A true seer | Neteyam

12. Troubled family and a forming couple

The first thing that awaited us the next morning were parents angry to the bones. They hadn't seen us together, at least, but they did notice our absences from our respective mauris. I didn't know what happened to Neteyam, how his talk with a preoccupied Neytiri went, but mine with Na'tyr was, needless to say, awful.

She had waited until sunrise to yank my hand as soon as she saw me waking up. She didn't let go of it and pressed her fingers harshly on my skin. Her face was contorted with a frown, wide-opened eyes, and her jaw shut tightly.

"Where were you, ungrateful girl?! You thought you could disappear for a whole night and that I wouldn't notice?" She roared, her voice rumbling in my eardrums.

"What? What's wrong with you? You're going to pretend you care? Please, I'm barely even your daughter. And I didn't 'disappear', it's not like I haven't missed a day to sleep here. I was busy with stuff. Not like you deserve an explanation."

She slapped my face, hard. My face turned to the left by the power of the slap. My eyes were filled with rage.

"Don't you dare talk to me like that! I'm your mother. It has been enough of your irresponsible, spoiled, brat attitude! You will do as I say. First, you'll stop that sick entanglement you have with the Sullys, that forest people. You are a reef person, not to be seen with those others, "she said and raised her hand to hit me again, but I stopped it midway.

I grasped her wrist so tightly I knew it would leave a mark. "You are not my mother anymore. You stopped being it since dad died. And I am a forest Na'vi, just as much as I am Metkayina. You have no right or power over me. I can provide for myself and live on my own, I don't need to live under your roof so you can go around giving orders like I'm your little puppet. I have no idea what the fuck went so wrong with you." Poison left my mouth as I said those words, but none of them were false. From that moment on, it wasn't 'mom' any longer, it was simply Na'tyr. "I'll get my stuff."

She didn't stop me from taking a basket full of my belongings. She had certainly changed from the woman I once knew. The woman dad mated with. This was only the same body occupied by a rotten mind. I wouldn't shed any tears for her late death as my mother.

I could only keep my mind focused on my sister, laying still on a cushioned floor. She had looked more lively than in the twelve years prior. Her dark blue skin, the same tone as mine, had an exceptional glow and was far from dry. Her hair was clean, given that I had washed it some days ago, and was dust-free. Something in her face made me say the following words that I wished I had kept to myself.

"Maitrey would be disappointed to see that not even her mother has been careful enough to notice that she has been moving a little for about two days," I said and then looked at her sour, shocked face. "Yes, you didn't notice that, did you? Her ears began twitching, as well as her fingers."

I have no idea if she would have said something in the remote case I'd stayed longer. But, because I didn't, the last two-way conversation that we had would forever be a fight. A discussion between a former mother and daughter.

A known numbness overtook my body. It was that confusing sensation of not being relieved, happy, angry, sad, or any other emotion. It was a filling nothingness. Luckily for me, a certain forest boy came to my rescue, and a spark of joy made me give a tight-lipped smile.

"Kaltxì," Neteyam greeted, having that cute smile of his plastered on his face, "I'm glad to see it didn't go as bad as I thought."

"You're wrong. It has honestly been the worst ten minutes of my life."

My words seemed to have dimmed his happiness and hushed away his cheerful spirit. His eyes flickered from my eyes to my body, maybe looking for marks. He stopped and looked intensely at my right cheek. The throbbing it caused assured me that it was getting redder by the second.