Scars of Prison Life

Sloane stood as a silent, detached observer. The sickeningly sweet mother-daughter act unfolding between Eleanor and Chloe played out right in front of her, but she possessed absolutely no desire to engage with the theatrical display. Her heart felt like a block of ice. She purposefully walked past the embracing pair, desperate to continue her journey toward her grandfather's courtyard.

Before she could take more than a few steps, a tall figure stepped into her path. Julian. He immediately spotted Eleanor’s tears over Chloe's shoulder and quickened his pace. His stride was aggressive, intercepting Sloane before she could bypass them.

"Sloane," Julian demanded sharply, his voice practically vibrating with anger. "What cruel things did you say to make Mom cry the second you got back?"

Maintaining an entirely expressionless face, Sloane met her brother's furious gaze. She didn't flinch. "Mr. Sinclair," she suggested calmly, "maybe you should ask your mother what she said to me. I only spoke a single sentence."

Julian’s jaw tightened. He looked at her with clear, aggressive disbelief, opening his mouth to launch another attack.

Eleanor hastily intervened, extracting herself from Chloe's arms. "Jules, stop it. Be nicer to Sloane. I'm fine, I'm just so overwhelmed to see her." She wiped her eyes, her gaze drifting over Sloane’s worn attire while offering a hollow, gentle criticism. "Sloane, I bought you entire closets full of new clothes and shoes. Why on earth are you wearing something so ill-fitting? It looks borrowed."

Completely brushing off the superficial concern, Sloane adjusted the strap of her cheap, faded backpack. "No need. This is fine. I'm going to see Grandpa."

Arthur was the singular person she was desperate to reunite with. After three agonizing years in a cell, the thought of his warm, grounding presence was the only thing keeping her standing. She attempted once again to bypass them.

Julian moved laterally, physically blocking her path like a solid brick wall. "Grandpa is already asleep," he stated coldly.

"No way. Derek is still with him, isn't he?" Sloane's voice cracked with sudden anxiety.

"Derek has left the premises," Julian replied, his tone dripping with sheer annoyance. He crossed his arms. If Sloane hadn't shown up and caused a scene, Derek might have stayed for dinner.

Frustrated and deeply wounded, Sloane clenched her fists. Their manipulative, pointless delays had cost her the vital chance to see the only person who cared about her. She chose to remain completely quiet. She refused to give them the satisfaction of a reaction. She would just go inside and wait until morning.

"Sloane, don't worry," Eleanor stepped in with a soft, placating promise. "Your room is completely ready for you. Now that you're back, I desperately want to make things right between us. Let's get you settled."

Julian shifted uneasily at his mother's words. His righteous anger faltered for a fraction of a second before he brutally shattered the facade. "The room isn't ready at all," he bluntly admitted to Eleanor. He turned his callous gaze back to Sloane, formally asserting his authority. "You'll have to stay in the tiny maid's room on the first floor for the time being."

Eleanor gasped dramatically, her hands flying to her mouth in shocked disbelief. "Jules, what did you just say?"

Sloane did not argue. She didn't bat an eye at the blatant degradation. "Where is the maid's room?"

Julian pointed toward the isolated corridor, looking slightly taken aback by her immediate compliance. Sloane adjusted her grip on her bag, entirely ignoring Eleanor's ongoing performance of horror, and retreated into the house.

Closing the door to the servant's quarters, Sloane exhaled a long, shaky breath. The room was isolated and simply furnished, but it had a bed, a window, and a door that locked. Having barely survived the torturous psychological strain of solitary confinement, this small space felt perfectly adequate. To her broken spirit, it was almost luxurious. She unpacked her few meager belongings, plugged in her phone, and sat on the edge of the mattress.

Later that evening, a sharp knock broke the silence of the maid's room. The door swung open to reveal Chloe. She was meticulously hiding her deep-seated hostility behind a bright, practiced smile.

"Sloane, Mom asked me to come fetch you for a family dinner," Chloe chimed, her voice dripping with artificial sweetness.

Sloane caught the venom lurking just beneath the younger girl's eyes. "Got it," Sloane replied flatly. "Let's go."

The dining room was blindingly bright, the massive mahogany table groaning under the weight of an extravagant spread. Sloane took a seat at the far end, keeping her posture rigid and her hands near her lap.

