In public, it was worse. The constant vigilance. The sharp, agonizing pinches Rebecca would inflict under the table at restaurants if I answered a waitress’s question too eagerly. “Charity case,” she would mutter under her breath, maintaining a brilliant smile for the room.
Lying in the hospital bed, the fear threatened to pull me under. I remembered the exact incident that had led to my collapse. I had accidentally dropped one of Rebecca’s decorative ceramic bowls. It shattered, and so did her temper.
She hadn’t hit me. She had done something much worse. She had knelt down, her manicured nails digging into my shoulders, and leaned into my ear.
“If you keep causing problems, Ava,” she had whispered, a sickeningly sweet smile on her lips, “I am going to make everyone believe you ran away. I’ll pack a little bag, leave the back door open, and you’ll just be gone. And trust me… nobody is going to look hard for a girl like you.”
That threat had played on a loop in my fevered brain for days, leading directly to my plea to Dr. Grant.
