I felt nothing.

That meant the pill had worked.

I felt no pain, no anguish, I forgot who I was and where my limbs were. There wasn’t a sound to be heard, not a thought that crossed my mind. It was like when the power shuts off in the middle of the night, and you suddenly realize how loud your fridge really is.

But I couldn’t even enjoy the feeling of peace and quiet. I felt no freedom, nor joy. I felt nothing at all.

My face melted like a Dali painting, spreading across the pillow like a gooey puddle of flesh. My jaw fell limp, and a small trickle of drool dribbled past my open lips.

I merely blinked, and the Sun was up. It was high in the bright blue sky, casting short shadows at the foot of the bedroom’s tall windows. Wide-eyed and short of breath, I jolted up from under the sheets and ripped them off the bed. Pablo was gone.

“Pablo?” I called out meekly, eyes riveted on the dip he’d left in the mattress.

A small plane flew over the house, low enough to startle a bird outside the window. It squawked as it flew off, scaring me in turn, and I stumbled two steps backward, crashing into the night table and knocking over a lamp.

“It’s all in your head,” I tried to reassure myself, as I slowly sat down on the edge of the bed.

I cradled my chest with one hand and my forehead with the other, to stop them from bursting. It was all in my head, but it was about to crack my skull open.

We weren’t at war with the Sandovals, they hadn’t killed Pablo, and the bird wasn’t a bad omen. It was a normal day, everyone was probably downstairs having breakfast, and I’d just slept for a little too long.

I couldn’t go downstairs like this. First, I needed to put some clothes on, and then I needed to calm down. Or maybe the opposite, because if I got dressed just yet I’d be drenched in sweat in less than a minute.

The breathing exercises I’d tried and practiced for years and years since I was a kid didn’t seem to work anymore, and panic gripped me by the guts like it never had before. My chest twitched with every breath, ached with every twitch, and the growing pain made me gasp for air.

I chose the easy route. With a shaky hand, I opened the night table drawer and picked out the first pill my eye was drawn to – a bright orange capsule, with faded numbers printed on one side.

Although my legs were as unstable as those of a newborn giraffe, I walked over to the bathroom, to find some water to swallow the pill down. I bent over the sink and drank straight from the tap. When I straightened up and glanced at the mirror, my mother was staring back.

Her eyes were dull, her cheeks were hollow, her hair was drab and her skin tone sallow. She held out an empty hand as if she was still holding a pill, and the look on her face seemed as tired and hateful as it always did.

Wow, I thought. That pill acted really fast.

I blinked a few times, hoping that dreadful hallucination would go away. She stayed for a while, glaring back at me, wrinkling her nose each time I sniffled, touching her cheek whenever I traced a finger down my own.

I had forgotten her face, and how much I hated it, but there it was, right in front of me, much clearer than I even remembered it.

I thought her skin was pale, and that her eyes were blue. Last time I’d seen her, her hair was much thinner, and her teeth were rotting away. She looked younger than I recalled, too.

It took a minute for me to realize that I wasn’t tripping just yet, and this wasn’t a hallucination. It wasn’t my mother in the mirror, it was me.

I am not my mother, I tried to convince myself.

I slowly stepped out of the bathroom, and walked over to the closet where all my clothes had been hung. I grabbed the first dress I put my hand on. When Andrea bought it during our shopping spree, it was too small for me. Now, it slipped over me far too effortlessly, and even seemed a little loose around my chest.

I won’t be my mother, I kept on repeating.

I caught a glimpse of my skinny fingers. They looked the same as the ones that used to slap and scratch my face whenever I fought with my mother. I remembered how afraid I used to be, thinking that I might break them whenever I tried to stop her blows or hit her back.

I can’t be my mother, I seethed through my clenched teeth.

I wasn’t my mother. I didn’t even look that much like her. I had just lost too much weight, and the traits we shared had started to stand out. I just had to gain that weight back, and I’d never have to see her wretched face again.

I would never be my mother. My reasons were better than hers. I was doing it for my own survival, because I only had the choice between eating a pill or a bullet. Meanwhile, she had a daughter she was supposed to care for, and instead she had robbed me of my childhood years.

