Never Atypical

I slow as I hear voices floating towards me. I glance up and realise that they are coming from Carney's Lane, a small alley behind some of the pubs and where most normal people avoid. Especially at this hour. What are people doing in there right now then?

I glance down the little roofed passage between streets and notice that there is a group of men standing in a loose circle all laughing and smoking something. Damn, my mother is probably going to be out looking for her dealers very soon if these guys got new loot.

My mother's dealers only come by once every other month for a few days from one of the larger cities around here, selling their stash to the punks they got hooked on it. I cringe at the thought and realise my mother is home alone right now! Only god knows what could be happening.

I turn and dash towards our house in an utter panic, the heavy rain already forgotten. I should have known better but stupid me forgot to remember that they were coming up soon. I should have gotten this week off so that I could keep tabs on my mother instead of work. I could have rationed, or even asked my father for some more funds if I really needed to.

I run full tilt up our driveway snatching for my keys from my bag. I fumble with the keys, trying to shove it into the lock slot but there isn't a point because as soon as I lightly push on the door it practically falls open, revealing the mess inside.

It’s even worse than the mess I left from the party last night. A few cups and spills were incomparable to this.

It looks as if our house was ransacked. The living room furniture was turned over and had half of the cushion stuffing torn out. The curtains hang ripped and half off of their rods.

I drop my backpack by the door, barely bothering to push the door closed again, and slowly make my way around the house.

The kitchen had every single one of its drawers pulled out, half of them were overflowing all over the floor. The cupboards were all open and a lot of our more expensive dishes were gone or cracked. My mother's and father's crystal wine glasses were gone except the one that was in half on the counter. Split right at the seam that attached the handle to the cup part.

I head towards the dining room. The chairs are overturned, and the table looks as if someone attempted to stab it with the bent knife that lay, discarded on the floor beside one of the overturned chairs.

I run my hands along the wounds on the antique wooden table, a gift from my grandmother when my parents moved here. Tears coming to my eyes as I do.

I'm afraid to go upstairs and see what else is missing or broken, but I know that I have to at some point in time.

I slowly make my way to the stairs and head up them to see what damage mother made to the second level of our house.

I peer into my brother's ex room, now the guest room. Not that we ever have guests anymore. My father's family all lives somewhere in Europe and most of my mother's family is either dead or disowned us a long time ago due to my mother's 'bad habits'.

The sheets I always make sure to have ready in case my father comes home for a night are ripped and torn into pieces discarded on the floor. The curtains aren't even covering the windows anymore. They lay in tatters on the floor. The sturdy wooden wardrobe is somehow laying on its side, and the one door is cracked in two, and laying on the opposite side of the room.

I can barely make myself go to my mother's room. Hers is the worst yet though. It looks as if it hadn't been cleaned in months and the bed was crumpled and the sheets were browning. The heavy stench of all the mixed drugs and body odors hanging in the air almost suffocating me.

I back out of her room slowly and make my way to mine. I am so glad that I hid most of my expensive belongings and special keepsakes in my closet that has half a dozen locks on the door that only I know the codes and have the keys for.

I go into my own room and see that it is almost untouched. Well until I get to the closet. It looks as if a hole was punched into my door.

I gasp in horror and scurry to go and unlock every single lock.

I yank the door open wide and attempt not to burst into tears when I do.

My photos, my only mementos from the good childhood, the amazing pictures of my brother and I, a happy mother and an ever present and content father. The only good things I hold dear other than my old acoustic guitar that was from my grandfather and my camera. Both of which are also hidden in this closet.

I can't help but simply stare at the box that has shattered on the floor of my closet. I look at it as if one movement from it or myself and I would shatter. One movement at all and I would simply break. I am not as strong as everyone thinks I am. I am a fragile little girl, not even old enough to vote yet, I can’t even serve alcohol at my job yet, I am barely old enough to be living through this kind of life. I am not an adult. So why am I the one left to deal with this?

A box of pictures, that is all that it takes for me to be practically curled up into a ball, crying my eyes out.

However, after a while, I realize that I need to phone my father. I have to tell him what happened. Maybe he'll come home, even if it is only for a little while. Maybe he’ll help me, even if it is just this once.

I pull out my slightly outdated android and press his speed dial.

"Hello," I hear his gruff 'I-just-woke-up' voice on the other end of the line.

I let out a heavy breath that I don't even realize that I am holding.

"Hi dad" I mumble into the phone. I can hear the creak as he sits back down on his bed.

"Hey pumpkin, it’s good to hear from you! How are you?" He asks and I sigh, a couple of tears spilling down my cheeks.

I wish I could tell him that I was fine, that I was simply checking in and seeing how he was doing. I knew I couldn't do that though; I had a purpose for calling. One that would probably hurt him even more than it hurt me.

"Urm, dad, well, uh" I mutter, stuttering on the words as I try and release them into the air that is hanging thick around me. The tension in the room is so thick that you could probably cut it with a knife.

"What is it, Pumpkin? What's wrong?" My father asks worriedly. I sigh a long, sad sigh.

