June 14th 2011
The shuffling sound of notebooks being pulled out and pens clicking back into place was the most beautiful sound Daphne could imagine at 3:47 everyday. People chatting as they got ready to leave the lecture hall. Silently she slipped everything back into her worn born leather satchel. As she checked the time on her phone she saw she had one text message from her younger sister.
"Done with school gonna go out with some friends be back whenever"
Typical.
Daphne walked out of the hall avoiding others becoming almost entirely invisible.
Do not speak to anyone unless spoken to.
She chanted the mantra in her head over and over.
Eyes followed her as she walked across campus. Once friendly and warm now filled with concern and unwanted pity towards her.
She got in her car turning up the radio hoping to drown her thoughts out with the sound of some over played pop song.
Driving she arrived at a stop parking in the barren drive way.
From the outside the home looked the same yet on the inside it was empty.
It was the same routine as always. Wake up, go to school, avoid human contact, go home, eat, worry, pass out.
Unhealthy to say the least.
After watching as many old Jeopardy episodes she could stand she took to pacing in the living room.
11:42
Past her curfew.
Mother would not be happy.
The door opened with a loud creak as Elizabeth snuck in the house trying to be as quiet as possible.
"You're late."
"You know Dad always said he was gonna fix that door." Elizabeth said with a light sigh.
"You can't party away your problems Beth."
"Yeah well at least I express myself! You used to be cool now you're like a freaking nun all the time! Even Gramps has noticed!" Elizabeth yelled throwing her jacket at the wall.
"You're going to wake him." Daphne picked up the jacket and put it on its rightful hook.
"You act like he's five not ninety he doesn't need to be babied!" Elizabeth stormed into the kitchen and began looking through the pantry.
"You and Grandpa are all I have left after..." The sentence was left floating in the tense air.
"After what? Say it." Daphne shook her head, eyes beginning to cloud with tears "Why can't you just acknowledge what happened? We're orphans! You are twenty and now you have to raise a seventeen year old and take care of an old geezer!" Elizabeth stopped rummaging and went over to her older sister.
"You need to come to terms with it, Mom and Dad would want you to live your life and do what's best for us okay?" She patted Daphne's shoulders and said a quick goodnight before returning to her bed.
Daphne walked upstairs and went to the last bedroom on the right. She walked in and went over to the frail figure laying in bed. At least he hadn't been woken during the fight. After tucking him in she shut the door and walked to her room.
From under her bed she pulled out a small wooden box and opened it.
Her father gave it to her when she was five and told her to put all her dreams for the future in it and he would help her make them come true.
Opening the box she saw several scrap pieces of paper with things written on them. The biggest piece of paper was an envelope titled "Daph and Dad's Bucket List". Laughing at some of the ridiculous things they wanted to do she then set it to the side. She found a small drawing from when she was eight. On the paper in purple crayon was a stick figure labeled as "me" and she was helping another stick figure who was sick. In big bold sloppy print at the top it read "I want to help people when I grow up". At the bottom in the small familiar neat scrawl of her father it read,
"I know you will".
With a new sense of purpose she put the box back under bed and crawled in, tomorrow she would start on finishing the list.
