Page 61 of Heart Of A Goon II

It was easier to pretend that it didn’t exist than to get down to the root of the issue. The last time I remembered my brother and sister showing emotion was when I was a teen. It happened, and then we moved on with life like that small moment in time never occurred.

None of us ever spoke about it.

It was brushed under the rug because there was always something else going on, and speaking about the past was something we avoided. Rather than rehash the past and deal with some skeletons, it was easier to pretend it never happened.

Out of sight and out of mind.

It was painful to accept the truth that the mother I had always known was actually my sister. The siblings that I had grown up with were my niece and nephews. Every time the thought crossed my mind, it made me sick.

Everyone kept saying nothing changes, but it did for me. The one thing I held onto was my parents’ love. There was so much love in our home, and I held onto that. When things were tough, I often thought about the fact that I was wanted and made in love.

When in reality, my siblings were the ones that had been made in love.

I was made in fear, terror, and an abuse of power. My entry into life wasn’t something to praise. It was something that required deep therapy and the strength not to kill yourself. When I stared into that woman’s eyes as she held onto that baby doll, I became sick thinking about how someone took advantage of her.

Nobody protected her.

She was raped. Forced to carry a pregnancy and then had to feel the pain of giving birth to the evidence. She was put through all of that without understanding anything that was happening to her. The doll that she held onto with the death grip was all she understood. Her real baby had been snatched from her and replaced with a replica that she held onto all these years.

Fuck.

So, when someone thought I could move forward, the reality was that I couldn’t move on because she was all I thought about. I thought about her being in a place like that one without any family. Not knowing her daughter was murdered, and the other one was raised as her child.

I choked on the spice from the beans and took a deep sigh. All I could do was push it out of my mind for now. Just the thought of my history that was kept away from me was enough to keep me in my head for long periods of time.

After my dramatic ass crying session, I finally mustered up the energy to make my way downstairs. Me and Ms. Sharon shared our villa. It was nice with it being the two of us, because we both valued our alone time. She called up when she cooked dinner, and we often ate together, but other than that, she allowed me to sit in my solitude without becoming offended. There was a bedroom with a bathroom on the main level, so it was easy for her to get around. In the evenings, Gams walked over here and they sat out back together.

I took a sip of the sorrel that was resting in the fridge, then checked the living room. She was usually in there watching her stories, or on the back patio. I checked both before heading down the hallway towards her bedroom.

“Ms. Sharon?” I called out.

“Bathroom.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I’ll give you privacy,” I replied, backing away from the door.

She was trying to use the bathroom and here I was calling her name while interrupting her.

“Zoya, come in here… please.” It was the tone of her voice that made me enter the bathroom quickly.

I was worried that she fell again. Anytime Goo questioned her on it, she shooed him away and reminded him that she was grown.

I pushed open the bathroom door, expecting her to be sprawled on the floor like a life alert commercial. Thankfully, she was sitting on the edge of the tub, her back towards me.

“Everything okay?”

She sighed. “When I had both my legs… yes.”

I felt so bad when I saw the expression on her face. It was the look of defeat and embarrassment, and it couldn’t be overlooked. I could tell she didn’t want to ask for help. Everything inside her didn’t want to ask someone else for help. She probably sat on the edge of that tub debating on how she could do it herself. Sharon wasn’t used to asking for help, but she needed it. We often took the simple things like jumping in a quick shower, using the bathroom or even planting both feet onto the floor before getting out of bed for granted.

Even the privilege of having privacy because we could care for ourselves. It was a privilege, because not everyone could do those things on their own.

With the way Goo spoke about his mother, she was his superwoman. There wasn’t anything that she couldn’t or wouldn’t do for her boys. He spoke on her working several jobs and always making it to some of their school events, if she could get the time off. Her sons were her priority, which made sense why both Khaos and Gerald didn’t play about their mother.

“Okay, tell me what you need from me, Ms. Sharon?” I asked, careful not to be too pushy, or make her feel like she was helpless.

“There’s no shower chair, so I have to wash up on the side of the tub. It’s a struggle trying to get my lack of leg back over.”

I looked at her. “Your nub.”