Mommy's Home

Maia tucked a short, golden brown curl behind her left ear and continued to work on her thesis paper. She paused to take a large gulp of her lukewarm coffee and typed a few more words on the computer, then groaned and erased them. She laid her head down on her desk, eventually deciding to surrender herself to her lumpy couch for the rest of the evening. 

She dragged herself into the small kitchen, pouring the rest of her coffee down the sink and popping a TV dinner into the microwave. Once it was done cooking, she grabbed a white plastic fork from the messy junk drawer and plopped herself down onto the couch. She turned the television to the Freeform channel and tuned into the movie as Harry was climbing out of his window and into the Weasley family’s flying car. She shoveled forkfuls of macaroni and cheese into her mouth, smacking her lips together obnoxiously and washing the food down with large gulps of Coca Cola. She knew she looked gross at the moment, but she was way too tired to care. She had been busy working on her thesis paper for the whole entire weekend, and she had barely gotten any sleep the whole time. She thought that she deserved the right to be a bit gross for a little bit. 

Maia finished her macaroni and cheese dinner, and decided to get ready for bedtime. She turned off the television and headed down the hallway to her bedroom, closing and locking the door even though she lived by herself. She began to prepare to go to sleep, pulling out a pair of fluffy pajamas and taking off her crusty, three day old makeup. She was about to change into her pajamas when she heard a loud knock on the front door. She sighed tiredly and headed to the door, opening it without checking who it was. Standing in the otherwise empty hallway of her apartment building was her mom, who she hadn’t seen in almost an entire month. Maia gasped excitedly.

“Mom, you’re here!”

Her mother smiled warmly as Maia wrapped her arms around her. Maia opened the door wider to let her mom in, and the women both got comfortable on the couch.

“What are you doing here, Mom?” Maia was surprised to see her, but not upset. She had missed her mom, and they usually didn’t go very long without seeing each other.

Her mom smiled at her again. 

“Well, I was thinking it’d been a while since we’d last seen each other, and I decided just to stop by on my way home!”

Maia nodded happily. Her mom dropped by randomly all the time, so it wasn’t too strange. 

The mother and daughter pair decided that they should watch a movie, and Maia went to her room to change into her pajamas. She walked back into the living room to find it empty, and the movie hadn’t even been pulled up on the television yet. She peeked around the corner and into the kitchen to see her mother hunched over the island, obviously struggling with something. 

“What are you doing?” She questioned curiously.

Her mother jumped and spun around quickly, swinging a bottle of wine into Maia’s view. 

“Oh, you scared me!” She laughed nervously. “I was just trying to open this wine bottle that I brought for you! They’re harder to open than I remember!”

Maia giggled and took the bottle from her mother, getting out two wine glasses and setting them on the counter. 

“How much do you want?” She asked, glancing at her mom.

The older woman shook her head.

“Oh no, none for me! I’m too old to drink wine,” She laughed.

Maia’s eyebrow quirked teasingly, and she returned one of the wine glasses back to her cabinet. She then poured herself a glass of wine and turned to her mom. 

“Well, what are you waiting for? Let’s go watch this movie!”

Around an hour and a half later, Maia was getting very tired. She had downed several glasses of wine, and it had started to make her unexplainably sleepy. She yawned widely, and her mother smiled at her. 

“Hun, just go ahead and go to sleep for the night. We’ll finish the movie the next time I visit.”

“Are you sure?” Maia asked quietly. She felt bad for ending the night early, but she knew she needed sleep. 

“Of course I’m sure, baby. You just have to do one more thing for me first.” Her mother responded, and Maia noticed that her voice sounded very strange. Almost.. Evil. 

Maia was slightly confused, and she began to raise her head up off of the couch cushion.

But before she could ask the older woman what she meant, she felt a very sharp.. Something stab her in the abdomen. She looked down at her torso, and sticking out of her body was a long, sharp knife. She screamed as loudly as she could, but her mother’s hand came down to cut the scream off.

“Now, dear, none of that. This needs to be a peaceful transition. The skin has to be relaxed for the sacrifice to work, my doll.” Her mother chuckled and pulled out a large roll of duct tape from her purse, carefully taping Maia’s mouth shut with it. 

Maia could feel herself bleeding out, but she couldn’t bring herself to try to run away from the danger. She was terrified and weak, and she knew she wouldn’t be able to stand up. Her mind was racing with confusion. A sacrifice? She didn’t want to be sacrificed. Her mother was her one person, her rock. She’d been the person to raise her and had stayed by her side through all her struggles. Why was her mom doing this to her, after being such a good parent to her for her entire life? At this point, Maia didn’t care about why she was doing it. She was tired and in pain, and her sight was getting fuzzy. She closed her eyes sleepily, and slowly breathed her last breath.