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Ashley
‘U SKANKY COW!!’
‘Why do u bother coming to school, nobody likes you!!!’ ‘Stupid whore with a munted face like a dropped pie!! Go infect some other school.’
Ashley’s fingers were white as they gripped her daughter’s iPad. Waves of nausea hit her like rough seas slapping against the side of a boat as she read message after message on her fifteen-year-old daughter’s Instagram account. The more she scrolled through the obscene comments the more her face burned hot with rage.
Emily had begged to have an Instagram account last year and Ashley had allowed it, eventually. It was hard to resist her only child’s charms and persistent nagging, but it came with the caveat that the password never be changed so Ashley could keep tabs. Which she did and found it all to be innocent friend chatter. But after a while the checks grew further apart until they stopped altogether. That was until today.
If Ashley Grisham allowed herself to be brutally honest, she had known for a while that something wasn’t right with Emily. But they were both coming to terms with overwhelming changes and she was trying to give her daughter time and space to grieve, to heal. She thought Emily would come around in time. But more and more, Emily returned home from school quieter and quieter, moving slowly through life, shoulders drooped, head heavy and her eyes so sad it was breaking her mother’s heart. And the distance, as if Em were on a boat drifting out to sea, seemed to grow between them with each passing day.
Of course Ashley had tried to talk with her, to check in, but Emily’s reply was always, ‘I’m fine, Mum.’ Emily would flash her one of those smiles with her naturally red lips and straight teeth, the sort that could make the world believe she was the happiest, luckiest kid ever. Ash had been falling for it for too many years, or maybe she knew but was too scared to see the truth behind that smile. Because that smile was one Ash herself had worn on many occasions.
But it was in Em’s eyes that the truth lay.
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