I couldn’t be my mother, and this single pill I’d just taken wasn’t going to change that. She and I were opposites. I wasn’t an addict, wasn’t hurting anyone but myself, and I had brown eyes while hers were blue.

I walked down to the garden. By the time I got there, the drugs had started to hit. Everything around me seemed so sharp and clear, yet so calm and quiet. My tongue danced around behind my teeth, my eyes moved in circles like the hands of a ticking clock.

“Good afternoon, Gordilocks,” Pablo greeted me. “Did you sleep well?”

“Yes,” I answered.

My answer was too drawn out, too sluggish. I’d hissed the s for too long. Shit, I told myself. Everyone probably already knew I was high. My heartbeat rose a little, and I had to remind myself to blink.

Manée and Andrea were lounging by the pool, whispering gossip into each other’s ear. They mirrored each other’s movements every time they took a sip of their drinks or rearranged their hair.

Pablo, Beto, Oscar and Hernan had gathered around a small table to stare at some mugshots they’d pulled out of some folders. One guy in the pictures had been beaten up pretty badly, another one looked dead, and the last one seemed kind of pissed. Beto’s nostrils flared when ash from Pablo’s cigarette fell on the paper.

Juan was sitting on the edge of the swimming pool, and his gaze followed the flamingo float as it twirled across the water. His legs were opened at too wide of an angle, which I replicated with my hands to try and figure out if that angle was more than ninety degrees.

“Are you alright?” asked Pablo, who’d somehow sneaked up on me.

“Yup,” I barked back.

That answer was far too loud, and not very convincing. It almost sounded like I was choking. If I was going to overthink every three-letter word this much, this was going to be a very long day.

I ducked my chin when my left eye started twitching, and covered one side of my face with my hand to hide it. Pablo’s hand grazed my shoulder, and I squirmed away from him.

I stood right behind Juan, slowly cracking my fingers for a lack of a better thing to do with my hands.

“Hey,” I murmured.

That one was too breathy, and sounded way too weird. Like an evil witch in a Disney Movie, just missing a poisoned apple in that claw-fingered hand I held out towards him. I silently promised myself to stop talking.

Juan slowly lifted his head, and his frown grew deeper the longer he stared at me. He shook his head almost imperceptibly, as if he was waiting for me to say something. I opened my mouth, hoping a coherent sentence would fall out.

I wondered if this was what my mother felt like when she got high. Could she feel the dust falling on her eyeballs? Did she ever have to clasp her fingers together to stop them from wiggling all over the place? Did her jaw always get this rigid? Why would anyone do this to themselves on a daily basis?

“What’s a good way to gain weight?” I finally asked.

“Well, you could eat, for a start,” answered Pablo.

“Shut up. I wasn’t talking to you,” I snapped back.

“Rude,” he muttered, and his eyes widened as he took a cautious step back.

“What, are you asking me?” said Juan, pointing a finger at the center of his own chest. “Have you seen how skinny I am?”

I pursed my lips and squinted my eyes as I took a quick glance at the people around the patio.

“Beto?” I deadpanned.

“Me acaba de decir que soy gordo, verdad?” he mumbled.

She just called me fat, right?

“Creo que si,” whispered Oscar.

I think so.

“Have children,” he shrugged. “It made my wife gain weight.”

“You need to eat calories,” Andrea piped up. “A lot of them.”

“That’s clever, thanks Andrea,” I chirped, turning to her with a nod of approval.

“Are you being sarcastic?” whined Pablo.

“Why would I?” I muttered. “It’s good advice.”

“I said the same thing thirty seconds ago and you told me to shut up,” he bickered.

“Well, you didn’t mention calories,” I mumbled.

“I don’t need to mention calories,” he said. “If you eat food, you eat calories. It’s logical.”

“That’s not exactly true,” added Andrea. “Celery has virtually no calories.”

“Yeah, but who eats celery?” Juan chipped in.

“I do,” she protested.

“What, do you just munch on celery sticks?” he frowned.

“Yeah,” she shrugged. She had a confused look on her face, but her eyebrows didn’t scrunch up. Botox, I thought.

