Sunlight on Thawed Ground

My mother constantly berated me for being lazy and fragile, claiming I couldn't handle a single shred of hardship. Her resentment stemmed from a terrifying symptom I couldn't control. Without warning, my body would begin to convulse, and my mind would go entirely blank. I would collapse into pitch darkness. Yet, every time she took me to the hospital, the medical tests came back frustratingly normal. My teachers eventually noticed my frequent episodes of zoning out and fainting, and they desperately urged my mother to take me for a more thorough evaluation. But my mother, a respected doctor herself, brushed their concerns aside. To her, it was an open-and-shut case: I was a lazy child faking an illness to skip class. From then on, she strictly rationed my diet. Whenever I felt dizzy, grew drowsy, or began to convulse, her response was swift and cruel. I was subjected to sharp slaps across the face and hours of forced standing, while she towered over me, screaming that I was a disappointment who was intentionally trying to ruin her life. Everything came to a dead end on the day of our school-wide physical exams. My mother happened to be the doctor manning the blood-drawing station. When my turn arrived and I sat across from her, that familiar, agonizing tremor seized my limbs. The entire room began to spin, and my torso pitched forward, nearly crashing onto the examination table. Instead of checking my pulse, my mother violently yanked me upward by the arm and shoved me away. "Stop acting!" she hissed, her voice dripping with disgust. "Faking a faint over a routine blood draw? Can you be any more pathetic? Get out into the hallway and stand there. Stop humiliating me in front of my colleagues!" She shoved me out the door before turning back to her work. The moment my back hit the cold hallway wall, an icy chill enveloped my body. My consciousness began to splinter. For the first time in my life, I couldn't fight the weight. Half out of it, I thought to myself that this was good. If I passed out completely this time, she would finally believe that I wasn't lying. Chapter 1 I crashed hard onto the icy tiles of the hallway floor, my limbs seizing in violent, uncontrollable spasms. The chaotic chatter of the corridor was instantly drowned out by a deafening, high-pitched ringing in my ears. The footsteps and voices of nearby students and parents warped, growing distant and muffled, as if filtered through a thick layer of cotton. I desperately tried to lift my head, aching to call out for my mother, Marie Wilcox, but my neck felt so heavy. No sound would come. Only hot, silent tears spilled uncontrollably from the corners of my eyes, tracking down my face. A familiar voice pierced through the ringing. "Ashley, are you okay?" Seeing me sprawled on the ground, he rushed over to help me up, only to recoil in shock as another violent tremor racked my body. "Don't... touch me," I gasped, using every ounce of my remaining strength to squeeze out a breathless whisper. "I'm fine. Please, don't tell the teachers, and don't tell my mom." The deep-seated terror of her wrath gripped me even now; if she found out, she would only accuse me of faking it to avoid the exam, subjecting me to another cruel round of screaming and punishment. Blake knit his brows, his eyes swimming with panic. "How is this fine? You're having a seizure! Hold on, I'm going to get your mom right now!" He turned to bolt toward the examination room, but I desperately clamped my fingers onto the hem of his shirt, my grip vice-like despite my fading strength. "Don't go, please..." My voice fractured into a weak sob as my consciousness continued to splinter. "She won't believe me. She'll just yell." Right then, Marie's impatient voice rang out from inside the examination room. "Blake Nash! Why haven't you come inside for your checkup yet? I've called out twice." She stepped out into the corridor, her eyes instantly landing on my convulsing form on the floor, my hand tightly grasping Blake's shirt. In an instant, her expression darkened, her gaze burning with a toxic mixture of disgust and fury. "Just how long do you intend to keep up this pathetic act?" she snapped, her stiletto heels clicking against the tile as she strode over. Stopping right beside me, she looked down with disdain. "Dragging your classmates into your little dramas? You're getting increasingly creative at avoiding your responsibilities, aren't you?" Blake scrambled to his feet, trying desperately to shield me. "Dr. Wilcox, Ashley isn't acting! She's really having a seizure. Look at her! She's completely pale." "What do you know about medical matters?" Marie cut him off. "Do you honestly think I don't know my own daughter? Her laziness is just flaring up