In Which I Share, Part Two

Here is the second part of the story, written from the same perspective but from the previous day...

Part Two

Flecks of dust float around in the warm sunlight streaming in from the window. Refracted light through a crystal hanging on the window scatter small rainbows throughout the room, slowly rotating in an unseen, unfelt breeze. The faded carpet is matted down and stained. An upright piano sits in one corner of the living room, with pictures of times gone past on display. The piano's keys haven’t been touched in years, and serves more as a display versus a musical instrument. In the center, a beautiful wooden framed picture of my parents on their wedding day. Pictures of my sisters and I surround them; birthdays, Christmas, and summer days when there didn’t seem to be a care in the world. I smile ruefully, wishing to relive those times again. It has been months since laughter has been heard in this house.

From my seat in the battered recliner I can see the entire living room. A sagging couch sits opposite the piano, its cushions worn from too many years of use. It has seen better days, much like everything else in this house. Even the mismatched curtains, hanging crooked and torn, seem limp and tired. The flowered wallpaper is peeling, its curled edges yellowed with age and cigarette smoke.

Much like the calm before the storm, the tranquility in our house is bound to be short-lived. My mom will be home soon. My sisters are in their room, quietly doing homework. I feverishly scribble answers to my own homework, knowing that I won’t be able to get any homework done when my mother gets home. From the second she walks in the door until she passes out drunk, she is constantly criticizing us, yelling our faults at the top of her lungs.

Trying to find someone to blame for everything that might be wrong, she blames my sisters and I, and when home, my father. She blames my youngest sister Mariah for the missing heavy silver candlestick that was her mothers. She blames me for the hole in the window that lets in the chilly late-fall air. She doesn’t remember that she was the one who threw the candlestick at my dad during one of her drunken rages. My dad was smart enough to move out of the way, and my grandmothers silver candlestick shattered through the glass.

I am putting the finishing touches on my English homework when I hear my mother’s car pull into the driveway. It’s hard not to hear it, with its loud misfiring engine sending birds flying from nearby trees and bushes. I quickly put my books into my backpack and zip it closed. Hearing my sisters stirring in their room, I know that they hear my mother as she comes up the front steps. The front screen door screeches as my mother pulls it open. My sisters walk into the living room as the door slams closed. We wait in silence, like soldiers waiting in their barracks for their general’s inspection.

Her footsteps sound loud and heavy on the tiled kitchen floor, and without even taking off her jacket she begins to inspect the cleaning my sisters and I had done earlier. I walk into the kitchen as my mother sets her purse on the counter. She looks visibly disappointed that my sisters and I had done a good job cleaning and that she couldn’t find anything to complain about. At least not yet.

Her piercing stare slowly moves through the kitchen. I look around as well, trying to see anything that we might have missed. Everything seems to be in place, the appliances gleaming, the kitchen smelling of lemon and surface cleaner. I sigh inwardly as I glance sideways at my sisters. It seems like we may have avoided conflict, if for a short while. I turn around to go back into the living room, and-

“You call this clean?” my mother yells loudly. The sudden outburst makes me jump, and I turn back around to see what she was talking about. She points at the trashcan, overflowing onto the floor with garbage. How could this have been overlooked? One of my sisters was supposed to have done that! It was all too late when I remembered that I told them I would take care of it if they did all of their homework.

My mom starts fuming and mutters curses under her breath as I hurry over and pick up the neglected trash. Things were going so well in my attempt to keep my mother happy until a simple oversight set her off. Getting the last piece of trash off the floor, I hear the telltale clinking of glass against glass. I look out of the corner of my eye to see my mom pouring herself a drink. Not even four o’clock and she is already beginning her downward spiral for the night. She uses drinking as a reason to calm her nerves, but it is more of an escape from the reality of home and her troubled marriage. By the time my dad gets home in two hours, she will be drunk.

