Caged

[Two]

I really hate Fridays.

Not something you hear often being said; especially from someone my age.

Fridays are supposed to be a happy day. It’s the end of the week. School is out, work is out for some people, and there’s the weekend to look forward to.

Everyone is mostly in a good mood on Fridays. Not me. Fridays were the bane of my existence.

Not only was it my day off from work and the only full day that I had to be able to finish off any Uni work that I had, but I had to spend the day in the same place as my mother. That meant I had to deal with whatever loud and rowdy random people she brought home from the pub that night.

You might think it’s harsh that I dread being in the same house as my mother, but believe me, it is completely justified.

She couldn’t care less that I was stressing over the work that I had to get done. All day I was up and down doing things when she told me to. It took me a whole two hours to get the introduction to my essay done because she kept interrupting.

If I didn’t do it as soon as she asked then she would be in a pissed-off mood all day up until she left to go to the pub, so I just got it over and done with. I wouldn’t be so bitter about it if she helped me just a little, but she just sat around watching television and drinking shot after shot of whatever alcohol she had lying around the house.

What really got to me, though, is that she calls me lazy, to my face and to everyone else she knows. I do everything around the house and she has the nerve to call me lazy. I try not to let it get to me but it’s painful and embarrassing being spoken about in that way to people I don’t even know.

At least every other day of the week I only had to deal with her in the afternoons after work.

Right now it was ten at night. I was sitting in my room with my iPod on, low enough so that I could hear if my mum called me, but loud enough to slightly drown out the drunken conversations and loud music down the hall.

Tonight’s party started an hour ago. It doesn’t usually start this early, but my mum must have gotten bored when she lost all her money in the poker machines and decided to bring the entire pub home with her.

I’ve only ever seen the same person twice. She brought home a new person every day. I guess she wasn’t very big on the whole recycling thing. She just ignored them when she was done playing with them as if they were an old toy that she didn’t want any more.

I hated it, but there was nothing I could do about it. I’ve tried for years to help get her back to the person she used to be. It never works so I didn’t see the point in trying anymore.

I was hoping that she wouldn’t call me out tonight. I was almost done with the first half of my essay and there were only one-thousand five hundred and twenty-three words to go.

I guess hoping doesn’t work because just as I started writing the first sentence of the next paragraph, I heard my name being called in her shrill, slurred voice.

Sighing, I threw my pen down on to my notebook with frustration; causing it to clatter to the floor. I tugged the ear buds of my earphones roughly out of my ears and walks to my door.

Before I unlocked it and walked out, I took a deep breath and composed myself, knowing that it wouldn’t do me any favours if I walked out looking as angry as a rabid dog. I took my time walking out, giving myself time to calm down.

I quickened my pace down the hall when she shouted for me to hurry up, and squinted slightly when I reached the living room.

The entire room was filled with so much cigarette smoke that it was difficult for me to see. I was used to it though so I ignored the stinging in my eyes and tried my best not the cough.