Aria agreed to take the pill for two more days. She writhed in agony on the floor of her room until she couldn’t take it anymore. She resolved to stop taking the pills. From then on, when Mrs Johnson brought the pill in to her before bedtime, Aria only pretended to take it. As soon as she left the room, Aria would spit it in the wastebasket in the corner of her room. Mrs Johnson was satisfied in her ignorance. When her daughter started feeling better, she felt confident that the side effect had worn off and that Aria was getting better.

That is, until she found the stash of unswallowed pills, on the very same day that Aria’s school called to tell her that her daughter had been suspended for being caught with a packet of cigarettes in her locker.

Aria sat outside the door in the hallway, listening to Mr and Mrs Johnson’s voices float back and forth. They had one thing in common: an air of defeat. Mrs Johnson had not bothered to take the issue up with Aria that day. She was past that point.

“She can’t stay here, Robert,” she said. “We have other children to think of and it’s not getting better. God give me the strength for this.”

She paced the room as her husband sat on the bed. To Aria’s amazement, he said, “I agree. She’s better off where she can get placed with a family that’s equipped to handle a girl with these struggles.”

Mr Johnson felt a foreign sense of reprieve at the prospect of Aria going away. The guilt that had preoccupied him for so long as a result of the indiscretions between himself and Aria might just come to an end. Somewhere inside of him, he felt a glimmer of hope that if Aria left, she wouldn’t tempt him anymore. He could live with himself. He could return to normal.

Aria could not believe her ears. She was sure that the secret they shared would at least bind him to come to her defense. She was sure that it would compel him to want her to stay here. But clearly she was wrong. She was worth nothing to either of them. Abandoned by one mother and hated by a second, and with a father who used her for his own idle pleasure without giving a damn, she stood up and retreated to her room. She shut herself in the closet and sat beneath her hanging clothes, confined in a sphere of sorrow.

She didn’t hear the surprise in Mrs Johnson’s voice at her husband’s words. “You really think so?” she asked.

“I think Aria needs more help than we can give her. I’ve got to work and you’ve got your hands full here at the house, and I just can’t stand seeing you like this every day.”