#miwtask

Noise. There was always noise in their small apartment. The apartment was too small for their family, and with the other members of their family filing in for dinner it was even smaller, somehow. Isadora had gotten lucky though. She had her own bedroom. That was what happened when the only other sibling you had was four years older than you and a boy. By the time the twins came along she was already nine and her mom thought it would be cruel to make her share her room when so much was already changing for her. 

When she was in her room the noise seemed to dim. It didn’t really get quieter, it just became less obvious over the other noise that she let in. Isadora had her window open as often as she could; the cool air would blow into her room, giving her a breath of fresh air, and the noise from the main area of the city that was just a few streets over flooded into her room and blocked out the noise from her family. On top of that, she had music playing as much as possible. It played it all night and all day when she had any say in it. It wasn’t that she didn’t like her family’s noise, it was just harder to focus with them all yelling and laughing than it was to focus with white noise.

It was Thanksgiving, which for some reason had become a big deal in their house. She didn’t quite understand the hype, but she didn’t question it either. It was fairly early in the day and the noise from the parade, though quieter than it was on television, still echoed through her room. It was only a matter of time before her mother came and knocked on her door. Her mom always made her help with cooking, but she didn’t particularly mind. She’d been cooking for about four years now, and she was pretty good at it. Plus helping cook every day gave her time with her mom that she didn’t get otherwise. Their family was busy and unless you had a reason to get the attention of their mom or dad, you just tried to stay out of the way. Cooking was their bonding activity. 

Isadora heard a light knock on her door, followed by her mom peaking her head inside the room. “Wanna come help me?” she asked with a smile. Isadora nodded, standing up from her bed and going to the door. She liked how her mom always asked, like she was actually going to let Isadora say no. It was kind of amusing to her, if she were honest. 

The small brunette joined her noisy family in the kitchen. The parade was much louder now that she could hear it on the television. The football game could be heard on the smaller television in the dining room, the men huddled around it while the other children laid, stretched out, over the couches and chairs watching the parade on the main television. Her brother sat by her dad, trying to seem interested in the game because he knew their dad wanted him to be. Cohen was playing with a toy by the couch and Thea was watching the parade intensely. She couldn’t help but smile at her family. While Isadora got annoyed with them more often than not, she loved him more than anything and she knew she was so lucky. 

“Are you coming?” her mom yelled at her from the kitchen.

Jace had been on his way to the bathroom when he heard his stepmother's voice, which normally would go unacknowledged by him. He wasn't one to pry into someone's conversation, nor was he someone who would willingly waste his precious energy involving himself in an argument he was not part of. But the irritated edge in Grace's voice made him perk his head up, like a dog hearing something interesting. The annoyance with which she spoke was sharper than any razor and could only mean she was talking about one of two things: the electricity bill, which was usually higher than she thinks necessary. Or Jace. And seeing as how the electricity bill was already taken care of, it could only mean that Jace held the honor this round.

So, of course the fourteen year old boy stopped outside the kitchen and leaned up against the hallway wall. It was the best seat in the house if he wanted to hear his loving stepmom speak about him.

If there's one thing anybody should know about Grace upon meeting her, it's that she is annoyed by a great number of things: cats, improper handling of books, reality television, using cups without a coaster, and especially orange juice with pulp. But there is one thing in this world that gets under her skin more than any other: Jace.

It could be that, despite their rhyming names, the two are complete opposites. Grace is uptight and cautious, whereas Jace is as careless as they come. Grace is organized and punctual, where Jace is messy and rarely on time for anything. It's just how they are-- it's their dymanic, you could say, although it's not one that works well for them. But, Jace doesn't really mind.

The boy didn't pay much attention to his father's wife. He actually tried to act as if she wasn't really there at all; she was merely a speed bump in his day-to-day activities. It was hard for anyone to be able to tune out the woman's incessant lecturing, but Jace did an amazing job of it. Taking all of this into consideration, it was easy to assume that this particular argument was was about something completely typical, like Jace's latest grade in his biology class.

