Marzena paced the kitchen tiles with a frantic rhythm, her phone pressed so tightly to her ear that it left a mark. "No, I haven't seen her since Friday," she told the neighbor in a voice carefully pitched with a tremor of worry. "She just... She vanished, and I- well, you know how sensitive she is. I'm terrified something happened." Her free hand fluttered against her chest like a nervous bird. "I keep thinking the worst. I barely slept."
Inside her head, the words came out differently. "Sensitive? That girl's always been weak. Pathetic, really. Runs off the moment life demands anything of her. And now she's embarrassing me in front of everyone. Two days gone? Do you know what people will think of me? That I raised a delinquent. That's what.
Her voice softened with an ache practiced over decades. "If you happen to see her, or if she shows up at your door - please, please let me know. I'm desperate here."
"Desperate, yes - for someone to finally acknowledge the ungrateful brat I've had to drag through life. Let them see what I put up with. Let them know it's all her fault."
She hung up, exhaled through her nose, then grabbed her coat. The neighbors on the stairwell caught her halfway down. "Have you seen Amy?" she asked, breathless, eyes wide. "She never came home."
"Oh dear," murmured one of the old women, wringing her hands. "That's awful. She's such a sweet girl-"
"Sweet," Marzena repeated with a brittle laugh. "Yes. Sweet, but... You know, vulnerable. She falls in with the wrong people. Doesn't know how to behave properly."
"Sweet, my ass. Sweet like vinegar. Always sulking, always clamming up. And those so-called 'friends'? Degenerates, the lot of them. Probably one of those 'lesbians' she clings to took her in. She thinks she's clever, running off to fuck with freaks."
By the time she reached the street, she had her performance polished. Concern on her face, venom in her heart. She stopped every passerby who'd listen: "Have you seen my daughter? 5'7, blond-red hair, blue eyes? She's fragile. If you see her, please - call me."
"Fragile little coward. Two days without me and she'll come crawling back, mark my words. She doesn't have what it takes to survive out there. Still, it doesn't hurt to stir the pot. Let the whole block buzz about poor Marzena's missing daughter. Let them shower me with sympathy while I lay the groundwork: if she comes back stinking of trouble, everyone will already know it was her fault."
By mid-afternoon, she was in a nearby Newpomeranian Police Department's precinct lobby, arms folded tight under her chest as she recounted her story for the third time. "She's missing. She hasn't come home. She's vulnerable, she's never been on her own like this. Please, you have to do something!"
The officer behind the desk, bored and unimpressed, tapped a few notes into his terminal. "Do you know your daughter's PESEL number?"
"Yes. One-seven-two-one-two-nine-zero-two-eight-four-eight."
The man ran Amy's PESEL through the global registry, then sighed through his teeth. "Then it's her right to come and go. Unless you've got reason to believe she's in danger, ma'am, there's nothing we can do."
Marzena's face crumpled with carefully arranged despair. "Nothing? But she's still a child-"
"-a child who's making me look like a fool in public. A child who thinks she's smarter than me, that she can run off and shack up with some rainbow-haired whore and call it 'freedom'. You useless pigs. You'd rather jack off to XBDs than help a mother in need."
The officer repeated his line, weary and flat. "Over eighteen, ma'am. It's out of our hands."
She clutched her bag strap, trembling just enough to draw sympathetic glances from the other people waiting. "God help me," she whispered aloud. "She's all I have!"
"All I have? Hah. She's been nothing but a burden since the day she was born. If she never comes back, maybe I'll finally have peace. But no- I can't let her just vanish. She'll come back, and when she does, everyone will know I tried. They'll remember poor me, the good mother, begging for help while her selfish brat ran wild."
On the tram ride home she rehearsed her lines again, muttering half aloud. "She doesn't know what she's doing. She's confused. It's not her fault. I blame the people she associates with. They fill her head with poison."
"Transgenders, gays, lesbians, deviants, fucking parasites. That's the poison. She thinks she can just choose that and call it love. She'll learn. Oh, she'll learn when those freaks of nature discard her and she has nowhere left to go but back here, begging for forgiveness. And I'll make her crawl before I let her in."
She reached her building and caught the landlord on the stairs. "Still no sign of Amy," she announced, voice shaking. "I'm worried sick. If you see her-"
"We'll let you know, Marzena. Chin up, don't worry," the man replied, resting a hand on her shoulder with genuine concern.
"-don't bother telling me. I'll hear her long before I see her, dragging her sorry ass back up these stairs. But for now, let me look like the grieving saint. Let them all whisper about me, cursed with a wayward daughter. Let them pity me, respect me, and know she's the one to blame when it all comes crashing down."
Back in her kitchen, she sat at the table, lit a cigarette, and finally dropped the mask. Smoke curled bitterly around her head. "Ungrateful little whore," she hissed into the empty room. "Run as far as you like. You'll still be mine. And when you come crawling back, you'll regret every second you thought you could live without me."
Marzena's fingers drummed on the table, eyes darting around the kitchen, thinking if she can do anymore to sink her daugher's reputation. Then - a sudden epiphany. "Her computer." She darted to Amy's old room and - sure enough - in her rush to disappear, Amy left her rig running unlocked. A spark of curiosity - no, of opportunity - lit her features. "What's this?" she murmured aloud, leaning forward until her face was almost touching the screen. Her eyes skimmed the messages, her expression bittering every second. "Void... What kind of name is that? And... A meetup? In Szczecin? She scrolled through the messages. "Drugs? Felony..? Aha. So that's where she's hiding. And with that... That... Whore. Trying to drag that little brat into whatever twisted world they have out there. I knew she was being corrupted. I fucking knew it."
She leaned back, breathing shallow. "My daughter... Gone with… someone who signs their name as 'Void'? A hacker? Some kind of... Deviant?" Her hands tightened into fists, her every word dripping with vitriol. "Predator. Corruptor. Degenerate. That's what they've turned her into. My own daughter, running around with sluts, letting them teach her to be... Filthy. To disrespect her family. To disrespect me."
In solitude, her voice was nothing like the cracked, fragile, screenplay she put up outside. "I should've known. I should've caught this earlier. If only I had... I'll teach her. She'll pay for this. I'll make sure everyone knows she's mine to control and is fine with it."
Marzena's phone buzzed with a notification from her neighbor, someone she'd roped into her performance. "Yes, yes, I found it. She's gone off to meet a drug dealer in Szczecin. She's probably in grave danger! Will you go with me there to look for her? Tomorrow? Yes. Thank you so much, you have no idea what this means to me." She hung up, throwing her phone back on the desk.
"She's just weak. But weak in the wrong ways. I can twist this, make it look like she's reckless, unsafe, incapable. They'll believe me. I'll leave them no choice."