Behind the White Walls

"Like what?" I shot back.

Janet, the Lloyd's princess, always got her way. She'd got that thing for bikes, loved the rush, I guessed.

I thought back to her accident, how I used to chew her out for taking those risks, always telling her to be careful.

Every time I tried to warn Janet, she gave me that look like I was the most annoying person on the planet.

"Seriously? You're a big guy, and you're fussier than me? What do you even know about it? Riding bikes is all about the rush! You're not my brother, and even Walter doesn't bug me about it, so why do you?"

I knew she was fed up with my lectures, but I could not help myself. Every time she was about to take off, I would repeat my warnings, driven by worry.

However, all my nagging, all my care, just evaporated over those five years without a single sign that she heard my cries for help.

Janet's face turned stormy in an instant.

"You're not scared I'll speed and crash?"

I shook my head.

"I don't get it. Isn't the whole point of biking to chase the adrenaline?

"I'm fine, I'm heading to my room, alright?"

However, Janet was not having it. She blocked my path, and when I tried to sidestep her, she stopped me with an outstretched arm.

"Are you still hung up on being sent to the psych ward for five years? Do you really need to hold onto that anger? Did you ever stop to think that if you weren't such a bully to Walter, if you hadn't been so vile, we wouldn't have had to send you there?"

Her laugh was sharp as ice.

Every fight, she would throw my past, my bullying of Walter, right in my face.

She would just stand there, watching me unravel, lose it.

However, not this time. I just shook my head, calm as could be.

"I'm not mad, not at all."

Yet she seemed furious, her foot slamming into the table.

…

When I saw Liliana again, I thought I would be overwhelmed, that I would spill out all the pain I had carried for years. However, none of that happened, not even a ripple stirred in my heart.

She stood there with Walter, the picture-perfect couple, a tenderness in her eyes I had never seen before.

She saw me and frowned, almost instinctively.

Ever since I was little, I fancied Liliana's future husband, scribbling down my dream of marrying her among other dreams of becoming a scientist, a doctor.

Looking back, it feels like I was the one who kept bothering Liliana.

She never really gave me a straight answer.

People said she was only nice to me because of the Lloyd family.

Well, Liliana probably got what she wanted.

"Zack, I noticed your clothes were all dirty yesterday, so I picked out a few for you. Don't worry, I've only worn them once. You don't mind, do you?" Walter said, holding up his cast-offs like trophies.

All eyes were on us at that moment.

I was hit with a flashback of all the times I was awkwardly bested by Walter.

However, those embarrassments seemed like nothing after surviving five years in what felt like hell.

"Thanks a lot!" I said, taking them with a polite smile.

They would come in handy when I finally got away from the Lloyd family, maybe even fetch a little cash.

The once proud heir was then scraping by, and even the loyal servants were gossiping.

The Lloyd family did not look too happy, though.

"Zack, you're so pathetic!" Janet snapped, tossing the clothes from my hands to the floor.

"How can you wear someone's hand-me-downs? Don't you realize you're part of our Lloyd family?"