A synopsis, written by AI (and it done a fing good job)
The air in dingy house always felt thick, heavy with unspoken things. The scent of stale cigarettes and cheap perfume clung to the second-hand furniture, a constant reminder of the life that was unfolding within its walls. Bria, at four years old, navigated this landscape with a quiet resilience, her eyes wide and watchful. Her brother, Bobby was a whirlwind of barely-repressed needs and desperate affection, traits that often went unanswered.
Their mother, Kayleigh, was a storm cloud that constantly threatened to break. Where her smile should be was faded into a lumpy, cheaply fillered and tired line. The work she did, the endless parade of men that slinked in and out of their lives seemed to be draining the life out of her, leaving behind a volatile shell. Their father, a ghost named Daniel, was a creature of shadows, popping in and out only when he felt able and mostly avoiding his responsibilities to the children in his vulnerable family.
Bria had learned early on that silence was her armor, her shield against the unpredictable waves of Kayleigh's moods. She understood, in a way a child shouldn't have to, that their mother's anger wasn't really aimed at them. It was a reflection of the despair she carried, a weight that often tipped her over the edge. Bobby, too young to understand, simply cried when Kayleigh yelled, his small fist clutching at his sister's hand in search of comfort.
One particular evening, the air crackled with tension. Kayleigh was defeated from yet again no more re subscribers, her shoulders slumped, her eyes red-rimmed. A small pile of beanie babies, a relic from a happier time, sat on the edge of the tattered couch. They were relics that reminded Bria of easier times.
Kayleigh threw a half-eaten bag of crisps onto their worn coffee table, then began to pace like a caged animal. Bobby, sensing the shift in the air, began to whimper. "Shut it!" Kayleigh snapped, her voice sharp and laced with frustration.
Bria, feeling uneasy burst into tears and demanded her dummy, something she shouldn't have but was yet to be weined from due to kaykeighs negligence. This seemed to ignite something within Kayleigh. She whirled around, eyes blazing, and snatched a beanie baby from the couch. Without a word, she hurled it.
Bria saw it coming, a blur of soft fabric and plastic beads, but she was too slow to move out of the way. The beanie baby struck her right in the eye, a sharp, sudden pain exploding behind her eyelid. She cried out, a strangled sound of surprise and hurt.
Bobby, witnessing this, began to scream, his small body trembling. The silence that followed was deafening. Kayleigh stood there, her chest heaving, the look on her face a mix of fury and something akin to horror. Then, just as quickly, the anger returned, and she turned away, slamming her bedroom door shut behind her leaving Bria alone to tend to herself.
Bria’s hand flew up to her eye. The pain was searing, her vision blurring. When she pulled her hand away, she saw a smear of blood staining her fingers. She didn't cry. Not a single tear. She simply stood there, her hand pressed against her throbbing eye, the image of the flying beanie baby burned into her memory.
That night, the pain subsided into a dull ache, leaving behind a sickening bruise that spread across her cheekbone and down into her lower eyelid. The following morning, when Bria looked in the chipped mirror hanging in the bathroom, she saw a stranger staring back at her – a girl with a blackened eye, a mark that went far deeper than the purple skin and swollen tissue.
The physical wound would heal, but the emotional scar, the memory of the beanie baby and the seething rage in her mother's eyes, would remain with Bria forever. The tiny home was her cage, a place where love was a distant whisper and violence was a casual occurrence. From that day forward, Bria’s eyes held not just the watchful quality they always did, but a layer of something new: the stark understanding that the world could be a dangerous place, especially within the four walls of her own home. The beanie baby incident was a line drawn in the sand, dividing her life into a before and after. It was the day Bria stopped being just a child, and started becoming a survivor. She would always carry the weight of that moment, a dark, silent testament to the fragility of childhood and the lingering trauma born from the neglect she experienced.
