Catfished by Mom

My mother was a control freak of the highest order. To keep a tighter grip on me, she created a burner account, posed as a sympathetic older-sister type, and became the person I confided in online. She even started a thread about it, practically glowing with pride. [He sends me his bank passwords and private photos of his crush all on his own! Once he gets into a top school, I'm applying as his dorm supervisor. When he gets married, I'm hiding under their bed!] I scrolled through the comments. Tons of people were ripping her to shreds. I laughed. She thought she had total control. She had no idea I was feeding her exactly what I wanted her to see. The bank password I sent two days ago was fake. The 'private photos of my crush' were stock images I pulled off the internet. I took my time typing out a message: [Hey, my dad brought a woman home last night. They were making out on the couch. I secretly recorded it. Want to see?] A scream ripped through the wall from the next room. I put my headphones on and leaned back. The show was just getting started. Chapter 1 My bedroom door flew open with a single kick, and Mom came storming in with her hair splayed to her face. "Where's your father? Where did that useless man go? She grabbed me by the collar of my pajamas and hauled me out of my gaming chair. I pulled off my headphones on cue and put on my best stunned, clueless expression. "Mom, what's wrong? Dad said something came up at work half an hour ago and drove off." "Don't you dare play dumb with me!" She got right in my face with her teeth clenched, spit flying with every word. "Did you see something last night? Who's the woman? What does she look like? What's her name?" Her grip was terrifyingly strong, her nails digging in hard enough to break skin. "I... I don't know what you're talking about. I was doing homework all night. I didn't even leave my room." Mom stared straight into my eyes, searching for any trace of a lie. She held the stare for a full 30 seconds, then shoved me away. "You're absolutely useless. You can't even keep an eye on the door." She spun around and stormed back into the living room, snatching her phone off the coffee table. I leaned against the doorframe, watching her retreating back, her whole posture twisted with anger. She switched back to her main account on the local forum and started typing. Her fingers stabbed at the screen like she was trying to punch through the glass. [$500 bounty, city-wide! [Whoever helps me track down and dox this shameless homewrecker in the photo gets the money wired on the spot! [My husband drives a black Volkswagen, plate ending in 886!] She paced back and forth across the living room as she posted it. Her chest was heaving, her breathing loud and ragged. I went back to my desk and pulled open the bottom drawer, fishing out an old backup phone that did not even have a SIM card in it. Once I connected to the neighbor's WiFi, I logged into an alternative account I had registered a long time ago and opened the local forum. Mom's bounty post had already been bumped to the top of the front page. The locals in the comments were eating it up. [Holy crap, this guy looks kinda familiar.] [Look at that couch. Doesn't this place look like Ridgeview?] I smirked and took my time typing out a reply. [OP, I just saw that black Volkswagen with the 886 plates parked outside Lucky Deal Card Room on Dalton Road. There was definitely a woman in a trench coat in the passenger seat.] I hit send. A heavy, ragged gasp came from the living room. "Lucky Deal Card Room… You piece of trash, spending my money on your little mistress!" She grabbed the heavy brass ashtray off the coffee table. Without even changing out of her pajamas, she shoved her feet into a pair of slippers and stormed out. The moment the front door slammed shut, I walked over and locked it from the inside. Then, I went back to the bedroom and pulled a black laptop out of a hidden compartment under the bed. Chapter 2 I typed a few lines of code with practiced ease. The screen flickered once, and the feed cut in. It was the dashcam I had personally installed in Dad's car last month under the pretense of theft prevention. It came equipped with front and rear cameras and a live audio feed from inside the vehicle. I cracked open a bottle of Coke and took a long sip. On screen, the black sedan sat parked in the underground garage of a budget motel. Wet, sticky sounds and soft moaning came through the speakers. The noises coming through were revolting. "Your wife's been keeping such close tabs on you lately, and you still have the nerve to bring me out?" The woman's voice was syrupy sweet, the kind that reeked of cheap perfume even through