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Unedited Version
Prologue
This was Maia Duncan’s favorite time of
day. This was the short thirty minutes
she had to herself to be whomever she chose…a pretend world that seemed to be
the only safe place a twelve year old girl with low self-esteem could dream up and
finally become an equal with her over confident counterparts. The anonymity of the internet.
Although her parents constantly lavished her with
compliments of her blossoming beauty, Maia did not delude herself into
believing she had striking, good looks nor did she wish for them. But she did
pray one day her unappealing overbite and pimply face would grow into the swan her mother promised she would become
someday.
Prtygrl14: “What are you doing?”
Shygrl12: “Nothin’ ‘bout 2 start my homework. What ‘bout
you?”
Prtygrl14: “Nuttin’ much. I’m tryin on sum nu clothes 4
an audition.”
This revelation brought a twinge of envy to
Maia’s heart. Not that she wasn’t happy
for her friend, but she couldn’t help but feel jealous of someone with the
confidence and spirit as Pamela, her new friend she’s come to know as Pretty Girl 14.
Shygrl12: “What kinda audition? Ooh, don’t tell me you
get 2 model on a runway, I’d just die with envy.”
Prtygrl14: “LMAO! I wish! No, but I do get 2 model some
pretty cool bathing suits & clothes. Some I get 2 keep.”
After Maia’s parent’s divorce she could only
dream of new clothes. Her father wasn’t
as generous with the child support, so Maia had to wear hand-me-downs from
family members or church member’s children who no longer had a use for their
old clothes. Just the thought of having
a new outfit was enough to make Maia drool.
A coy smile played on her lips as she got lost in the notion for a brief
moment.
Prtygrl14: “Hey ya still there?”
Shygrl12: “Yea, just dreaming about some nu clothes.
U’re so lucky.”
Prtygrl14: “I’m not lucky, it’s easy. All u hav 2 do is take
a few pics & they pay u. It only takes a couple hrs for ea photo shoot. U
shud try it.”
Maia looked at her reflection in the computer
screen. She was not pleased with what
looked back at her. In her mind, she was
not the budding flower that would blossom into the beautiful rose her mother
would promise each day. What she saw was
a dark mop of hair that could not be tamed, pimples that covered her cheeks and
forehead that resembled a crater catastrophe and features that were too harsh
to be considered feminine…thanks to her father’s dominating features.
Maia let out a piteous sigh.
Shygrl12: “I’ll leave the modeling 2 u. I’m not born
w/looks…brains maybe LMBO”
Prtygrl14: “U don’t give urself enuf credit. There’s
nuttin a lil makeup can’t fix. Trust me, I kno.”
Shygrl12: “Only beautiful ppl say things like that.
Girls like me kno better. I need more than makeup to fix all of my problems.”
Prtygrl14: “Do u have a webcam?”
Shygrl12: “No. My mom says I’m not old enuf 2 b
responsible w/that kinda technology. I think it’s bcuz she’s 2 cheap.”
Prtygrl14: “If u were a model u cud make ur own money
& buy ur own things. That’s what I did. I have all the cool gadgets now…my
mom said we were poor, but I think she was just being cheap 2.”
Shygrl12: “I kno what u mean. They just don’t
understand what teenagers need to b cool these days. They nvr had internet or
needed a cell phone. I wish I did have my own money so I cud buy myself all of
the nice things other kids have.”
Prtygrl14: “Well, the guy that takes my pics is pretty
cool. Mayb he will let u take a few pics and pay u. Ur mother won’t have 2 kno.
It’s not like she’ll b browsing thru teen magazines Haha!”
Maia could feel the yearning at the pit of her
belly, but with that came all of the warning bells and whistles her mother
planted in her head to make her afraid to do something as daring as defy her
when it came to internet safety. Still,
her mother didn’t know what it was like to be a teenager in this time...how
other kids teased her for not having the latest or nicest things.