because she wants to get out of the physical exam. "Now that I've called her out, she's intentionally staging a collapse to garner sympathy and manipulate you into lying for her!" Blake intended to protest, but the sheer, glacial malice in Marie's glare made him flinch. He took a hesitant step backward, completely cowed, and ultimately didn't dare utter another syllable. Terrified and overwhelmed, he turned and bolted down the hall. Marie bent down. Without an ounce of maternal gentleness, she grabbed the back of my collar and yanked my trembling body straight up off the cold floor. Chapter 2 My head lolled helplessly, my forehead knocking hard against her arm. A wave of dull, throbbing pain bloomed across my skull, and the black spots dancing in my vision began to multiply. "Move!" Marie hissed through gritted teeth, her voice low and toxic with vitriol. "Stop humiliating me out here. Just wait until I get you home." She dragged my limp body down the corridor, hauling me toward the vacant classroom at the far end of the hall. Passing students slowed their steps, forming a loose circle. They pointed and murmured among themselves as we passed. "What's happening? Why is that doctor dragging her like that? It's terrifying. Look at her arms and legs twitching!" "Oh, you don't know? That's Ashley Wilcox, the school's most notorious faker. That doctor is her mother. What else would it be? She just wants to skip class, so she's staging another one of her dramatic episodes." "Seriously? That's pathetic. No wonder her mom is entirely fed up with her." The biting whispers drifted into my ears, growing clearer and sharper with every step. I lay on the floor, my eyelids feeling as heavy as stone, practically glued shut. I desperately wanted to open my mouth and scream that they were wrong, but my vocal cords refused to cooperate. Only my tears flowed faster, soaking into the linoleum tiles. I wasn't faking. I couldn't control this, and I felt like dying. Unfortunately, not a single person tried to step in, not to mention offering a helping hand. Right then, a voice cut through the noise. "Dr. Wilcox! Where are you taking Ashley?" Our homeroom teacher, Hailey Lowery, came rushing through the crowd. The moment she took in the scene, her expression fractured into utter shock, and she threw herself forward to block Marie's path. She added anxiously, "Look at the state of this child! She's having full-body convulsions, and her face is as white as a sheet. This isn't an act. You need to get her to a hospital immediately!" "Ms. Lowery, this is none of your business. Stay out of it," Marie replied, her tone a freezing wall of indifference. "She is my daughter, and I will discipline her as I see fit. She's intentionally staging this spectacle to play the victim and embarrass me in public. Am I not allowed to manage my own child?" "But she is clearly in severe distress!" Hailey argued, her voice trembling with rising panic as she reached down to support my weight. Marie shoved her away, but Hailey persisted. "Feel her hands. They are ice-cold! That's not a good sign. If you keep dragging her like this, something catastrophic is going to happen! How can you be so merciless to your own flesh and blood?" "Merciless?" Marie let out a harsh, mocking laugh. Bending over, she grabbed the back of my collar and yanked me up off the ground. "If I were truly merciless, I would have abandoned this ungrateful wretch years ago!" The words flew from her mouth, thick with venom, her grip tightening until it restricted my airway. She continued bitterly, "I slave away at the hospital to fund her education. And what do I get in return? A child who spends every waking hour concocting fake illnesses to skip school! "She's lazy, fragile, and utterly incapable of handling a single second of hardship. How did I ever give birth to such a useless, spineless disappointment?" She violently shook my limp body to emphasize her rage. My head snapped back and forth, the entire world spinning in a nauseating blur, as a thick, metallic taste of blood began to pool at the back of my throat. I finally gathered all my remaining strength and squeezed out a weak whisper. "Mom, I'm not..." My words hit a raw nerve. Her eyes flared with blinding fury. "You still dare to lie to me?" Her hand whipped through the air, delivering a brutal slap across my cheek. The sheer force of the blow snapped my head to the side. My skin burned instantly, a sharp, deafening ring filled my ears, and the sheer shock of the impact temporarily froze the tears in my eyes. "Look at you! You can't even stand upright, and you're still trying to deceive me?" Blinded by anger, Marie raised her hand once more. Hailey threw her weight forward and firmly locked onto Marie's arm. "Dr. Wilcox! Stop