“But my pestering urge made me send you the message first.”
“Hello? Anybody there?”
I’d smiled against my will. She really must be bored.
“Yep, I’m here. Reading your spam on my phone.”
“Sarcastic, are we? That’s good. I heard the scientists have proved that people who are sarcastic have 97% more chance to live longer than the rest of the world.”
I’d burst out laughing. Somehow, I felt nice. I felt warm inside. No matter how nuts she was, Melissa was actually trying to befriend me.
I admired people who could easily make friends. Melissa was all that I wasn’t. She was easy going, relaxed, and cheerful, which made me wonder why she bothered with me. After all, I was a reserved girl with no social skills.
I replied to her last message. “No, I don’t have Snapchat. It’s boring.”
I couldn’t admit to her that the reason for not having any personal social accounts was because I wanted to avoid being cyberbullied by my classmates. My Instagram and YouTube art accounts didn’t contain my photos or my real name, so no one knew who the person behind my accounts was.
“Really? Boring? You must be from another planet.”
I barely had time to read her text before she sent another one. “Do you have Instagram?”
Why was she so insistent?
“Nope.”
“Why?”
“Because.”
“Do you have Facebook?”
Oh my God.
“Do you even know what the Internet is?”
I was just about to send her some excuse when I heard the front door slam. I jumped to my feet, leaving my phone on the bed, and sprinted downstairs. I was surprised that mom came home because she was supposed to be working her night shift.
Just as I climbed down the last step a loud crash came from the kitchen, and all my senses went into high alert. Scared of what I might see, I bolted to the kitchen and found my mother surrounded by broken plate shards. My blood ran cold.
“Mom?”
Her mascara ran down her face, her eyes bloodshot as she looked through me. She was swaying, standing at a rather strange angle, which conveyed just how drunk she was.
“What do you want?” she sneered at me.
I hated when she was like this. I hated when she became aggressive and despised everyone and everything.
“A-Are you okay?”
“Of course I’m not okay.”
Something must have happened at her work. “Why aren’t you working?”
She pivoted and opened the top cabinet stuffed with her liquor. She snatched a bottle of bourbon, opened it brusquely, and took a swig straight out of it. It sickened me to see my own mother doing this to herself. She didn’t even care that her daughter was watching her go to rack and ruin all the while.
I’d thrown her alcohol away so many times before, but it made no difference. We always ended up fighting, but I could never get my point across, and despite all my pleas, she kept buying it without even trying to stop. That was what hurt me the most. She never tried to stop drinking. She didn’t care that it pained me to see her like this. I needed a mother, not this angry, uncaring stranger.
“Is everything okay with your job?” She didn’t answer or face me, taking another gulp from the bottle. “Mom, did something happen at work?”
She slammed the bottle down on the counter and swiveled toward me, her eyes filled with burning animosity.
“Will you just shut up?!” she screamed. “I can’t stand your voice right now!”
“How can you expect me to shut up?! You just popped up here and you’re drunk! Stop doing that to yourself!”
I marched over and reached for the bottle, but she grabbed it at the same time and yanked it. I pulled it back, trying to snatch it away from her, but she was strong. “Give me the bottle!”
“No! Get away from me!”
I lost my grip on the bottle, and she jerked it away, pushing me forcefully into the counter. “What I do is none of your business!”
“You’re my mother!” I bellowed. “You’re always getting wasted, and you don’t even care about me! Stop doing this! Stop ruining us both!”
She slapped me, and the pain fogged my mind. I watched her with my hands curled into fists and bared teeth, my anger rising rapidly. I wanted to hit my own mother. I wanted to make her feel the same pain I felt next to her, both emotionally and physically.
“You will not speak to me like that!” She tried to push me again, but I grasped her wrist, defending myself.
“Don’t touch me anymore, mom! Enough!” I let go of her and took a step back. “I’m sick and tired of you! I’m embarrassed to talk about you to anyone. I’m ashamed to have you as my mother—”
She slapped me twice, cutting me off. I met her raging eyes, horrified by the intensity of her hostility. She hadn’t held back when she slapped me. She’d made my lip crack when it collided with my teeth, and I could taste the blood on my lips, feeling shattered. This will never end. Never.
“Get out!” I backed away, her shriek piercing my ears. “Get out of my sight!”
I darted out of the kitchen, rushing to escape her and this oppressive feeling. It spread inside of me—this blackness, this anxiety—and I couldn’t be in the same house as her anymore. I needed to run away.
I grabbed my running shoes and jacket, but I didn’t get far, because just as I scurried out to the porch, she came after me. “Where are you going? Come back here, cunt!”
I turned on my heel to face her and saw her charge at me with the bourbon in her hand. I staggered backward, terrified of her.
“You’re not allowed to leave the house this late! You will go to your room and stay there. Do you hear me?!” She was yelling so loud that I was sure all the neighboring houses around us could hear her. This wasn’t the first time she made a scene, but that fact didn’t make this situation any less humiliating.
“No! I can’t stand to be in the same place as you. I’m leaving!”
I turned around and took several steps, barely noticing Hayden and Blake watch us from his yard, when the bottle missed me by a few inches, crashing next to my feet on the ground. I jumped aside, yelping, and looked at her in horror. I couldn’t believe my own mother threw a bottle at me. No, no, no.
“If you leave, you aren’t my daughter anymore, Sarah!” she said these cruel words, certainly not for the first time.
This always hurt. Everything hurt so damn much when she had these aggressive-drunk episodes, and I couldn’t bear it. I glanced at Hayden, who was watching me, and I felt even more humiliated because he got to witness this. He wanted this. He reveled in this. I couldn’t stand that now he had even more ammunition to attack me.
My mother never meant this threat, but that didn’t matter. Drunk or not, she had no right to attack me under the pretense of not being able to control herself. Nothing justified the hateful speech and violence.
“I don’t care,” I retorted and ran away as fast as I could.
IT DIDN’T HELP. NO matter how fast I ran, trying to break free from the demons, it was useless. They were always next to me, clutching me, pressing their claws into me, making me bleed profusely. I didn’t want to go back there. I didn’t want to be stuck living this kind of life anymore.