Fat Chance

The Dungeon

After what seemed like an eternity of being laughed at by three little boys on the Public Transit Bus, I was home. The whole Walmart ordeal made me not want to leave the house for the rest of my life and all I wanted to do from now until Monday was eat, sleep, and watch YouTube videos. But immediately upon entering the house, my mom was yelling at me. Of course.

"Quinn! Where the fuck have you been?!? We're gonna be late!" At first, I had no idea what she was talking about.

Than it suddenly hit me.

Her and Dad were going to go see the 8 o'clock showing of a movie and I had promised to watch Alex, my nearly 2 year old little brother. I looked at my watch. It was 7:34 pm.

Shit.

"Crap, Mom I'm so sorry. I forgot!" Mom just rolled her eyes. Dad came downstairs, dressed fancy in a ironed button up shirt and tuxedo pants. "Who's ready for a fun night?" he asked with a smile, clearly unaware they were going to be late. One thing about my dad is that he was almost always smiling, even if there was nothing in particular to smile about. He was an unusually optimistic person, which got on everybody's nerves at times, but in the end he helped us work through many almost fatal family problems. My mom was the complete opposite.

She rolled her eyes at him and stomped out the front door. My dad hurriedly ran after her, trying to make things right. "Thanks, guys!" I yelled. "Love you to!" After my sarcastic outburst, I went upstairs to check on Alex. But upon seeing him sleeping and safe in bed, I retreated to the downstairs hall closet, which is actually my bedroom, but I've never really considered it to be anything else but a dungeon. The reason for that is because It's literally the size of a cereal box and it's not reflective of my personality, which from what I've seen on TV, magazines and the few friends rooms I've been in, is important.

A persons room is supposed to reflect their uniqueness and personality. Your room is supposed to tell what kind of person you are. If your a neat freak or if you could care less about cleanliness, if your a tomboy or a girly-girl, if your popular with pictures of your friends hanging on the walls or if your a nerd with lots of textbooks and comics everywhere. Except for maybe assuming I have a bland taste in wall color, you wouldn't be able to tell a damn thing about me by looking at my room. The walls are an angry charcoal color and the only two things in my room are a cheap blow up mattress with strips of duck tape holding it together and my breathing machine for when I'm sleeping. Come to think of it, I can't even really fit into it.

It was my dads idea to move me to the downstairs closet. He thought that Alex would be able to live a somewhat normal life with me hidden away for the good majority of it. Even though he's a bright, positive person, we weren't ever close. He never really gave that much attention or thought to me, his excuse is because I'm nearly 15 years old and very self dependent. I say it's because he just doesn't like me, and never has.

But I don't blame him.

Ever since I was very little, I've been a huge introvert and a loner. I never had any friends and use unlike the average kid, I hated to play outside with the neighborhood kids. Friends of my parents would always shake their heads in pity and ask them what was wrong with me. When I was 6, I was diagnosed with Depression, Anxiety, Dyslexia, ADHD, ADD and S.A.D.

Everyone was shocked to learn that I had so many things wrong with me. We all just thought that I was a shy little girl, that I was just In a phase, that this was all going to go away. My dad wanted to get rid of me right than. "Carol, we don't have the finances nor the resources to deal with a mentally ill child. We should discuss putting her up for adoption, where she can find a family that can attend to her special needs." I had been snooping outside my parents bedroom door when I had heard him say that, and I was purely devastated. I didn't even bother to stay around to see what kind of response my mother would conjure up.