LW&W (12.14.04)
The phone is ringing in my ear. I have it jammed tight to my head so the sounds of my mom will be private and not escape into this house. I am standing in the kitchen, by the back door, where the phone is on the wall above the table, across from the refrigerator where my chocolate milk sits lonely. You are not unwanted, though, chocolate milk. I wish things were normal for us and I am embarassed that you are even here during this. I don't want you wrecked by this gross stuff happening and whatever is wrong with me.
The phone is sort of butterscotch colored. It is a push button, where the buttons are right in the hand part. We don't have a push button at our house. Or a microwave, which Sue and Roger have over there on the counter. We don't even use our heat most of the winter, just the stupid wood stove that does not heat the bedrooms even a speck, no matter how we all have to pretend to feel a difference. The ear part and the buttons of this phone are kind of dirty, but I don't care, I just want to smash my face into it until I wind up inside and can be home. Or anywhere else, really. I have thought of just going outside and trying to, I don't know, go somewhere. Just walk and get away to anywhere. But there really isn't an anywhere around here. Not at all. The road you drive down to get to the house is a long time from the highway, and it is just dirt and farms and stuff. And even at the highway, you just turn right to head to town, and it is a long, long way before you would even get to a store or anything. Not even a gas station. You have to fill up before you head out here so you have enough to get back. That's what my grandma always does when she drive us out here.
It has rang twice, my mom's phone. The second ring just ended, and it sounds very empty over there after the ring. Where is my mom? I don't think it can be that late because the news isn't on yet, I don't think. Is it? I don't think so. My hearing is all weirded out like everything else. It's like my proportions are completely distorted and freakshowed. My hearing disappears and then gets huge on some small thing, like the phone ringing, or the cards flapping when you set one down on the pile. Or Roger, how I will hear him breathing.
God, I do not want to go back and play that game. I do not want to look at those cards anymore. They are making my stomach hurt so bad. They are so gross. And he keeps saying how it feels good, that stuff, and it is what people do to have fun and feel good, but they do not look like they are having fun, those people in the pictures. They seriously don't. It looks gloomy and dark and like a rotten basement they are in. I mean, I like basements, my Grandpa's especially, but the pictures just have this black overtone to everything, like it is just, I don't know, grimy. The people aren't even nice looking or anything. This one guy always has his socks on, which I don't know, but I don't picture my husband one day if I ever have one to have his socks on during that kind of thing. That's part of it: these people don't even look like they like each other, let alone love each other. Does Roger think these people do love each other? Because I am only eleven, but I think I can tell that they look like they almost sort of hate each other. And there is a card I saw where two men were with one lady, and there is no way that was fun for anybody. Roger is full of shit.
Where is my mom? Third ring. The house is still empty and echo-y over there. Why does it have to be so far away? Why did my mom make me come out here? I don't know what is going on. I don't understand even what is going on at all. Like, if Roger thinks I am having fun and liking this stuff, what would my mom think? Why can't I stop doing whatever it is that makes him do this? I don't understand. Please God, help me understand so I can stop. Is Nick right? Am I really just, like, evil or something? It sure is looking like it. But why can't I be different on the outside, because I do not feel the way they all see me on the inside. I just want out. God, I would be in so much trouble if I just booked and left right now. Even if I didn't freeze to death, I would be in so much trouble. What would Roger think? He would feel so bad. And my mom would be so pissed for me being that rude, just taking off. I almost don't care, I swear to God, I almost would do it right now. Because I am close to the door and he is in there laying on the floor in front of the couch where I have to be and his thing is still hanging out, and he is waiting there with the rotten cards and the drinks and I want to go go go, I don't care where. But I am only in my pajamas and don't even have shoes on or a coat and how far could I honestly get without freezing? Maybe I should find out.
Mom, please answer.
Even Nick; I don't care.
"Hey Aim, you coming back or what?" Roger is getting impatient. My eyes are trying to melt and sprout tears but oh my god, that would just make everything worse. I guess he would be pretty mad if I did that. I can't even answer him. Where is my throat? Does it still make a voice? What if my mom answers the phone finally and I can't speak? What if that happens, and she doesn't know it was me, and so she hangs up and thinks it's a prank call, and I am stranded out here again?
