Chapter 1

A Chapter by Aubrey R.

“Ross, Marley, Lincoln, Meghan, Kaleen, Olivia, Stella,” Mum called up the ladder leading upstairs. “Supper’s ready.”

I looked across the attic at Ross. His headphones were buried in his ears and his eyes were shut as he mouthed the words to a rock song. I took off my sneaker and threw it at him. His cold blue eyes flickered open as the shoe hit his hip. He turned to me and gave me an icy gaze as he threw the sneaker back at me with a force only Ross had.

“Supper’s ready and Mum’s yelling for you,” I said. I got up and ignored the pain in my shoulder from where my shoe made contact when Ross tossed it at me. He grunted and pulled the headphones out of his ears.

“Next time you let me stay up here and figure out what Mum called for.” Ross got up and followed me down the ladder. As we climbed down into the makeshift dining room, he asked, “Where’s Papa?” I shrugged.

“Working late for more money, perhaps?”

I huffed as my feet hit the wooden floor. Without looking up at Mum, I said, “I have to go to school early tomorrow to finish the project for Science, but I promised to buy bagels for the group.”

Mum was silent for a bit. “You got your allowance this month,” she replied plainly. I swiveled around and glared into Mum’s dark eyes.

“No, I haven’t got any allowance, Mum.” She sneered back at me and thrust a plate of one turkey slice, a quarter of a roll, and a spoonful of potatoes to me.

She smiled an evil smile. “That’s because you’re eating the food I prepare and living under my roof.”

“If you’d just-”

“No, Stella. Every task I give you is like performing brain surgery! Kaleen can do laundry, Lincoln can cut wood for the furnace, Ross is strong and has a job at the school, Marley can bake treats to sell, Olivia can sew, and Meghan is beautiful which will one day bring a man with money. What can you do, Stella? Nothing. You can’t scrub the laundry right, you aren’t strong enough for cutting wood or working eight hours a day, you burn everything you bake, you prick your finger every time you try to thread a needle, and you’re just a beautiful as a rag doll left in the rain!” Mum’s face was inches from mine and I felt tears threatening to spill over my eyelids.

“I made a promise,” I whispered through sobs a moment later. “I know that doesn’t matter to you, but it matters to people who have a heart.” A single tear slid over my cheek, leaving a pink stain where it had traveled. Mum was untouched by my argument. “I just need two pounds!” I pleaded.

Mum looked over to the table where my siblings were pretending not to hear. Mum chuckled and turned back to face me. She drew her hand back and slapped the cheek where my tear had fallen. My head jerked with the force, but I held in the whimper that arose in my throat.

I knew that slapping me was Mum’s way of saying no, so I quietly ambled to the small wooden chair in the corner and ate the food that I was given. I threw quick glances to the table in the middle of the room where I watched my siblings take massive piles of potatoes, several slabs of turkey, and more than three rolls all for themselves.

There were two ways I saw these things. One, I felt lucky to be given so little food when much was served, because I knew men didn’t want fatty wives such as the other girls in my family. I knew men wanted dainty, skinny women that knew their manners and had a polite air about them. Two, I was oh-so envious. I would lay awake at night listening to my stomach growl in a way that I thought it shouldn’t be able to sound like. I watched my family stuff themselves heartily and live easy lives while I was near starved and lived like a hostage in my own house.

After I was finished with the food, I got up and threw away the paper plate. Olivia, my eighteen-year-old older sister, brushed past me and pressed a 2-pound note into my hand as she walked by. Olivia turned her head to look at me. Her green eyes looked into mine and flickered with comfort. As the second oldest in the family, she’d seen the worst of Mum and knew that she took her anger out on me and me alone. I nodded slightly to her and continued walking as I clenched the note in my fist.

I shoved the crumpled up note into my too-big pants pocket and climbed the ladder to the attic. My lungs were fragile from the daily climbs that required too much effort and the dust that I consumed from doing so. Little did I know that this was to be the last time I would ever climb into that musty, hot attic ever again.