#(( holds chise tenderly ))

[witchembrace-a]

@moonminstrel inquired:

SOBBED for chise !

glimpses of the past.

  When Chise’s little eyes fluttered open,  there were hands wrapped around her throat.

  Immediately her tiny hands reached out to try and stop it,  but she didn’t have much strength in such a small body.  Looming above her was her mother,  face contorted into a mixture of anger and spite.  The little girl didn’t understand.  She didn’t understand why this was happening. Was she such a burden to her own mother ?  Where did this even come from ?

  Mama . . .  Why ?  I can’t breathe . . .  Did I hurt you,  Mama ?  Is my existence such a burden that you have to kill me ?  Your hands are tight,  Mama . . .  I can’t breathe.  Stop this, Mama !  Stop it !  Let go of me !  I don’t want to die . . . !

  Chise wanted to cry out,  wanted to voice her pleas for her mother to stop,  to let go,  but the hands that trapped her there were too tight.  All the child could do was cough as she struggled to take in air.  Her vision started to blur and her heart was pounding in overdrive,  tiny legs kicking and flailing,  doing anything she could to break free of her mother’s grasp. She was powerless to stop it.  And yet she kept on trying.

  “ I wish I’d never had you.  I wish you’d never been born . . . ! “

  Chise’s eyes widened.  How could you say such a cruel thing,  Mama ?  She stopped trying to fight it.  She was starting to accept that this was how she was going to go out.  The child did nothing else as tears ran down her little cheeks.

  The next thing she knew,  those hands around her throat lessened in an instant,  releasing her.

  More coughs escaped her throat as she managed to pull air into her lungs again,  wiping her eyes as her neck stung from her mother’s hands.  She sat up and watched as her mother jumped backwards,  palm covering her mouth as if in shock.  She seemed to regret her actions,  which confused Chise ;  didn’t she do that because she wanted to kill her ?

  What further confused the child was the way her mother glanced back at the open window and then back at her daughter,  almost as if she were contemplating something.  But before Chise could ask what was going on,  her mother took more steps backwards,  towards that window.

  “ Chise.  I’m so sorry. “

  There were tears in her mother’s eyes as she smiled at Chise one final time.

  “ Forgive me . . . “

  And then she was gone.

  All Chise could do was stare at the space where her mother had been,  watching helplessly as she jumped out of that window.  She was frozen where she sat,  unable to move from the shock.  And then the tears came,  flooding her senses with the kind of desolation that a child could never experience as her broken voice came out in shattered sobs.  Her heart felt like it had been fractured,  like she could never experience love again.  The sheer despair that she felt crashed into her like a derailed train,  drowning her in sorrow like the ocean at high tide.  She didn’t know what else to say,  to do,  to think,  except lay down and cry until her body dried up.

  First,  it was her father who left.  But at least there was a chance he could come back.  Even if Chise doubted it,  it was still possible.  But the same couldn’t be said for her mother,  whose crimson hair likely blended with the blood of her broken body after she’d jumped from the window and ended her own life.

  She felt sick,  but no matter how much she coughed and hacked,  nothing came out.  She curled up into a ball on the futon and cried herself to sleep,  wishing she could wake up from this nightmare.  But it wasn’t a dream.  Even if Chise wished it had been.

  Her mother was gone.

  And she was alone.