My Last Walk Home

Mom said I needed to toughen up, so she made me walk home alone. "You're ten. Everyone else can do it. Why can't you? If you were even half as capable as your cousin, I wouldn't have to worry so much." I shook my head and signed, [I can't hear. Crossing streets isn't safe.] She gave me that look. Total disappointment. Then she walked off with my cousin, Sadie. What Mom didn't know was that before school let out, Sadie had stopped me. Said she was helping Mom make me independent. Then she snatched my hearing aid. Now the whole world was silent. I followed the crowd down the sidewalk. At a small intersection, a car spun out, horn blaring. Everyone scattered. Everyone but me. I couldn't hear it. My spirit rose above the street. Below, my body lay in a pool of blood. Mom... Sorry. I couldn't do this independence thing. Chapter 1 My left leg bent the wrong way. Blood kept spreading under me. It had to hurt. But I couldn't feel anything anymore. "Someone got hit!" "Don't move her! Wait for the paramedics!" "Oh my God... she's just a kid..." Voices came from everywhere. I could hear again. The driver stumbled out. He looked maybe forty, wearing a faded puffer jacket. He rushed over, but his legs gave out. He dropped to his knees, hitting the icy pavement with a dull thud. "I didn't mean to." He was shaking badly. "The brakes failed. I swear, I hit them. Pushed them all the way down, but nothing happened... The road was too icy." Someone spotted my uniform. "She goes to Eastview Middle! That's an Eastview uniform!" A girl in the crowd was my classmate, Mia. Mia leaned closer. Her face went white. "Mom, that's my classmate Vienna! Call her mom!" Mia's mom looked shaken too. She got Mom's number from a teacher and called right away. The second it connected, she rushed to explain. "Ms. Dudley, Vienna's been in an accident. She's at—" Sadie's voice cut in. "Aunt Florence, there's no way Vienna got into an accident. She's probably throwing another fit. I saw her after school, and she was super upset. She said you always make her do stupid stuff. She was already in a bad mood. She probably just doesn't want to walk home alone." Mom's voice came through. "What's she whining about now? Is walking home alone really that hard?" "No, it's real," Mia's mom said quickly. "The driver's still here. There are witnesses. Please come right away. Your daughter is badly hurt—" "Enough." Mom sounded annoyed. Painfully familiar. "Did she put you up to this? Are you all doing some little performance for me?" Mia's mom went silent. "What? Vienna's always been like this. The second I make her walk home alone, she gets upset and pulls something. She's faked being sick before. She'll try anything. Now she dragged all of you into it? All she does is lie and make excuses to be lazy, just like her father." Chapter 2 The call ended. Mia's mom stood in the snow, phone still in her hand. Speechless. I floated above them, watching. Then I remembered Dad. Back when he was still with us. I was five. Maybe six. I could still hear then. Mom and Dad fought every day. Eventually, they got divorced. The day Dad left, he stood in the doorway and looked at me. Then he crouched and took my hand. "Come with me, okay?" I looked back. Mom stood in the middle of the living room, clutching her apron so hard her knuckles went white. She wasn't crying, but her lips shook. Her chin too. Like she might break any second. Her eyes begged me not to go. She was scared I'd leave too. I thought if I went with Dad, Mom would be completely alone. So I said no. After Dad left, Mom hugged me so tight I could barely breathe. "Vienna," she whispered, "you're all I have now." After that, she poured everything into me. Her expectations were simple. Be number one. She said grades were all we had left. She said I couldn't end up like Dad, wasting my life. I figured she was right. So I studied as hard as I could. Then one time, I got a B+. Third-grade math test. I couldn't crack the last word problem. It was raining when school got out. Mom picked me up on her e-bike, and I held an umbrella over us from the back. On the way home, she asked how I did. When I told her I got a B+, she went quiet. A few blocks later, she stopped. "Get off." I did. Rain hit my face so hard I could barely see. I hugged my backpack to my chest. Mom twisted the throttle. The bike jerked forward. Crying, I grabbed the edge of her coat. "Mom, I'm sorry. I'll do better next time. I promise—" She peeled my fingers off and rode away. Then I realized she'd left the umbrella behind. I ran after her, crying. "Mom! Your umbrella! Don't you want it?" The rain swallowed my voice. So did the wind. So did the tires slicing through puddles. She never looked back. It took me forty minutes to walk home in the rain. That night, I developed a 103.6-degree fever. It lasted all night, but I was too scared Mom would get mad, so I kept quiet. She didn't realize