May has arrived full force and the flowers have since bloomed, showers unrelenting and no less beautiful. Life lost and life gained. Friends waved off and lovers held close. Edith, dearest friend of Darcy, passed away peacefully in her sleep about a week ago.

Darcy is devastated but shields it well, telling me of how Edith just, 'had to go and kick the bucket,' before they were meant to go to their favorite spot in the park. Humor is how she's been coping, or deflecting. It was the same when Eddie died, she was constantly joking around with a smile on her face that never seemed to reach her eyes.

The only relief that's been found in Edith's passing is that bright white light that reminds Dee that the struggle of pain is over for her, that she's in a heavenly paradise where the sun always shines and pain is intangible.

She's been much more solitary, reflective. Leading up to Edith's final breath I felt as though I had to spend every waking moment with her as a source of comfort and a confidant, now though, she has been shooing me away to, 'live my own life,' and, 'stop coddling her silly old self.'

I've respected her wishes, my moments have been spent in a doting daze of desire. Gazes of green and effervescence. Days spent lounging lazily in His cozy sheets and napping on His distressed couch, shouting lyrics over the vinyl vibrations and reckless touches of skin. Repairing chipping skies of opulent azure that creates a tension dying to be released--hands and mouths filling the gap of what could be.

Those fluttering wings each time beating harder, faster--each time the need becoming stronger. Each mind numbing kiss and gut tightening touch leads me closer and closer to a destination so long feared and now so heavily required.

Sex, it's the finality of growth--to finally break down the wall of defense I've spent the past years of my life painstakingly building with bricks of anxious hyperventalation and cemented together with tears of undying loss, reinforced with the forging of a gate so heavily guarded by the demons of my past that I laid wasting away on the dirt of my wasted youth.

A chastity belt binded around my hips unwillingly by the experience of objectivity, the conclusion that my body was not my own, as told to me from the start. From the beginning, I was my mother's property, I was a misspending of breath that was brought about by the carelessness of two degenerates. I was the unwanted duality of my parents, a blending of the heartlessness and indiscretions of those who saw the law as mere suggestion and morality as a pathetic lack of defiance.

I've brought a sledgehammer to that wall and a key to the belt that hold me back. With each swing of my tool I chip away at the inhibitions molded by years of mistreatment, I recognize it as the monster it was. The monsters that tugged me into the darkness that was denial. Denial that each strike at my fragile body was out of disdain rather than discipline. Denial that each grope of my nonconsenting shape was out of exploitation rather than liability. With each twist of my key I grind the gears of the lock that guarded me from vivaciousness, I recognize it as the loss it is. The loss that beat me down into the ground until I was unable to stand, the loss that was silence. Silence of my pain, the mistaking of my bruises as love bites. Silence of my passion, the mistaking of my desires as unattainable.

He, the blazing ball of bright rays and warmth of solace--my Sunshine. He has repaired my broken body after each fortnight of labor spent destroying a barrier only I have the ability to crumble. He has listened closely as I pick the lock and told the progress of my shifting key that I fashioned from sparse findings of confidence and strength.

He is the love I've searched for--the infatuation I so desperately scoured for. One so fierce and indescribable that even the inked language could not articulate the harshness of hitched breaths and gentleness of whispered words.

I have never pinned for forever, a permanence that I cannot understand. The deep devotion that seemingly is impossible for someone so damaged as myself. The adoration that rarely can be found past the final pages of a book. A permanence I have yet to comprehend, and so I've never pinned for a forever.

More so a temporary tangible taste of an impossibility that I do not call for but nonetheless admire, that is what I have always wanted. He has granted me my hopes and dreams, an infatuation that leaves its sufferer with gelatine limbs and a shining heart, an endearment that forces its inhabitants to chase after a high only found through racing love muscles and quickened gulps of air.

He is what I've always wanted, and that is the only thing I'll believe forever. I fear not that it will end prematurely to my demise but that it will diminish into bickers over unimportant inconveniences and forced flushing of cheeks brought about by half-hearted compliments.

