I went to Luce's house today. I knocked on her door with my fractured fingers, standing there patiently. I listened to the patter of her dog's claws on the hardwood floors, and began to hobble on the heels of my feet. It was early morning, and the sun hadn't come up. But my mind was stuck on the little girl that was stripped from my arms. I wanted to be her older brother. I don't call Luce mom anymore. Not since she let Wrenley's case go cold, just like her mind.
Luce started doing opioids again.
In my mind, any mind that I have left to think about something else except for Wrenley, Luce is not my mother. She should have never been allowed to be someone's mother. Let alone mine, or Wrenley's. But I want my little sister back. One I wasn't even able to hold, to feel the curves of her spine, or watch her grow.
I never got to cry under the covers with her as Luce brought home another man, and the glass began to shatter, and the floor began to shake.
I've been living with aunt Opal and uncle Taylor. Even though they have cousin Daniel, I still want Wrenley.
Finally, as I felt the tip of my nose go numb, Luce opens the door. Her skin is pale, and her arms are thin.
She's stopped eating.
I stare at her for a few seconds, my mind running blank and the color draining from my face. She looks irritated by my presence. It's probably because I look too much like her and not my absent father.
"Mom…" I mutter out, and she opens her maw as her eyebrows knit together. I feel my heartbeat speed up.
"Don't pull that 'mom' shit with me now, Lucius!" She growls, and my jaw lays agape. It's like a wound in salt. All those sleepless nights, where I wished my mommy would hold me in her frail arms and warm embrace, and now brought to the clearing of my mind. I stutter, sputtering like an old car, unable to start up. I can't comprehend anything.
Luce and Lucius sound too similar. I don't like when Luce says my name. She used to call me Luci when I was young, and everything was better. But not anymore.
I can feel the cold winter air, albeit being October, fill my lungs. It burns. My throat feels charred and everything is hurting. "I'm sorry… I just—" Luce cuts me off as soon as I get to the reason as to why I'm on her doorstep at six o'clock in the morning. When the sun is still down, and when the snow is still falling. "Why are you at my house?" She demands to know, and I can feel my eyes well up with tears. I wasn't the boy she wanted.
"Well, I needed to ask you something. About Wrenley…" I manage to mumble out, shuffling my feet on the cement. It's cold and I don't want to be by her.
I glance up after a beat of time has passed, and I notice her expression has hardened. Luce doesn't like talking about Wrenley. She likes to imagine that Wrenley has never even been born. That Wrenley is a figment of my diverse and complicated brain, something I wrote down and somehow, in my short-circuiting mind, imagined was a real human. I'm not even sure if Luce likes me.
"You know she's gone, Lucius. She's been gone for years!" She snarls, and then I watch as she grips tightly onto her door, and brace myself for the slam.
…
…
…
She doesn't close the door. I was expecting to be left out here, dwelling in the freezing cold, begging to have my queries answered. "You really should have worn a scarf." I hear Luce's raspy and cold voice whisper out, before the door is slammed shut. The locks click, and I fight the tears in my eyes. Luce was never a great mother, but she tried.
That never really mattered, because drugs were much more important than her kids.
I come to terms with the fact that I will have to find Wrenley on my own.