anything was wrong until the next morning, when she rushed me to the hospital. But when I woke up... I couldn't hear. Mom sat beside my bed without saying a word. Her eyes were red. Hurt. Disappointed. "If you'd told me your ears felt weird sooner, this never would've happened." Later, Mom brought Sadie to live with us. After that, everything changed. Sadie was good at everything. Top student. First in her grade on her very first unit test. I wore hearing aids. Since I couldn't hear my own voice clearly, my words came out a little slurred. Even when I studied as hard as I could, I only made third in my class. Third sounded pretty good to me. Mom didn't care. "Look at your cousin," she snapped. "Straight A's, like it's nothing. Why can't you do that? Same teachers. Same books. She aces every test, and you're still bringing home B's? Are you even trying?" Chapter 3 Whenever Mom went off like that, Sadie stood quietly beside her. Sometimes, she even spoke up for me. "Aunt Florence, Vienna has it hard too. She can't hear well, so it's tougher for her to focus in class." It sounded like she was defending me. But every time she said it, Mom got even madder. "Her hearing's bad because she did it to herself," Mom snapped. "If she hadn't been so stubborn that day—standing in the rain until she got sick—she wouldn't have lost her hearing." I just stood there, apologizing over and over. Promising I'd study harder. Do better next time. *** When I floated home, Mom and Sadie were eating dinner. The food was still steaming. Sadie loved cilantro, so Mom had put it in everything. It was everywhere. Just like Mom's love for Sadie. I was seriously allergic to cilantro. The last time I accidentally ate some, my lips swelled for three days, and a red rash crawled across my neck. Mom took me to urgent care for meds, but still complained. "Everyone else can eat cilantro just fine. Why do you have to be so difficult? If you're picky, just say that. Don't use allergies as an excuse." After that, she still cooked with cilantro. She said other people lived here too, and she couldn't plan every meal around me. So every time we ate, I had to pick through my food and pull out every tiny green leaf. Sadie ate quietly, like a perfect little angel. Then she looked up. "Aunt Florence, why isn't Vienna home yet?" Mom's face darkened. She set her fork down with a sharp clink. "She's just like her father," she said through her teeth. "Stubborn to the core. She's obviously throwing a tantrum." Mom picked up her fork, took a bite, then dropped it back onto her plate. "I told her to walk home alone, and now she's giving me attitude? Seriously? Other kids ride the bus alone at six. Why can't she? She's doing this on purpose. She just loves pushing my buttons." Sadie lowered her head and kept eating. Mom got more irritated. She pushed her fork around her plate, grabbed a piece of beef, and chewed like she was mad at it. "Everything I do is for her own good. Was I wrong for wanting her to be independent? Was I wrong for wanting her to quit relying on those hearing aids? And this is how she pays me back? Not even a little gratitude. I raised an ungrateful brat." She looked at Sadie, and her voice softened. "Sadie, you're the good one. You never make me worry. I wish you were my daughter." Sadie gave her a shy smile and ladled soup into Mom's bowl. "Aunt Florence, don't be mad. Vienna's probably just upset. She'll be back soon." Mom took a sip, set down her bowl, and said in that same cold voice, "She can come back or not. I don't care." Ever since Sadie moved in, Mom poured all her attention into her. She used to watch me do homework. Watch me study. Watch every minute of my life. Now she watched Sadie. Homework. Studying. Performances. Competitions. Sadie crushed it at school. By the end of elementary school, she'd won one of the district's top academic awards and gotten into the best middle school program around. In seventh grade, she ranked first on her very first unit test. Mom bragged to everyone. "Sadie got first in her grade." I had to give everything just to place third in my class. Mom leaned back on the couch without even looking at the report card in my hand. Chapter 4 "Sometimes I wonder if you're even my daughter. How is your cousin so smart, and you're this stupid? Did the hospital mix you up at birth? "God, you're stupid." *** After dinner, Mom did the dishes. Then she picked up her phone and called my smartwatch. But my watch had shattered in the crash. "It's off." She gritted her teeth, a vein pulsing at her temple. "She did it on purpose. Turned it off just to make me worry. She's getting back at me." Mom, I wasn't trying to make you mad. But she couldn't hear me. She opened our chat, held the voice button, and spoke. "Vienna, I'm telling you right now. If you don't come home, don't ever come back. There's no place for you in this house!" She sent it, then threw her phone onto the