The closer the debutante ball gets; the meaner Seraphina gets. I have even told Lyra and Mira to not identify with me in public so as not to attract Seraphina's ire on them and make her transfer her apparent hatred of me to them which I'm not sure I'd be able to take lying down as much as I would like. I don't want them in harm's way because the truth is that I am leaving this pack one way or another. Whether intentionally or not. I just have to constantly remind myself that freedom is so close that I can actually taste it and that gives me the strength to bear what I need, to get out of here safely.
It is because I know that my leaving this pack is inevitable that I can't afford to put my friends at risk of having Seraphina send her goons on them which would inadvertently hurt me more. And the truth is that, I know it is driving her crazy that she can't seem to elicit the desired emotional reaction from me. One thing I promised myself when I caught a glimpse of her smiling face while her goons beat me to pulp was that she was never going to see me cry and I know it drives her immensely crazy which gives me a little bit of satisfaction.
This is why I cannot afford to joke with my work-outs because I know that if it wasn't for those gruelling exercises making me tougher and harder, I seriously would have died at her hands. That doesn't mean that my friends actually like it though, but even they are afraid to go up against my bitch of a sister because she basically has everyone in our pack eating out of her hand so getting them to see her for who she truly is or even believing me when I try to declare my innocence in whatever crap she has found to pin on me is not as easy as it seems.
What actually makes it worse is that she doesn't bother to hurt me herself, she just gives the order and those dumbasses would find me and begin to lay into me. This makes it easier for her to maintain deniability and uphold her perfect daughter image. Knowing that I would soon leave and not see these shit heads again makes it easier to keep my head down and do my best to keep the peace.
My mother also tries to look like she cares for me and I understand that in her own way she does but it is difficult for me to believe that the unconditional love I've received from Mira who isn't even related to me that is supposed to come naturally for mothers seem to only be directed towards Seraphina and it messes with my psyche more than I'd like to admit.
It doesn't matter how much you claim to be strong, seeing your parents who are supposed to love you unconditionally treat you like the tissue under their feet makes it extremely difficult to have a semblance of a healthy self-image. This probably makes me more desperate and sceptical all at the same time. I am desperate to meet someone who would love me for me but I am also afraid of meeting them because I know that I would struggle with not just accepting their unconditional love but also believing that they actually loved me as much as they claimed.
That kind of emotional abuse and familial isolation makes it easier for me to believe that I don't deserve the good things of life. Mira and Lyra, bless their hearts always get so frustrated with me because of my actual inability to accept any kind of compliment. Their frustration is cute and heartwarming but I think I would finally learn to see myself as special when I finally leave this place.
This is because, regardless of their many efforts which I appreciate immensely, the fact is that I still go home where I'm made like I'm actually a waste of space in my own family. It is not the best situation but I'm doing the best I can, to at least get out of here with some part of my sanity remaining which seems more and more difficult as the days go by.
The feeling I'm choosing to focus on instead is that of someone who has been imprisoned for a long time and they are almost done serving their sentence which means they would soon be set free to at least get some of their life back even if it's not completely perfect or what they initially dreamt of.
That prisoner does everything the guards say and takes all sorts of insults from fellow inmates and guards who don't exactly want them to leave. He or she does this because their freedom is closer than when they first got imprisoned and this makes bearing all the insults and beatings remarkably easier than they probably expected.
That is just what is helping me keep my head above water and refuse to give in to the depression and despair that seems to cloud my mind each time I wake up and realise that I'm still at home. Some days, all I can do is get up, have my bath and leave for work at the clinic because then at least I have one person who cares for me.
However, sometimes memories of me as a child and how happy we were as a family before my latency was discovered floods my mind. And it physically hurts to shut the door on those nostalgic memories, but the pain I feel when I let myself feel it, at what I lost just because I can't change into my wolf or even access her. Reminiscing is a venture steeped in futility that sometimes it is just easier to push the memories aside and move on with my life.