I'm Gonna Miss You

Chapter 15: Swimming With The Fishes

Thud! Thud! Thud!

The whack of the hammer against the nail head, echoed through my room endlessly. There were three nails in place over my bedroom door, perfectly fit for Nelson's guitar to rest. I set down the hammer on the floor then climbed the step ladder, the instrument in my hands. I carefully stationed it on the nails, ensuring that it wouldn't fall. Pleased with myself, I sat down on the edge of the bed, facing the four signatures while I massaged my hammering arm.

I decided to do this mostly because I wanted to take out my anger from reading the disgusting article in the newspaper moments ago. Kyan and I had a heated discussion— well, I yelled and she listened, but she had to go so we ended the conversation abruptly. There was nothing that I wanted more than to stop worrying that someone would guess that it was me in that photo.

"Shut up." I told my own brain as I got up and walked towards the box of envelopes and pulled out the sixth letter.

'Lilah,

I know that you heard my side of the story as to why I did what I did, and I made it sound like a lot of blame was put on mom and dad. But I hope you don't carry any resentment or hatred towards them. They were only doing what they thought was best, and although it was wrong and a blind decision, they didn't know any better.
I wish I could say that you would understand and that everything would still be the same with you three but, I know you and it's not easy for you to forgive people. Just ask the girl who spit gum in your hair in 3rd grade.

With that in mind, I'm begging you to open your heart and listen to what they have to say. There's nothing a parent would hate more than for their own kid to hate the sight of them. I sound like a hypocrite, I know, but there's still hope for mom and dad to change.

In case you haven't noticed, we barely ever visited Grandpa and Grandma, even on the rare occasions that we did, mom and dad never came with us. The reason that is, is because they aren't on good terms. They haven't been ever since we moved out here. It was all because mom and dad wanted to start a family on a stable income, where dad didn't have to keep paying for Gran and Gramps. Dad couldn't leave because he felt the need to take care of them, which meant mom wouldn't have the family she wanted. At the time, Gramps didn't have a job because he was told to retire. Usually they get a pension or something like that, but that wasn't enough to pay off the debts that Gramps piled up from betting. When dad finally cleared him of his debt, he felt that he could finally leave them and they could take care of themselves. So he told them that him and his wife were going to move away, but Gran and Gramps weren't too pleased to have their only grandchild taken away from them. they refused to listen to any of their reasons, leaving mom and dad no choice but to leave without saying goodbye. But by doing that it meant cutting off all connections with each other.

It's a lot to handle and take in considering how much happened in a short amount of time, but guess what. That's not even the whole reason. That was all they would tell me. They just kept saying that I was too young to understand. That I needed to wait until I was older. But they never told me.

Even though they hate each other's guts because of that, they always shared one thing in common.

Fishing.

Before you came along, dad and Gramps promised to take me fishing at every end of the month, and up until they fought, that promise came through. You should've seen them when they were out on that boat, they were all smiles and jokes, it was hard to imagine that those two were the same grumpy bulls today.

But yeah, the moments spent on the boat, hold a strong influence in their life. I'm sure they would do anything just to get those moments back and to experience them once more.