The Cage - Chapter One

So here we go, with the first chapter of The Cage. Happy reading. :)

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“At least I got the car,” Maria said, walking up to a shiny red convertible. She smiled at the flawless leather interior and the glossy finish of the paint. Everything about it was perfect. Maria gazed at it, wanting to get in and drive off.

“Yes?” said the car’s driver, who was peering at her strangely. “Can I help you?”

“Oh, sorry,” Maria said, stepping away from the vehicle. He rolled his eyes and quickly drove off, revealing Maria’s beat up old car that was hiding behind it in the parking lot. She sighed.

Behind her stood the courthouse. Its front doors opened, and a man and two small children emerged, walking in-between the building’s large columns. The man stared straight ahead, making eye contact only with his car, but screams came from the children.

“Mommy!”

Maria turned around with a jolt, a tear running down her cheek.

“No, stay with me, we’re going home,” the girl’s father said sternly, grabbing the wrists of his two daughters.

“But I want to go with Mommy!” one of them yelled, flailing her arms in the air, tears streaming down her face.

He pushed the children into the back seat of his car, strapped them in, and slammed the door shut.

“Please don’t take them from me!” Maria bellowed, standing right behind the man. “Matthew, you know I can’t live without them!”

The children’s wailing screams could still be heard from inside the car.

“You should have thought about that before you started drinking,” Matthew said. “Maybe then your life wouldn’t have gotten so out of control, and the judge wouldn’t have found you to be an unfit parent.”

“I am not an unfit parent!” Maria screamed.

“I could never trust you to watch over the kids! You would just get drunk instead of taking care of them. You put yourself above them, which is not what a good, fit parent should do.”

“But Matthew!”

“I know you were able to hide everything from the kids, and from our friends, even from your parents, but not from me. The judge was right on the money; you can’t handle the kids right now. You’re only a danger to them.”

Maria slapped him in the face, leaving a bright red mark on his cheek.

“And you wonder why I had to leave you,” he said. “You’re not the woman I married. You let yourself be changed by your drinking habits.”

“I am not a danger to my children!”

“You need to get help before you destroy yourself and everyone else you love. For now, stay away from me and my children.”

With that, he got in his car and drove away.

The apartment was messy, looking as if a hurricane had just gone through a library. Books and papers were everywhere, some torn in pieces. The paint on the walls was faded and peeling. Boxes piled up in the corner and the furniture’s layout seemed to have been decided at random. Sitting at a desk in the middle was Maria, staring at a stack of papers.

“Rent, food, insurance, telephone, it’s all due,” she said out loud. “How am I supposed to afford this?”

For the past seven years, Maria had been a housewife and stay-at-home mother. She and Matthew were married when she was twenty-seven; he was twenty-nine. A year later, she gave birth to their first daughter, Dixie. Two years after that, their second daughter, Nevaeh, was born. Maria’s time had been spent raising those two children, while Matthew was working as an accountant at a tax service. Now thirty-four, she was completely on her own and self-sufficient for the first time.

Maria had never had a job. Her parents were very wealthy, and both were dead by the time she was seventeen, leaving everything to Maria, their only child. Her inheritance supported her and her husband well into their marriage. However, four years ago, things turned downhill. Maria had fallen into deep postpartum depression after the birth of their younger daughter, Nevaeh. She had turned to alcohol and drugs, and other things that she doesn’t remember. Her fortune dwindled down to nothing.

They tried counseling, they tried hypnosis, and they tried medicinal drugs. They tried everything they could think of, but Maria couldn’t stop reaching for the bottle. She would sneak out of the house at night to go to a bar or liquor store, or down to her secret stash of booze in the basement. Anything to wash her troubles away in a bottle of something hard.

Sooner or later, enough was enough for Matthew, and he filed for divorce. He won custody of the children in a court battle, due to Maria’s continuing destructive lifestyle. Now she lives alone, making minimum wage as a receptionist in a local office building.

She stared at the pile of bills on her desk, which seemed to grow by the day. She still hadn’t paid her custody battle court fees or her rent for the last month. She slammed her fist down on the desk, then melted into a pile of tears. She stood up and walked to the refrigerator and opened it, taking out a bottle of vodka. Maria quickly flicked off the cap with her fingers and lifted it up to her mouth, but then stopped. She stared directly ahead, though the open doorway of the bathroom, into the mirror hanging on the wall. She saw her reflection there, with the bottle of beer lifted up to her mouth. She hated that image.

