Midnight Blue || Yang Jeongin

{1}

I never liked long drives across the country. They are tiring and they weighed on my shoulders like a grudge.  I loathed sitting for hours and hours staring my soul away at the colors green and light blue. The whole process made me develop a migraine that wrapped around my head like a band. I would have slept it all off and escaped from the tension of travel, but the rustling of the car and the lack of neck support made it difficult to try. At least the store stops were nice. Grabbing energy drinks and spiced chips always helped me ease the tension I had built with traveling. "It will be nice!" My mother exclaimed. Though, I didn't appreciate the fact she forced me to transfer universities. I was fine on my own and I could have gone to a dorm. Though, I was offered a full ride. All four years covered and dealt with. Just because my mother was deemed the best in her field of study. I guess its better than drowning in debt at my other university, but I liked how public and homey it felt. There I had many friends and I was doing well on their girls volleyball team.

"You think they have a volleyball team?" I asked opening a bag of chips.

My mother smiles, "They have much more than sports. You could even get involved in a sorority."

"I don't think I could. They drink as if the world will end soon."

"That's not entirely true. The town our campus is in has a dry-county. They are dedicated to service."

"I still think its not my cup of tea.." I say playfully rolling my eyes.

My mom turns up the radio to a broadcaster announcing the weather for the week. Sunny, cloudy, rainy, cloudy, sunny, sunny, and thunderstorms. And then they switch to a soft love song that was apparently popular in this area.  I shake my head and looked out the window to see the signs welcoming us into the town we were to live in.

Our new house was an nice older country home with two stories and a wide open porch. The area around was filled with trees and loud birds. You could even feel the difference in the air and in the breeze as it was much cleaner and crisp than that of the city streets. Around 10 acres of land stretched from all sides giving us a lot of distance from neighbors. My mother insisted that we were only 10 minutes from the school, but I couldn't believe it with so many open fields and mots of trees.

Later, we got settled on the living room floor as all of our things were still in moving trucks headed here. We ate mediocre local pizza and watched a TV series on a laptop screen.

"When is Heather coming back from deployment?" I asked curiously as Heather is my mother's new Fiancé.

"End of March she will be staying with us again. Hopefully this will be the last one for a while."

I nodded, "I hope so too.. She is way better than anyone you've dated in a while."

"My taste in women isn't as bad as my taste in men..." I laughed knowing she was referring to my biological father who left us 4 years ago. I remember bits and pieces of the moments before he disappeared. Arguing and scattered papers trailing along the hallway. My mom used to scream that she would leave him. He laughed at her for it every time. They tried their best to keep me from hearing or seeing things like that, but they were not as secretive as they thought. Those walls were too thin to be breaking glass and screaming curses. And the trash was too open to not notice white paper towels stained with blood.

We stayed up a while playing card games and making jokes until around 12am. Then next day the movers came in helping set up furnishings and large décor. Everything went well and everything was placed as if we had lived here for years. Even my room was finally decorated as it once was back in our condo. As they finished getting the kitchen and living area situated, I figured walking around and exploring the property would cure a bored heart. There was several things to discover and explore like I was some kind of adventurer. The first thing I looked into was an old shed. It was filled with farm equipment and old hay. There was even a single stray calico colored cat lurking around the shed. It meowed excitedly as if it had not seen a human for years. I pet it's soft fur and admire its green eyes. Though I wave it goodbye as I was anticipating the rest of the property. There was a mot of trees in the very back surrounding a small house and a swing that I was especially interested in.