The teenager had been mindlessly examining one of the wood panels on the floor when he heard his father let out a disgruntled sigh, knowing full well that he was growing tired of going through the same motions when it came to talking about his son. These types of arguments were so exhausted in the Young home that they seemed to be recited off a script now.

"Sigh all you’d like, but at the rate he’s going, he’s gonna end up just like her." Grace stopped speaking for just a beat. "Don’t look at me like that. You know it’s true."

Jace furrowed his brows, keeping his eyes focused on the floor, as he bit at the delicate skin of his lower lip. Grace spoke with so much certainty, it's as if she knew that becoming like his mother was the worst fate that Jace could ever face. It made him shift uncomfortably.

Of course, it wasn't entirely true. There were numerous people in the world who would exemplify the type of person one should steer clear of becoming-- the news was filled with stories that go along with this. Nevertheless, Jace hated being compared to his mother; the woman who birthed him. Who virtually only birthed him, seeing as she was seen to be too unfit to actually raise him. He had heard his family speak enough about his mother growing up to know her footsteps weren't the ones he'd want to step in.

But the comparisons happened too often for his liking. He heard them at family reunions, when meeting old friends of his mom's, and even in offhand comments from his own dad.

You're so stubborn. You get that from your mom, ya know.

You have your mom's smile.

Look at him, he truly is Rebecca's son.

It made Jace's skin crawl.

Listening to this conversation seemed to be doing no more than annoy Jace, so he figured it was time to continue his trek to the bathroom and then go about his business as usual. But, of course, it could never be that simple for him. Just as he was attempting to discreetly turn around, he bumped into the small hallway table that sat against the wall, resulting in one of the picture frames tipping over. It wasn't enough to make a scene, but it was more than enough noise to penetrate Grace's bat-like hearing.

"Jace?" Her tone pierced through the kitchen and into the hall just as an exasperated cuss word could be barely heard from his father's mouth.

Muttering a few curse words of his own, Jace plastered a cocky smile on his face and unveiled himself as if he hadn't heard a word that was uttered within the confines of the kitchen. As if he wasn't fazed or hurt in the slightest-- no cares in the world, as always. "Ay, Gracie, don't mind me. I'm on my way to take a piss and this table is a hazard-- just like I knew it would be when you moved it here." He gave her an exaggerated look, as if he was scolding her for her poor decision making.

His stepmother didn't look amused, as per usual. But Jace turned to walk off, shrugging his shoulders and speaking again before she had a chance to go into one of her tangents.

"You can thank me later for not relieving myself on the new carpet."

Kristi's day so far had been going perfectly. A few days ago her mom had agreed to not forcing Kristi to go to college.  The condition was Kristi would have to move out, find her own place and support herself, but she was sure she was capable of at least that. Of course, she still had to finish her high school education, which for Kristi meant two more years of hell, but that was it.  Once she was eighteen and got through graduation she was done forever.  She had also secured a job as a cashier at Starbucks.  She didn't really plan to work there long, it would just be a temporary job to keep the cash flowing until her art career really picked up.  Finally, just to top everything off, her mom had left yesterday on a trip in order to secure a new job, one that would pay significantly more than her current one, leaving Kristi the whole apartment to herself.

With the house empty Kristi saw it as the perfect opportunity to take out her art supplies and work.  She didn't have a studio, there wasn't room with both her and her mom living in the apartment, but with her mom out she could certainly set up a miniature studio for herself right in the empty space of the kitchen.  

Ten minutes into her painting Kristi groaned and put down her brushes, holding herself back from destroying the canvas in front of her.  she was painting the fucking city again without even realizing it. It was all she had painted recently, and all she had seemed able to paint.  At first Kristi had assumed her lack of a muse came from a lack of interesting thing in her life, but when she thought over it she realized her theory was the dumbest thing she'd come up with in a while. Her life was plenty exciting.  She had just started drinking, she was starting to get involved sexually as well, if there was anything Kristi's life was lacking it certainly wasn't going to be excitement.