“You did this to me,” she said to the bottle. “My life was great before you came into it. I had it all, and I lost everything because of you.”

She slowly walked over to the sink, closed her eyes, breathed deeply, and poured the beer down the drain. She laughed.

“She was right! That crazy shrink was right! I can say no, I can control myself, I don’t need you!”

Maybe it was the hypnosis kicking in a year late, but something in her brain clicked at that moment. She suddenly felt a power over the drink that she hadn’t felt before. She no longer craved it; she no longer found her refuge in it. She gave away all the remaining alcohol in her apartment and threw away the address to her favorite bar. She never touched alcohol again.

Two knocks at the door and Matthew answered, surprised to see his ex-wife outside. His house, formerly their house, was large and impressive. The outside walls were of a light colored rustic brick, and the yard was outlined with pristinely shaped fir trees. Everything about the house was perfect.

“Maria, hi, what are you doing here?”

“I came to see my children.”

“Mommy!” she heard from inside. Dixie ran through a hallway towards the open door, arms outreached, sporting a wide smile on her face.

“No!” her father screamed, stopping her dead in her tracks. “Back in the other room!” he yelled, obviously irritated, causing Dixie to run into another room, crying. He turned back to Maria.

“You know you’re not supposed to be around them, judge’s order.”

“But I’ve changed, Matthew!” she said, smiling. “I haven’t touched a drink in a month. I have a stable job and everything, I’m doing fine.”

“I’m sure you are, but you’re really not supposed to be here.”

“Just let me see my children, Matthew!”

“You already had your visitation this month, didn’t you?”

She scowled at him. “A visitation which you cut way short, Matthew. I want the rest of it now.”

“Please go, Maria,” he said nervously, “or I will have the police take you home.”

A tear rolled down her cheek.

“Why don’t you believe me? I really have changed, I really am better.”

“I’ve heard this all before, it’s the same old thing. You resist for a while and then you run back to it. It’s always a roller coaster ride with you, Maria, up and down and up and down. You can’t stabilize your need for alcohol and whatever else you’re still doing.”

“I’m not doing anything! Why don’t you trust me?”

“Trust? Trust is leaving your children with a woman who you think is mentally stable enough not to put them in mortal danger. Trust is giving your heart and soul to your wife because you think she will always be there for you. Trust is not worrying about your children every time they’re in the presence of their mother. I’m sorry, but it’ll take quite a bit of time to get me to trust you again.”

And with that, he closed the door.

The phone woke Maria up.

“Hello?” she said groggily.

“Maria, this is Jane at the apartment office.”

“Oh, hi.”

“You know that you’re two months behind on your rent, right?”

“Yes, yes, I know, but I can pay part of it when I get paid.”

“When is that?”

“Just two more weeks.”

“Maria, we’ve been very patient with you,” Jane said harshly. “We’ve given you several warnings. You’re constantly late, and you constantly don’t have the money when you say you do. Our patience has grown too thin and has—“

“It’ll be different this time; I promise I’ll pay it.”

“We can’t afford any more next times, Maria. There is no next time. We have no choice but to evict you from our building.”

Maria gasped.

“What? But, how can you do this to me?”

“We can’t afford to have people living here for free.”

“But what will I do? Where can I go? I have nowhere else!”

“I’m sure you have family or friends who will take you in for the short term, but that’s out of our hands.”

“I don’t—”

“I’m sorry, but our decision is final. You need to be out by the end of the month.”

“But—“

“Good day, Maria. I hope you land on your feet.”

Two more knocks on the door, and Matthew answered again, and again was surprised to see her.

“Before you say anything,” she said, “I want you to hear me out. I lost my apartment last week. I sold everything I own just so I can afford food. I’ve been sleeping on the street for the last couple weeks, under park benches and trees. I lost my job because I never got to work on time and because I couldn’t shower. Please, Matthew, help me.”

He stared at her, mouth open. He pulled out his wallet and handed her some cash. “This is all I can do,” he said. “I can’t let you stay here; I don’t think it’d be good for the children.”

“What about what’s good for me, Matthew?”

“I can’t keep pulling you out of the holes you’ve dug for yourself. You need to be able to do that,” he said, pointing at her. “You and you alone.”

“But what am I supposed to do? You can’t leave me out on the street!”

“The girls are my priority now. I can’t solve your problems too.”

“The girls are my priority too!”

“You fix your situation, and show me that your life isn’t a wreck anymore, and maybe you’ll be able to see the girls more. Until then, I’m sorry, but I can’t let you any closer.”

And with that, he closed the door.