a screen. "What's there to be scared of?" Dad let out a sleazy laugh. "That hag spends all day with her eyes glued to the kid. You have no idea how crazy she is. "Back in elementary school, the kid scored below 95 on a math test, so she pulled his pants down and made him stand bare-assed in front of the school for half an hour. Every parent in the neighborhood came out to watch. Even the teachers couldn't talk her out of it. "In middle school, the kid wrote a love letter to some girl in his class. She found it, marched into the school the next day, read the whole thing out loud in front of everyone, and then grabbed the girl by the collar and called her a little tramp for seducing her son." The woman laughed so hard that she could barely sit still. "That's a whole other level of crazy. And you just let her do all that? He's your son too, you know." Dad scoffed. "Why would I get involved? Watching from the sidelines is entertainment enough." "So, when are you gonna divorce her?" "Soon. Once I move all the savings into my mother's name, she's out the door without a cent." I watched the screen, a cold smile tugging at my lips. The perfect pair, the two of them. One treated me like a prisoner; the other treated me like entertainment. Just then, the dashcam footage lurched. The screech of brakes tore through the empty garage, and a red scooter slammed into the front of the black Volkswagen at full speed. The impact shook the whole car, and both of them screamed. "What the hell?!" Dad fumbled with his pants in a panic. A face pressed up against the windshield. Her hair hung wildly around her face, her features twisted with rage. It was Mom. Her eyes bulged as she stared at the two half-dressed figures inside the car, her whole face dripping with venom. "You pig! Get out of the car!" She raised the heavy brass ashtray and brought it down hard on the windshield. The blow rang out through the garage, and cracks spiderwebbed across the glass. The woman in the passenger seat let out a piercing scream. "It's her! It's your wife!" Dad practically fell out of the driver's side door, tripping over himself in blind panic. He shielded his head and face with both hands, screaming at the top of his lungs, "Security! Somebody help! She's trying to kill me!" Mom did not even spare him a glance. She rounded the front of the car and went straight for the passenger side. "You shameless tramp, sleeping with my husband! I'll strip you naked and throw you out on the street!" Just as she reached for the passenger door, the woman in the trench coat moved fast. She did not even stop for her shoes. Barefoot, she shoved open the door on the opposite side and bolted for the fire exit. "Stop!" Mom screamed, spinning around to give chase. However, the garage was too dark, and her slippers caught on a speed bump. She went down hard, both knees slamming into the rough concrete. Even through the screen, I could hear the dull thud of bone hitting the ground. Chapter 3 Blood soaked through her pajama pants in a wide, dark patch. She curled up on the ground, clutching her knees and wailing in pain. Dad saw his chance. Instead of helping her up, he scrambled back into the car and tried to slam the door shut and lock himself inside. However, Mom caught it in time. She forced herself off the ground despite the searing pain and jammed her body against the door before it could close. "You think you're getting away? You're not leaving until you give me that woman's name!" She grabbed him by the collar and dragged him bodily out of the car. The two of them went at each other on the oil-stained garage floor, tearing at each other's hair and screaming the most vicious things they could think of. I watched the whole spectacle on my screen, and when I had seen enough, I hit record. I clipped the segment cleanly—all the brawling, the screaming, the half-dressed chaos—and opened a video editor. I blurred both their faces just enough that it would not hold up to any real scrutiny. Then, I pulled up the neighborhood group chat, the one with all 500-plus households from the complex. They used to love posting videos of me being punished in that chat for everyone to see. It was only fair to return the favor. I set it to anonymous and hit send. [Huge scoop! Mr. Barton from Building 3 in our complex just got caught cheating in the parking garage by his own wife! She went full action-movie on him. You have to see this!] The video had not been up for ten seconds before the previously dead group chat exploded with hundreds of messages. [Holy crap, isn't that Craig Barton from Building 3?] [Yeah! I know his wife too, Pam Lewis. She's always walking around the complex with her nose in the air like she