Dollenganger 02 Petals On the Wind by V. C. Andrews Read Free Book Online Page B

then got up to fetch years of mending and perhaps a dozen shirts with missing buttons.
Chris spent every available moment with Dr. Paul who was coaching him so he could enter a special college-prep school in midterm. Carrie was our biggest problem. She could read and write but she was so very small. How would she manage in a public school where children were not always kind?
"It's a private school I have in mind for Carrie," explained our doctor. "A very good school for young girls, run by an excellent staff. Since I'm on the board of trustees, I think Carrie will be given special attention, and not subjected to any kind of stress." He eyed me meaningfully.
That was my worst fear, that Carrie would be ridiculed and made to feel ashamed because of her overlarge head and undersized body. Once Carrie had been so beautifully proportioned, so very perfect. It was all those lost years when the sun was denied us that made her so small. It was, I knew it was!
I was scared to death Momma would show up on that day she was supposed to appear at the court hearing. But I was certain, almost, that she wouldn't come. How could she? She had too much to lose and nothing to gain. What were we but burdens to bear? And there was jail too, a murder charge. . . .
We sat very quietly with Paul, dressed in our best to appear in the judge's chamber, and waited, and waited, and waited. I was a tight wire inside, stretched so taut I thought I might break and cry. She didn't want us. Again she told us by not showing up, how little she cared! The judge looked at us with too much pity, making me feel so sorry for all of us--and so angry with her! Oh, damn her to hell! She gave us birth, she claimed to have loved our father! How could she do this to his children--her own children? What kind of mother was she? I didn't want that judge's pity, or Paul's. I held my head high and bit down on my tongue to keep from screaming. I dared to glance at Chris and saw him sitting blank-eyed, though I knew his heart was being shredded, as mine was. Carrie crouched in a tight ball on the doctor's lap, as his hands soothed her, and he whispered something in her ear. I think he said, "Never mind, it's all right. You have me for a father and Henny for a mother. You'll never want for anything as long as I live."
I cried that night. I wet my pillow with tears shed for a mother I'd loved so much it hurt to think back to the days when Daddy was alive and our home life was perfect. I cried for all the good things she had done for us back then, and, most of all, for all the love she'd so generously given us--then. I cried more for Cory who was like my own child. And that's when I stopped crying and turned to bitter, hard thoughts of revenge. When you set out to defeat someone, the best way was to think as they did. What would hurt her most? She wouldn't want to think of us. She'd try to forget we ever existed. Well, she wouldn't forget. I'd see to it that she didn't. This very Christmas I would send her a card, and sign it with this, "From the four Dresden dolls you didn't want," and I had to change that to "The three alive Dresden dolls you didn't want, plus the dead one you carried away and never brought back." I could see her staring at that card, thinking to herself, I only did what I had to.
We had let down our shields and allowed ourselves to be vulnerable again. We allowed faith, hope and trust to come and dance like sugarplums in our heads.
Fairy tales could come true.
They were happening to us. The wicked queen was out of our lives, and Snow White would reign one day. She wouldn't be the one to eat the poisoned red apple. But every fairy tale had a dragon to slay, a witch to overcome or some obstacle to make things difficult. I tried to look ahead and figure out who would be the dragon, and what would be the obstacles. All along I knew who was the witch. And that was the saddest part of being me.
I got up and went out on the upper veranda to stare up at the moon. I saw