"The house is ransacked again," I tell him slowly and I hear him let out a breath and mutter a few curses.

"Is that it?" he asks, sounding as if I just aged him by at least a decade from just telling him that mother just destroyed our house, yet again.

"Well, uh, no," I tell him, and I hear him draw another breath.

"What? What else could be wrong!" He shouts through the phone, and I feel more tears well up in my eyes as I listen to the panic clear in his voice. He is almost hysterical, just like I am.

"Mother is gone" I mutter into the phone, and I know I've done it this time when I hear his sharp intake of breath.

"WHAT! What did you just say, young lady?" He screams at me, and I hold back a whimper from the sad and ashamed feeling ripping through me. Like a knife was jabbing into my heart and gut continuously. I feel so guilty that I couldn’t look after one person.

"She is gone" I repeat carefully, hoping the tears that stain my cheeks aren't evident in my voice. I need to be strong in support of my father. I need to be strong to get through this ordeal because the weak ones don't survive in this world.

"MY GOD ELEANORA! Where were you!?! Where the Fuck were you when this was happening? Why the fuck weren't you there? Why do I have to do everything myself? Why couldn't you just do the simple task of looking after your mother!?!" He shouts at me through the phone. I hold the phone away from my face and cry like I never had before. He never yelled at me ever. Meaning I knew I fucked up. Badly. He’s not wrong though, I failed to make sure she didn’t up and disappear, didn’t ransack the house, didn’t break my father's already fragile and crumbling heart again and again.

The other side of the phone goes eerily silent and I hear him breathing hard.

"WHERE. WERE. YOU." He pronounces every word. His voice in that moment is both fragile and livid. I feel as if someone stabbed me in the heart and is currently twisting the knife around inside it. As if I wasn't hurt enough already.

I’m hurt, I’m scared and alone in this situation. I have no idea what to do and I need someone, anyone to help me. Even though I know that isn’t really going to happen at this point. I feel guilty for not being able to look after my mother, it shouldn’t even be my job to do that, but here I am. I can’t help any of these feelings.

But most of all, I feel angry.

Angry that he would accuse me of such things. Angry that it was my, a seventeen-year-old, working, high school students, job to look after her definitely not well mother. Angry that he expected me to deal with all of these things myself when he couldn't be bothered to come home to check up on us once in a while.

"No dad." I start, letting the anger take root. I feel tears continue to stream down my face even as angry as I am, and it seeps into my voice as I respond.

"The better question is, where were you? Where were you when all this shit was happening to me and my mother, your wife? Where were you when you knew that she was getting worse and not better? Where the Hell have you been all this time, huh? WHERE?" My voice continues rising in pitch as I keep speaking, more and more. Higher pitched than I’d heard it ever, and my throat burns as I end up near shrieking at him through the phone, and I can’t even hear him breathing on the other end of the phone, as if he never expected my anger.

"Where the fuck were you while I work every night so that I wouldn’t have to come home? So that I didn’t have to see my deteriorating mother and deal with her moods on my own? Where were you when she had all those wild parties that lasted until five in the morning because I couldn't end them? Where were you while I was being tormented by my mother and tortured by the rumors?" I add, getting even more shrill in pitch as every sentence comes out of my mouth.

Even if I wanted to stop this rampage, I knew I would never be able to. I was way too worked up now. Too hurt at this point to really even think of stopping. My father had accused me of being negligent, so now I would accuse him of the same.

"Where were you when I feared for my life? My safety? My well being?" I ask and then let out a cackle of humorless laughter.

"Oh, that's right, you couldn't be here because you 'had' to work. You 'had' to sleep over at a co-worker’s house due to on call shifts. You 'had' to do this, you 'had' to do that, blah, blah, blah" I carry on, my voice hard and accusatory. I know this must be hurting him as much as it’s hurting me to say it, and somewhere inside me I know this is wrong to say this to the father I respect. But right now it feels good to get all this pent-up anger out. Like I had too much pressure building up inside me and the dam just broke and let it all fly free.

"Elle, I..." He starts to mumble, finally calmed down now after listening to me. But I am far from calm myself, now. Beyond having a conversation with him, or anyone else at this point. So, I cut him off before he can appeal to me.

"There's no point father. It's over and done with" I tell him, feeling my shoulders sag as if under the weight of the world. I feel more drained of energy than I have ever felt in my life. And that’s saying a lot at this point.

"You can't change the past now, there is no way possible. Besides, I know you, you wouldn't have done anything differently anyways." I tell him in an almost completely emotionless voice.

Then I end the call, I wouldn't be able to take it if he started to apologize. Tried to appeal to me. Tried to be there when he was so so far away from me right now. Far enough away that he would never be able to help.

I start breathing hard, feeling the tightening of my chest and my hands start to shake. My eyes are blurring with tears.

With a shriek, I throw my phone at the wall in anger and then burst into sobs that wreak through my body so hard I feel as if I might fall apart if they don't stop. Sobs so hard it feels almost impossible to breathe. But they don't and I don't think this pain in my chest will go away anytime soon either.

I curl up on my floor, a ball of sobbing, shaking mess.

Why is life so cruel?