"I'm coming." It just flew out of me, I didn't even plan it. I don't want to go back there! Please, God, please, I don't want to! How can I be so hysterical on the inside and like a rock on the outside? What is going on? Please help. God, Devil, right now I will take either one who will help me. I'm sorry God, but it just is really that bad and I cannot exist like this a second longer.
I told Roger I was supposed to call my mom. He doesn't even care, though; I can tell. He doesn't care if my mom got mad at me for not calling her when I supposedly was. That's how it is, like we are the buddies and screw the parents or whatever. Why?
There have been six rings. They must be asleep. Nick is going to be so pissed for my letting it ring and ring when they are sleeping. It must be later than I thought. I don't care, I am going to let it ring until they answer. They have to, right? I mean, it could be an emergency or something. I don't think they would have turned the ringer off. Please.
"Hello!" It's my mom. I am going to cry. Shit. I am turned now to face into the laundry room where it's dark and my face can hide out.
"Mom? It's me." Tears are hitting my fuzzy purple footies.
"Oh." I can hear her settle back down a little bit and tell Nick that it's me. I don't have to hear anything out of him to know he's fuming and ready to break something, but I do, anyway. "Why are you calling this late, honey?" She is being nicer and I know it makes my stepdad even madder. She is on a tightrope of edginess.
"I don't feel good." It's all I can think of, and it's not a lie. I can hear my mom sigh. She is irritated and doesn't need this, are her feelings.
"What do you mean?" She is blending with Nick, now.
"I just don't feel good."
It goes on like this, our conversation, until we reach a stalemate where she refuses to suggest the obvious, and I haven't asked for it. She has tried to tell me that I just need to lie down and go to sleep, that I'll feel better in the morning, but I can't tell her that Roger and his thing are waiting in there for me to get back.
"Look, what do you want me to do?" She is mad. "You're just going to have try to go to sleep."
"I want to go home." I cry when I say it, because honesty busts the wall down.
She sighs. She is so mad she picked up the phone. It is way, way, way too far for her to come and get me, she says. By the time she even got here, she says, it would be the middle of the night, and so I might as well just go to sleep and wait until morning. If I still don't feel good, she will come and get me then.
"Please, mom."
(Note to Self: he is going to ask me to sit next to him when I come back, and look more closely at the cards. I don't want to. I am not having the fun he thinks I am. Why is he getting a magazine?)
The phone is sort of butterscotch colored. It is a push button, where the buttons are right in the hand part. We don't have a push button at our house. Or a microwave, which Sue and Roger have over there on the counter. We don't even use our heat most of the winter, just the stupid wood stove that does not heat the bedrooms even a speck, no matter how we all have to pretend to feel a difference. The ear part and the buttons of this phone are kind of dirty, but I don't care, I just want to smash my face into it until I wind up inside and can be home. Or anywhere else, really. I have thought of just going outside and trying to, I don't know, go somewhere. Just walk and get away to anywhere. But there really isn't an anywhere around here. Not at all. The road you drive down to get to the house is a long time from the highway, and it is just dirt and farms and stuff. And even at the highway, you just turn right to head to town, and it is a long, long way before you would even get to a store or anything. Not even a gas station. You have to fill up before you head out here so you have enough to get back. That's what my grandma always does when she drive us out here.
It has rang twice, my mom's phone. The second ring just ended, and it sounds very empty over there after the ring. Where is my mom? I don't think it can be that late because the news isn't on yet, I don't think. Is it? I don't think so. My hearing is all weirded out like everything else. It's like my proportions are completely distorted and freakshowed. My hearing disappears and then gets huge on some small thing, like the phone ringing, or the cards flapping when you set one down on the pile. Or Roger, how I will hear him breathing.
God, I do not want to go back and play that game. I do not want to look at those cards anymore. They are making my stomach hurt so bad. They are so gross. And he keeps saying how it feels good, that stuff, and it is what people do to have fun and feel good, but they do not look like they are having fun, those people in the pictures. They seriously don't. It looks gloomy and dark and like a rotten basement they are in. I mean, I like basements, my Grandpa's especially, but the pictures just have this black overtone to everything, like it is just, I don't know, grimy. The people aren't even nice looking or anything. This one guy always has his socks on, which I don't know, but I don't picture my husband one day if I ever have one to have his socks on during that kind of thing. That's part of it: these people don't even look like they like each other, let alone love each other. Does Roger think these people do love each other? Because I am only eleven, but I think I can tell that they look like they almost sort of hate each other. And there is a card I saw where two men were with one lady, and there is no way that was fun for anybody. Roger is full of shit.