owns the place.] [Oh my God, this is so embarrassing. He didn't even have his pants on all the way.] [They deserve it! Those two have always been awful. They're up every night smashing things and screaming, keeping the whole floor awake.] [Save it before the admin takes it down.] I leaned back in my chair, thoroughly satisfied as I watched the messages pour in. Half an hour later, heavy footsteps and the sound of something being dragged echoed down the hallway. Then a massive bang shook the apartment. The front door had been kicked open. "You absolute piece of garbage! I'll kill you!" Mom's raw, shredded screaming came from the living room. I cracked my bedroom door open just a sliver. Dad was on the living room floor. His shirt had been torn to rags, buttons scattered across the tile. His face was covered in bloody scratches. However, he still had the nerve to stiffen up and try to argue his way out. "What is wrong with you? I told you, she's a new coworker! She'd had too much to drink, so I gave her a ride to the hotel to sleep it off! What gave you the right to smash my car?" Mom was shaking from head to toe. She jabbed a finger at his face and tore into him. "Gave her a ride to the hotel? Such a good ride that your pants came off? Do you think I was born yesterday?" She lunged at him, grabbed a fistful of his hair, and shoved her phone screen against his face. "Open your eyes and look! What is this?" On the screen, the secretly recorded video played. It was the one I had sent from my burner account to the older-sister persona she had been using online. In the dim living room, Dad and a woman were wrapped around each other on the couch, kissing without a shred of shame. Dad went still. He stared at the screen for a full ten seconds, his pupils slowly widening. "Where... Where did you get this?" He jerked his head up and stared at Mom. "This was taken inside our house! You put cameras in our home?" Mom let out a cold laugh, her expression caught somewhere between triumph and something completely unhinged. "It's not a camera. Your precious son filmed it himself and sent it straight to me." Chapter 4 Dad was completely blindsided. His bruised, swollen face went white as a sheet. "Our son sent it to you? Why would he send you something like that?" Mom puffed up her chest like she was showing off some grand trophy. "Because I made a burner account on the forum and pretended to be an older-sister type he could confide in online! He does whatever I tell him now. He even sent me the proof of your affair all on his own! "I've seen through both of you. Neither of you is worth a damn!" The room went dead silent for a solid three seconds. Dad's expression shifted from shock to disbelief and then to something twisted and ugly. He shot up from the floor, his voice rising so loud it could have cracked the ceiling. "Are you out of your mind? You've been talking to your own son about intimate things online? Have you completely lost your shame?" Mom stumbled back a step, her words tripping over themselves. However, she stiffened up almost immediately, trying to dress up what she had done as some noble act of motherly devotion. "I did it for his own good! He's in his senior year right now. This is a critical time! "If I didn't pretend to be someone he was talking to online, how was I supposed to get him to open up? How was I supposed to stop him from getting distracted by some girl and ruining his future? "I'm a devoted mother. Everything I've done has been for this family!" Dad laughed. It was the kind of laugh that came from pure, boiling rage. He charged forward, swung his arm back, and slapped her hard across the face. The crack echoed through the room. Mom spun halfway around from the force of it and collapsed onto the couch. "You're sick!" Dad pointed at her, screaming. "You're a twisted, disgusting freak! So what if I'm cheating on you? Living under the same roof with a psycho like you, any man would've lost his mind!" Mom pressed her hand against her swelling cheek and let out a piercing wail. "You hit me? I'll tear you apart!" She threw herself at him and sank her teeth into his arm. The two of them rolled across the living room floor again, fists and furniture and screaming all tangled together. I held up my phone and aimed the camera through the crack in the door, recording every second of them beating each other senseless. Pounding sounds came from below. The downstairs neighbors had finally had enough and were jabbing a broom handle against the ceiling. Someone was also banging on the front door. "It's the middle of the night! Are you gonna let anyone sleep? "Keep it up and I'm calling the cops!" Mom suddenly froze. She whipped her head around, and