Until Proven Innocent

CHAPTER TWO

BEFORE
Cordelia Waters
November 13, 2015

I was a devilish child. The phrase 'never judge a book by its cover' could be accurately applied to my life. Everyone I knew was hoodwinked by the white blonde hair and Bambi eyes, thinking I was this innocent angel who could do no wrong. That couldn't have been farther from the truth.

I used to roam around the neighborhood with a hardy look of malice in my eyes. To this day I'm still not able to pinpoint the exact origin to the madness that was in my soul. While the rest of my friends played contently with their dolls, I had a craving for trouble and conflict. I got high off the fumes of disaster and punishment. Something about the feeling of rivalry and revolt left me almost intoxicated, constantly wanting more.

I would plan out events in my little pink diary, noting which of the neighborhood children were going to suffer the wrath of little Cordelia each week. Thinking about it now, perhaps it was my looks that were the core driving force to my behaviour. I was small and petite, the subject of ridicule, the one easily pushed around. When you're small and a female, people assume things about you – that you're gentle and kind. That you can do no harm. I guess I wanted to prove that I was more than just a stereotype.

My family lived in a rural-suburban neighborhood where everyone was accessible and easy to locate if you needed them – usually lounging on the front porch with a drink or two in hand. In the summer time, our house was the meeting place for stray cats. Numerous felines would wander into our yard, squat out for a while, breed, reproduce. My emotions were fairly neutral towards the strays. I didn't despise them, but I wasn't fond of them either.

This one day, a stray who we called Tim-Tam, had somehow made his way into our house. He was an orange tabby – a brave little thing. The rest of the clan remained outside, afraid of the trouble that loomed if they dared enter our home. But like I said, Tim-Tam was a brave one. He was clearly oblivious to the lack of authority he possessed. He strutted inside and perched himself on our kitchen table. I remember walking into the kitchen one afternoon only to lay my eyes on the orange tabby sitting there, staring at me. Squinting his beady eyes at me in defiance, it was a show down, determining who possessed more power. I must admit, I had to give the cat some credit for challenging me out of all people. Me! The one relatives referred to as the craziest of the Cruz children.

After moments of periphery battle, I lunged forward and grabbed him, his tiny body struggling as I held him tight. His claws lurched towards my face, aiming for my eye. I swung open the door to the backyard, and in one quick motion, threw him into our little blow up pool that my mother would set up for us kids every summer. It wasn't a large pool, but it was deep enough for Tim-Tam to go in head first and spasm out just as fast. I remained standing at the door as I watched, smiling. I was the victorious one that day. Until my mother called me into the kitchen later that night to ask why the pool was leaking.

Over the years, I found that I could get away with anything. The platinum blonde hair – inherited from my mother – and large brown eyes were often the key in the hole to my getaway. I could manipulate people so well that they didn't even realize they'd been manipulated. My parents thought I was an angel. I was their only daughter, born between two rowdy and obnoxious boys.

Liam, the youngest, shares a particularly similar aesthetic to me. Both of us full heads of blonde and eerily similar facial structures. However, contrasting to my dark brown eyes, Liam inherited my father's deep shades of blue. Their eldest child, Colton, did not look like us at all, with his dark brown hair, skinny chin, and brown eyes. It was an ongoing joke between Liam and me that Colton was adopted since he didn't resemble us in any way. My father, maybe a little. The facial structure and the hair, really. But other than that, people often didn't realize he was our sibling. Anytime the three of us went anywhere, it was obvious to everybody in the room that Liam and I were brother and sister. No questions asked. Colton, on the other hand, was not as obvious to pinpoint to our family.