The Stolen

Chapter 1

Mara has always known that she was born with her mother's“playful" side. Of course, playing with that side isn't a game for kids, and not just anyone can make a good playmate. For some people, like Mara, her playful side makes things a little more interesting at times, and because Mara isn't exactly what you would call picky, it's as if a lioness is looking for her prey when Mara's playful side comes out.

And she likes to hunt. She likes seeing the fella's faces when the“angry chick from class says something slightly inappropriate the next time they accidentally brush up against her.

Her playful streak also helped her feel comfortable with smoking drugs and drinking too much booze. Mara didn't necessarily want to use drugs, and she didn't feel pressured to either. She just didn't have a good reason not to, so why not attempt to fit in with the only people who didn't seem to mind that she hung around so much?

The drugs seemed to work for some time. For a little while, drugs were cool to do everywhere and Mara found herself surrounded by friends most of the time. If she could smoke it, snort it, or eat it, Mara was down to play. More than once Mara had found herself in a stranger's bed in the hazy aftermath of a forgotten evening. But no matter how much trouble found herself in, Mara always made it back to the center.

Other playful ones didn't have it as easy as Mara. Other people weren't able to walk away from the fun when it wasn't fun anymore. There were those, like Mara's mother Pandora, whose“playful side” was more like a direct portal to Satan himself. People like Pandora had a playful side that was nothing less than a deep, dark mass of chaos and torture that continued to grow with each deed that couldn't be undone and with each drop of blood left on the rotting floorboards.

Pandora's dark mass was guilty of consuming as much of Mara's existence as it possibly could. It could smell when she entered a room and it craved the smell of her fear more than anything else. Pandora's playful side was always hungry for Mara, and Mara knew this about her mother from the time that she could tell when someone was f***ed out of their mind. For Mara, this was around the ripe age of six.

Pandora called Mara's couch home and asking for some cash from her daughter just seemed like a programmed behavior at this point. Mara knew that keeping money from her mother was a longer, more exhausting route to the same ultimate ending. She was going to open her wallet and hand over whatever money she had at the time of Pandora's incessant begging. Even if Mara was genuinely cashless, Pandora would ask for the debit card next, so keeping a little bit of money at the house at all times was cheaper and less worrisome in the long run.

This had been going on for as long as Mara could remember. If it wasn't for Mara's constant handouts, and Pandora's side-gig as an“escort", Mara was convinced her mother would be living under the bridge with the other addicts. Sleeping on mattresses that were covered in more than one bodily fluid from an unknowable number of people.

The folks who passed their time under the bridge mostly kept to themselves, but not Pandora. You see, Pandora was an equal-opportunity user, which meant she was willing to do anything that could get her zooted. She would stay out at all hours of the night, causing Mara to worry, whether she wanted to or not. Once Pandora finally sauntered in, Mara would have no idea what kind of ride she was about to go on.

Sometimes Pandora would scream in Mara's face for hours, slapping her cheeks until the sting was making tear drip from her eyes like a runny faucet. On other nights, Pandora would cry on the floor for hours, begging Mara to stay. On these nights Pandora apologized for being a s*** parent. She would apologize for the abuse, for selling Mara to strange men before she was old enough to fight back. She would apologize for everything. Mara liked to believe that her mother was being genuine, but Pandora never remembered those nights so it was like they never happened.

When Mara was old enough to leave on her own, she started going to 'The Pub'. The Pub was an old bar/concert venue where she met Kurt. It was four years, three months, and 128 shows ago when she saw Kurt for the first time. She was just fifteen years old and had a mother that was more worried about her next fix, rather than where her teenage daughter was in the middle of the night. Kurt's dad was the same way, so Kurt was there by himself, as well. The pair of neglected teens noticed each other from school and began swaying to the sounds being amplified from the stage next to one another in the crowd.

Mara and Kurt exchanged phone numbers that night and they have been inseparable ever since. Kurt was the reason why Mara could look forward to the future with a dead-end parent like her mother“raising her". After the second year of being together, Kurt began to press the issue of the couple moving in with one another, but Mara continuously rejected his offer. Even though her mother had been neglectful and abusive to Mara her entire life, that was her mother, and you just don’t leave your mother.

That was the case for four years. Kurt would bring up the issue and Mara would give him the same response, “I just can't". And after four years Mara knew that she would never be happy as long as she was always taking care of her mother. So after the last binge Pandora went on, Mara's decision was made. That night, whenever her mother dragged herself through the door, Mara would tell Pandora that she was moving in with Kurt. Mara would make Pandora's worst dream come true: Mara would tell Pandora that she was being left behind...and it didn't bother her anymore one bit.