Wow, after last night and the change in my attitude, I have a new determination and view of life. I feel more peace. I know that something great is coming and I'm excited to see what each day will bring toward that greatness!
I thought that today I would share a glimpse of the new novel. Here is a sample chapter and I hope that you enjoy it.
Broken
Another school year begins today. Everyone, including my own
family, tells me that time heals all wounds. Yet, each day I feel more broken.
Just one day is all I want. I want one day to wake up from this nightmare. I
want one day to see her smile. I want one day to hear her soft, calming voice.
Looking at her picture perched on the old milk crate I use
as a nightstand brings a flood of emotions. Her hazel eyes mimic the bright
blue sweater she’s wearing in the picture. I remember that day fondly. Elliot,
Dad, and I did everything we could think of in order to convince Mom to get her
self-portrait taken. She hated cameras. Mom always did whatever she could to
get away from a camera. That’s why we had so few photos of her to use at her
funeral last year. Anyways, Elliot tried to persuade Mom by promising to win
the Diocesan football championship. Dad’s version of persuasion was a new
Mercedes. Both of their attempts failed. It was my promise that got her to get
the portrait taken. Now that she’s gone, I’ll never get to fulfill that
promise.
I look at the alarm clock next to Mom’s picture. The bus
will be here soon. I dry my cheeks with the underside of my t-shirt and rush
over to my dresser made from the cardboard moving boxes we used to move into
our little hellhole on the third floor—apartment 3B. Luckily, my grey uniform
skirt and white polo didn’t wrinkle too much in the makeshift dresser. I really
miss having a real dresser and closets. I just hope that my uniform fits
because, unlike other years, we couldn’t afford to buy a new one this year.
With my uniform in hand, I sift through my shoe pile on the south wall.
I gingerly walk down the hall toward the bathroom so that I
don’t wake Dad sleeping in the living room. Looking into the small space, I see
him still asleep on the couch. He looks like some kind of contortionist. Half
of his body is on the seat of the couch. His left arm and head rest on the arm
of the couch. His right arm and leg gently brush the floor. I wish he wasn’t so
stubborn. With his condition, he really needs a room with a bed. Sleeping on
the couch can’t help him get better. I’ve offered him my room multiple times,
but he refuses by saying that, “Kids come first.” If his condition gets worse,
or the unthinkable, how would that help us?
The old, wooden floor of the dump we call home creaks with
every step toward the bathroom. Son of a…,
I screech to myself when something jabs into my heel. Keeping my left foot in
the air, I hobble the last three steps to the bathroom door. I have to use my
butt to push open the door wide enough to squeeze through because, like everything
else in this crappy apartment, nothing works right. The only window in my
bedroom doesn’t open. Last week the faucet in the kitchen started flowing
brownish water instead of clear. Half of the lights in the apartment don’t
work, so we use candles at night to see. Dad keeps telling me that he’ll get
things fixed, but nothing ever does. It’s not his fault. He’s too weak to do
the repairs on his own. Elliot is always out with his friends or at practice,
so he can’t help Dad. I’m busy with work. And Uncle Gary, who owns the
building, is the laziest man on this planet. It took him three days to get the
faucet in the kitchen fixed. According to what I read on the internet at the
library, all he had to do was change one pipe in the back of the sink. Uncle Gary
calls our apartment building the never-ending money pit with character. Where
he actually puts money into the building, I’ll never know. Nevertheless, he is
right about the character. This building is the very definition of a horror
villain. It’s cold, calculating, and leaves you screaming for mercy.
A foul stench invades my nostrils the moment I press through
the small opening into the room. The smell is so bad that I dry heave right in
the middle of the tiny space. Looking to my right, I spot the culprit creating
the disgusting smell. I try to flush the toilet, but nothing happens. This is
what we absolutely don’t need right now—another broken piece to our broken
apartment that affects our broken lives. With frantic speed, I jam pieces of
toilet paper in my nostrils attempting to block out the vileness. It’s a good
thing that I took my shower last night before the toilet broke because I
wouldn’t be able to make it through with the stench in this room. I close the
lid to the toilet bowl and rush through my morning routing.
