My sister and I were never really close growing up. She was seven years
older than me, so we didn’t have very much in common. Our parents tried to
get her to help take care of me, because they were so old and tired, but she
had an excuse for everything. Before quite recently, she thought the world
of herself, and didn’t give too much thought to anyone else. She needed to
get away from the two of them, and be free of the burden, and it wasn’t
relevant that I couldn’t leave. I had to grow up fast after that. I started
driving them around even though I was nowhere near old enough to have my
license. I’m just talking about the bread store and the pharmacy, but I got
caught by the cops a couple of times, and suddenly I’m the
bad sister. The judge went easy on me, because she understood that I
wasn’t just going out for joyrides. Still, if I let it happen again, she
would contact family services, and then we would be in a real mess. I
continued to care for them even after that, though I no longer drive. I
started to hustle, because we needed money for all the rides we were
sourcing. Don’t worry, I didn’t get caught from one of my schemes, and I put
those old habits in the rearview mirror when I was old enough to get a job
and start driving again; legally, this time. I didn’t do great in school,
but it didn’t really matter. I just needed to graduate so I could be taken
at least a little bit seriously. Not going to college is a very normal thing
that a lot of people do, and you often don’t even have to tell them why it
never happened. It could be money, it could be grades, it could be having to
stay home with family. Anyone who judges you for it can go suck a—anyway,
all of those reasons were mine. I had to focus on holding down a decent job
with flexible hours, and upward mobility. I didn’t need to become the owner
of my own franchise, but some kind of manager would suffice. That was my
goal.
I busted my ass. I was still taking care of the parents, who weren’t getting
any better—mind you—but taking as many shifts at the department store as I
could. My co-workers liked me, the customers loved me, and the bosses were
impressed with me. I had that promotion in the bag. It should have been
mine. When they told me they gave it to someone else just because he had a
dick, I lost it. Okay, so that wasn’t exactly their reason, but it sure felt
that way. I started rampaging through the store, throwing clothes around
and...well that’s all I did. It was an inconvenience to clean up, and I was
super fired for it, but they didn’t even call the cops. I realized then that
this was all my big sister’s fault. She left me here to deal with all this
crap, and now she was living the high life out in Vegas, or whatever. I was
literally in the car, having just turned in my badge when I got the call
that my father’s medical bill was overdue. So I lost it again. I called my
sister to complain, but a volcano erupted inside me, and I started to
scream. She was cool about it, to her credit, and after a few more
conversations, she agreed to come back and finally pitch in. While she was
helping, we got to know each other better, and learned that we had more in
common than we realized. For instance, we both wanted to try mountain
hiking. We didn’t want to do big long backpacking treks, but we wanted to
admire the view. Now that the parents are dead and buried, we’ve decided to
go on a trip to Whiteside Mountain with a family friend. It’s great, and
we’re having a lot of fun, so we want to commemorate our newfound
relationship with a selfie. The edge of that cliff just comes out of
nowhere. Someone really should have put up a sign on the fence.
No comments :
Post a Comment