couch, her chest heaving. The more she thought about it, the madder she got. She stormed into my room. It was tiny. Just a bed, a desk, and a little bookshelf. Mom stood in the middle of it, looking around. Then she went to my desk, opened the drawer, and pulled out my sketchbook. She'd bought it after I got the highest score in my class. Light blue cover. Little white rabbit. I'd filled it with drawings. Besides studying, drawing was the only thing I had. Mom opened the sketchbook, glanced at it, and started ripping. Hard. The sharp tear of paper filled the room. "No! Mom, don't!" I lunged for her, but my hands cut through empty air. I dropped to the floor, shaking, staring at the scraps everywhere. I couldn't even cry anymore. When the sketchbook was shredded, Mom stood there, catching her breath. Then she walked out and shut the door behind her. Leaving me alone with the torn pages. *** Mom's phone rang again. The driver. He begged her not to call the cops. Said he'd pay whatever it took. Mom frowned. "You're saying Vienna got hit by a car?" Uncertainty slipped into her voice. "Yes. She's still here. The ambulance should be here any minute. I'm so sorry..." Mom started to panic, about to ask what happened. Then Sadie walked over, all sweet and innocent. "Aunt Florence, one of my classmates saw Vienna near the school. She was lying in the street and wouldn't get up. They said it looked like she was faking." She paused. "Maybe she wants you to pick her up so she can apologize." Mom's face went dark. "You don't need to worry about her." The driver went quiet. "What?" "She knows I have a soft spot for her," Mom said. "So she's putting on this whole act to manipulate me. This isn't the first time she's pulled something like this." "No, it's not an act. It's real!" "That girl is hopeless." Mom's jaw clenched. A vein throbbed at her temple. "She can die out there for all I care." The call ended. *** My body still lay at the intersection. The crowd was gone. Only the driver stayed beside me. My lips had turned purple. So had my fingers, curled stiff against the frozen ground. Dirt and ice were packed under my nails. Chapter 5 But I couldn't feel the cold anymore. The ambulance arrived. Two paramedics jumped out and ran to me. They knelt, checking my pulse. My breathing. The younger one pressed his fingers to my neck. Then he looked up at his partner and shook his head. Still, they lifted me onto a stretcher, covered me with a thermal blanket, and loaded me into the ambulance. They took me to the morgue. A doctor called Mom. By then, Mom was dead sure I'd hired people to help me fake the whole thing, so she ignored every random number. She was helping Sadie with homework. Sadie had barely started seventh grade, but she was already doing ninth-grade work. I stared at her worksheet and got nothing. Quadratic functions. Similar triangles. The symbols might as well have been another language. Mom explained everything patiently, solving each problem step by step on scratch paper. Her voice stayed calm. Easy. Whenever Sadie didn't get it, Mom tried another way. I floated nearby, watching. It reminded me of back when I could still hear. Mom used to teach me like that too. Back then, she didn't snap so much. She'd explain it again and again until it clicked. Then she'd pat my head and say, "Smart girl." Those days felt forever ago. Like they belonged to another life. After math, Sadie moved on to her English reading assignment. Mom checked her answers beside her. Every time Sadie got one right, Mom nodded, her face softening. "Good job. You nailed this whole passage." She flipped the page. "Finish this one, then take a break. You've studied enough today." Mom rested her chin in her hand and watched Sadie work. Her eyes held the kind of pride and warmth I hadn't gotten from her in forever. Then someone knocked. Mom's whole body relaxed, like she'd finally released a breath. "Vienna's back," Sadie said, smiling. "She came home to say sorry." Mom stayed in her chair. She just tipped her chin at the door. "Don't you have a key? Open it yourself." Nothing. A few seconds passed. Mom frowned and called again. "Vienna, did you hear me? Use your key." Still nothing. Three more knocks. Mom shoved back her chair. "This is ridiculous." The legs screeched across the floor. "She can't even open a door now? She has to make a whole thing out of it?" She stormed over, unlocked the door, and yanked it open. Two cops stood outside. "Are you Vienna Vann's mother?" "I'm her mother. What did she do this time? Did that brat get herself in trouble again? I told her to walk home, and somehow she ended up at the police station?" The officers glanced at each other. Then the taller one looked Mom in the eye and said, slow and careful, "Your daughter, Vienna Vann, was in a traffic accident this afternoon at the crossroad of Mason Road and Newhall Street. The doctors tried, but she didn't make it."