BIG, FAT, DRAMAS

One

Reluctantly, I slid into the back seat of the car. My old nan in the passenger seat, my chatty auntie next to me and my mum driving. I took out my wallet and realised my phone was still sitting on the kitchen bench, charging.

"Mum, hold up, I forgot my phone." I told her, holding the door handle ready to jump out when she stops.

"Oh, well too late now, you need to be less forgetful next time." She told me in a mildly forceful tone.

I took my hand off the door, slightly shocked until I realised my nan was with us.

She's always telling mum to be more hard on me and my two younger siblings because of my uncle. He was my Nan's first child and she had him before she met my Pop.

I've never actually heard what happened to him but Mum said that he was a bit loopy and thought he could do what he wanted so he took drugs. My Nan thinks it's because she wasn't hard enough on him. I kind of feel sorry for her.

"You know, forgetfulness can lead to dementia which is actually more common in women than men." My auntie blurts out in her naturally loud voice.

"I don't have dementia." I mumbled, rolled my eyes.

"Well, you never know!" My auntie exclaims, raising her eyebrows.

"Oh, Marie! Don't freak her out like that!" My Mum said, laughing.

"Well you know, one of my friends has dementia." My Nan told us.

"Ethel, give us a break, we don't want to hear you yacking on about your friends!" My auntie boomed.

I eventually tuned out when they started talking about how the building companies are starting lots of high-rises around our the community so I decided to look out the window for the rest of the way to the mall. My aunties voice was pretty hard to drown out but somehow I did it.

We pulled up into the car park and I slipped out of the car, slightly miserable that Mum wouldn't let me get my phone and kind of embarrassed that I'm a 14 year old going to the mall with my Mum, Auntie and Nan.

I quickly rushed everyone inside when I spotted a girl from school- a particularly snobby one as well. My auntie chatted on the whole time about some crap like why social media is so important or something like that- she's obsessed with Facebook. I think most of our family gave up trying to listen to her years ago.

"Summer, do you want an ice-cream? I think she wants an ice-cream, Go get an ice-cream." My Nan told me, dropping a few dollars into my hand.

They obviously wanted to talk about things without me hanging around.

I started for the ice-cream parlour, only a couple of shops down, when a familiar group of cute-clothed girls turned the corner where the parlour was located.

I immediately jumped behind a conveniently placed trash bin that was next to a large public chair. An old man who was sitting on the wooden thing glared at me in a funny way.

"Are you ok?" He asked in a raspy voice, his bushy eyebrows half covering his eyes in an angry way.

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine thank you." I said, eyeing the group of girls as they started to order some ice-creams.

The man turned in what looked like quite a big struggle.

"It's those girls." He said going back to glaring at me. "Who are they?"

"They're, uh, they're just my..friends."

"Then why are you hiding from them?"

I shuffled around the seat so the girls didn't see me as they walked away.

"Because....we're in a fight right now." I said to save anymore drama and then quickly hurried off before he could ask anymore aggravating questions about my social life.

I wasn't actually fighting with them, it was different.

We were quite a big group at school. Me and a few of my other friends are quite close but the other girls are a bit different.

They seemed to act quite a lot older for the sake of a few people that might be impressed and things mattered to them a bit more; boys, clothes, hair, popularity. Me and my close friends didn't really care about that sort of stuff, it doesn't bother us.

Sometimes I don't feel like the other girls are really good friends. They kind of make me jealous of them on purpose and are really friendly with me when boys are around or at the mall but when we are a group, they ignore me totally.

I don't really care much because I have better friends. Friends that are true and long-lasting.