NAME TO BE DETERMINED. Chapter 1

~~CHAPTER 1~~



"Sylvianne!" Mother called out the door, summoning me for dinner. I looked up from the garden I was tending to and smiled. I'm not sure how she did it, but Mother always managed to look beautiful. Even while she was working, her chocolate brown locks poured seamlessly down her back. My father had always said she was the prettiest woman ever to live. Mother was always happy back when Father lived with us. Now I had a step-father and Mother always had dark circles under her eyes and I hadn't seen her smile for a long time. Nonetheless, Lynn Kaya was beautiful.

I stepped into the threshold of our small, one room home. The floors were worn now, but you could tell that many years ago they were a beautiful mahogany color. The walls were a faded tan color. I smiled over at my favorite piece of furniture in the house. The wooden table. It was so amazing, with small marks and different colored splotches in it, making it seem foreign. When I was a child, I had believed that it was from a different world completely. Father and I used to make up stories about who or what had made each mark.

I still had many memories of Father. From when I was just a toddler to my preteen years. He was my rock, the man that kept my life together. Anytime I got angry or flew off the handle at one of my siblings, he was there to calm me down. I was so confused when I came home from my first sleepover to find my mother, alone and crying. After that, I had no one to help me. I sort of collapsed into myself, keeping my feelings inside.

Suddenly I heard a loud noise. I awakened from my reverie and saw that my step-father, Jones, was clearing his throat and beckoning me to the table. I hurried over and sat down, realizing (too late I might add) that I hadn't washed up. I waited for our daily prayer to end then excused myself from the table to wash my hands.

"Really, you'd never believe the size of that truck. And the man was driving way too fast to be on the road. When I tried to call in the woman who answered wouldn't report the dang guy." on he droned. Jones always did this. He believed that what he had had to say was a lot more important than anyone else's opinions. Especially more important than mine and my younger sister Rosalie. He had a soft spot for my oldest brother Charlie, who was 18 and helped out on the farm with Jones. Charlie was tall, with short blond hair and deep blue eyes. He was the spitting image of my father. My other brother was Victor. He and I were twins, both looking like our mother. We had glossy, dark hair and tan eyes the color of straw. Rosalie was the exotic one. She had curly hair, almost white, and had tiny features. I had always said she resembles an angel.

Bored of the truck story, I tried to interrupt the constant flow of ramblings, "You know Mother, it's almost Christmas. Are we celebrating at the church or at-"

"Neither." Jones interrupted.

"Excuse me?" I looked angrily at him, trying to remind him that I was addressing to my mother, not him. His eyebrows lowered and he regarded me as though I was one of the poor workers at the farmers market. According to him they were "scum".

"You heard me. Christmas is for people who worship satan."

"It is a time to celebrate Jesus' birth." I yelled, slamming my fork onto the table. The clatter seemed to awaken my mother who said,

"Sylvie. Calm down."

"No, mother, I will not calm down! He's ruining our lives." my anger from the past year seemed to burst out of my in a waterfall type way, crashing on whomever happened to be below. My father left us and so quickly after, my mother married this... Man.

Jones jumped up and moved threateningly towards me. "Don't speak to me like that, you little-".

"I wasn't speaking to you! I was trying to talk to my mom. That's the problem with you, you always think it's "all about you". It's not! I hate you!" I pushed him out of my way and ran up the wooden stairs, not before looking back and seeing the stunned faces of all of my family members staring at me. Mother, because I had used the informal term of "mom" like I used to, back when Father was around. Jones, because no one had ever spoken to him like that. Charlie and Victor, because they regarded Jones as some sort of hero and agreed with everything he said. And Rosalie, because she was so fragile and didn't like seeing me like this.

I locked my door and sat on the small bed, trying to control my anger. I needed to get out of this small Iowan town and move somewhere where I could find a job, a room, and someone who cared about me. I needed to find my father. Mother said that one day she woke up and he was gone. She said she knew he still cared about her and that he was a good man. When she had gotten engaged to Jones I had asked her, one late night, why. Why didn't she keep waiting for Father? Mother said, "Dear, when you are older you will understand."

"I'm sixteen now, and I still don't understand. Why did you do this to us?" I whispered softly, tears welling up in my eyes. I shook my head, clearing it of any of those thoughts. My resolve hardened. I must go find the one man who truly cares about me... I thought as I leaned back into my pillow.