Kanna-sama: I generally don’t pay a lot of attention to the words of songs, even if I’m singing along with it. However, when it comes to rap, it’s rather hard not to. The first time I heard Eminem’s Mockingbird, I never actually listened to the words. When I did, I was inspired by this song.

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Title: Little girl

Rating: K

Genre: Drama/Angst

Summary: Joey and Hilary’s marriage has slowly been breaking and although they suffer, in the end, it is their young daughter who suffers the most. Drabble.

Notes/Warnings: Drabble; drama; inspired by Eminem’s Mockingbird

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Little girl

Karen held the bag of groceries to her chest, staring with tearing eyes as she watched her brother’s things being tossed on the unkempt lawn. Misty, her niece, stood beside her, staring with a blank expression. Karen, holding the tiny girl’s hand with her right hand, tightened her hold, bringing her closer to her side. It had been agreed that Misty was to stay over at Karen’s during the weekend and to be brought back this Sunday afternoon.

Maybe Karen should have expected this.

Maybe she should have called before coming, knowing how Joey and Hilary’s marriage had been going.

There was a scream that sounded like it was from Hilary and Misty trembled against Karen’s side. Letting out a shaky breath, Karen turned back to the car and shoved the bag of groceries in the driver’s seat and tucked Misty in the backseat, smiling reassuringly. “Stay out here, will you, sweetheart? I promise everything will be okay.” She smoothed Misty’s hair, so like Joey’s, from her face and kissed her on the forehead. Misty nodded and watched as Karen shut the door and rushed to the house, slipping once on a shirt before climbing the porch steps and vanishing.

Misty stared at the shirt Karen had slipped on, recalling her father wearing it so many times. She heard the shrill voices of Karen and Hilary dimly beneath her father’s roaring, angry voice. She never once looked up at the house to see the contorted faces of her parents in the window in the kitchen; she never once looked from the shirt among the weeds and grass to watch as Joey was hurled from Hilary, whose usually beautiful face was marked by a few scratches and streaked with mascara. It was only when the door slammed and her father’s belongings were beginning to be gathered that she looked up.

Her aunt was trying to console him, her eyes full of desperate tears. He let out a quick stream of angry words, gesturing furiously towards the house. Misty didn’t allow herself to comprehend the words, her blank, brown eyes fixed on her father’s handsome face. At a soft word from Karen, his expression dropped to that of weariness and sadness, his shoulders slumping. Slowly, he turned his gaze to Misty’s and he stared at her. She raised a hand to the window, barely conscious of doing so. She absently stroked the image of his face, feeling her heart constricting.

Dropping the things he had picked up, he jogged to the car and Misty pushed the door open, stumbling out. Before she could fall, Joey swept his four-year-old daughter up into his arms and hugged her close. Misty rested her head on his shoulder, feeling a warm dampness on her neck. She closed her eyes, clutching at him, knowing instinctively that he was crying despite the stillness of his body, despite the silence. Karen, a few feet from them, stared at them with a drooping mouth.

“Daddy...?” Misty murmured as he drew away, heaving in a deep breath.

“I’m leaving for awhile, Misty,” he rasped. Clearing his throat quickly, he forced a smile of his mouth and stroked her cheek. “My pretty little angel...”

“Daddy...” She dug her fingers in his shirt, but he pulled her away, handing her to Karen. “Daddy!!!”

“Come on, Misty. Please, come.” Karen placed her in the backseat again and shut the door quickly.

“DADDY!” She shrieked, even as the doors locked. She slammed her hands on the window, staring frantically at his depressed, long face. The car pulled out of the doorway and Misty continued to bang on the windows, screaming for him even as they pulled away from the house. She choked on a sob, blinded by the tears as the door turned, leaving the last sight of her father.

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No one told her what happened to her father two nights ago. No one told her why she never saw her, why her mother cried in bed every night. No one told her why her aunt couldn’t say her brother’s name. The only thing that she had to remember him by was a picture that she had stolen from her mother’s photo album. The picture held happier days; it was that of her and her parents, pressed together and smiling. Misty pretended to herself that her father was smiling wherever he was, if only to console herself that he was still alive.

Finis