When Kat Came Back

Chapter 2

"Lexi, I swear, if my mom finds out I was at the concert with you she will literally kill me."

"You're such a drama Queen," Lexi rolled her eyes. "I don't get what your mom has against concerts. And Fall Out Boy specifically. That's weird."

"She's just overprotective," Ashlynn said. "People go missing at concerts all the time."

"She let you go to the Panic  At The Disco concert," Lexi stated.

"And she came with and ruined the whole experience," Ashlynn said, recalling her mother literally hovering over the two girls the whole time like an unimpressed bodyguard.

Lexi thought Ashlynn's parents were incredibly strict. She had no idea what Ashlynn's home life was like. She'd only been over a couple of times since Ashlynn had moved into the area two years ago. Ashlynn didn't have many friends, kept mostly to herself and was always so quiet. She never rocked the boat. She never wanted anyone to be upset and would generally go along with whatever others wanted to avoid conflict. Her teachers over the years described her as a 'peacemaker'.

Ashlynn looked over at her friend as they made their way through the streets to hop a bus back to their neighborhood.  Lexi was the complete opposite of Ashlynn. She had blonde hair but dyed it a raven black. It really suited her, Ashlynn thought. But she was also so confident and fearless. She said what she meant and meant what she said. She was Ashlynn's best friend.

'Well, not hard when she's basically my only friend,' Ashlynn thought to herself.

"Why is your mom so dead set against Fall Out Boy specifically?" Lexi asked.

"I don't know. It's weird, right? I mean I get that it's a concert and she hates them, but I don't know why she's so set that I can't see them specifically in person."

"Look, tomorrow is Friday. Tell your mom you're sleeping over. Which you might as well, and we'll go to the show. My mom won't even be home."

"I won't tell her that part," Ashlynn said, knowing that would be an automatic 'no'.

"Shit!" Lexi spat out as the girls watched the bus they needed pull away from the curb.

"Lexi! I have to be home in half an hour. I'm lucky my mom let me out at all tonight!  And she thinks I'm at that art exhibit at the library!"

"Good thing that runs until midnight," Lexi said.

"I still had to be in the house by eleven thirty!  It's eleven now! I'm so dead," Ashlynn cried.

"Chill," Lexi said, taking out her phone. "I'll call David. He'll come get us."

David, Lexi's older brother, was 18 and had his own car. He was actually a pretty good guy and pretty reliable. Ashlynn liked him. Not romantically, but the boys at school were douchebags. David was at least polite.

Ashlynn sighed and paced while Lexi spoke to David.

"Stop being a dick. Ash has to get home and we missed the bus."

"We wouldn't have missed the bus if you hadn't insisted on trying to meet the band after," Ashlynn muttered.

"But I did. And look how that turned out!" Lexi replied, brandishing the tickets and passes.

Ashlynn rolled her eyes.

"Fat lot of good those'll do when my mother kills me," she retorted.

"Your mother isn't going to kill you. Stop being so dramatic."

But Lexi didn't know what Ashlynn endured at home. They lived in a modest home in a fairly affluent area. Ashlynn's parents both worked and worked hard, and did very well. They lived very comfortably. Well, her parents did anyway. Ashlynn, on the other hand, felt like she got the scraps if she was lucky. Her clothes were mostly from thrift shops, which people thought was cool because thrifting was 'so cool' now.  Ashlynn got thrift store clothes because her mother told her that's what she was worth.

Her whole life, Ashlynn was told that she was useless and worthless. Her high grades didn't impress her mother. If she got an A, her mom asked why it wasn't an A+. If she got an A+, her mom asked why it wasn't with distinction.

She could never please the woman. Her room, always neat and tidy, dusted twice a week, vacuumed every week, nothing ever out of place, was never clean enough for her mother, and her rage would rain down on Ashlynn.

Ashlynn's dad wasn't any better. He never laid a finger on her, but he never stood up for her, never took her side. He never took sides except to tell Ashlynn to listen to her mother and do what she says. From the outside, they were the perfect family. Both parents respected professionals in their fields, their perfect and beautiful daughter whose reddish brown hair complimented their black and blonde hair perfectly.

People commented that Ashlynn looked so different from them. Her mom would say she's the spitting image of her own mother, whom Ashlynn had never met. She'd died before Ashlynn was born.

They never told people she was adopted. It was like it was some deep, dark secret they didn't want people to know. Once, when Ashlynn was seven, she'd asked why there were no baby pictures of her until she was nearly one. Her mother explained then that she'd been adopted at six months old.

"Your birth mother didn't want you anymore. You were a difficult baby. Cried all the time. She got tired of you so she put you up for adoption. We adopted you and you were so much happier. I think you knew your birth mother didn't even want you to begin with," her mother had explained. "Pretty sure, from what the agency told us, she was a druggie anyway. Single woman who got knocked up having sex to fuel her drug habit, no doubt."

Any time Ashlynn asked about her birth mother, that was the story her mother would tell her, and so Ashlynn stopped asking. What was the point?  Her birth mother was probably dead now anyway.

"Fine, David. We'll start walking. Please hurry though. Ash is about to have a complete nuclear meltdown and we scored tix and backstage passes for tomorrow's concert. I'd like her to survive to see it," Lexi winked at Ashlynn. Ashlynn rolled her eyes and pulled the sleeves of her long sleeved t-shirt down over her hands.

The two girls started walking in the direction of their neighborhood, Ashlynn hoping David would hurry.