I love Him, I love Him more than I can put forth into words. The four words unable to leave my lips form the beat of my heart. I, thump. Love, thump. You, Harry, ta-thump. Each moment spent staring into His eyes as I bury myself in Him digging around for His heart, I bite my tongue and tighten my lips to force the phrase back down my throat past my vocal chords to swallow them into the depths of my gut.

The sentence that could change everything, pent up under lock and key. The furtherance of my imprisonment, one far more bearable but nonetheless debilitating.

I sit and stare out the window as I sit in front of the computer, slowly recording returns as I daydream of the strength of His hold and the beat of His heart against the skin between my shoulder blades. The thumping of His own love muscle vibrates up my spine and sends a thrill of hope through my senses, a flickering light that my frustrating fondness is not in vain.

Each drop of rain that hits the pane of glass acts as a picked petal of a sunflower. One, He loves me. The next, He loves me not. Again, He loves me. Once more, He loves me not. Each sprinkle that dares to fall upon the transparency another unnerving reminder of the mental purgatory I forced myself into because I trusted myself not to step off the cliff but fell into Him anyways.

All it's done since those green eyes flashed at me is down pour--drenched in relief and desire, a life so vibrant even the cloudiest day is full of Sunshine. Ever since that dimpled smile calmed my uncompromising trepidation, all that's been is rain--showers of fluttering heartbeats and flittering eyelashes that drip on my skin and sink into my veins, the liquid love draining into my heart to continue the ever present thump, thump, ta-thump.

He loves me. He loves me not. He loves me. He loves me not. He loves me.

My phone vibrating in my tote bag drags my attention away from the drizzle of racing rain drops to the buzzing coming from the coat stand. I finish logging the final return and rush over to the fumbling, my mind whirling with the farfetched aspiration of seeing five letters that finish the tip of my tongue plea.

When I dig through the clutter that assembles my belongings and retrieve the ringing device I'm meant with only three, Bob. I can't help the slight pout of disappointment that forms on my lips as I bring my finger to pad the answer button and bring it to my ear.

"Bob? How have you been?" I ask as my tone shifts from disappointed to pleased questioning. I haven't been able to talk to Bob very much recently, I've been, well, preoccupied.

His tone is serious and somewhat downtrodden, I can hear the frown in his voice, "Phoebe, my dear, I love chatting with you, but I'm afraid we have to skip the pleasantries today."

"Oh, what's wrong, has something happened?" I match his saddened tone.

A long huff blows through the speaker, his voice muffled by what I can only assume to be his hand dragging down his face, "Your mother is in the hospital, again."

I shake my head as I reply, my voice full of dismissal, "For how long this time?"

A long pause follows that has my heart sinking, the dismissiveness I previously had replaced with worry. A worry I despise having but can't help but harbor. I wish I could discard the wasted space in my heart that I continue to expel on her, a woman that never behaved as a mother but somehow still held that title.

I wish I didn't love her, but I do. I hate how she treated me but I love her for the rare moments when she was kind, when she was clean.

It only happened for the short periods of time between when she was released from rehab and when she inevitably replasped, that what crystal methamphetamine does to you, it forces you to search for something that gives you that euphoria until you eventual are forced back to it, even though it leaves you battered down.

In the months in which she was clean, when she met Bob, she was the kindest I had ever seen her, the happiest I'd seen her. She would tag along on diner dates and take us to the bookstore, she got a job and got her shit together, until she ran into her dealer and it all hit the fan.

She would read us stories before bed and kiss us goodnight, she would apologize for her misdoingings with dance parties in our tiny kitchen and walks in the park.

Whispers of, 'I love you, my sweet girl,' were frequent and earnest.

'My beautiful baby, you can do anything you set your mind to,' Would shed my fears about a spelling quiz or presentation for show-and-tell.

