I was filled with this hateful vengeance

And it blinded me completely

Submerged in this grim rebellion 
 

***PAST ***

“Jennie?”

Hearing the familiar voice calling her name, Jennie couldn't restrain how she felt her lips tug back into that gummy smile of hers. 
 

“Yes, Auntie?” She asked, beaming. 
 

“Can I ask you a favor?" Her aunt requested, her eyes softly gazing down upon her little figure. 

"Of course! For you! I'll do anything, Auntie!" Jennie vowed back as she placed both hands at her waist, chest puffed up in certitude. Standing tall like a mighty cavalier. 

"Pinky swear?" The older asked with a held-out finger. 

Jennie nodded back and tangles her aunt's little finger with her own. 
 

"Then. Promise me this." Her aunt knelt down on one knee and held Jennie's right shoulder with a hand. "Take care of your mom, okay?"

Hearing her request, Jennie should've noticed it back then. It was a warning, only to be shaded by her youthful innocence. 
 

So she merely furrows her brows at the older before replying, assuring her. 
 

“Of course, I will." Tilting her head to the side, Jennie ponders. “Why? Where are you going, Auntie?” 
 

“Nowhere. Of course, I’ll always be here.” The older replies with a grin before squeezing both of Jennie's cheeks. 
 

"Auntie~! That hurts.” Jennie cried out at the older, now nursing her reddened cheeks. 
 

The older only chuckled at her and stood. "And besides. Who would come to pick you up at school every day? Read your bedtime stories? Build forts and have a teacup party with your dolls?" Grinning at her next words, the older points out. "And most importantly, Who’ll buy you ice cream?” 

Jennie immediately seized her Aunt's hand and tugged her. 
 

“I want chocolate!~” 
 

Her aunt was always the one to spoil her. Being strictly monitored and directed to follow rules by her parents, her aunt was the one who would always bend all the restrictions placed on her. Their secret exploits - of toy stores, amusement parks, or candy shops - remained between them.  
 

Jennie happily skipped through the hallways of their mansion, adorning a bright smile. 
 

Blissfully unaware of what will ensue. 
 

That those moments were to unravel in a complete reversal. 
 

It was the fall of the first domino.  
 

One that would set off a succession of hysteria.
 

Immersing them completely into a complete void of darkness. 
 

And it was silent.
 

As it draws the pain into perpetuity, like the complete state of a vexing metronome.  
 

Inaudible, yet it haunts them all over the place. 
 

Jennie couldn’t understand it.
 

That somehow the joyful smile of her aunt whenever she’d go home after class was now gone.
 

She watched it.
 

How those throng of people all adorning black clothes stood against the grass, heeding to the words of her father who stood beside the coffin of her Aunt.
 

Telling stories about how good of a person she is. 
 

How kind of a sister-in-law she is. 
 

That she was someone to be always admired for being determined and bright. 
 

Jennie blinked back.
 

In denial.
 

That it wasn’t happening.
 

That her Aunt wasn't in that white casket. 
 

She denies those whispers that relentlessly rang through her ears.
 

Words of assassination.
 

Executed by their rivals. 

Plotted against her Aunt, the next heir to inherit their company. 
 

A throne that’s already covered in blood. 
 

Doused over by the spite of their enemies. 
 

Jennie stared straight ahead. Mindless of it all. 
 

Of how each person gave out a speech, bidding her Aunt goodbye with a flower as the casket goes down to the dug-out grave. 
Jennie held hers, opting out of wishing her Aunt farewell. 
 

Shut off in a far-away space. Deaf from all the noise that borders her. 
 

Only to ring back the last conversation with her beloved Aunt.
 

“Why? Where are you going, Auntie?” 
 

Jennie felt how her heart tightly constricts against her ribcage. Her mind conjuring the image of her Aunt, gently smiling at her. 
 

“Nowhere. Of course, I’ll always be here.”
 

Seeing that smile once more only broke her. 
 

Her breathing started to get ragged, it was as if grief caught sight of her from its haunt, settling inside as it claws at her. 
 

She clutched her heart before falling to her knees. 
 

That the mask she'd put on front crumbles, unveiling her tear-stricken eyes. 
 

She tightened her grip on the stem of the flower, benumbed of the thorns that now impales her skin, that its ache was far off from the affliction on her chest. 
 

"You’re a liar. Auntie." She utters out of spite, out of resentment, as tears unceasingly streamed down her face. 
 

It was on all of the discordances.
 

All muddled up. 
 

The burning anger of being lied to. 
 

The overwhelming misery. 
 

And the heavy weight of grief, striking its heavy scythe into her. 
 

Scarring her completely. 
 

*
 

It tore them apart. 
 

The space that her Aunt left them only sets a rift between them. 
 

When was it?
 

When did it all become black? 
 

That the hallways suddenly turned into a grim sight of a pathway. The light that hails from the chandeliers seems to be the beacon of how somber it is. And that the air enveloping them became stifling, suffocating them, constrained by the silence that perpetuates. 
 

