It's always darkest before the dawn.

What a crock.

Life isn't as simple as some pretty platitude or movie. If it were, then the credits would have rolled on my film after the moment my mom and I shared together in the hospital. The stinger would show the two of us living happily together, without a care in the world. But life isn't a movie, and contrary to that optimistic cliché, bad things usually get worse, not better.

It's been two months since I was almost killed by my so-called father, Eric. I wish I could say it's been sunshine and rainbows since then, but in fact, it's almost like those few, magical moments I shared with mom never happened. The reality of a life after that scumbag has set in, and while it should be just as amazing as I've spent the last seventeen years dreaming it would be... it isn't.

In a quarter mile, turn right, the GPS on mom's phone says, robotically. It continues to be the only thing that has spoken inside the car in hours.

In the time since my discharge from the hospital, my head has gradually healed. Though, frequent headaches and other post-concussion symptoms still plagued me. According to the doctor, it would be a few more months before it was considered fully healed, so I still needed to take care. Unfortunately, being on the road for nine hours straight wasn't helping much. We had begun traveling in the wee hours of the morning, and since then, the sun had risen and shone so bright that I instantly developed a migraine. For whatever reason, I don't own a pair of sunglasses. So, I've been at the mercy of whatever beams the visor can't keep out of my eyes for a while now. Fun.

"We're almost there, get yourself ready," mom says, finally breaking the hours long silence.

"Whatever."

Mom sucks her teeth and rolls her eyes at my response, and I couldn't give any less of a shit.

She has some nerve getting upset with me for anything. Despite all her grandstanding and bright, shining words, she's the one who went running to visit Eric in jail the first second he called apologizing. No matter how much she denies it, it's obvious that she is beginning to second-guess herself for leaving the asshole. Thankfully, he's still rotting in a cell for what he did, and the divorce is still ongoing. But lately, she's begun drinking herself stupid over this situation for reasons I can't fathom. Not only that, but I've caught her sneaking glances at old pictures of them together several times already. Pathetic.

I thought she claimed that him nearly killing me was "too far", but I guess I'm really not that important to her after all. Still need to waste tears and play nice with an abuser.

Blegh.

Mom obeyed the GPS system and turned right at the prompt. The road we turned onto was annoyingly bumpy and uneven, like it hadn't been paved in years. That had been the case for the past few minutes as well, but it made more sense when the roads we had driven on were lined with nothing but trees. Now that we were driving through this miserable excuse for a town, it was far more noticeable. Though, honestly, it was far from out of place. Everywhere I looked, something was rundown. Shopping center? Rundown. Diner? Rundown. Church? Especially rundown.

What a pile of shit.

No, wait, it's Redville—my mother's twisted idea of paradise!

I grew up there, it'll be great! she had said. Yes, because you grew up in some backwards, backwoods, trash fire of a town, I have to as well. And that's the thing, she made such a big deal out of this entire move being all for my sake. Yeah, right. She should've known damn well that this is the last place I'd ever want to even look at on a map.

This isn't even the first time I've been here or made my feelings about it known. We visited this place when I was younger, and I hated every second of it. The town is the definition of a Potemkin Village, with shoddy-looking everything barely concealing the fact that there's nothing to do but get smothered in ticks. The people are painfully fake, the air stinks of animal feces, and most of the buildings all looked—shocker—rundown. But mom loved it, of course, because it was nostalgic for her. She was the "bare feet in the grass" type growing up. Give me a break. Just about the only thing I ever agreed with that shit-stain Eric about in my entire life is that this place is complete and utter garbage.

Boy, they had one hell of a fight when he told her right to her face that this place was shit. She had been excited to show him the precious place where she grew up for years, just for him to react like that. Oh well, that's the price one pays for marrying a sentient pool of vomit.

Anyway.

We drove through the drab, ugly town I was soon to see too much of, and after a short distance, turned yet again onto a rural road. A small community of houses came into view, all of them lined up with a decent amount of space separating them. The lots weren't farmland or ranches or anything, but they weren't your average, cramped suburban properties either. There was enough space between the homes to create a sense of privacy and breathing room.

Mom brought the car to a stop on a driveway just outside of a blue, two-story house at the end of the street. As we pulled in, I immediately took note of a sign that carried the name of our new address.

Melancholy Lane.

How inviting.