Frustrated by her lack of inspiration and her lack of understand Kristi stood up, trying to calm down by pacing around the apartment, when she heard a knock on the door.  Kristi's groaned in response, sure that whoever was here was just trying to buy something and went over quickly throwing open the door.  She saw a middle aged man in a suit standing in front of her and instantly moved to close the door, completely uninterested in whatever the hell he had to say to her.  "Sorry, I'm sure your product is great, but I'm really not looking-"

Before she could finish her sentence and fully close the door his hand shot out, forcing the door to remain open. "Kristi, please, no, do I honestly look like some low life who has to go door to door selling things to you?"  He paused, and then smiled at her.  "You've changed, so much since I last saw you, but I know it's you, you have all the beautiful traits that your mother possessed after all."

Kristi narrowed her eyes, her hand instinctively wandering to her back pocket, closing around the pocket knife she always kept there, just in case.  She smiled tensely, not wanting to set the man off by showing her concern.  "I'm sorry, I'm sure you just got a hold of a school phone book or something, but I'd still like to know exactly how you know my name.  I'd also like to know how you know what I looked like and how you know my mother."

Now the man in front of Kristi seemed to be mimicking her, crinkling his eyes at her the same way she was looking at him  "What are you talking about?" As far as Kristi could tell this man sounded generally confused, but that didn't lessen the slight fear of danger welling up inside of her. "I saw your birth certificate.  I helped pick your name.  Why wouldn't I know it?"

Kristi felt like this was a weird game, where the two of them just copied each other, because all of a sudden she was the confused one. "So, lemmie guess?  You're a friend of my mom or something? You must have been giving her support while she was having me, and I guess you decide to help pick my name as well.  Well thank you for that, I suppose, I'm very fond of my name after all, but that still doesn't really explain why you're here." Krist paused for a second.  "Oh, wait, sorry I'm stupid, you must be looking for my mom." She genuinely smiled, and removed her hand from her back pocket, feeling the control of the situation coming back to her.  "Well I'm afraid she's on a trip, but if you want to give me your name and I can totally tell her you visited as soon as she's back." 

The man shook his head again, and his confusion seemed to have transformed into an emotion somewhere in between anger and sadness.  "I should have known she'd do this.  Your mother was always fucking around, thinking she knew what was best for everyone." Kristi scowled, but before she could speak up and defend her mother the man continued speaking, this times his words coming out slightly harsh.  "I'm not just some casual friend of your mother.  My name is Gregory Hampton, and I'm your father."

Finally Kristi understood, this guy was a homeless crazy trying to find a place to sleep for the night.  She nodded, smirking a bit, and moved to close the door once again.  "Sure, sure, okay. Look, I'd believe you, except my father didn't even stay to see me born.  He wouldn't come around knocking on my door ever, but it was a nice effort.  I'll give you that."  She pulled out a twenty from her pocket and handed it to the guy.  "You were amusing, so here, take this, go buy yourself a hot meal."

The guy threw up his hands, seeming desperate at this point.  "Look, give me two more minutes of your time, and then your can throw me out okay." Kristi just nodded, her pity for the guy taking over. He reached into his wallet and pulled out his wallet, presenting Kristi with his driver's license.  He pointed at it.  "Look see, right there, Gregory Hampton, that's me.  That's my name."

Kristi just shrugged, tiring of the games and confusion.  "Okay, so that's your name, What's your point?"

Before Kristi could stop him Gregory had barged into the apartment, instantly moving to a shelf in the back, as if he already knew his way around the place, and grabbed Kristi's framed birth certificate, which, in Kristi's opinion was nothing more than a piece of junk that she had never payed attention to.  Suddenly, it was being shoved into her face.  "And here, on your birth certificate, thank god your mom didn't at least keep this from you, it says that you're the child of Julia Howell and Gregory Hampton.  Do you get it now Kristi?"

Kristi's brain stopped for a moment, she didn't know what to do.  The only thing she could think of was to grab onto her pocket knife again, suddenly feeling very scared, and very angry.  "I need you to get out of my house, now."

Gregory backed away from her, sensing that she needed her space.  He spoke quietly and slowly.  "Listen Kristi, I just want to talk to you."

