The first thing Jessie noticed that morning was the silence.
Not the soft, peaceful kind of silence you get on a lazy Sunday, but the heavy, suffocating kind that made you feel like the world was holding its breath. In this mansion, silence meant her father was home.
She sat up in bed, blinking at the tall curtains that spilled golden light across her room. Even after eighteen years here, the place still felt less like home and more like an expensive hotel she'd accidentally moved into and forgotten to leave. The walls were too clean, the air too cold, and the staff were just too polite.
Pulling on a sweater, Jessie padded over to the door. Outside, the hallway stretched "endlessly" in both directions, lined with portraits of strangers she'd been told were 'ancestors.' The only one missing was her mother.
It had been three years since they'd removed her portrait from the landing. Her father had ordered it gone the day after the funeral, as if erasing her from the walls could erase the loss from their lives.
'Humph!' she thought.
Jessie still remembered standing in that same hallway, fourteen years old, asking her father why the police weren't doing more. His answer had been a single, distracted "It's being handled," before he returned to whatever billionaire business he'd deemed more important than his wife's suspicious death.
Since then, they'd spoken only when absolutely necessary.
Step.
She entered a room that morning, the dining room, and found him sitting at the head of the long mahogany table with a newspaper folded neatly beside his untouched coffee. His expression didn't change when she entered.
"Good morning," Jessie said, sliding into a chair several seats away.
She wasn't sure why she still even bothered with politeness. Maybe it was muscle memory.
He looked up briefly with eyes scanning her face as though checking for something. Then he nodded once. "Morning."
They ate in silence,
*CLINK* *CLANK*
The clink of cutlery was the only sound between them. Jessie stared at her plate, wondering when breakfast had started tasting like wet cardboard.
"Ahem." Halfway through, he cleared his throat. "Your tuition has been paid for the next year. The driver will take you back to campus this afternoon."
*CLINK* Jessie set her fork down. "I'm not going back."
He blinked, slowly, like she'd just announced she was moving to Mars. "What do you mean?"
"I mean," she said, forcing her voice to stay even, "I'm leaving. For good."
The silence that followed was sharper than any argument they'd ever had. He didn't shout, didn't plead, none of that stuff… He simply went still with eyes narrowing a fraction.
"You have everything you need here," he said finally.
"Except a father," she replied.
HUMMM
The air in the room stifled as his jaw tightened. "You're making a mistake."
Jessie stood, her chair scraping loudly against the polished floor. "Maybe I am, But it'll be mine to make… for the first time." She walked with measured steps, her hips sashaying naturally, like a practiced cat that had been walking the runway for years.
That was the day Jessie walked out of her father's mansion with nothing but a duffel bag… oh! And the kind of stubbornness you can't pack in boxes. But one thing was sure—she had made up her mind, she didn't even look back.
Three years later.
Life had been a patchwork of cramped apartments, late-night diner jobs, and the occasional secondhand victory, haha! — like finding a $200 leather jacket for $15 at a thrift store. She made friends who didn't even know her last name and enemies who simply didn't care, in other words, they were non-existent. And for the first time in her life, she felt like she belonged somewhere, a place where everyone minded their business.
Until the party.
It wasn't the kind of party Jessie usually went to. There were too many crystal glasses and people who smiled with their teeth but not their eyes. Her friend — her best friend — had insisted she come.
"Hey Jess! You need to get out more," her friend had said cutely, looping her arm through Jessie's. "Let's have some fun before we're old and bitter."
Jessie had laughed. "Humph! Speak for yourself, you're the one driving all the men away!"
They bickered but nobody heard or bothered to pay attention.
The music was loud and the lights were soft.
"Jess~ Jess~ let's go over there and get some refreshments, I feel dry…" her friend had proposed dragging her name teasingly.
As they walked through the hallway, ignoring all the men that glanced their way like the Divas they were, her friend finally got the refreshment she desired and offered Jessie a glass of champagne.
Ignoring the way her friend watched her a little too closely, they wandered from room to room, talking, laughing and doing best friend stuff. It was almost easy to forget how far she'd come from the girl who'd grown up in halls of silence.
Almost.
*DRINK*
It happened between one sip and the next.
'Hmm?' The taste was off — too bitter, like the bottle had been left open too long. Jessie frowned, lowering the glass. Her friend was still smiling, but it didn't quite reach her eyes.
"You okay?" her friend asked.
Jessie's mouth felt numb. Her vision went blurry as the room tilted. Somewhere far away, someone laughed. She tried to stand, but her legs wouldn't listen.
*SHATTER*
Her glass slipped from her fingers and shattered on the floor.
The last thing she saw was her friend's face — calm, almost relieved — before everything went black.