What good girls don't do
“Persephone Parthenia Penelope Hayes.”
My full name landed on me like an execution. I flinched as my mother’s glare met mine through the rearview mirror. Her bright green eyes were sharp as knives, mine darted nervously, trying to look at anything but her.
The car smelled like leather and old air freshener, the kind she liked; the clean lavender scent. Everything looked smeared and unfocused, streetlights bleeding into soft halos. I’d thought I wouldn’t need my glasses tonight. I guess I was wrong.
My hands were clasped in my lap until my fingers went numb. My knees pressed into the back of the passenger seat, trembling despite my effort to keep still.
She’d found out. Not privately.
Publicly.
I lowered my gaze, lips pressed together, throat tight.
“I’m sorry, Mom,” I muttered, the words tumbling over each other. “I swear I was going to tell you－”
“Tell me?” she snapped.
Her foot hit the accelerator. The engine growled as the car surged forward, and my back slammed against the seat.
“Tell me what, Persephone?” Her voice was sharp enough to cut skin. “I don’t want to hear anything from you right now. You know the rules.”
My stomach twisted.
“What’s rule number one, Persephone?”
I swallowed. “It’s－ it’s－”
The car sped up again.
My fingers clawed at the seatbelt as panic crawled up my spine. The streetlights blurred past the windows.
“SAY IT!”
“I’m not allowed to date until I’m twenty-five,” I whispered.
She ran a red light.
“LOUDER.”
Fear ripped the words out of me. “I’M NOT ALLOWED TO DATE ANYONE UNTIL I’M TWENTY-FIVE!”
She slowed down.
“Good.”
The word was quiet. Controlled. Somehow worse than her shouting.
My heart pounded so hard I thought it might crack my ribs. I hesitated, then pushed the words out anyway, desperate to be heard.
“Mom, I－I didn’t mean for it to happen like this. Carter and I were only trying to help－”
Her arm shot up.
Not toward me, just to silence me.
I pressed my lips together, my chest burning with everything I wanted to say. I knew better. When my mother got like this, words became weapons, and I was always the one bleeding.
“And yet,” she said coldly, eyes locked on the road, “what did you do? You went behind my back. You dated Carter after everything I warned you about.”
“It’s not like that,” I said, barely louder than a breath. “We don’t have feelings for each other－”
“AFTER ALL I TOLD YOU,” she shouted. “AFTER－”
Her voice cracked, her knuckles whitening around the steering wheel.
The car swerved slightly before she corrected it.
“After knowing what your father did to me,” she continued, the rage in her voice splintering into something brittle. “The way he treated me.”
My chest ached.
I remembered.
I remembered too well.
“I’m sorry, Mom,” I said again, softer this time.
When I looked up, she wasn’t glaring anymore.
She stared straight ahead, jaw tight, eyes dull with disappointment. The same look she gave me when I brought home a B instead of an A. The look that said you should have known better.
I dropped my gaze to my hands, fidgeting with the hem of my dress. Red. Soft fabric. Carter had picked it out for me tonight.
Tonight.
The word felt stupid now.
She’d stormed into the café like a force of nature, heels striking the floor, eyes scanning the room until they found me. She hadn’t yelled. She hadn’t needed to. She grabbed my wrist and pulled me up in front of everyone. Conversations stopped. Forks froze midair. Carter’s face had gone pale as she dragged me away.
I hadn’t looked back.
I didn’t want to see his embarrassment mirror my own.
The car turned onto our street.
Home.
My mother’s car skidded into the driveway, the tires screaming like they were just as desperate to escape as I was.
I loosened my grip on the seatbelt slowly, like sudden movement might set her off again. My chest still felt unstable. She hadn’t driven like that in a long time. Not since… I didn’t even know when.
She got out first.
The car door slammed so hard the sound bounced off the houses. A second later, Poppy immediately started barking. Our five year old husky probably thought we were being attacked.
I got out too, closing my door carefully, like the noise might make things worse. I watched my mom storm into the house without even glancing back, not bothering to close the door behind her. She didn’t crouch to scratch Poppy’s head the way she always did.
That scared me more than the driving.
I adjusted my dress, smoothing the fabric down with shaky hands, then took slow, careful steps toward the house. I’d survived the car ride. That had to count for something.
Now came the harder part. Mom.
As I reached the porch, I caught movement from the house across the street. Mr. David－ our middle-aged neighbor with the permanently disappointed eyebrows－ stood at his window, staring at me like he already knew the verdict.
I forced a tight smile.
He shook his head once and pulled his curtains shut.
Great.
“Persephone!” my mom’s voice cut through the house. “You better not be stalling!”
I flinched and stared at the ground, breathing in and out like that might help. My fingers curled into fists at my sides. I took one step forward. Then another, a little steadier.
I was almost sixteen. Almost. I couldn’t keep letting her decide everything for me. I was tired of the rules, the horrible names, the curfews, the constant no’s. I needed space. I needed－
Five minutes later, all of that confidence completely disappeared.
She stood in the center of the living room, arms crossed, posture rigid. Her foot tapped against the polar bear rug my aunt had given her for her thirty-second birthday last January. The tapping was slow, deliberate, like a countdown.
She didn’t say anything. She just watched me.
Six minutes passed. I counted without meaning to.
The tapping filled the room, though my heartbeat was louder in my ears. I stared at the floor, gripping my dress at both sides. My knuckles turning pale white, as if my skin wasn’t already pale enough.
“How long,” she said at last, then paused, “have you been together?”
I bit my lip before I could stop myself. “A week before summer vacation,” I said softly. “Tonight was… our first date.”
I lifted my eyes.
She didn’t take the news well.
She pressed both hands to her face and screamed.
The sound was raw, unfiltered rage. Before I could react, she grabbed the flower vase from the side table and hurled it at the wall beside me.
It shattered.
Fragments skidded across the floor, glittering dangerously close to my feet. I stood frozen, staring at the wreckage. Behind me, Poppy darted under the fireplace and curled into himself, whining.
“I can’t believe you’d do this,” she said, her voice shaking now. “Do I have to say it over and over? Boys are a distraction. They’ll ruin your life if you let them in this early!.”
She stepped toward me and grabbed my shoulders, shaking me just enough to make my teeth click together.
“Why don’t you understand?”
Her eyes were wet.
That hurt worse than the yelling.
“Mom,” I said, struggling to get the words out, “I do. I swear I do. I was just helping Carter. He wants to know what dating feels like before he talks to this girl he likes and I－”
My voice cracked when her fingers pressed harder into my shoulders.
She noticed. Her hands dropped immediately, and she turned away, blinking fast. Her arms crossed again, like she was rebuilding her armor.
I rubbed my shoulders. The skin felt hot, tender.
“You’re grounded,” she said flatly. “You’re not leaving this house until school starts next Monday.”
The words crashed into me.
“No,” I said, panic spilling out. “it’s the last week of summer. I have plans with Miyeon, we’re going to that Korean boy band concert on Tuesday, we already bought tickets, and－”
She lifted her hand without looking at me. “I’ve made my decision.”
Then she held out her palm. “Your phone.”