As soon as she sat down, Eleanor attempted to overcompensate for the earlier tension. "Here, Sloane, you must be starving," Eleanor cooed enthusiastically, suddenly leaning heavily across the table. Her manicured hand darted rapidly toward Sloane's plate with a serving spoon.

The sudden, unannounced movement triggered a severe, visceral trauma response.

In a microsecond, Sloane's vision tunneled. She didn't see a mother serving dinner; she saw a threat. Sloane violently threw her body backward, her chair screeching harshly against the floor. Instinctively, she slammed her forearms over her plate, physically shielding it with her own flesh as her chest heaved in sheer panic. A piece of broccoli flew from Eleanor's spoon, landing messily on the pristine tablecloth.

The dining room plunged into stunned silence, save for Sloane's ragged breathing.

Julian’s anger flared instantly at the sudden, chaotic motion. He slammed his hand on the table. "What the hell is wrong with you?" he shouted loudly, accusingly. "Mom is just trying to serve you food! Are you really putting on this pathetic, dramatic act just to make us feel guilty?"

Sloane's wildly beating heart began to slow as the crystal chandeliers and polished silver came back into focus. She realized where she was. The suffocating gray walls of the mess hall vanished. She slowly lowered her arms, her fingers trembling slightly against the porcelain.

"Sorry," Sloane said softly, staring down at her plate. "It is simply a habit."

It was a brutal reality forged in blood and hunger. In the cutthroat, unforgiving environment of the penitentiary, a hand suddenly reaching toward your plate meant only one of two things. It meant your meager, life-sustaining rations were being violently stolen, or it meant someone was maliciously dumping garbage onto your food to starve you out. If you didn't guard your plate with your life, you didn't eat.

Julian let out a sharp, cruel laugh. "A habit? You're a terrible liar. You honestly expect us to believe that garbage?"

Sloane slowly picked up her fork. She looked straight at him with deadened eyes. "Whether you believe it or not is entirely up to you."

Desperate to smooth over the suffocating tension, Eleanor awkwardly cleared her throat. "Jules, please. She didn't mean anything by it." Eleanor turned her watery eyes to Sloane. "Sloane, why aren't you eating? Is the food not to your taste?"

Sloane looked down at the extravagant spread spanning the table. Every single dish—the glazed ribs, the spicy shrimp, the candied yams—was heavily catered entirely to Chloe's specific sweet-and-spicy preferences. There wasn't a single plain or easily digestible item in sight, save for a small side of plain macaroni.

Three years ago, Sloane would have eagerly choked down the spicy food just to earn a crumb of Eleanor's approval. Now, the mere smell of the heavy oils made her stomach churn.

"The food is simply too heavy," Sloane answered honestly, her voice devoid of any emotion. "My stomach cannot handle it."

Julian cruelly sneered, practically leaning across the table to mock her. "You used to eat this stuff just fine before you left. What, prison made you too good for our chef's cooking? Suddenly you can't eat?"

Sloane finally met his aggressive gaze with a flat, completely deadened tone. "Back then, I hadn't been starved sick."

Julian's sneer faltered.

Sloane didn't raise her voice, but she delivered a chilling reality check that cut right through the dining room. "After three years in a penitentiary, enduring agonizing hunger became my baseline normal. Devouring food at lightning speed so it wouldn't be stolen became normal. And developing chronic, debilitating stomach problems from eating literal garbage became my new reality. So no, Julian, I can't eat heavy food."

Julian froze in his chair. The brutal truth of what he had subjected his own sister to finally seemed to pierce his thick skull. The color drained from his face as he stared at her, utterly speechless.

Eleanor, her eyes immediately red and weeping once again, looked completely shattered. "Sloane..." she whimpered naively, "why didn't you call home and say something? I... I genuinely thought you were doing perfectly fine on the inside. Why didn't you tell us you were hurting?"

Sloane found the sheer ignorance of the people who intentionally threw her to the wolves utterly laughable. Did they honestly think prison was a summer camp?

Her voice turned to pure ice. "I did call."

Julian immediately blurted out a denial, aggressively shaking his head. "That's impossible! No one in this family ever received a call from the prison. Stop lying!"

A trace of mockery touched Sloane’s eyes. "Two months after I went in, I called home. A maid answered. She told me you all said I should focus on serving my sentence and not call again."

The atmosphere at the table froze instantly.