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The first time Clary saw it was when she was playing in the park. Mom– Mother was as listless as usual, only seeming to sink further into an abyss of negativity whenever she watched other parents play and interact with their squealing, giggling and innocent children. Bright-faced and bright-eyed, weren’t they truly a delight to be around? Clary stared at her for a moment, before her gaze went back to the neat sandcastle in front of her.
One, two, blink, blink.
Clary demolished the sandcastle without a second thought.
Would Mother pay more attention to her if she acted more like them? Or was it...ok to just be the same as always? (Hah. As if. It was obvious to anyone that Mother clearly didn’t like Clary for the way she was right now. Really, in Mother’s eyes she was probably nothing more than extra baggage she was obligated to take care of due to being the reason for her existence.) Dirty little hands dug into the sandpit and scooped up dirty sand-curling into fists. Then, they unfurled back in a flash, releasing the dirty sand, pouring it back to its original “home”. Void black eyes stared at open palms, focused yet glazed over-as if the owner of those eyes had magically become a porcelain doll.
Slowly, slowly, Clary put her hands down-still with the same glazed over look in her eyes-on the sand, and pushed herself up onto her two feet. Without a single glance to her mother, Clary walked out of the sandpit towards the (mostly) clear water of a fountain. She looked down expressionlessly at a rippling, watery reflection of herself. Then-propping her hands lightly against the edge of the fountain-she leaned in a little nearer to the water.
And smiled.
A dull, colourless thing it was. The edges of her eyes neither crinkling up nor thinning to make a playful closed eyed smile. Her aura of random, unexplainable happiness was like decaying plastic. To put it simply, Clary’s attempt at her own “innocent, childish” smile had as much appeal as a dead horse. Any bystander could attest to that, even Clary could see and understand that.
It was no use beating a dead horse.
It took less than a few seconds for her farce of a smile to dissipate back into her usual straight lined mouth. Rising back up from looking at the fountain water, Clary swiftly turned and walked to the direction of the swings. However, on the way there, a small scene caught her attention-nothing too out of the ordinary, it was merely an older child standing up for what could presumably be his younger sister against a group of even older children. She stopped walking, but made no move to help the other child out. It was fine to just watch and observe.
“Why’re you hurting my lil’ Sis anyways! She already said sorry to all you big meanies! Didn’t your mommy tell you hurting other people is wrong?” the boy screamed fearlessly at the small group of young teens, hands bunched into tight fists and his body standing protectively in front of his sobbing little sister.
A red-shirted girl started to retort back, “Well—” she was suddenly interrupted by a furious looking woman dashing towards them. Judging from the brightening face of the young boy, she was probably his mother.
“Ezekiel! Calliope!” the woman yelled worriedly; the appearance of an adult caused the teens once circling the two children to scram and run away as fast as they could. Big as they were, picking a fight with an adult would be the height of stupidity.
“Mom!” the newly dubbed Ezekiel beamed at his mother. His emotions were a complete one-eighty from the previous anger-even little Calliope behind him had given her mother a thin watery smile. The two children both hurried over to hug their mother’s legs. “Mom! Mom! Those big kids just now,” he pointed in the direction of where said kids had run off, “were really mean and rude to me and Lili-they even hit Lili!”
“What?!” the woman, obviously shocked at the news, immediately bent down to anxiously check her daughter. Once she spotted the bruises, her face darkened with anger, and she pulled both her children into a tight hug. Whispering words of comfort and apologies that Clary barely heard into her children’s ear, the woman gently stroked their fine brown hair.
Clary thought it was a rather extreme reaction for mere bruises, but perhaps… She turned and looked back at where she knew her Mother was, pondered, then stared down at smooth freckled skin. Unblemished and unbroken with injuries, any assortment of vivid colours-whether they be red, green, purple or yellow-would be a stark contrast on her skin. The key point being easily noticeable. Her thoughts rushed around in her head, creating scenarios and discarding ideas as quickly as they came.
No, it wouldn’t work. Maybe Luke would worry and fret a little, and that faint sometimes there voice would screech and fuss at her. But she sure as hell wouldn’t actually care. Why did she want her to care so much? It would’ve been better for Clary if she’d never expected anything from her at all.
Static filled her mind, making her blank out as she tightly gripped onto her arm and wondered why was it so–
Loud voices yanked her out of her thoughts.
“...got hurt, I didn’t stop them before they hurt Lili! I’m sorry Mommy…” Ezekiel looked forlorn, clearly unhappy about how his inability to win against a group of clearly stronger teens.
What an idiot. Didn’t he know he did the best he could in such a situation?
“That’s…” the woman’s voice trailed off, hesitant about exactly how to respond. ”I’m proud of you for defending your little sister Ezekiel. What happened to Lili wasn’t your fault. Did you cause them to come over and choose to act like bullies to you two?” By then their mother was looking determinedly, but gently at her son.
“No..”
“Then don’t blame yourself for it. You did the right thing in that situation. Instead, be proud of yourself for being so brave and standing up to them. Alright?” With that, she stood up, holding Calliope in one arm and holding Ijekiel’s hand with her free hand. “Let’s go home now. What do you two want for dinner?”
In the shadows Clary watched them go, unseen by any mortal soul.
How strange. Was this the kind of behaviour parents wanted from their children? Would she prefer her to be that way?
Well, she’d never know if she didn’t try.
So as Clary walked back to her mother, she tried to practice along the way. Helping out others, being as kind as she could. Did you need this? That? What’s wrong? Are you ok? Before she reached the end, she would make sure she remembered well what was “good” and “right”.
And the pretty smile Mother gave her (no matter how fake and plasticine it was, no matter the stretched, trembling corners of her mouth, how doll-like it was compared to the sun that shone with Luke), was worth all the blood, sweat and tears she put into perfecting this persona.