Besides, she and Pamela had been chatting for
over a month and she was nice. She was
another teenager just like herself, with a mother who didn’t understand what it
was like to be teased for being poor.
Yet, Pamela had done something about it.
Something Maia wished she was brave enough to do herself.
Again, Maia got caught up in her daydream about
new clothes and shoes and maybe a few new gadgets…like a cell phone or a webcam
so she and Pamela could see each other and talk instead of typing all the
time. That would be so freaking awesome, Maia thought to herself.
Shygrl12: “Wudn’t he need a parent’s sig 2 take pics?”
Prtygrl14: “No! I take pics all the time. My mom nvr
knows where I get my money. I tell her I save up my allowance. LMAO…she’s so lame.”
Shygrl12: “I don’t get allowance.”
Prtygrl14: “Oh, ur mom is cheap! U need 2 think
seriously about going 2 one of the auditions. U’d b surprised how easy it is.”
Maia could hear her mother’s keys jingling as
she attempted to unlock the front door.
Over the last month, Maia’s keen sense of hearing increased ever since
their outburst about Maia’s constant preoccupation with chatting on the
internet. Besides, she was not supposed
to even think about getting on the computer until all of her homework was done
and she hadn’t even started yet.
Shygrl12: “My mom’s here…gotta go!”
Prtygrl14: “Ok, but think about it. Talk 2moro.”
The screen went black.
Maia raced to the bed and dumped her books out
of her backpack and began reading a random book just as her mother walked into
her room. Maia hated that her mother
didn’t respect her privacy and would just walk in without knocking. But that was another argument Maia lost, with
the threat of her mother taking the door off the hinges if she ever found the
door locked.
It seemed more and more she and her mother were
at odds about one thing or another. One
day it’s her internet time…another it’s her privacy. No matter what Maia seemed to want to do, her
mother always found fault. Nothing she
did seemed to be good enough for her mother.
She didn’t even allow Maia to talk about boys…even her favorite boy band was off limits in her mother’s
house.
But living with her father was out of the
question. With the contentious divorce
between her parents, Maia was lucky if she saw him once a month or during the
holidays. He did everything he could to
avoid his ex-wife and Maia was beginning to understand why. Ever since her mother didn’t have her father
around to nag, Maia seemed to be her new target. There was nothing she could do or say to
satisfy her mother and everything became a big fight. There wasn’t a day Maia didn’t wish she was
18 so she could finally move out and be on her own and make her own decisions.
Brenda Duncan walked into Maia’s room and looked
around as if to spy a boy hiding in the corner of the room. She always had that suspicious appearance
ever since she had to entrust Maia to come home alone and become another
latch-key kid in a single parent home. To
her mother, it was akin to being an outcast in society…a step away from teen
pregnancy, drugs and alcohol…and in no particular order.
As her mother did her surreptitious perusal, Maia continued to pretend she was engrossed
in her studies. But what she was really
doing was thinking about how suffocating and untrusting her mother had become
since the divorce.
“How was school?” Brenda finally asked when
everything was met with her satisfaction.
Maia could see the physical relief her mother
displayed that Maia did not defy her by having anyone in the house when she
wasn’t home and she was not on the internet.
“It was okay.” Maia never looked
up from her book. Lately it was safer to
keep her responses to her mother short and sweet. It seemed the only way to prevent an
argument.
“Doing your homework I see,” Brenda remarked,
attempting small talk.
But Maia was not buying it. She was not going to let her mother bait her
into conversation. Before long, she’ll
be in a heated discussion about her worthless
father or how Maia was not doing well enough in school and her grades were
dropping…anything to start a fight to vent her own ineptness.
“Yeah,” was all Maia said in response.
Brenda stared at Maia for a long moment but
didn’t say anything else. Maia knew she
wanted to say something, but she didn’t.
Whatever she wanted to say, she kept it to herself and walked out of the
room to leave Maia to her own thoughts.
Thoughts about how nice it would be to finally have some of the things
in life the other kids in her school had.
