stood. Glaring at Lana, she whispered “He’s still here.”

Lana watched her leave the room, her head reeling with all the worst possibilities all the while. What was it, some kid picking on her at school? Depression? Suicidal thoughts? Multiple personality disorder? 

As Lana continued to think of the most horrid things that could be troubling her daughter, she went to get a wet rag to sop up the spilled juice before leaving.  

When Lana returned to the table she noticed the cereal bowl. Some strange instinct took hold, and picked up the bowl and sniffed the remaining milk. Sour, it’s gone completely sour. And in fact it had; the liquid had become yellowed, ripe with a foul and unmistakable scent. She gripped the spoon and pulled it from the already thickening fluid. Lana examined it in the light that came through her kitchen windows. The handle was all that was left.