Where is my mom? Third ring. The house is still empty and echo-y over there. Why does it have to be so far away? Why did my mom make me come out here? I don't know what is going on. I don't understand even what is going on at all. Like, if Roger thinks I am having fun and liking this stuff, what would my mom think? Why can't I stop doing whatever it is that makes him do this? I don't understand. Please God, help me understand so I can stop. Is Nick right? Am I really just, like, evil or something? It sure is looking like it. But why can't I be different on the outside, because I do not feel the way they all see me on the inside. I just want out. God, I would be in so much trouble if I just booked and left right now. Even if I didn't freeze to death, I would be in so much trouble. What would Roger think? He would feel so bad. And my mom would be so pissed for me being that rude, just taking off. I almost don't care, I swear to God, I almost would do it right now. Because I am close to the door and he is in there laying on the floor in front of the couch where I have to be and his thing is still hanging out, and he is waiting there with the rotten cards and the drinks and I want to go go go, I don't care where. But I am only in my pajamas and don't even have shoes on or a coat and how far could I honestly get without freezing? Maybe I should find out.
Mom, please answer.
Even Nick; I don't care.
"Hey Aim, you coming back or what?" Roger is getting impatient. My eyes are trying to melt and sprout tears but oh my god, that would just make everything worse. I guess he would be pretty mad if I did that. I can't even answer him. Where is my throat? Does it still make a voice? What if my mom answers the phone finally and I can't speak? What if that happens, and she doesn't know it was me, and so she hangs up and thinks it's a prank call, and I am stranded out here again?
"I'm coming." It just flew out of me, I didn't even plan it. I don't want to go back there! Please, God, please, I don't want to! How can I be so hysterical on the inside and like a rock on the outside? What is going on? Please help. God, Devil, right now I will take either one who will help me. I'm sorry God, but it just is really that bad and I cannot exist like this a second longer.
I told Roger I was supposed to call my mom. He doesn't even care, though; I can tell. He doesn't care if my mom got mad at me for not calling her when I supposedly was. That's how it is, like we are the buddies and screw the parents or whatever. Why?
There have been six rings. They must be asleep. Nick is going to be so pissed for my letting it ring and ring when they are sleeping. It must be later than I thought. I don't care, I am going to let it ring until they answer. They have to, right? I mean, it could be an emergency or something. I don't think they would have turned the ringer off. Please.
"Hello!" It's my mom. I am going to cry. Shit. I am turned now to face into the laundry room where it's dark and my face can hide out.
"Mom? It's me." Tears are hitting my fuzzy purple footies.
"Oh." I can hear her settle back down a little bit and tell Nick that it's me. I don't have to hear anything out of him to know he's fuming and ready to break something, but I do, anyway. "Why are you calling this late, honey?" She is being nicer and I know it makes my stepdad even madder. She is on a tightrope of edginess.
"I don't feel good." It's all I can think of, and it's not a lie. I can hear my mom sigh. She is irritated and doesn't need this, are her feelings.
"What do you mean?" She is blending with Nick, now.
"I just don't feel good."
It goes on like this, our conversation, until we reach a stalemate where she refuses to suggest the obvious, and I haven't asked for it. She has tried to tell me that I just need to lie down and go to sleep, that I'll feel better in the morning, but I can't tell her that Roger and his thing are waiting in there for me to get back.
"Look, what do you want me to do?" She is mad. "You're just going to have try to go to sleep."
"I want to go home." I cry when I say it, because honesty busts the wall down.
She sighs. She is so mad she picked up the phone. It is way, way, way too far for her to come and get me, she says. By the time she even got here, she says, it would be the middle of the night, and so I might as well just go to sleep and wait until morning. If I still don't feel good, she will come and get me then.
"Please, mom."
(Note to Self: he is going to ask me to sit next to him when I come back, and look more closely at the cards. I don't want to. I am not having the fun he thinks I am. Why is he getting a magazine?)
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