Juan then suggested I eat nothing but water, since that didn’t have any calories. That’s when the patio erupted in absolute mayhem, with Andrea screaming that I wanted to gain weight, not lose it, while Hernan lost his mind arguing that Juan was an idiot because you don’t eat water, you drink it. Oscar and Pablo debated on whether eating an ice cube still counts as drinking, since it melted in your mouth anyway.

Amidst the squabble, Beto was silent, and gently cleaned his glasses while he waited for people to stop fighting and start caring about his stupid pictures of dead guys again. I was quiet as well, too deep in thought as I tried to figure out where I could find calories.

“In the kitchen,” I murmured, answering my own question.

“What?” said Pablo.

“The kitchen,” I repeated.

“Okay,” he mumbled, as his forehead creased up in confusion.

Juan grabbed Hernan by the collar, and I wondered if they were still fighting over water. Pablo sighed, rolled his eyes, and walked over to separate them before anyone got hurt. That was my cue to escape from this situation, and I scuttled away, towards the kitchen.

There, I opened every cupboard and pulled out each packet or box I could find. I carefully checked all of their nutritional facts, their lists of ingredients, and even at times, their cooking instructions. I methodically arranged them on the countertops, sorting them out by calories per portion.

“What are you doing?” asked Juan, standing on the other side of the counter as he dried his bare chest with a bath towel.

“Reading,” I muttered.

“The back of a pasta box?” he snickered. “Does it have a happy ending?”

“I don’t know,” I shrugged. “I haven’t finished reading yet.”

“You’re so funny, Emily Smith.”

“So I’ve been told, John Danger Glade.”

“What?”

“I said, people have told me I was funny before,” I repeated with a sigh. “And then I said, John Danger Glade.”

“Why are you talking so fast?” he replied. “I can barely understand what you’re saying.”

“I’m not talking fast, you’re just really slow,” I mumbled.

“Geez,” he scoffed, “you’re completely off the rails.”

“What whales?” I asked.

“Em, are you on drugs?” Juan scowled.

“No,” I spluttered.

I took a step back as he took one forward, and laughed nervously as he trapped my chin between his two fingers. He looked straight into my eyes, one after the other, and his frown grew a little deeper.

The pill I took probably wasn’t the same as the one I had the night before. Although it worked just as well, because I was so obsessed with the idea of optimizing my calorie intake so I could gain weight as fast as possible that I’d completely forgotten I was surrounded by traitors and murderers and I could totally be killed any second.

I swatted his hand away, and wiped the sweat off of my brow. Sure, I was on drugs, but he didn’t have to know that. It was nobody’s business but my own how I chose to cope with my miserable life, and it was especially not Juan’s business, since he played such a large role in making it so awful.

“Sugar cookies,” said Andrea as she walked into the kitchen and pointed a finger at me. “Those have a ton of calories. And alcohol does too– unfortunately.”

“Oh, uh, I’ve quit drinking,” I stammered.

“Really? Why?” she asked, almost disappointed.

“Can’t mix drugs with alcohol,” Juan replied.

“What drugs?” said Andrea.

“No drugs,” I stuttered. “I don’t do drugs.”

“You can tell us, Em,” sighed Juan. “We all do drugs.”

“Which is why I would totally tell you if I was doing drugs,” I spat back at him. “But I’m not. So stop saying I’m on drugs.”

“See how fast she said that?” pointed out Juan. “She’s one-hundred-percent high on some drug.”

I clenched my jaw, and my eyes all but popped out of their sockets. The word drugs had stopped sounding like a word, and I was starting to doubt what was real and what was a hallucination.

“I’m not,” I retorted.

“Also, her eyes are–”

Juan tried to grab my face again, and I snapped my teeth at him like a rabid dog.

“Where can I find sugar cookies?” I asked Andrea.

“Fun fact, sugar– also a drug,” added Juan. “It’s worse than cocaine.”

“Are you doing cocaine?” gasped Andrea.

“Nu-uh,” tutted Juan. “Cocaine lasts a few minutes. She’s been like this for hours.”

I shook my head. That didn’t sound right. I’d taken the damn pill either fifteen minutes ago or a day and a half. It felt like anything but a few hours.

“Guys, please,” I sighed. “Where are the sugar cookies?”

