Linda's POV
Sometimes, Emma made me wish I never had any more children. She could be so much trouble herself.
Lily's death was really hard on her. She'd barely eaten anything for three days, and while Mark said to let her cool off I was still deeply worried about her.
I loved Mark, but he's not exactly one I'd take parenting advice from.
"What if she never wants to talk to me anymore?" I cried on his shoulders one day.
"You know that cannot be true," He assured me,"not in a million years. Emma would always need you, just like me, and everyone else in fact." He added.
She wasn't acting like it anymore. The few things I knew about her these days were from Chase.
And he too was getting tired of me.
"I don't know, I don't know anymore." I cried.
"I don't like seeing you like this." Mark said, wiping the tears off my eyes. "Do I talk to her?" He asked me.
I would literally take any help or assistance I could get. There was no refusing.
We both went to her room, but I stood by the side of her door. I had made Mark promise to be audible from outside, forgetting the doors were all soundproof. He suggested instead that we be on a call all the while, so I could tap in on their conversation.
"Hey baby girl." He said to her,
There was utter silence for the next minute, one which I'm sure Mark used to re-strategize how to proceed.
"Did she put you up to this?" I heard Emma ask him.
I had begun to shake, my legs were wobbly.
"No she didn't." Mark said. I heard bedclothes shuffle as she turned. I was beginning to get a bit jealous of how good Mark was with her at times.
He bought her so much whenever he traveled, and she liked him.
While it'd be silly to say I never saw her like me so much, it's just, I wished, we were closer.
Sad to think that I never knew the thing with her and Chase.
But Chase was my stepson as well. I loved Emma, and I wasn't gonna make her go through it a second time. He obviously broke her, even though no one was saying why.
"Your mom means no harm, you know?" He asked her.
"I don't care." Emma yelled.
I was beyond hurt. Every single part of the conversation was breaking my heart.
"You do. You're just angry." He replied to her.
"There's a lot going on with me," She started, I strained my ears well to hear her voice, "when I think she's the one I should be crying to, she does stuff like get Chase a house. Who fucking does that?" She broke down in tears again.
Not only did that hurt me, I also knew I was in a little bit of trouble with Mark.
"Are you just saying these things because you're angry?" He asked her.
She sniffed again. "No!" She yelled. "I mean it."
The line went dead.
I dragged myself away from her door before I broke down there.
I was hoping Chase didn't tell her much. Then I reasoned that if he had, Emma wouldn't have been so cool with me. She was quite expressive, and could be explosive too.
I had dragged myself halfway to Mark's room when I thought against it.
I couldn't possibly keep running from my own daughter.
Taking the bull by the horn, I twisted the handle of her door open, neither of them looked shocked to see me. That was good.
"What is she doing here?" She asked Mark.
He was clearly not too happy with me, but he wasn't gonna let her make a fool of me either.
"Emma, baby," I started, all my bravado was gone, and I was reduced to the poor, emotionally bankrupt teenage mom I had once been. "I know there's a lot of things wrong with us, but baby, we aren't gonna fix it by staying apart. Lily's death hurts me, just the way it did you," I said.
Emma screamed so loud at the mention of Lily's name.
I was crying, but I wasn't gonna be deterred. I ventured closer to her, assured by Mark's presence that nothing could go wrong.
"Baby?" I said, touching her face. Her skin was fast losing its glow. Her eyes were quite sunken, and she looked really pale. Emma had eaten for days, and it kept breaking my heart each time she turned Patty out with the food the latter took to her. At any rate, she was gonna be a skeleton soon.
"Please go." She said,
I looked at Mark, begging him with my eyes to say something.
"Emma," He started, obliging me.
I was determined to make it work this time around, I had to win my daughter.
Emma wobbled up from the bed, and headed to the bathroom like she didn't just hear Mark call her.
We were beside ourselves in grief and shock when she reentered. Her face was washed, and she looked a bit more like a human than a ghost.
"Emma?" He called her again.
She headed for her closet instead and picked out a head warmer, and a pair of sandals.
Before I could make sense of what was going on, she was already descending the stairs. Mark and I ran in pursuit of her, almost tumbling down in our frenzy.
She grabbed a car key off the wall, and headed for the garage. It only made me more frightened.
I never taught her how to drive. All she knew, she probably learnt from Chase and Lily.
She backed out from the garage quite professionally, but that didn't stop my paranoia.
Mark, who was, well, more coordinated, grabbed another key and unlocked his mustang.
He stopped by me, and I hopped in.
We raced in pursuit of Emma who was driving so fast, above the speed limit.
Mark and I both looked at ourselves in mutual knowledge. We were on the police radar. Running at Emma's speed was gonna do nothing but put us in police custody, where they could beat out answers to all the funny questions we'd been answering for weeks.
"We can't." I said to him, sadly. There was no way we were gonna do that to ourselves.
"We sure can." He said instead. I knew he hated to see me in that state, but it was not wise, breaking more laws.
We soon stopped at a really pretty house I guessed to be Lily's.
Emma got down from the car, left the door open, and started screaming out Lily's name.
She shouted so hard, at one point, she began to cough.
Mark held me back from going to stop her.
"It's what she needs." He said.
"I don't think so." I cried.
No one was answering her from inside, but I saw the curtain shift, and a cute little boy with bold curls like Lily poked his head.
"Lily, come down!" She kept screaming, kicking, and crying.
Emma threw little rocks at a window that was shut tight.
It hurt so much to see her that way.
Prior to Lily, I hadn't seen her so attached to anyone.
"She's gonna calm down." Mark observed, "she has to." He added.
"Let me go." I cried, wriggling my hand out of his grip, but it was futile.
Emma soon crashed to the floor, a sight that made even Mark wince.
She got into her car, and banged on the steering wheel multiple times with her head.
"I have to help her." I begged Mark to let me go, but he held me even closer.
Emma soon got so weak, it looked like it was her ghost who drove out of Lily's house. We trailed her back home, and were greeted by a fleet of police cars.
She waded through them like they were not there, leaving Mark and I.
Once again, we were escorted out of our estate by the police, and Emma didn't, as much as, spare us a glimpse.