After escaping from the bathroom, I go to check on my little
brother. Well, maybe not so little now that he’s a big eighth grader. I reach
his room and watch as he tries to tie his tie in the broken mirror. “Need
help?” I ask.
“Go away,” he says while fidgeting with the black, satin
tie.
Our rooms are almost identical. The only difference is that
he has a working window and the fact
that he refuses to pick up anything. None of his clothes occupies the cardboard
boxes stacked along the north wall of the room. I carefully enter. It’s
interesting how hooded sweatshirts, jeans, and socks can mask the sound of an
old, wooden floor. I get next to him, “Here Shellie Eli, let me help.”
He
pushes my arm away. “Dang it, Midget, I hate it when you call me that. And, I already said I can do this
myself. I don’t need my older sister to dress me,” he snaps.
Elliot definitely got his height from Dad’s side of the
family. He’s three years younger than I am and he’s already two feet taller.
Some days I wish I could’ve inherited my height from Dad’s side of the family.
But I’m glad that I got my height from Mom’s side of the family. Even though
Elliot always teases by calling me vertically challenged, I definitely can hold
my own. I’ve taken down both guys and girls that were much taller than I was
all of my life. “You know I can help you, right? Don’t you want to look your
best for your last year at St. James?”
In one quick motion, he strips the tie from his neck and
flings it at my head. “Fine. Whatever. I wish we didn’t have to bother with
this crap. I hate St. James. Life would be so much better if I could just skip
this year and start high school at St. Josephs,” he says.
“And give up your last year of middle school?” I ask as my
hands go to work on his tie. “You’d miss the best year of grade school. Eighth
grade was awesome. You get to run the school. Not to mention, eighth graders
get extra field trips and fun events. I can’t believe that you’d give that up,”
I say, finishing the perfect Half-Windsor knot and cinching it around his neck.
“Trust me, Beaner, high school isn’t as great as you think,” I say, admiring my
handiwork and taking a seat on his mattress lying on the floor.
“You don’t understand, Brandy,” he says.
“Don’t understand what?”
“We both know that Dad is getting worse. He sleeps all of
the time,” he says.
“So what does that have to do with you skipping eighth grade
to go directly into high school?”
“Because the sooner I get into high school to play ball, the
sooner I get into college and then drafted by the Raiders or some other NFL
team. I’m the only one who has a shot at saving our family from this mess,” he
says.
“Thanks a lot, Jerk,” I say, tossing the pillow at his head.
His comment hurts. He’s right, but it still hurts. Even if I would’ve continued
playing softball, it’s not like I can make a living being a professional
softball player. Elliot’s face whitens as his eyes bulge. I turn to my right
and see why Elliot looks scared.
“Seriously?” I ask, picking up the bottle that was hiding
under the pillow I threw.
“Come off it Sis. It’s not like you don’t do it,” he says.
“But—”
“But nothing, Midget. You started in eighth grade too. I
remember the night you came home drunk and climbed through my window so that
you could avoid Mom and Dad. I lied to them when you crashed into the chair in
my room. On top of all that, I spent the next day scrubbing my bathroom because
you puked over everything,” he says, snatching the bottle out of my hand.
He’s right again. I want to yell at him for drinking, but
how can I? After Scarlett left St. James because of the bullying we received, I
spent the remaining months of my eighth grade year finding ways to get drunk.
If I didn’t go to a party with Steph, I made excuses to hang out at my cousin
Nia’s house. Uncle Skip was always out of town, so Nia and I would slam through
a bottle or two. Nia often went over to her neighbor Daniel’s house to get us
beer. After Mom died last year, I can barely remember the whole month of
December. Steph made sure that I had every opportunity to escape from the pain
with an abundance of parties and alcohol. My grades slipped, but I didn’t care.