“I don’t know,” shrugged Juan. “Perhaps in the pantry?”

I stormed past the two of them, and headed down to the maid’s quarters. This time, I didn’t have to wander around, turning the same corner a dozen times before I found my way. My path was almost too easy to follow, as if it had been highlighted. I could see things so clearly, so plainly, like a veil had been lifted.

I reached the ill-lit staircase that led down to the pantry, but the iron-wrought gate that crossed it had been shut, and sealed with a heavy padlock. Still, I shook it, rattled it, kicked it and climbed it, trying to find a way to get it out of its hinges.

“Seño?” said a high-pitched voice behind me.

Mafer was standing at the top of the stairs, leaning over to see me better. I smiled as I saw her, and let go of the gate to join her. I jumped up the three steps in a single step, and wrapped my arms around her.

“Emilia!” she gasped. “I haven’t seen you in ages.”

“I know,” I squealed. “I’ve really missed you.”

“How is everything doing?” she asked. “I heard you’re staying in Pablo’s room, now.”

I sighed, and her sweet grin turned into a straight line.

“I’m fine,” I lied. “Everything’s fine.”

My shoulders sagged under the weight of too many deadly secrets. I still hadn’t told her about the backpack, and how I’d almost gotten her killed. I wasn’t ready to tell her, and I probably never would be, nor was I going to admit to anyone that I’d told Juan about Sarah Kennedy, and how I was about to get everyone killed.

“Are you sure?” she frowned. “You look a bit... weird.”

“Oh,” I breathed. “I’m on d–”

The words petered out before they left my mouth. She probably had enough things to worry about without me telling her I’d turned to drugs. She’d panic, and think I was trying to kill myself, albeit very slowly, and she’d try to do something about it. Maybe she’d be right about it, but I didn’t want to become a burden to anybody.

“–diet,” I finished my sentence. “I’m on a diet.”

“You want to lose weight?” she blurted.

“No, no, not at all,” I spluttered. “I want to gain weight. I’m starting to look like my mother, it’s a bit scary.”

“Oh, well, that’s good,” she said softly, rubbing her thumb across my bony fingers and she held my hand. “I was getting a bit worried, too.”

“I know,” I muttered. “Everyone is always worried about my weight.”

“I’m sorry,” she answered, biting her lip. “So, did you need anything from the pantry?”

“Yeah, food,” I replied, perhaps a little too dryly.

“I could get you something from the kitchen, if you’d like,” she suggested.

“I need sugar cookies.”

“Sugar cookies?” she repeated, raising her eyebrows.

“Sugar cookies.”

“Sugar cookies,” she echoed in a whisper. “Well, there might be some in the pantry. Let’s check.”

She pulled out a bunch of keys from the front pocket of her apron, and twisted one in the padlock. The gate opened, the neon lights flickered on with a few faint clicks, and we walked down the last few steps. Mafer stared at me as I strolled past the bottles of liquor, and headed straight for the biscuits.

“So, what’s going on?” she asked, as she watched me rustle through the shelves, reading through the labels of every pack of cookies I could get my hands on. “Aside from the, uh, diet.”

I knew if I started talking, I wouldn’t stop. I could hardly control my own hands, let alone my tongue. I choked on my answer, and coughed a little.

“We always talk about me,” I replied with a falsetto voice. “Why don’t you tell me about you?”

Mafer looked confused, almost taken aback, but only for a second. She shrugged off my reaction, and answered my question anyway.

She started telling me about her mundane days, the old tasks she’d switched back to now that we spent less time together. She knelt beside me, picked up the boxes I’d either dropped or thrown over my shoulder, and neatly arranged them into small piles.

I was too focused on counting calories to clearly hear what she was saying, but she was telling me something about her boyfriend, how she didn’t see him really often, but they’d recently gone together to San José on a date.

“–but then he gave me these earrings,” she said, and when she settled her hand on my elbow, she pulled me out of what felt like a trance.

“Wow,” I breathed, as I glanced at the small, shiny stones. “Are they real diamonds?”

“I don’t think so,” she chuckled. “I just tell myself they are.”

“Real or not, it’s sweet that he bought them for you,” I smiled.

“Yeah,” she whispered. “I’m really lucky to have him.”

