"You're insufferable, you know that?"
"Aw come on sweetheart, don't be that way."
"For the last time, I'm not your sweetheart!"
Nevaeh Roman never had an easy life, but she never complained (atleast not to others). She lives with an alcholic mother...
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This is not a good idea. It was a dumb idea. No! Not just a dumb idea. It was an extremely dumb idea.
Looking at my phone screen, I see Cade's number, the number that I entered in my phone, the number that I have been staring at for the past two minutes, the number that I am supposed to call no matter how much I retch at the thought of hearing his voice.
The faster I do this, the faster I get my pencil. I thought.
I let out a groan as I fall face-down onto my bed. After a few seconds, I lift my face from the suffocating pillow and glance at the phone in my hand. I take in a deep breath as I move my thumb to hover over the call button. I slowly lower it to hit call.
"What are you doing?" I jump and quickly turn in response to the raspy voice coming from the doorway of my bedroom. My mother is standing there, her messy curls dangling down against her face. She is holding on to the door frame as though she would fall without its support. Surprisingly, she does not look drunk, but she does not look completely sober either. Maybe a little tipsy, I thought. "Nothing mama," I reply, as I subtly slide my phone under my pillow.
"Where is your sister?" she asks.
"She's at Jeffrey's," I said, as I watch her glassy eyes as they glance around my bedroom.
"Your room is a mess," she said, her voice sounding more frustrated than angry.
"I'll clean it up," I quickly reply, trying to keep my conversation with her as short as possible. It is best to keep conversations with my mother short, very short, and I try to have as few of them as possible. Talking to my mother is the most draining thing in the world to me. When she is not criticizing me, body shaming me, or yelling at me, she talks down to me. She tries to make me feel small. And it works.
Mama's nose curls up in disgust as she glares at me before muttering something about me being a lazy child as she turns and walks away. I wait until I hear a door shut, which I assume is the one to her bedroom. I exhale the breath that I did not realize I had been holding. I lift the pillow that my phone is under and toss it on the floor. My mother always knows how to tick me off. My problem is I let her treat me this way because no matter how many times she screams and yells about how my sister and I are bastard children, no matter how many times she left the house in the middle of the night only to come back two days later, and no matter how many times she tells me I am the reason our father left, she is still my mother.
I look down at my phone remembering the call I am supposed to make. Oh, screw it! I need a distraction anyway, I thought.
Picking up my phone, I hit the call button to ring the number I had already entered. It rings, and rings, and rings.
"Well, you took your sweet time, almost thought you were gonna leave me hanging." As soon as I heard Cade's voice, a feeling of irritation washes over me. He has the power to tick me off by just speaking.