this!" Her voice was tinged with desperation as she tried to reason. "Even if she really made a mistake, you can't assault her like this. She is so weak. It could kill her." Chapter 3 "Kill her?" Marie let out a cold, sharp laugh, her eyes flashing with pure contempt. "If she actually had the spine for it, she'd pass out and never wake up. At least, that would save me the embarrassment of dealing with her pathetic attention-seeking out here!" With a violent shove, she released my collar. My limp body crumpled instantly, crashing heavily against the edge of the corridor steps. A dull crack echoed as my head slammed into the sharp concrete, and a warm, thick crimson began to well up from my forehead immediately. My body convulsed even more violently from the impact, but I forced my heavy eyelids open, staring desperately up at her. I wanted to scream, "Mom, look! I'm bleeding. I really am not faking this. Can you just believe me this once?" But Marie merely looked down at the blood with unadulterated disgust. "You're even manufacturing blood now just to keep your little act alive? You truly are something else. Too bad you waste all that cleverness on underhanded tricks." Turning on her heel, she barked at the lingering students in the hall. "What are you all standing around rubbernecking for? Don't you have physical exams to complete? "Get back in line right now! Anyone caught slacking off will have their physical exam eligibility revoked!" The students scattered immediately, and a hollow quiet returned to the corridor. Only three people remained: me, Marie, and Hailey. Hailey crouched beside me, her hands trembling as she gently tried to dab away the blood pouring down my face, her voice thick with heartbreak. "Does it hurt terribly? Come on, let me get you to the infirmary, okay?" "Absolutely not!" Marie snapped, striding back to yank Hailey away. "No one is taking her anywhere! Let her lie right there on the floor and reflect on her behavior. We'll see if she still has the nerve to stage these fake illnesses after this!" "That's way too far!" Hailey finally exploded. "She is your daughter, not your enemy! What if something goes wrong?" "She brought it on herself!" Marie's stance remained unshakeable. "Let me tell you something: no one is playing the savior today. I am going to ensure she burns this lesson into her memory. She needs to understand once and for all that faking a medical crisis achieves absolutely nothing!" She stepped over to my convulsing form, crouching down and clamping her fingers around my jaw, forcing my face upward. "I am asking you one final time: are you faking this or not?" she warned. "If you confess right now, I'll show some mercy and let you get that cut patched up. Otherwise, you can rot right here on this floor until your brain clears up!" The agonizing pressure on my jaw collided with the throbbing, burning pain in my forehead. My entire body was shaking uncontrollably, and my awareness was rapidly dissolving into grey shadows. Yet, with the absolute last breath of life left in me, I weakly shook my head. "I'm not... pretending." "This is just great!" Marie shook with rage. She violently released my chin, letting my head snap back against the floor, before standing up and delivering a brutal kick straight into my ribs. "You still want to play the stubborn martyr? Looks like you have to learn it the hard way!" She stormed back into the examination room, returning a moment later with a chilled bottle of water clutched tightly in her hand. "Don't you love acting sick? Didn't you say you were freezing and shivering all over?" Marie crouched down again, ruthlessly pinning my trembling wrist to the tile floor. "Since you claim you're so cold, let's give you a real reason to wake up! Stop lying here like a corpse just to fish for sympathy!" She ripped the cap off the bottle and dumped the freezing water squarely over my face and head. The piercing, icy torrent saturated my hair and ran down my neck, soaking straight through my clothes. My core temperature plummeted, causing my limbs to curl inward instinctively as my consciousness drifted even closer to total blackness. Yet, Marie remained blind to my agony, her hands continuing their relentless assault. "Are you awake yet? Do you still dare to fake a faint?" she growled. "I'll douse you until you're completely lucid! I'll wash away your laziness and your desperate need to humiliate me! Let's see if you ever have the audacity to pull a stunt like this again!" I tried to turn my head away from the freezing stream, wanting desperately to beg her to stop, but my muscles had completely locked up. I could only lie there in the freezing puddle, utterly paralyzed, as the ice-cold water washed over me again and again. Chapter 4 "Dr. Wilcox! Stop