Athena Roman

Hold Me Close and Drop Me
2014-01-20 10:15:29 (UTC)

Sibling Rivalry

Kayla and Leah, being two years apart, fought like cats and dogs. Kayla was a year older than me, but she had to repeat kindergarten (though was extremely bright), and was in the same grade as me. Being in my grade, though we didn't see each other much at school, did make us get fed up with each other a little easier. Kayla and Leah were pretty much my sisters at this point - that happens when you're stuck with people every minute that you're home in a cramped space. We did chores together, which consisted of each of us getting three random chores from my mother on a Saturday and not being allowed to play outside until they were done and dishes after dinner. We did homework together, which consisted of Kayla doing work, me pretending to do work with little to show for it, and Leah and Logan playing video games. We ate together at a picnic table-sized bench, which usually consisted of hamburger helper, boxed potato flakes and some canned green beans or carrots. And we played together, which consisted of my cousins and I running around in the Ditch, evading "The Mexicans", and sneaking off the glorious places that were probably forbidden.

Sides began to develop within our posse (it was a forced grouping, after all.) Logan started hanging out with the other little boys around the trailer. Kayla became infatuated with a boy named Nester, who was a year older than us and went to the MIDDLE SCHOOL. That was a big thing. And Leah and I ran off together.

Bryon, Mom, Shawn, and I eventually got our own trailer on the next street. It was on Dalton, while Uncle Tommy's place was on Durley. Anyway, our trailer was rather baron, with five pieces of furniture within the place, if you count bare mattresses. A mattress for me, for Shawn, my desk, Mom's dresser, the couch. At least I had my own room. I still had to go over to Tommy's about every two or three days to do my family's laundry. I also got the duty of cleaning the house and making dinner, because Mom had to go to work, which was a position selling curtains at J.C. Penny's. Bryon and Shawn were lazy and did nothing but yell and watch football games. And Shawn would steal my money.

We tortured Kayla about the whole Nester thing. See, we had made a clubhouse out of a refrigerator box and put it next to the shed. We colored the inside and put our favorite things in there. At night, we covered it up with a tarp to keep out rain and dew. One day, Kayla lost some "High School Musical" stickers and thought we had them. I walked back to my trailer, noting a pair of white panties on the dirt and gravel road. When Leah and I got back to our clubhouse the next day, our tarp was off and the rain had completely ruined our project. I think Leah cried. In retaliation, I proposed means of revenge. With a stick, Leah and I gathered the panties from the road, grabbed some yellow, red, and brown markers, and degraded the undergarments even further. Then, we wrote on them "Kayla's panties". I can't believe we did what we did next. We threw the underwear on Nester's front porch. When Kayla found out, she ran into the ditch and cried. Like, I could literally hear her screaming. She didn't talk to us for a couple of days. She did something to get us back, but I don't recall what it was.

That was what life became: school and getting a leg up on Kayla. She got in Beta club - I called Nester an asshole at the dinner table. I avoided getting grounded when I should have - she destroyed a fort I was working on. Oh, and then there was the infamous stealing stolen items from each other's hangouts. That was lovely. We got a trampoline from so-and-so's yard, Kayla and her friends stole it. Then we stole it back in the night. It was "fun", I guess, but it was also like survival for us. We didn't have anything, it seemed. School mattered to Kayla, but even that seemed to lose her interest. I had no interest to begin with. We only cared about our adventures outside and nothing but. All day, I'd sit in school and think "what am I going to do when I get home? Play in the ditch? Make a fresh batch of mud-sand balls? Sneak off the the fancy kids' park?"

In the midst of all this white-trash delinquency, I made a new friend. One day, when Leah and I were walking back to my trailer, we heard a noise in my trash can. We opened the lid. A little blue-eyed black lab puppy looked up at me. I convinced my mom and Mr. Douche Canoe to let me keep him. He was my dog. Except Mr. Douche Canoe got to name him. But it was an okay name. It was Midnight.




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