How nice it would be not to be talked about because she didn’t have
something as simple as a cell phone, even kids younger than she had one. It was embarrassing, but that was the least
of the things that made her feel ashamed of her circumstances.
********
Maia played around with her food on her plate as
Pamela’s words bounced around in her head.
She almost smiled at the moment she came to the realization she had
already decided that she was going to do it.
But her mother’s stern scrutiny prevented her smile from appearing on
her face. Instead Maia remained a blank
slate, stoic and unexpressive…a trait she learned from watching her father over
the years.
“What are you thinking about?” Brenda finally
asked.
Maia knew she would not be able to fool her
mother for long, but she knew she wasn’t going to confess the truth either. So she had thought of a lie earlier she knew
her mother would fall for. Like Pamela
had said earlier…mothers are lame.
“I have a friend in school who’s going to give
me some of her clothes,” Maia lied.
Brenda had her pride, but it was long hidden by
the necessity of survival. There was a
time when she’d reject the charity of another, but after the divorce it was a
bitter pill to have to not only ask for, but accept the assistance from
strangers. Maia knew it killed her, but
she liked having the same things as other kids her age. Just because her parents were no longer
together didn’t mean she should suffer.
Brenda’s face was suspicious, but she didn’t
voice it. She only asked, “Why would she
offer to give you her clothes?”
Maia shrugged as if that simple gesture
explained all of her mother’s unanswered questions.
“I’ve never heard you talk about Pamela
before. Is she a new friend?” Brenda
asked.
Maia had forgotten how Brenda was when it came
to knowing everyone she knew. Maia had
to think quickly if she wanted to avoid another blow-up with her mother and get
caught up in her lie. “She’s new. She’s only been at the school for a month.”
“Maybe I’ll get to meet this new friend,” Brenda said. It was the tone she used when she didn’t
completely believe what Maia was saying, but came up short of calling her a
liar.
“Sure, maybe you’ll see her when you drop me
off. Sometimes she waits for me…but
sometimes she’s late so you might not get a chance to meet her,” Maia lied
again.
“That’ll be nice. I like knowing all of the people you
know. Is she nice?” Brenda asked. It was her subtle way of asking if she talked
about boys or sex or anything she didn’t deem appropriate for Maia.
“Yeah.
You’ll like her. She’s smart and
beautiful. She’s a model,” Maia said
before she could stop herself. She had
gotten so caught up in her own lie; she had carried it too far. Now she was adding more information for her
mother question her about. She wanted to
bite her deceitful tongue from her mouth.
“A model, huh?
What type of model?” Brenda asked.
“Um..I don’t know. Just a model.
She gets clothes from some of her photo shoots and some of them she said
she’ll give to me,” Maia said.
Brenda’s lips pressed into a thin line, a
gesture she used to prevent the words she felt from spewing from her
mouth. Maia had seen this expression a
million times when her mother didn’t want to fight, but the words were just on
the tip of her tongue to throw an innocent conversation into a downward spiral which
lead to yelling, crying and hurt feelings.
“Maia, please tell me this isn’t one of your friends you’ve met on the internet,” she
finally said it. It was too serious to
keep to herself.
Maia let out an audible sigh and dropped her
fork in her plate with a loud clank.
“You never trust me. You always
want to find something to fight about.
Now I see why daddy left!”
Brenda leapt from her chair in a shot, her first
instinct to slap Maia across the face, but thought better of it…counted to ten
and sat back down. She was not going to
be goaded into a fight by a 12 year old when this was serious. Maia had no idea the predators who stalked
young, naïve little girls like herself.
It was her job as her mother to educate and protect her.
“Maia you’re only 12 years old, you have no idea
the evil that’s out there in the world waiting for someone like you to prey
on,” Brenda said calmly. “I don’t say
these things to fight, I say it because I love you and I want you to be
protected and safe.”
“Well, you can’t save me from everything. When are you going to let me learn things on
my own and make my own mistakes? You’re
not always going to be there for me…then what?
