Motherless Brooklyn Novels & Stories

She had no idea her mum couldn't be nice. "Hey, hey," Violet said softly and Brooklyn felt her arms wrap around her. "Come on, let's go out back." "I..." Brooklyn was lost for words. "M-mum... what happened to me was the most horrific thing in my life. I will never get over it, and I never ever did anything to deserve it. No one could ever do anything to deserve that, and if you can't understand that then I pity the unsympathetic and cruel person you are." A tear slipped down Brooklyn's cheek and she let Violet pull her away from her parents.

“She shouldn’t be sitting alone with all of this.” “You want company?” “No.” I shook my head. “This one I need to do alone.” My mother lived in a small apartment in Queens, a forty minute subway ride from Max’s place in the kind of neighbourhood that had once been full of families and was now full of people quietly holding on. I had grown up two streets over in a building that had since been demolished. Sometimes when I came to this part of the city I felt my childhood pressing in at the edges of everything, not unpleasantly, just persistently.

she asked. “Brooklyn,” I replied evenly. “I grew up there.” There it was. The pause. The almost imperceptible shift. “Oh,” Catherine said. Brooklyn. Not Paris. Not London. Not a Manhattan penthouse. “And your family?” Michael asked. “My mother works a few odd jobs ” I said. “My brother’s in college.” No mention of money. No inherited legacy. No impressive surnames. I could almost hear the unspoken thought forming between them.

If I didn't have so much pain in my hands, I would clap. A woman dressed in black, frozen in time inside her head, was probably the dead man's mother, but it was clear that the cries and screams of the others... ten? Tem women, it was pure theater for those present to enjoy. I still don't know the story that links Tobias DeLuca to my father, but I was going to find out. Out of the corner of my eye, I look at Sarah. She had covered the redness on her face with makeup, but even though it wasn't a black and aggressive mark, the pink that marked her face was enough to make my insides boil.

Yvonne called out to her, but she said nothing. A few times later, she started tearing up, and her voice cracked, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't do this. Jessica's still brooding. I can't think about the trip." My mother snapped out of it and felt her heart ache seeing her beloved daughter cry. So, she hastily hugged Yvonne and cooed, "This isn't your fault. Jessica is just being a child." "However, I just got a call." Mom said hesitantly, "My colleagues said they found a female corpse in a dumpster about six miles away. They've determined that it's an abduction and murder case. Do you think it could be your sister?"

Victor’s mother was still shrieking on the phone. The Ricci family had spent five generations barely surviving at the edge of obscurity. If Victor hadn’t married me—the only daughter of the Messina family—they would never have tasted the lifestyle they now took for granted. The Messinas didn’t climb society. We built parts of it. Victor’s mother had once been homeless—no better off than the addicts sleeping under bridges. Now, she hurled filth at me over the phone, every word as foul as sewage. I muted my phone and placed it face-down on the desk.

"Don't ever think you know what’s going on in my head. You could never love that old man. He’s even more of a bastard than I am. You’ll regret it if you trust him. And for your information... my love died five years ago in that dingy apartment, Elara. All that’s left now is possession. And I am a very selfish owner." Xavier released her roughly, causing her to stumble slightly. "Go bathe. The water is ready. If you aren't out in thirty minutes, I’ll drag you under the shower myself—and you’ll find out exactly what happens when we're both soaking wet..." Elara stood frozen as Xavier slammed the bathroom door. She took a deep breath, trying to fill her lungs which felt constricted. She knew sh

The three of them always seem to know when someone’s hurting. I give her a sad smile and press a kiss to her forehead. “Hi, Natty-cat.” “Papa cry,” she says, touching my face. It’s only then I realize my cheeks are wet. I nod and wipe the tears away. “Yeah, baby girl. Papa’s sad. Nyx is gone. I’m gonna miss her.” She doesn’t understand—not really. How could she? But then she leans in and says, “Natty love Papa.” It’s a simple sentence. Just four words. But it punches through the pain like nothing else could.

Aunt Lana gently squeezed her hands, but Mila kept going. “I was devastated. Crushed. But I didn’t let him see it. I didn’t let lily see it either. I smiled, held my head high, and said goodbye. Because it wasn’t my fault. Not being able to have a baby—it’s not a crime. It wasn’t a choice I made.” Her voice cracked. “What broke me even more was that my family—the ones I called Mom and Dad—vanished when I needed them most. They didn’t pick up my calls. Didn’t come when I begged them to. I was nothing to them without him.”

The words underneath were scribbled but written with determination. [Mommy, I learned to play the Moonlight Piece, but there's nobody to listen to it. I eat broccoli every day now, but there's nobody to say they're proud of me. My teacher says admitting your mistakes makes you a good person, but some mistakes don't undo the damage even after you say sorry. [When I grow up, I want to study art restoration, just like you. I want to save things that can not speak for themselves. I'm sorry, Mommy, and... Goodbye.]