Her words were impotent, she couldn't lead by example. Rehab was court ordered and months free of substance abuse were few and far between. I'm not sure if she truly set her mind to it and it simply wasn't possible, or if she never cared enough to set her mind to it. Either way, I never had those words uttered again after that short stint of bliss.

The wandering of my mind that leaves my eyes glassed is interrupted by Bob clearing his throat before speaking, "I think this may be it, her organs are shutting down. I know she was never your mother, never a real mother, but I know you Phoebe, I know that if you don't say goodbye to her you'd never forgive yourself."

"Oh." That's all I'm able to gasp out as the lump in my throat grows and the hole in my heart where she has laid at rest swells with a burning ache.

"I'm so sorry, Pheebs. She's at Chapel Memorial, I spoke to a woman over the phone and she said that her outlook is grim. Visitors are suggested to come as quickly as they can because they don't know how much longer she has. I'm on my way to get you now, I'm assuming you're at work?"

"Yeah, I am. Thank you, Bob." I say through quivering lips, "For everything."

"Of course, I love you, Phoebe."

"Love ya, Dad." I choke out before dropping the call.

Dad, so few times have I found myself speaking the title that I pray Bob understands he holds. I trust myself so slimmly that attachments are scarce. I can count the number of times I've reminded him of his importance to me on one hand. Three times.

The first was when he married my mother. I was around six years old, after they'd had their first dance in a cheap, rundown rented out dining hall, Bob had a first dance with both Teddy and I. I had known him for sometime and I really did see him as my father. I stood on the toes of his shoes as we shuffled around the room to some cheesy love song I don't remember the name of. I stood on the toes of his only pair of nice dress shoes as I looked up at him and said, 'I'm so happy you're my dad."

The second time was when he finally left my mother. I think I was fifteen, he'd finally had enough of her bullshit. The papers sat on the kitchen table where we'd eat breakfast every morning, his face was red with anger and his lips were a tight line. I remember sneaking down the hallway to poke my head past the wall to see what all the commotion was about. I'd heard yelling and the slamming of our back screen door. His eyes softened and his face relaxed when he saw my poorly hidden figure eavesdropping. He walked over to me and held his arms out for a hug, I embraced him and as the tears welled in my eyes as I understood the gravity of what was happening, I sobbed out into his chest, 'I don't want you to leave, Dad.'

And finally, just now, with the news of my mother on the brink of death, I have called him what he truly is to me, Dad.

I choke back the weak weepings to set myself at the desk with my notebook in front of me. I find the final page, crisply blank and begging for a pen to be dragged across it. I lift the pen in my shaky hand to begin writing down all I could ever think to say to the woman who I owe the life I never wanted but could never say out loud.

...

Clare Mae Carter,

You brought me into a world full of torment. Torment against my body and mind, but especially my heart. You were never the mother I needed you to be and I resent you for it. I grew up never believing in love or fairytales wholeheartedly. I grew up believing that the bruises you left on my skin were due to my bad behavior rather than your bad soul. I fought with myself over the many desperate attempts I'd made to seek your affections to corral your love. I fought tooth and nail because I grew up in a world where family wasn't the people you chose, but rather the people you'd been stuck with. You'd binge and tell me that, 'I can't believe I'm stuck with you two.' You'd get your fix and shout at me, 'You stupid piece of shit, I never wanted you.' You'd get clean and you'd whisper to me, 'My darling, you are so bright.'

It took me so long to finally see that I wasn't to blame, that no matter how many times you told me I'd never amount to anything or I was far too much like you to be good, it wasn't my fault. I wonder maybe, if it wasn't your fault either. I think maybe it wasn't, I pray to a God I don't even believe in that it wasn't. I hate you, I despise you, but I hate myself more because I pathetically love you more than I could ever hate you. I love you because I think you grew up like I did, tormented, thinking you could never be anything more than you were, damaged. I think that you couldn't escape it, so you'd numb yourself instead. I faced some of the worst abuse of my life while you were numb, while you didn't know up from down or right from wrong. Maybe you weren't built to be a mother, or maybe you were too scared to even try. When you were clean, that was the only time I ever thought that you really did care about me, but even then I knew it wouldn't last. You screwed over so many people in my life, Teddy and Bob, which led to Nick and Eddie, and even Darcy, they all have to pay the price of your maltreatment. I never met my grandparents or even knew their names, I barely remember my biological father, not that I want to remember more than I have to. All I've learned from you is that promises are always broken and I am a wenches daughter.