You need to trust me to take care of myself and let me grow up,” Maia
made an impassioned plea.
Maia loved her mother, but she was feeling
smothered by her mother’s love. All she
wanted was to have a chance to do some of the things regular kids did. What was so wrong with going to the movies
once in a while? What was so terrible
talking about boys with her friends? It
wasn’t like she was going to leave with a stranger or have unprotected sex and
get pregnant. She was smarter than
that. Still, she resented the fact that
her mother didn’t trust her enough to let her make some of the decisions for
herself. She was growing up, but her
mother was treating her like she was still a baby.
“Maia, I know you think that I’m not letting you
grow up, but it’s not that. I don’t want
anything to happen to you. I want you to
be safe,” Brenda said.
A lone tear rolled down Maia’s cheek. She swiped at it with disgust. She hated to fight with her mother, but she
also hated that her mother treated her like a child. She was growing up and her mother was going
to have to get used to it. “I’m tired of
you treating me like a baby. You don’t
let me do anything. You even try to pick
my friends for me. Give me some credit
to pick my own friends.”
Brenda was silenced for the first time in her
life. She had nothing she could
say. Maia was right, but her maternal
instincts kept telling her she was doing the right thing, but she remembered
being 12 and her and her mother had a similar fight…how she resented her mother
for not allowing her the freedom to make decisions on her own. As a result, it prompted Brenda to rebel at
an early age…another fear she held, but refused to face at the moment.
“Alright, I’ll back off a little. But if I see where you’re not making the
right decision or choice in friends, I’m going to reassert my authority…no
bones about it,” Brenda said, but conceded that Maia should be allowed to
select her own friends. She could always
intervene if needed.
This time Maia did smile. It was a hard fought, but genuine smile. The one day Maia decided she would defy her
mother, she decides to concede to her demand for more freedom. Maia should have felt horrible for breaking
her mother’s trust by what she was planning, but she was too excited to think
about the ramifications. Anyway, if her
mother never found out what would it hurt?
Brenda smiled back at her daughter, finally
feeling as though they had reached an agreement…praying she was not going to
live to regret this day. It was a break
through, of sorts. It was a day that was
bound to come, but Brenda admittedly was not ready for it to be now. Secretly she wished she had a few more years
before Maia would assert her need for freedom and independence.
********
“Hey!
Don’t forget your backpack,” Brenda yelled through the passenger side
window when Maia jumped from the car and ran towards the school.
Maia trotted back and grabbed her backpack from
her mother. She could hardly contain the
grin that took over her face since the night before. After she went to her room last night, she
chatted with Pamela for a few minutes…long enough to tell her she was ready to
go to the photo shoot with her. She
prayed she would not be embarrassed for being so lacking in the looks
department, but somehow Pamela made her feel like she could accomplish anything
with a little blush and lipstick.
Deep down, Maia knew this day was going to
change her life forever. And though
those warning bells and whistles her mother planted in her head tried to take
up residence in her psyche, she ignored it and pushed it to the back of
her mind. She was not going to let this
opportunity go by. Who knows, one day
she may become a famous model and have a very interesting story to tell about
how it all began…with the friend on the internet.
With that
thought Maia let out a short giggle.
“You seem to be
in a good mood this morning,” Brenda said.
“I’m glad our little talk last night makes you happy.”
Maia smiled at
her mother. Yeah, mothers are lame, she thought. If only her mother knew what she was really
thinking about she’d be grounded until she was 100.
“I’m glad we had
our talk. You can trust me to take care
of myself,” Maia said before she turned to run towards the school and meet up
with Pamela in the back of the school as planned.
“Maia! Don’t forget to come straight home from
school. Your father will be there to
pick you up for the weekend,” Brenda yelled to her daughter’s retreating back.
Maia turned and
waved to her mother as she drove away and out of sight.
Maia ran to the
back of the school to meet Prtygrl14 to
start her new life...
This was also
the day Maia vanished into thin air...
Copyright © 2010 Valerie Maarten
