*I put my muse on a time-out but she escaped...another short story*

The tension in the house had been building over the past couple of weeks leading up to this moment. Alice had just come home from working another long 12 hour shift at the hospital to find the sink full of dishes yet again. There were empty chip bags and pop cans scattered across the counters and crumbs everywhere. She sighed, a slight strain in her voice as she called out “Tiffany, could you come here please” She could hear the heavy footsteps as her daughter came down the stairs and stopped in the kitchen doorway, her arms crossed in front of her as if her mother had somehow inconvenienced her. “What?” she snapped as she narrowed her eyes, staring at her. “How many times have I asked you to clean up after yourself?” her mother’s voice was tired and strained. Tiffany scoffed, "It's your job to take care of the house and I have a party to get ready for.” Alice worked long hours to make sure the bills were paid and food was on the table and her daughter was apparently ungrateful for anything she did for her. Things had been tough since Tiffany's father left them for a younger woman and she blamed her mother for him leaving. “Unless you plan on cleaning up your mess before you leave, you are not going anywhere young lady” her voice now had a sharp edge to it.

The look on Tiffany's face could have melted ice as she scowled and stopped her feet, and yes at 16 yrs old she was stomping her feet like a little child. “ That’s not fair. My friends are expecting me to be there.” Alice was not backing down “You are old enough to be responsible for your own messes” 

“I hate you” she screamed as she turned on her heels and stormed through the house and up to her room like a hurricane, slamming the door behind her so hard that a picture frame fell off the wall in the hallway, cracking the glass. Her mother sighed as she turned her attention to cleaning up the disaster that her spoiled entitled daughter refused to take care of. One day that girl would need to learn before it was too late. Meanwhile, Tiffany was in her room throwing her clothes around the room, muttering about how her mother was making her life miserable and that her friends would not forgive her for missing the party of the year. She huffed as she stood in front of the floor length mirror that her mother had bought for her at a flea market, her face a mask of anger and frustration, tears forming in her eyes but not ones of sadness. “I wish I never had to see her again” she muttered to herself as she reached up to wipe her eyes. “I don’t blame Dad for leaving her.” She turned around and flung herself on top of her bed and clasped onto her pillow burying her face into it. Time seemed to pass and by the time she opened her eyes it was dark, the moonlight filtering through her bedroom window and a voice very faintly seemed to whisper in her ears “Be careful what you wish for”. The mirror swirled in a dark cloud, a mist forming in the air around it but Tiffany did not notice it. She was so caught up in her own indignation that she had no idea that her entire life was about to change.

By the time Tiffany got up the next morning the house felt different. There was no smell of coffee, no sound of her mothers footsteps in the kitchen as she got ready for work, it was like the rest of the world had gone silent. She yawned and stretched, quickly dressing before she opened her bedroom door and stepped into the hallway. The picture that had fallen off the wall and crashed to the floor was no longer there. It was not simply cleaned up but it had vanished, in fact all the pictures on the wall were gone. Confused, she headed down the hall towards her mothers bedroom calling out to her “Mom?” but there was no response. Pushing open the bedroom door she stepped inside but something was not right. The bed had not been touched, the closet was empty and there was no sign that her mother had ever been there. Starting to panic she ran down the stairs and into the living room then through the kitchen but there was nothing. She grabbed the phone in the foyer and quickly dialed her father. “Hello,” a man's voice answered on the second ring.” Dad mom is gone. I woke up this morning and everything of hers is gone. Silence on the other end of the phone for a moment “ Who is this and why are you calling me Dad. Who is your mom?”

Tiffany is caught off guard for a second” Dad this is your daughter Tiffany and my mom is Alice, she used to be married to you. Please don’t play games with me. I am worried about her” The man’s voice on the phone got stern. “ I don't know any Alice and I definitely do not have a daughter, do not call this number again.” There was the sound of a click as the phone went dead. She stumbled back, running back to the living room to the mantle above the fireplace and  stared at the pictures that remained but they were now different. There were no pictures left of Alice holding onto her daughter, just pictures of a baby all alone on a blanket. Her hands began to tremble as she remembered the filing cabinet in the office where her mother had kept all the paperwork. She felt her legs almost turning to jello as she stepped into the office and opened the cabinet and pulled out a folder that had her first name on it. The first piece of paper inside was her birth certificate but on it, it did not list her mothers name or even her fathers. Everything was blank but how was that possible? She flipped through the other papers inside the folder and everything was the same. There wasn’t a single paper with her mothers name on it and any papers that used to be from her mother were now blank. She knew she had upset her mother but now it was as if she never existed and her own father did not even acknowledge her. Were they both trying to punish her to teach her a lesson? If that was the case, it was not funny and she was definitely not laughing.

She ran back up the stairs to her bedroom and flung open the door. She could sense something in the air was different as she stepped inside. The mirror had changed in its appearance. The front of it was a swirling darkness and she approached it cautiously and it began to morph in front of her eyes. Inside she could no longer see her reflection but her own mother in the distance sitting at a table with her head in her hands, so close yet so far away. “Mom” she screamed, touching the glass in front of her but the figure did not react. She pounded on the glass desperate to get her mother to look at her. What was happening…why was her mother inside the mirror and ignoring her. She remembered her words before she went to bed and was now terrified of what she may have done. “I did not mean it Mom. I am sorry for what I said, please come back to me.” The figure in the mirror still did not move but a voice deep inside of her mind whispered words that chilled her to the bone. “Words spoken in hate can not be undone by a simple regret. A life for a life. What are you willing to do to bring her back?” 

