CARMEN-G. DUNNE

002-TAKE A SHOT?

CARMEN ARRIVED HOME THAT NIGHT, to her Mother bellowing her lungs out like they were built in French horns. Something about her Father Carl not doing the dishes, or maybe it was not doing enough with her? Carmen couldn't make that part out.

It was a nightly routine, arguments. Raising their voices was her parent's way of saying I love you, perhaps it was their way of getting their words across after so many years of war when you had to shout to be heard.  Carmen however, put it to the fact that her mother was an extremely argumentative person, and the mere inactivity of her Father was more than enough reason to blow her top.

She slipped past them both in thr living room just as her mother threw a golden thread lined pillow at her Father. Carmen made a run straight up the stairs, leaving their echoing voices on the floor bellow. It only seemed to muffle them, the volume never decreased.

She walked into her room, being careful not to slam the door. Noise pollution was already overwhelming without something as loud as that.

It was still light outside, rays of creamy orange sun projected through her blinds onto the beige bedsheets that were still unfolded from this morning. Carmen strolled over to the window, suburbs were uncanny. Peaceful, they felt like your own corner of the world. But in truth there were millions of people living in a place just like it, so it wasn't her special place to look out on. It belonged to everything else.

At least here Carmen could make the most of her sun rays and the warm air that settled on her cheeks. Because they belonged to her, no one else could say their sun rays blocked out two bickering parents. Because it did. Looking out at the sun setting was like  putting a block of ice to a burn. It numbed everything. It took it all away.

Carmen shifted to her vanity. When Graham had asked her out to the gig earlier, she'd already made up her mind. Far before Graham approached her with the question. When Eddie gave her the set list weeks ago, she raced down to the music shop to buy the chord sheets for each song. Learning all of them in two days on her Fender Bass. It had changed over the years.

One night when her Mother was in her moods. She's accused Carmen of being dumbfounded, she was wasting her life on music.

'You'll never get anywhere Carmen. I thought I raised you better.'

Studies were more important. Of course she acted as though Carmen didn't have top grades, she knew the consequences of music an made sure her grades were above average for that reason.

However, perusing your dream costed more than your own ambition. It cost your mother's breath and wasted it too.

Carmen ran straight back up into her room and snatched up a flip knife from the bottom of her sock drawer. Carving her name 𝓒𝓪𝓻𝓶𝓮𝓷 onto the back of her bass. It will always belong to her, this bass will get me famous. She thought, from that night, it wasn't just about making herself and Eddie proud.

It was about proving her mother wrong.

Carmen peered into the mirror, her eyeliner had come off from all the sweat in the day. It was the 60s, everyone sweated no one cared.

'It's a California summer baby.' Eddie would say whilst looking like he had just walked out of the shower fully clothed. That's when Carmen cared.

She took her pencil and drew fresh wings on the eyeliner, sharp and new.

Her braids had turned into ropes of split ends, so she un did the hair ties and brushed out her waves that had transformed from bone straight hair after a day of wearing it up. Despite how warm everything was, her mahogany waves still reaked of coconuts. Thanks to the homemade hair mask everyone was raving about in thr magazines.