Chapter153: 153

DADDY, WILL YOU TAKE CARE OF ME? I grip my phone hard, staring at it, the little text box taunting me. An overwhelming fury wants to sweep over me, and I have to take a few deep breaths and close my eyes to keep it at bay. When I open my eyes, I feel only a little better, but the taunting never ceases when I look at my messages to Mark. Right, my messages, not his. Read, it says, nearly two hours ago. And not a single response back. And that's the last message. My other texts have been up for days and I haven't gotten a single thing back, not even a fucking smiley. I just want to throw my phone through the pink wallpaper of my room! I scroll back through our texts. I mean, my texts. It must be about fifty texts from me, each one only momentarily followed by a signal telling me they'd been read. Read, but not responded to. I swallow, my breathing becoming shallower as I realize what this all means. Panic sets in. I've been willfully ignorant for a while. Every time he didn't text back,