Tiffany sobbed as she shouted”I’ll do anything to have her back” , her shoulders heaving as the tears flowed down her face, her hands now sliding down the glass The shadows in the mirror began to swirl into different shapes before it went completely black then a whisper barely audible pierced the silence “You must forfeit your future” the words echoed as the image of her mother disappeared, replaced by a large clock, the hands of it spinning backwards at a rate faster than she could comprehend. She closed her eyes as she collapsed to the floor, feeling her teenage clothes beginning to bag on her, her speech was becoming more broken and incoherent. She did not understand what was happening but all she knew now is that she wanted her Mommy. 

The front door opened and the familiar smell of the hospital and burnt coffee filled the air as Alice stepped inside the house, setting down her work bag on the floor and kicking off her shoes. To her it had been just another day at work or so she thought. She called out to her daughter but there was no response. She sighed heavily once more as she walked up the stairs to her daughter's room expecting to find her daughter still sulking about not going to her friend's party. When she pushed open the door expecting to see a messy teenagers room she froze. Instead of finding her teen age daughter she found a 4 year old girl sitting in a pile of clothes much too big for her, crying and asking her mother not to leave. The child sitting on the floor had long curly brown hair and was the exact image of her daughter when she was that age. With shaking hands she reached down and picked up the little girl, staring at her as if somehow she magically reappeared as the older version of her daughter she had left that morning. The little girl looked her in the eyes with that familiarity, wrapping her arms around her neck, holding on tight. Alice could barely keep herself steady on her feet as she closed her eyes and opened them again thinking perhaps she had a fever but all she saw was a child still secure in her arms. Moments later she heard keys jingle and the front door opened once more. 

This time a man’s voice spoke” Alice? Tiffany? Are you here? I just got back from the store. The traffic today was absolutely crazy.” Alice slowly walked to the head of the stairs and looked down, the voice she heard was not possible. Taking off his shoes and hanging up his coat on the hook by the door, there stood her husband Ron. He looked the same way he did when they were still married, a much younger version of himself compared to the day he had left them when Tiffany was a teenager. Ron looked up at Alice with a smile crossing his lips “ There are my two favorite girls” He paused for a moment as he saw the expression on her face “You look like you have seen a ghost. Is everything ok?” Alice nodded her head slowly as she continued to stare at him. Twelve hours ago she had left her teenage daughter at home and left for work and her ex husband had been with his new wife two states away, refusing to pay child support and would not give his daughter the time of day. Now a younger version of himself was standing in her home asking her about her day as if nothing had changed between them.

Ron slowly climbed up the stairs and kissed his wife on the cheek before looking at his daughter and holding his arms out to her” Come on my little pumpkin. You can help Daddy put the groceries away while we let Mommy rest”. He turned and headed down to the kitchen with Tiffany in his arms giggling as she held on tight. Alice grabbed the banister still shaking before she returned to her daughter's bedroom. The only thing out of place that remained was the pile of clothing that she found her daughter in that definitely would not fit her for many years to come. She knelt down and began to pick up the shirt then the pants, carefully folding them as if they might break beneath her touch. She felt something inside the pocket of the jeans and reached inside pulling out what looked like an ID card of sorts. Flipping it over she saw her daughter's name and a picture of her as a teenager, it was her library card. It was dated September 2025. The terrifying truth of everything finally clicked into place. Tiffany had not just changed, she had given up her future, the life she had lived to fix the broken pieces of her family to put it back together. Her mother slowly slipped the card into her pocket and stood up. She took the clothes and hid them in the back of the closet where no one would easily find them and swallowed hard. She now had a second chance for that happy ending and her daughter had given that to her. 

She could hear the laughter in the kitchen and she stood in the doorway watching as her daughter helped to take groceries out of the bags, her husband chuckling as Tiffany tried hard to lift up the carton of milk saying “I helping” She felt a mix of relief and horror as she was the only one to remember that it was not that long ago that her daughter had told her how much she hated her, how her husband did not want to be a part of their lives anymore and now…now it was like time had not passed. Her daughter had felt so torn by their divorce that she had somehow sacrificed her life, her friends, her future to make her family whole.

Alice was no longer going to spend long hours at the hospital. She took the time to call work and tell them she needed to cut back on her hours letting them know she needed to spend more time at home. She was going to make time for her husband and daughter, make sure they both were taken care of and knew tt they were loved. She had a second chance to show them both that they mattered more than her work and she would never let them forget it. The card nestled deep in her pocket reminded her always of the sacrifice her daughter made and she would make sure that by the time her daughter became a teenager once more that she would know her mother loved her and that her father was still a part of her life. Eventually that day would come when Tiffany would be in her bedroom staring into the mirror as she did all those years ago but she would not be filled with anger or regret. She would see the reflection of a well grounded girl who had grown up with two loving parents who supported her through the years. Alice stood in the doorway of her daughter's room watching her as she got ready to go to her friends party chattering excitedly on her phone before she hung up then looked at her mother and smiled. Grabbing her backpack she stepped up close to her mother, kissed her on the cheek and whispered “I love you” before she headed out. Alice patted the card that still remained hidden in her pocket, a reminder always of her daughter's gift.