Kristi didn't know why but she found herself yelling, and trying to put as much space between her and Gregory as possible.  "About what?  What the fuck could you possibly have to tell me?  I don't give two shits about you! You know why? Because the moment you left my mom, the moment you heard she was pregnant and decided to ditch, that's the moment you agreed to leave me alone, forever! So don't come waltzing back over here like everything fucking fine as hell!"

Gregory's eyes widened, but to Kristi's relief he started walking to the door, a certain anger lacing his movement.  "I'm going to go, because clearly your mother and you need to talk before I visit you for real.  You guys need to talk about her compulsive lying habits.  You need to talk about the fact that I raised you for the first two years of your life.  You need to talk about how I only left because your mother was driving me out and I was tired of it.  When you've talked about that come and find me." With that, the door was slammed closed and Kristi was left alone.

It was suddenly as though all the energy had been taken from Kristi.  She walked over to the door slowly shaking her head and mumbling to herself.  "No, no, he's the liar, he's always been the liar.  That's what mom told me.  Mom's always right."  Her back hit the door and she slid down to the floor, everything suddenly hitting her all at once. She was shaking, crying, talking to herself.  Her head was spinning.  She couldn't think, or breath, all she could do was cry, and tell herself it was him, it was his fault.  Her mom didn't do this. Her mom couldn't have done this."

It lasted a solid ten minutes, her breakdown, and when it was over Kristi stood up, grabbed a bottle of vodka from the cabinet and pulled out her phone.  She sent a quick text, canceling her date for tomorrow night.  How could she go on a date? How could she trust anyone now?  She could trust her friend, Eloise, probably, but everyone else, everyone else had to go.

Christmas 2000. Love always, The Monroe Family.

Peyton picked up the picture and she smiled a bit. The red head let out a small smile and put the picture the down and her mind immediately flew to that night.

It was August 30th, 2001. Samantha Monroe was sitting in the drivers seat of one of the Monroe’s many silver BMW’s. Samantha Monroe. She was known as the high school’s ‘brown’ eyed Barbie doll and head cheerleader. Her glossy black hair lay perfectly across her back. All the boys wanted her and yet, crystal blue eyed Mike Manning, the quarter back of the football team, got her. Funny how years later, when Peyton was in high school, she was the head cheerleader and she was dating the quarter back on the football team but in the moment, 6 year old Peyton Monroe was sitting in her car seat kicking her tiny feet in the air.

"Sammy!" Peyton giggled as she kept kicking her feet but she noticed her sister’s crystal brown eyes kept checking in her review mirror.

"I need to get away from this person." Samantha murmured to herself. 

It was a dark evening and the two Monroe girls were on their way to their parent's typical end of the summer party at their courthouse and oddly, Samantha and Peyton were invited. A crazy driver was swerving around the road and it was obvious to anyone that this driver was either drunk. Samantha kept ignoring little Peyton’s screams that 6 year olds tend to yell. Samantha stepped on the gas and she went into the left lane. She kept driving until all of a sudden the drunk driver swerved around and made it’s way into the left lane and CRASH. The huge truck hit the Monroe car head on. Bright lights sparkled and glass shattered everywhere.

"SAMM-" Peyton screamed and started crying as she saw the flashing lights and all she heard was her sister saying ‘I will always love you Peyton.’ as if she knew this was the end for her life.

In the next few hours Peyton remembered waking up in a hospital bed with her crying parents sitting in the chair.

"Daddy?" Peyton looked down and saw her arms covered in scars and blood. Her leg was wrapped in a cast. "Mommy?" She glanced over at her crying parents. "Where's Sammy?"

"Sam…Sammy isn’t coming home with us, sweetie." Tom Monroe's sparkling brown eyes were no longer sparkling and he had his daughter’s rings in his right hand along with a silver heart pendent that she had on that night. Karen Monroe gently brushed Peyton’s curly brown hair out of her eyes. "Sammy is on a very long vacation to a place called paradise."

"When will I see her?" Peyton asked not understanding that this meant no more bedtime stories with her sister, no more ‘I love yous’. She would have to face middle and high school on her own. Simple girl issues, she would have to ask her mom or best friend questions about.

"One day." Tom wiped Petyon's tears that were stained onto her cheeks and that was it. No more big sister or role model to Peyton.