The truth in our songs

Chapter 6

Maia-Jane Miller

Five days

Five days had passed and my dad still hadn't returned home.

This was the longest he'd ever been away. Of course his sudden disappears weren't unknown but usually he would come back after one day, with a busted eye and a bleeding nose. I never asked what happened, playing with the fear of getting the injuries myself. I would bandage is wounds, clean the blood up and put ice cubes into a fabric to, cool his eye. I never expected a thank you or a nice word in compensation, he never talked to me, except if it was for buying him new liquor.

The house had never looked more empty and left behind than it did now. Of course I had cleaned up, thrown all the used and full bottles and cigarettes away, had washed the bedsheets and clothes. I had opened the doors and windows, to let the fresh cold air carry all the smell away and fill the house with change. Above all, I felt left back, forgotten, unwanted. Shouldn't I be happy about his absence? He had done nothing kind to me, had hurt and humiliated me. Yet, he was still my father, I had no one but him. At the same time I had never had him either, all I had, was myself. Did I miss him? I didn't know, my feelings were indefinable. Should I miss him?

I felt bad, inconsiderate, selfish, ungrateful- I could go on and list all the disappointements up I contained. Beside that, I was mad, angry, frusturated, filled with hate, despisement, regret and weakness. I had left Benjamin sitting alone at our meeting, had never showed up. Didn't I deserve a kick in the ass?

What rode me was the insecurity and suspicion I had towards everything and everyone. I didn't go out, didn't meet people, didn't show up to events, hardly talked if it wasn't necessary. If I were to sit down with someone, not a single loud would come out of my mouth, not one glance would happen between our foreign eyes, the only thing between us would be the breaths that tried to be more silent and inaudible than the rest of our presences.

He showed up at my house, tried to get me out after I had skipped him a second time, he didn't look mad, neither surprised, just confused and questions written all over his kind face. I told him I wasn't feeling well, that the last night had carried a cough and a running nose with it that my head was screaming and my body aching. He understood, didn't follow up more, asked if I needed something- what I politely declined- and left.

Maybe I was a liar after all.

I had skipped school, what else, and didn't do any work. What a great start. Now I was hunched over my old laptop and picked all the solutions from the missed lessons out of different websites.  A little bit information from this side and something else from that side. I spent hours, cribbing and copying the sentences and formulas on pieces of paper, I had ripped out of my writing pad.

Did I understand any of the things I wrote down? No.

Was I prepared for another Monday to knock on the door? No.

Was I still sitting here, already cheating my way through graduation year? Yes.

But it was okay- school was school, work was work, studying was studying. The problem was just that school was a nightmare, work was exhausting, studying was nowhere to be seen. I simply had no time to do anything casual, I couldn't go out for a coffee, couldn't turn two pages in a book to read a bit, couldn't hang out with friends- I didn't have. I had to work, had to earn at least a bit poor money to survive, I had to keep my life alive. If I would stop doing what I was doing, it would slip through my fingers and vanish.