through the mess of tangled hair, her venomous eyes locked onto my half-open bedroom door. Something clicked behind them. She shoved Dad off of her and pointed straight at me, screaming, "It's him! It's that little monster! He sent me the video on purpose to pit us against each other! He's the one who destroyed this family!" A furious roar tore through the apartment, and my bedroom door flew open under both of them at once. Dad held a leather belt he had just ripped from his waistband. Mom had a pair of sharp sewing scissors clenched in her fist. At that moment, they had completely forgotten their hatred for each other. Every ounce of their rage and humiliation had been redirected at me. "You little piece of garbage!" Dad closed the distance in one stride and grabbed the back of my collar. He slammed me face-down onto the hard surface of the desk. "You think you can play games with me? You got a death wish?" The belt came down with a whistle of air and cracked across my back. My thin pajama top split open on impact, and searing pain ripped through my entire body. I let out a muffled grunt and bit down hard on my lip. "Give me your phone!" Dad's eyes were bloodshot, and he was screaming like a man possessed. Chapter 5 "Delete every single one of those videos right now! I'll beat you to death if you don't!" The belt came down again with a sharp crack. I curled up against the desk, shielding my head with both arms, refusing to make a sound. Mom did not stop him. She went straight for my desk and tore open every drawer. "You ungrateful little snake!" She ripped through everything like a woman possessed. Then, her hands went still. From the bottom drawer, she pulled out a brown envelope. Inside was the university recommendation letter I had been planning to submit to school the next day. It bore the official stamps of the district's Outstanding Student Award and the principal's office. A vicious smile crept across Mom's face. "You want to go to college? You want to get out from under my thumb? Dream on." She raised the sewing scissors. "No!" The scream tore out of me before I could stop it. But she did not hesitate. Right in front of my face, she lined the scissors up against the letter. The blades came down without mercy. The stamped, certified pages were shredded into confetti in seconds, drifting down around my feet. Mom jabbed a finger in my face and screamed. "A conniving little animal who plots against his own parents doesn't deserve a college education! You're staying locked up in this house for the rest of your life, working yourself to the bone for me!" She swept every book off the desk as she screamed. Dad was not done either. He ripped the phone out of my arms where I had been clutching it against my chest, then lifted his foot and stomped my computer monitor off the desk. Glass exploded across the floor. I lay curled up in the wreckage while Mom grabbed my hand and forced my finger onto the phone to unlock it. She tilted her chin up, her voice dripping with absolute authority. "I'm going to use your account to post a public apology on the local forum. It's the only way to save your father's reputation and mine." Her fingers flew across the screen as she started to type. Just then, three loud, heavy knocks hammered through the apartment. In the wrecked bedroom, the sound was deafening. Dad spun around, irritated. "Who the hell is it? You got a death wish knocking this late?" He stomped into the living room, cursing under his breath, and yanked the front door open. Three uniformed officers stood in the hallway. Their expressions were stone cold, their eyes hard. Dad froze on the spot. "Officers, what brings you here? We're just disciplining our kid. A family matter, that's all..." The lead officer did not even acknowledge the excuse. He pushed past Dad and walked straight into the destroyed bedroom. His gaze swept across the smashed monitor, the paper confetti covering the floor, and the bloody welts on my back. He did not say a word until he had taken it all in. Mom's hand was trembling so badly she nearly dropped the phone. "Officer, he was the one who secretly recorded us first." She tried to flip the blame. The lead officer let out a flat, humorless laugh. He unclipped the radio from his belt and held up a tablet, turning the screen so both of my parents could see it clearly. "Disciplining your kid? We have the entire thing on camera. The two of you beating a minor, destroying his school admission documents, the brawl in the parking garage, the vehicle damage…" His voice was ice cold, filling every corner of the room. "All of it was broadcast live to a local stream with over 50,000 viewers, including both of your supervisors at work."