“Go to your room!” my mother yells at my sisters as she takes a swig from her glass. The drink should burn as it goes down, but she is so used to it that it is as if she is drinking water. My sisters scurry away to their bedroom. I see my mom sway on her feet as she uses her hand to steady herself against the counter. Looking at me with her eyes half closed, you can see the emptiness in her soul being filled, however temporary, with her drink. She takes the bottle and glass and walks unsteadily to her bedroom. She'll stay there, same as every day when she gets home, and will only come out when she runs out of alcohol, or when she hears my dad coming in the front door, whichever comes first.

I sit back down in the recliner and try to finish up my homework, taking advantage of my mother’s relative quietness. Time passes slowly as we all wait for my dad to come home from work, waiting for the fight to begin. My mom stays in her room, but occasionally I hear her bang up against the wall, or heavy objects falling on the floor. I lose track of time as I become absorbed in my homework.

My concentration is shattered as I hear a car door slam closed. How many hours had passed since my mom went into her room? The clock on the wall says six-thirty. Two and a half hours! My mother hears the door close too, and comes out of her room. Her walk even more unsteady now, her eyes bloodshot and her nearly empty, to meet my dad at the front door. They speak quietly for a minute, and then enter the kitchen. I begin to think that they might not fight tonight, but it is too soon to say. I start to gather my books just as my parents come in. My dad, weary from his long day at work, seems about ready to fall asleep standing up. He glances at me with his empty, dark eyes, as if pleading with me to stay. I pick up the last of my things and leave. I just make it into my room when the yelling begins. It must be a new record; the fight of the night starting just three minutes after my dad arrives home from work. Usually it’s at least ten or fifteen.

“You should have called me if you knew you were going to be home late!” my mother yells, her speech slurred.

“I can’t call you if there is an accident on the road and traffic makes me late,” my dad wearily states, not having the energy to fight. “I made it home as fast as I could.” My mother says something in response, but I put on my headphones and drown her out. More yelling and screaming ensues, and I turn up the volume of my music. I sit in the corner of my room, and try to focus on my music, to let it take me from the fighting and yelling.

Suddenly a loud thump shakes the house, followed by the sound of breaking glass. I turn up my music even louder, and close my eyes. Every loud tantrum that manages to reach my ears was accentuated by a crash of something breaking. I shudder, and turn my shoulder into the corner where I’m sitting, as if to get further away from the fighting. The fight lasts for another hour, and then all is quiet.

I wait a few minutes before venturing out into the living room. The room is dark, save for the last feeble rays of sunlight shining through rain clouds, before it hides behind the horizon. My mother lay on the couch, passed out with a bottle of her favorite booze in her hand. Whatever she had not managed to drink before she passed out was spilled on the floor. Fragments of my parent’s wedding picture lay in her other hand; it’s once ornate wooden frame now ruined, the glass shattered, the picture torn. The front door was open, and I could see my dad outside on the front porch, smoking a cigarette. His tall and strong frame was silhouetted against the night sky, as wisps of cigarette smoke encircle his head.

He must have heard me coming. As I approach him, he turns around to face me. “Be a man, son,” he said, with sadness in his voice. He takes a long drag on his cigarette, and then snubs it out in a nearby ashtray. With a heavy sigh and heavy footsteps, he walks back inside.

He sits down at the table in the kitchen, and begins to read the newspaper. He doesn’t even look up at me as I walk past, heading back to my bedroom for the night. As I quietly walk past my mother, the living room turns dark as the sun is finally gone for the night. I can hear my sisters crying softly in their bedroom. Closing my bedroom door behind me, tears surface in my own eyes. I wrap a blanket around my shoulders to ward off the cold, and fall down onto my bed. The last thought I have is hoping my dreams take me to a better place. I close my eyes, and hearing my sisters crying softy, let the darkness of sleep overcome me.

---

I know this isn't the best writing I've read, nor is it the best that I've written. I posted this story here not only to share it with you, but also as a reminder to myself of how much progress I've made with my writing since this story was written. I kind of feel bad for leaving this post on such a sour note, with the last part of the story ending so negatively, but I can't think of anything else to write. Don't worry, though... I'll have something a little more positive for tomorrow.