I mean, seriously? You can't write this shit.

"We're here," mom said, unceremoniously. She opened the door, stepped outside, and began to stretch her legs. "Come on, get out already."

I reluctantly obeyed and exited the vehicle. The house that loomed over me had clearly seen better days. It wasn't in the worst shape I'd ever seen, but it was obvious it hadn't been built recently or been maintained very well by its previous owners. The exterior's blue color appeared long tarnished, stained all over from uncontrolled exposure to the elements, and the paint on the white, two-car garage doors and the frame surrounding them was chipping badly in places as well.

"Looks like paradise, mom."

"Quell the attitude and help me bring our bags inside."

Ever the loyal soldier, I gave her a mighty salute and opened the trunk to begin doing as she asked. She made a face that suggested she didn't appreciate my gesture, but I think she realized that making a situation out of it would have just irritated the both of us. Instead, she walked up to the front door of the house and unlocked it as I loaded several bags into my hands and onto my shoulders.

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Gray clouds began to roll in alarmingly fast, blocking out the sun and draining the color from just about everything on the street. Fitting, one might say. But I digress.

Mom came back down the stairs and took a few bags from the back of the car before leading the way up the stairs and into the house. I followed closely behind.

She had basically gone about the entire process of getting the house while I was focused on recovering from my injury, so up to this point, I hadn't even seen a single picture of what the place looked like. Upon stepping inside, I finally got my first glimpse of our new home.

"Here it is," said mom, a proud smile forming on her lips.

I stood beside her, taking in the scene. The scent was the first thing that struck me. It was a combination of pine-scented, recently scrubbed wood floor, and that pristine smell of a closed space absent of people or animals to taint the air. Altogether, the aroma that filled my nose could best be described as the instantly familiar "new house" smell. I hadn't encountered it in years, but it's something you never forget once you've had a whiff.

Conversely, nothing my eyes could see was familiar at all. To my immediate left, a white staircase with brown, wooden steps resided. It led up for about five steps, stopping at a flat landing before continuing right and up into a hall that was too dark to see from where I was standing. The walls that wrapped around the foyer and into the other rooms were covered in a calming, cream colored paint that nicely complimented a shiny, beige wood floor. On the wall, not too far from where I stood, was a stone fireplace. I admit, it was pretty, and like the rest of the interior so far, it looked quite clean. What a contrast from the glum, off-putting exterior.

"What do you think?" asked mom.

"It's... better on the inside than out."

"High praise, coming from you, Jen," she quipped. "Go set those bags down in the living room for now, then we can go get the rest."

I did as she requested and took the opportunity to peer into the other rooms. In total, I noted a foyer, living room, family room, dining room, kitchen, and bathroom. And this was before considering the basement and the second floor! Sure, the lack of furniture made the rooms look larger than they would inevitably become, but all things considered, this house was larger than I expected. In fact, it was too large for just two people, and definitely too large for what I assume our budget had to be. After dropping the bags, I turned to mom and voiced my confusion.

"Don't you think this place is too big for the two of us? I mean, this is even bigger than our old house. How can you even afford this?" I asked.

"One of the great things about this place is how modestly priced the houses are. I tried to tell you I had very good reasons for wanting to move to Redville, but all you do lately is get mad at everything I say instead of just listening to me."

"That's funny, mom. Because if you listened to me, you'd know how much I hated this place the first time you dragged me here. You know what? Screw that. If you ever listened to me, maybe you would have acted like a woman rather than a scared little girl and left that piece of shit Eric years ago instead of waiting till he tried to kill us."

A flush of anger came over her face and she spoke curtly. "I owned up to what I did and apologized to you. The fact that you would even say something like that is—"

A sudden knock on the frame of our open front door took us both out of the moment.

"Hello, neighbors! Hope we're not interrupting something..." said a man on our porch.

Mom's demeanor flipped instantly, and she replied, "of course not!" Hurriedly, she stepped away from me and approached the door.

Yeah, go put on a face. It's what you seem to do best these days, mother dearest.

Rather than waste my time awkwardly standing around and listening to a painfully artificial conversation, I decided to go to the living room and start unpacking whatever we would need tonight. The movers wouldn't be arriving with our stuff for another day, so we brought as many useful items that could fit into the car as possible. Toiletries, flashlights, a first-aid kit, and two air mattresses are just some of the things we had enough foresight to lug along with us.