I know only one aspect of myself that I love because of you, I love rain. I love rain because you, in your rare moments of motherhood, would take us out on the porch to watch the storm. We'd sit in our rusted fold-up lawn chairs with stained quilts covering our bodies as thunder grumbled and lighting struck, as rain poured down on the lawn and you'd say, 'Girls do you know why I love rain?' and we'd shake our heads even though we'd heard it all before. You'd laugh with your hoarse voice and unpleasant teeth on display, 'Rain is the best thing in the entire world. It washes the world clean, it feeds the flowers, it makes people nicer, the world is vulnerable in the rain.' And so now, because of you and your fleeting kindness, those few hours of warmth, I love the rain. I am only grateful for this because in those showers I was vulnerable enough to let myself love, I found someone that has brought Sunshine in my life that you could never even imagine. I resent you because I want to love this person with all of my heart but you take up space that I will never be able to declutter. You will always have a piece of my heart and so I hope you know that although you may die alone, you didn't die unloved. Even a wench like you, with a daughter as pathetic as me, won't die unloved.

Yours truly,

Phoebe Mae Carter

...

I tear the paper from my journal as tears spill and crash upon the page, I fold it up and scribble with shaking hands, 'To the woman I owe my name and nothing else.'

My face is hot and splotched with redness from the futile attempts to withhold tears, I can tell from the all too familiar pressure of my temples, a mirror isn't necessary or wanted. All a mirror will show me is what I already know--no matter how much things change, no matter how much I think I've grown, things will always be the same, I will always be the same. I'm still the scared little girl that huddled in the corner of her room hiding behind a book with a handful of fiery red hair between her fingers, as my mother screams at me before pulling the illustrated children's book from my grasp, seeing my stained cheeks and fading bruises and lulling me into silence with empty promises.

As soon as Darcy comes into view, I break down. I drop in front of the desk, letter in hand, as I sob uncontrollably against the worn floor. She simply lifts me to stand, wipes the tears from my face, and with a knowing nod as she places my tote onto my shoulder, sends me out the door.

"Sweetheart, I'm so proud of you." Were the last words I heard as I rubbed the heels of my palms against my eyes to stop them from watering.

Bob's car is waiting, engine running, on the curb, as I stumble out with weary eyes and fumbling limbs. The car ride is silent--no music, no words, nothing. The discomfort is making the air thick in my lungs, a discomfort I've gone quite some time without, but even then I knew it wouldn't last.

We walk side by side together through the automatic sliding doors to the smell of disinfectant and death. The talc and bleach scent that attempts to cover the unmistakable musk of loss, its efforts are noted but not awarded. Nothing can hide the inevitable, not even the rank of death.

Bob waits in the hallway as I shuffle to the door of her room. We were ushered here by a nurse who apparently had nothing better to do than meddle in the business of a freshly twenty year old girl and her father. I twist the handle gently and push it open, fearful of what I may find.

No option is a win. I could find her dead, I'll have been too late. I could find her alive, but she could hurt me no matter what. She could be frail and kind, falsely telling me how much she loves me and how proud of me she is, which is unlikely and cumbersome. She could be harsh and brutal, falsely telling me how much she hates me and how disappointed in me she is, which is likely and heartbreaking.

I know that's why we never visited her in rehab, why when we spent stints in the system we never saw her. Even the social workers saw that it was too dangerous, too destructive, to allow young children to be tormented that way.