Family

By Dorothy


She called the woman "toxic" behind her back.
He preferred "poisonous" to describe the person who cried one moment like a lost child then attacked, snakelike, with verbal venom the next.
"Slut!" the woman spewed.
"Addict!" she'd say.
"Baby killer!"
He heard the spit through the phone, practically felt the bile and swallowed it whole before it dared reach his family.
Both used her first name - three syllables spoken in cold impatience - because neither could bear to call her mother.

Akesia

Slumped and spent, her sobs had subsided, for now. This was her new normal. Gut and fists clenched, a little hope lost with every heave. Desperate and searching, she willed herself to look again. "I've done everything right, she said, taken such good care of you. How could you betray me like this?” Silence, save for the pounding in her head. "Why are you doing this to me?" she screamed. "Why are you fucking doing this to me?" Silence. Her head hung in defeat. She knew not to expect a response. A body ravaged with cancer doesn't answer.

By Akesia

Desolate and desperate

By Michelle Ho


Mystic air and solemn gloom,
Hovers sedately over Riddle’s tomb.
Mind and body miles apart,
Wrecked he who was once good at heart.
Lust for power and eternal life,
Left him shattered, sorrowful, and without a wife.
Timely did the Horcruxes fade,
Where seven spirits unleashed away,
Where noble Followers ceaseless mourn,
Where hope for Harry was reborn.
Never did he think his soul would betray,
If only his obdurate heart would tranquilize day by day.

Very, very loud - Lara Hill

Broken was how he felt. No longer a whole person. The most difficult thing was that previously when Sam had been at low points, he could rely on Ash. She had been there, solid as a cornerstone.

 

One night towards the end of a long, disconsolate phone call to his mother, they devised a strategy for his survival. She agreed to listen to him for an hour every morning before work. She said she would do this for as long as it took, but they must limit the phonecall to an hour. Mostly he asked the same questions over and over. There seemed no logic to the betrayal, no last word. The fact that they could betray him came from another planet!

 

Sam's mother was surprised once at how upset he became over his former friends' musical differences. "Mike doesn't even like indie pop. He used to slag off Bon Iver". Sam's mother did not know who or what Bon Iver was. She wasn't sure what indie pop meant, but she did know that the only way her son would chase away the betrayal was to give voice to it.

 

In the deep night, if he sensed an army of harms coming, he curled his body into crash position and rocked himself back to an approximate calm.

 

Sometimes he got up and played 'Skinny Love' very, very loud.

Betray by b303tilly

The tight, burning knot in my chest and the roiling sickness in my belly allowed for no release. I wish I could cry. Not wanting to betray someone is not at all the same thing as not doing so, I thought as I turned my back and walked away.