this right now!" Hailey screamed, her face contorted with panic as she lunged forward, desperately trying to wrench the water bottle from Marie's grip. "You're killing her like this!" "I am giving you ten minutes," Marie finally said, halting her actions. She stood up slowly, positioning herself right above me with icy detachment. "If you are still lying here playing dead when the clock runs out, I will drag you out to the middle of the sports field. I'll make sure every single student and faculty member in this school can see you. "I'll let everyone see just how incredibly pathetic and humiliating you are—a lazy, worthless parasite who can only survive by faking illnesses!" With that final insult, she spun around and marched back to the examination room. The freezing water continued to drip from my hair and clothes, pooling around my rigid torso. My body had gone completely stiff, and the biting cold was gradually replaced by a hollow numbness. Hailey crouched closely beside me, frantically dialing the school doctor. She called out to me repeatedly, but I couldn't hear her or feel anything. My consciousness slipped inch by inch into darkness. In that fading haze, a flood of memories washed over me—countless days and nights filled with Marie's brutal misunderstandings, sharp slaps, and endless screaming. I remembered once when I suddenly started convulsing in class. My mind had short-circuited, and I had pitched forward, my face smashing violently into the desk. My forehead had split open, blood pooling on my notes. When the teacher called Marie to the school, Marie didn't pull me into her arms. She didn't ask if I was in pain, nor did she take me to the emergency room. Instead, in front of all my classmates, she delivered a ringing slap across my face. She screamed that I had intentionally staged the fall to embarrass her, then hauled me home and forbade me from sleeping all night. I remembered another night when a profound, suffocating agony had crept through my limbs, leaving me curled into a tight ball beneath my blankets. Unable to bear the pressure, a few quiet whimperings escaped my throat. Marie burst into my room, raging that I was intentionally making noise to disrupt her sleep. She called me a worthless burden and forced me to stand upright in the corner of the room all night. By the next morning, my entire frame was shaking so violently that I nearly collapsed onto the floor, yet she ignored me completely. Every time she took me for a medical workup and the lab results came back clean, her conviction grew stronger. To her, a normal blood panel was proof that I was a manipulative liar, wasting her hard-earned money and precious time. She eventually placed me on a draconian diet, rationing my meals. She monitored every bite, banning even a single scrap of snacks or sweets from the house. "Your chronic exhaustion is entirely your own fault because you're lazy and gluttonous," she would sneer. "You only pretend to be sick because you want an excuse to shirk your duties and skip your classes." During those dark years, I had wondered countless times if I really was useless and didn't deserve her love. I had even doubted my sanity. "Am I somehow subconsciously faking the tremors?" To survive, I learned to swallow my pain and wear an invisible mask. When the agony became too heavy to bear, I would bury my face deep beneath the quilts and weep silently. When the violent tremors seized my limbs, I would slam my hands into tight fists, driving my fingernails deep into my palms until they bled, forcing myself to look normal. I didn't dare show a single speck of vulnerability in her presence. I had foolishly believed that if I could just be more obedient and stop fainting, she would believe me, treat me better, hold me in her arms, and ask if I was hurt as she used to do. But I had been entirely wrong. She would never believe me. To her, I would always be nothing more than a lazy, fraudulent waste of space. Suddenly, a profound shift occurred. The biting chill and the aching pressure in my chest began to lift. I felt incredibly light—like a feather floating in the air. The throbbing in my skull faded away, taking the deep sense of grievance and the agonizing sting of being hated along with it. It felt wonderful. This way, I wouldn't have to endure Marie's slaps or listen to her accusations ever again. I wouldn't have to hide under the covers or force myself to pretend to be strong. I could finally stop the endless, exhausting cycle of hoping for her trust and aching for her love. There was only one tiny, lingering shadow of regret left in my fading heart. Even at the very end, I never managed to make her believe me. I really wasn't lying about being sick, and despite everything, I still loved her.