After the long day I've had, I just want to take a nice, hot shower and fall into a cozy, bouncy bed. So, naturally, I grabbed one of the air mattresses, the air pump, and the bag with our shower stuff, and placed them aside. Here's hoping the bathroom is as nice as the rest of the house has been so far.

As I rifled through the bags, I admit that my curiosity was piqued. The conversation I had been ignoring between my mom and that man had seemingly changed while my thoughts were elsewhere. There were now two other voices in the mix that I didn't recognize—laughing and chatting away. As much as I tried to fight the urge to pay it any attention, I found myself looking out the archway of the living room to catch a glimpse of what was going on.

There were three figures standing at the entrance: the man from before, a woman, and a girl who looked about my age. The first two weren't anything special, to be honest. The man wore a dark red polo, regular, blue jeans, and had short, brown hair, and a pair of black glasses on his face. He looked like the typical sitcom dad, and the same could be said about the woman next to him. She wore a plaid shirt and sky-blue jeans, and had layered, blonde hair with bangs draping down on either side of her face, framing it. To say that her hair resembled every newscaster woman ever is the easiest way to describe it. Like I said, both the man and the woman were the same unremarkable people you've seen a million times over in every town ever.

The girl was the one in the trio that really caught my attention. Her hair was neck length, dyed bright blue, and fashioned in the "scene" style, with sideswept bangs resting over her left eye. On the one eye that I could see, she wore a mix of black and dark blue eyeliner that gave it a rather sharp appearance. A black belly shirt hugged her torso, exposing her navel, yet, her arms remained covered by the long sleeves of a lower cut, white undershirt. On her bottom half, she wore dark blue skinny jeans and a pair of slightly worn looking black and white canvas shoes.

Just looking at how eye-catching the girl was made me think of myself a little bit. My gothic style has always attracted a lot of negative attention and made me an easy target for bullies and old, nosey, religious nuts with plenty of unsolicited opinions about me. I've never cared about any of that because I wear the look for me, not to impress anyone else or gain their approval. But I've never come across anyone else who dressed as blatantly outlandish as myself. So, seeing the girl was admittedly refreshing.

As I looked on, examining the three individuals standing on the porch, mom turned in my direction and waved me over.

I might be a bit curious, but that doesn't mean I'm in a rush to socialize with anyone from this accursed town. Looks like I have no choice now, though.

Ugh, here we go.

I got up and walked up beside my mom, doing my best not to look as nonplussed as I felt.

"Honey," mom started. "These are our new neighbors. They came to welcome us to the neighborhood! Isn't that sweet?"

She said that last part with a little insinuation. I guess I'm supposed to be captivated by the "charm" of this place or whatever. Do yourself a favor and save it, mom.

"We're sorry we dropped by unannounced," the man said, looking at me. "But we saw your car pull up outside and figured you must be the new neighbors. We're old school, so we like to greet new folks around here."

"No need to apologize," mom replied. "What you're doing is absolutely appreciated. This is my daughter Jen, by the way."

The man smiled at us and continued. "Nice to meet you, Jen! But where's our manners? We should reintroduce ourselves. I'm Clark. This is my wife, Melissa. And this is our wonderful daughter, Heather. We're the Matthews!"

"Nice to meet you all too," I replied, wearing the best polite façade I could manage.

Heather was standing front and center, flanked by her parents in a perfect, triangular formation. She was holding a large, plastic food container in her hands. What looked like a bevy of chocolate-chip cookies were visible beneath the clear, plastic top her black painted fingernails rested on.

"These are for you two, by the way," said Clark. "A little gift from our family to yours."

Mom looked touched by their gesture and took the container from Heather. "How nice of you! They look delicious."

"Oh, trust me honey, you'll love them. Our darling, Heather, made them all by herself!" Melissa declared, proudly.

"Wow, that's amazing!" mom said.

"Hey, you know what?" Clark started. "I couldn't help but notice you still had some bags in your trunk. Why don't you let Melissa and I give you a hand with that and let our girls get to know each other?"

Mom gave me an excited look and said, "that's a fantastic idea! Why don't you two go hang out in the backyard while we do that?"

Well, now that you've put me on the spot, what choice do I have?

"Sure," I said.

Heather stepped inside the house and said, "then what are you waiting for? Let's go have a little chat..."