My name is Milly now. They gave me a new one, a fresh start, after I told them about my mother. Annie, that was my name before, but she ruined that, didn't she? They say I'm safe now, that she's behind bars, but her voice, it still echoes in the quiet spaces, in the shadows that cling to the edges of my new life. It was me that told. Forgive me when I tell you it was me. The stained dungarees, tiny, the teddy bear peppered red with blood – I pulled them from my bag, and the disbelief on the kind man's face turned to something else. I had to make her stop.
They placed me with the Newmonts. A perfect family, on paper. Mike, my foster father, is a psychologist, meant to help me, to prepare me for the trial where I am the star witness against her. He talks of healing, of a future, but sometimes I catch him watching me, a calculating glint in his eye, and I wonder if I am just another case study for him, another story to dissect. Saskia, my foster mother, drifts through the house, a ghost of a woman, her presence as ephemeral as smoke, lost in her own internal world. And Phoebe, their daughter, she is a storm.
Phoebe is my age, and she sees through the fragile veneer of Milly. She sees Annie, the girl who doesn't belong, the girl with the unspeakable past. At the exclusive private school they sent me to, Phoebe's disdain is a constant, sharp prick, a chorus of whispers and cruel jokes that follow me down the corridors. She doesn't know what I did, what I saw, what she made me do, but she senses the darkness that clings to me, a scent of something rotten that no new clothes or new name can quite wash away.
The memories, they come in jagged flashes, like broken glass. The hidden room, the "playground," where my mother would take them. The screams that echoed, then faded into silence. And her, my mother, Ruth Thompson, with her kind smile for the outside world, her gentle hands that could turn so vicious. She taught me lessons, Annie. Lessons about good and bad, about how far an apple falls from the tree. And I loved her, still do, in a way that twists my insides into knots. How can you hate the one who raised you, even when she filled your world with monsters?
The trial looms, a monstrous shadow on the horizon. I am the only one who can put her away for good, the only witness to her unspeakable acts. Every session with Mike, every question about her, drags me back to the cold, dark corners of my past. He wants details, the prosecution wants facts, but all I have are fragments, nightmares, and the terrifying question that gnaws at me: Am I like her? Is the bad me stronger than the good me?
I try to be good. I try to fit in, to forget the blood and the fear, to believe in the fresh start they promised. I even find a friend, Morgan, a quiet girl who seems to understand without knowing the truth. But then there are the moments, the impulses, the familiar darkness that stirs within me, a chilling echo of my mother's own twisted logic. It's a constant battle, a silent war waged inside my head, between the girl I desperately want to be and the daughter she made me.
The closer the trial gets, the more the lines blur. Is this new life a cage? Is Mike truly trying to help, or is he just another manipulator, like her? Phoebe's taunts become sharper, more pointed, and I find myself wondering what my mother would do, what she would say. The whispers in my head grow louder: THAT'S MY GIRL, YOU SHOW THEM. THANKFUL NOW, YOU SHOULD BE, FOR THE LESSONS I TAUGHT YOU, ANNIE. The world outside feels like a stage, and I am merely playing a part, waiting for the curtain to fall on the woman who gave me life and took away my innocence.