Dad constantly lectured me about school. I don’t think he knew about the
drinking because he never mentioned it. It hurt disappointing him. Yet, the
pain was too much to handle. Dad’s diagnosis last March sort of curbed my
drinking, but there are still times where getting wasted helps me escape.
The thoughts about why I started drinking makes my eyes
burn. I rush out of Elliot’s room right before the tears cascade down my warm
cheeks. Our old house had a million places for me to hide. In this dump, I have
nowhere. My chest caves. I can’t breathe.
“Brandy, wait. Where are you going?” Dad’s voice echoes from
the living room. I look over. His bones crack as he sits up on the couch.
“Please come here,” he says.
I move closer to him. The tears soak my face. I get closer
and he reaches out to dry my tears with the sleeve of his St. Aelred High
sweatshirt. “You were thinking about her again,” he says.
I nod right before I bury my head into his chest.
“It’ll be okay. Just relax. I miss her too,” he says.
Stepping off the number two city bus, a warm breeze brushes
my hair against my neck. Hopefully the rest of today will be better than this
morning. I spot Steph over by the oak tree near the peace garden. She’s
standing with a couple of other girls getting their last nicotine fix in before
going into the school. She holds out her cigarette right when I make it over
from across the street. “Thanks,” I say, taking the cigarette from her. I take
a few quick hits before handing it back. Gabby, Lindsay, and Kara, the other
members of our little smoking group from last year, don’t even turn to say hi
to me. They continue talking as if I didn’t exist. I guess that’s what happens
when you go from social elite to poverty-stricken outcast. “So did you get it?”
I ask.
“Yep. I still don’t understand why you just didn’t ask your
dad to get you one,” she says, rifling through her backpack. She pulls out the
blue sweater and hands it to me.
“Thanks.” I take off the old uniform sweater and put on the
new one Steph handed to me. “I promise to get you the money next week.”
“Don’t worry about it,” she says, handing me the cigarette.
I finish off the cigarette and toss it to the curb. “Hi
Gabby, Lindsay, and Kara,” I say. No one responds. They don’t even turn.
Lindsay begins to laugh. “Figures.”
“Don’t pay any attention to them, they obviously haven’t
learned any manners yet,” Steph loudly says. The three girls laugh and start
walking toward the school’s entrance. “I know why you asked me to get the new
uniform sweater for you, but how did your dad come up with the funds to get you
to come back this year?” she asks.
“He told me this morning that Mrs. Hagerty found a donor to
pay.”
“That’s awesome, but why do you look like it’s the worst
news in the world?” she asks.
“Because I wanted to go to the public school. Now that I’m
no longer in the popular crowd, my whole year will be just like how Gabby,
Lindsay, and Kara acted.”
Steph grasps my arm and stops me in the middle of the
sidewalk. “Seriously, Brandy, just because your family is going through
problems doesn’t change who you are. You’re still the same fun, cool chick I’ve
known my entire life. If other people want to act like twerps because you don’t
have a ton of money anymore, it’s their loss,” she says.
“I guess.”
She stops. “You should be happy. I know that if I were you,
I’d be on cloud nine knowing someone came forward to pay for my tuition,” she
says.
She’s right. I should be happy. I’m grateful, but for some
reason I’m not happy. Maybe I’ve lost the ability to be happy. Between Mom’s
death and Dad’s illness, I don’t feel happiness anymore. I don’t even see any
hope. Everything is broken, and there’s no way to fix it. Besides, what’s there
to be happy about? Life truly sucks. If Mom was alive and Dad was healthy, then
maybe I’d be happy.
I hope you enjoyed this brief chapter from the new novel. It's still rough, but I know that it will be spectacular when it is finished and ready for publication.
Count your blessings, give thanks, pray often, and enjoy each moment of life.
Peace
