Chapter 4 - The Reflection
The room was deathly silent. Even the clock on the wall seemed to have stopped ticking. Brenda looked around, desperate for an ally, but Lily was staring at her with wide, hurt eyes, and I was standing up now, blocking her exit.
"Do you know why he grew those curls?" Mark asked, leaning over the table.
Brenda shrank back, her bravado evaporating. "It’s just hair, Mark. It grows back."
"It’s not just hair," Mark said, his voice trembling with a rage he could no longer contain. "His sister was dying. She was losing everything. She was losing her health, her energy, and her beauty. Leo made a promise to her. He was five years old, and he understood something you never will: that loyalty is a form of love."
He leaned closer, his shadow falling over her. "When you cut his hair, you didn't 'fix' a boy. You destroyed a promise. You took the one thing that made him feel like he was helping his sister survive."
Brenda began to cry—not out of remorse, but out of a desperate, selfish shame. "I just wanted him to look... I wanted people to be proud of him!"
"We were proud of him!" I shouted, the words tearing out of my throat. I walked over to the table, taking the single, golden curl Leo had kept and placing it next to the clippers on the table. "We were proud of him every single day. The only person who wasn't proud of him was you, because you couldn't stand the idea of a boy who defied your narrow, ugly version of the world."
May you like
Brenda looked at the curl. It was small, fragile, and utterly insignificant compared to the damage she had caused. She reached out to touch it, but Mark moved the clippers, blocking her hand.
"Don't," he said.
