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By @Madison
That night
I see myself roaming the aisles of a supermarket.
I’m not quite sure it’s me at first.
This woman is older
With a rat’s nest of blonde hair
Dressed in a ratty gray sweater.
These things, combined with the dark rings around her eyes
Make her look terribly haggard.
I would attribute her sunken face to drugs
If I didn’t then see the children prancing behind her.
It is when I see them
That I know this woman and I are one in the same.
The children are twins
A boy and a girl.
The boy is a regular Todd Junior
Looking like a shrunken down carbon copy of his father
Minus the acne issue.
The girl
Is a walking printout of myself in my childhood photos
With large blue eyes and little blonde pigtails.
She walks with a jovial gait
Black buckle shoes squeaking against the linoleum.
The older version of me hardly notices the children behind her
Pushing the shopping cart down the aisles as quickly as she can
As if she’s trying to get away from them.
But they are nothing but two sets of adoring eyes looking at her
Following like loyal ducklings.
The older me suddenly stops the cart
Picking a package of Wonder Bread off the shelf.
She turns it over, examining it for mold.
Meanwhile, the children find themselves in some sort of quarrel
The girl making grabby hands at a plastic dinosaur the boy is holding.
Giggling, he dangles it above her head
Causing her to whine.
For the first time, their mother casts a glance at them
Her eyes containing nothing but hollow disdain.
Absolutely devoid of love or concern
She turns back around.
Sick of her brother’s teasing
The girl opens her mouth
Tears glistening in her sky blue eyes.
Lifting herself to her tip toes
She reaches for her mother’s hand.
“Ma!” she calls.
Not thinking twice
The woman who was once me
Whips around
And backhands her own child
As hard as she can.
The girl gasps
Stumbling backwards to the floor.
Everyone in the store stops moving
Hundreds of venom filled eyes land on the caricature of a mother.
The girl sits up on the floor
Pulling her knees into her chest
As scarlet droplets trail from her newly split lip.
The boy, still standing
Looks from his sister
To his mother.
His bright green eyes hold nothing but betrayal
A look of sorrow that just might haunt me forever.
That’s when I jerk awake
Gasping for breath.
Shaking, I unwrap myself from my bedsheets
Check my hands for blood.
Finding nothing
I collapse against the mattress once more
Though I know I won’t go back to sleep easily.
How can I live through this
When ‘mother’ and ‘me’
Seem to be antonyms?
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