The news of her Aunt’s death was circulated on national TV, announcing the murder of the next heir of one of the biggest and most powerful conglomerates of the country. 
 

And it was Jennie's mother who heavily took the blow of her Aunt's passing.
 

Her mother was closest to her Aunt as she was the only family member left after their parent's passing during her childhood.
 

And despite how polar opposites their personalities are - with her Aunt being that sunshine who glows in any room she walks into and her mother having that stony and frigid persona - Jennie could always see that slight smile that paints her mom's features during the banters she had with her Aunt. 
 

Her mother started to seclude herself. Isolated in her own room. Refusing to vacate it despite all the entreaty of Jennie and of her father. 
 

Her mother became withdrawn from the world itself.
 

Forgetting about her duties. All the roles she'd been always into. 
 

Forgetting about her own family.
 

All her attempts to approach her mother were waved off with silence. Her knocks fell into a deafening reticence. That it felt like their agony couldn't be bared nor be heard by each other from what she calls 'family'. 

The burden was left to be carried by her father. 
 

He's the one who carried out all the remaining funeral arrangements for her Aunt, communicated with the media regarding matters of their family, and settled that brewing and the inevitable feud between their rivals that was brought upon her Aunt's death.
 

Those days turned into weeks and paced into months, yet her mother was still confined into her own cocoon as she still turns a blind eye to everything.
 

Years had passed. And it was then that her mother broke out of her own shell.
 

Jennie knew, at that moment, that it wasn't the mother she'd always known. 
 

And she was right.
 

Her mother rarely sets foot in their mansion again after leaving her own confinement. She completely devoted herself to the company, spending all her days on all the projects and business proposals that were hindered and postponed due to her absence. 
 

"Daniel will be the one to come pick you up. I'll be off to New Zealand tomorrow, your Grandpa called me this morning saying I'm the one who should present to the board." Her father informed her from across the dining table, before asking. "You have no concerns now? Do you?"
 

Jennie silently shakes her head no. 
 

The older nodded. 
 

Finally looking up at her father, Jennie realized the prominent exhaustion that appears in his features. His skin was paler than usual, his hair starting to form lines of white streaks, his eyes heavy from fatigue as dark circles masked his face, and his frail figure evident from the loss of weight. 
 

"I'll go now then. Should you need me. Just ask Daniel to call me."
 

Jennie nodded in response. 
 

Her father didn't move for a few seconds. He opens his lips, caught in contemplation on whether or not he should impart it to her, but closes it just as quickly. 
 

Her father gave a nod in her direction and stood from his chair. The maids and butlers all bowed in unison at her father as he took his leave. 
 

Once her father was gone, Jennie heard that familiar clacking of heels headed in her direction. 
 

"Milady." 
 

The man voiced out beside her.
 

"You...didn't tell him."
 

Jennie tried to laugh it off and waved her hand in dismissal. 
 

Feigning the hurt. 
 

She let out a small smile, drawing out the seconds by scraping at her food with a fork. 
 

"I know. But..."
 

Jennie looks down and dryly laughs. 
 

"I mean. It's not like I'm the first kid who doesn't have anyone on Family Day, right?" 
 

It wasn't new to her as she's never been into one. 
 

She couldn't even remember when was the last time they were all together for dinner. 
 

It wasn't that she was feeling lonely. Or sad. 
 

Or anything at all. 
 

And maybe that was it. 
 

She was completely indifferent to that void. 
 

That she didn't even notice that it was there all along. 
 

Keeping her company. 
 

Lingering beside her.
 

So no. 
 

She wasn't lonely at all. 
 

*
 

Maybe it was her pride.
 

A fragment of her, a facet that she'd always repressed. That a part of her self-esteem was built to prove a point to them. 
 

To flaunt at them that she too could attain what her sister had achieved. 
 

Jennie tried her hardest on everything. 
 

She could clearly recall it. How she'd always find herself during her childhood at the far end of that exuberant gaiety.
 

Hearing all those sing sang voices.
 

A commendation that was only set for her sister. 
 

So she did just all that.
 

She became the best. To be at the top of everything. 
 

She's class valedictorian. 
 

The most esteemed, highly regarded, and most awarded student of their class. 
 

The clanking of her heavy medals adorned around her neck was proof of that.
 

She searched past the crowd as she finishes her valedictory speech. The spotlight was hers - and hers alone, coupled with the clamor of claps directed at her. 
 

At her achievements.
 

But it wasn't enough.
 

Those accolades didn't mean anything. 
 

Jennie tries to inspect the throng once more, trying to find the familiar figures of her family. 
 

Only to find herself back feeling that same disappointment. 
 

She could only nod back. 
 

Eyes emptied into bleak nonchalance. 
 

She steps down the pedestal and didn't utter anything on the car ride back to their mansion. 
 

Why?
 

She asked herself. 
 

She did her best.
 

She is the very best.
 

The top of her class, of the entire student body even. 
 

Yet why? 
 

Jennie felt her hands balled into fists. And upon arriving home, she stormed off to her room and ignore the pleas of the head maid and her