"You cannot possibly think that is true?"

"You fucking touched me," she says in a monotonous voice contradicting the seriousness of the accusation.

"I never laid a finger on you or your sister."

"You think I am making this up?"

She took another sip of the drink at the same time he took a sip of his. Her confidence levels built up with every sip she took.

"Yes!" I put the drink down too hard. The sound silenced them both.

"Well, I am not."

"And you are going to claim that I touched your sister as well? Now that she is not here to correct the nonsense you are spewing?"

"You know what you did," Maya looked away as she could not face the penetrating stare in his eyes. What really happened was a blur to her. The drink did not help with thoughts. A hazy mist through which she could not climb. She knew something happened that night and many others. But it is blocked by many years of drinking and overthinking.

"You cannot be serious," he stood up and poured another drink. It was 9 am.

"Yes, I am."

"But it never happened. What are you even thinking? I would never do this to you or your sister. It was your friends that put this shit in your head. Or the drugs."

The last part hit her like a fist in her gut. She forgot the youthful days and the many nights she spent with them drinking and listening to music so hard she could not even think. A smile quickly returned to her face, but it did not stay long.

"I am not going to sit here and listen to this slander. Get your shit together or get out of my house."

She looked at him walk out of the room. The silence she was so used to returned; her ears rang from the alcohol that flowed through her body. The images of her youth flooded her memories and for a moment she was numb, sitting and staring at the books that covered the wall. Her fingers found a loose thread on the chair and she pulled at it with no particular strength.

As she walked out of the kitchen, her mother was still cleaning the glass that shattered earlier. There was no connection left between them. Like the thousands of pieces of glass that covered the floor, their relationship could not have been mended even with the best of intentions. She felt the early morning breeze kiss her skin as she walked through the gate toward the road.

The road was empty as she started to walk back home. Big trees covered the road and the leaves rustled in the little wind there was. An absence of birds was noticeable. Or did she not want to hear them? They reminded her of her youth, so many things did. If she could only escape that period, that chain that kept her from moving on.

The past was a constant reminder of the things that kept her from moving forward. The drinking made her more aware of it. The chain became heavier and heavier with each drinking session.

She took a shorter route home; the path went through a patch of woods. A pond in which various bird species swam, trees that covered indigenous plants, a small footpath that went through the trees. She knew the route by heart, she used to hide in the old drain pipes with her friends and smoked cigarettes. Now, it is again a reminder of that past.

She kicked a couple of rocks into the pool as she breathed the sharp air in. She craved more of her drink, her hands shook. But she just looked at the birds swimming in the water. Drifting as if no care in the world. She picked up a rock and threw it at one of them.

"Why don't you care," she shouted at nothing but the birds.

The rock splashed in the water far away from any bird. They also did not care and merely swam on their journey.

"Why don't you want me to become better?"

She threw another rock and slipped. The ground was hard, her thin body cracked. She stood up and felt for any pain that might consume her, but nothing happened. Merely a small cut that did not even bleed.

***

She made her way back home. The bottles still covered the floor. Reminders of the previous night, the call. Silence clung to her body and the pain of the call still shouted. Nothing could make her feel better at this stage. The bed caught her body. She closed her eyes and tried to forget about the day that slowly ticked by.

Postscriptum

I hope you enjoyed this modulation or installment of this story. I am enjoying the writing process. I have a very vague idea of what story I am working on, but there are still a lot of blank spaces in which I have nothing yet, but this is great, therein lies the opportunity to make something new!

All of the photographs are my own, taken with my Nikon D300. The story and writing are also my own.

Happy writing, stay well!