“I’m happy for you,” I said, holding back a sigh. “You deserve a great guy. What did you say his name was?”

“José,” she answered, and blushed a little.

She looked so in love when she said his name, so much in fact that she seemed embarrassed. She stared at the floor, nibbled the nail on her pinky finger, and a sweet smile drew on her lips.

“That’s funny,” I snorted.

“What is?”

“You went to San José, with a guy named José.”

“Oh yeah, I hadn’t thought about that,” she giggled softly. “By the way, how are you and Pablo–”

“What about your friends?” I cut her off before she finished. “How’s Majo?”

“Oh, uh, Majo’s not doing great,” she stuttered. “Her boyfriend kind of broke up with her.”

“Who, Juan?”

“When did I tell you about them?” she frowned.

“You didn’t,” I grimaced. “I managed to get stuck under Majo’s bed while they were doing... stuff. You know, on that night I tried to escape.”

“I’m so, so sorry,” she gasped. “I didn’t know–”

“It’s fine, it’s not your fault,” I reassured her. “But tell Majo she needs to move on. Juan is a player.”

“Is he?”

“Yeah, we snuck out to some club the other night, and while I was dancing with this one guy, Juan talked to like a thousand girls,” I ranted. “But then, since Juan had left me alone, this guy I’d been hanging out with, he–”

I paused. I was going to say too much again. Two steps further down that tale, and I’d be telling Mafer a secret I’d promised myself not to tell. What happened on that beach, and what I’d told Juan was something I would never let anyone know.

“He what?” asked Mafer.

“What time is it?” I asked, glancing at the darkening sky outside the awning window of the pantry.

“What happened at the club?” she frowned.

“Nothing interesting,” I answered, shaking my head. “Anyways, I was pretty drunk, so I don’t really remember it. It’s getting late, Mafer, I think I should go.”

“Alright,” she said softly as I stood up. “If you ever need to talk, you can find me here. I’m usually somewhere around the kitchen.”

I was never, ever going to touch one of those orange pills again. They made me talk too much, too fast and too loud, they made me twitch all the time and they caused thick pearls of sweat to roll down my neck. Plus, I’d spend so much time obsessing over what to eat, that I’d forgotten to eat anything at all.

People acted weird around me, side-eyeing me and asking me strange questions, but that was probably because I was acting weird around them. Soon, I was convinced that everyone knew I was high, and that mere thought paralyzed me with embarrassment.

“Did you find something to eat?” asked Pablo, when he found me roaming around the garden.

“No.”

“Do you want me to cook you something?”

“I’m not hungry,” I mumbled.

“Then why all the fuss about food?” he groaned.

I shrugged, and walked away from him as soon as he had his back turned.

Trying to act normal was almost an impossible task. Whenever no one was looking, I’d grind my jaw, lick my lips, crack my knuckles and stretch my neck. I put on a frozen smile to stop my face from twitching, clawed at the hem of my dress to get rid of the urge to rip it off.

The drugs wore off by the time everyone went to bed. Pablo quickly fell asleep, and I laid restless. Once again, the dark thoughts came running back– the neverending stares, fixated on the handle of the bedroom door. The bone-chilling scares I’d give myself every time I heard a noise.

I pushed back the urge to take another pill. I wasn’t like my mother, I wasn’t going to get addicted. My heart kept thumping in my chest, at a rate faster than ever before. Tears gathered at the corner of my eyes, and fell out on their own.

My craving for a pill turned into an ache, and then into a sickness that swallowed me like a rogue wave. I shivered, trembled, and sweated out every last drop of water. I felt nauseous, breathless, and had a migraine that wanted to make me scream out loud.

I opened the drawer and reached for a pill, thinking that if I didn’t stop this, the next thing I would want to grab would be Pablo’s gun. I picked one at random, one that in the dark seemed to be the same shape and color as the one I’d taken the night before. I just wanted to stop hurting, and go back to feeling numb.

I am not my mother, I told myself over and over, almost like a chant.

I repeated it at least a thousand times, rolling the pill between my shaky fingers.

“I am not my mother,” I whispered, as the pill slowly melted under my tongue.

Kerning

I Am Not My Mother

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