The Days Of Kelsea's

(24) Kelsea - Friday 1st September, just before 12 midnight, My Room.

(24) Kelsea - Friday 1st September, just before 12 midnight, My Room.

Hi. 

Let's start with that. Hello. 

Today was probably the worst day of my life. But it was also probably the most super day of my life so far too, and it was the first of September, so for me, autumn is officially here. My favourite season. 

Mum's getting worse. You probably think I mean that she's drinking more and staying in bed more, but no. She's just walking around, smiling and pretending that suddenly everything is alright. Then, her mood suddenly swings in the opposite direction and she becomes lethal. But she isn't getting a new job, and she's not trying to make conversation with Lucy and I. 

Lucy went out today at twelve, while I was sat on the chair in the living room reading a teen fiction novel I picked up at the library. It's got an original plot of murder and prison and psychological problems and schizophrenia and friends with benefits; it's not one of those books with a bright pink cover and a blurb of "Jessica had no friends but that all changed once she met the mysterious boy Zac." Those books annoy me to no end. 

Anyway, yes. Lucy had decided to go shopping with her friend Carol. Carol is alright, just not very conventional, in one of those slightly embarrassing ways. She wears a lot of unfeminine clothes and plays video games and likes Maths, and I was surprised someone like that would want to go to the mall. But Lucy has known her since she was seven and as long as she's happy, I am too. 

Mum surprised me today by telling me she was going over to see Gram. She hasn't seen her for weeks, despite her being her mother. I suspect that Gram will have something to say to her, although Gram never lets on to us that she dislikes her daughter's behaviour. Because that would just confirm it to us, and Gram is sweet in the way that she puts mine and Lucy's thoughts and wonderings first and foremost. 

So out mum went in her red car. As she was leaving I caught traces of how my mum used to look when she was younger; a lot like me, but just prettier. You can see it quite clearly behind the dark circles and the pale make up.  

She's only young, because she had me when she was seventeen. Her and dad were apparently madly in love, says Gram. "Your grandad did everything he could to try and stop them being together," Gram whispered to me one night when I was ten and I was staying over at her house. "But I am glad they were together because otherwise, you and your sister wouldn't be here and I wouldn't have such lovely angels to talk to." 

So one episode of unprotected sex produced me. I think that mum had high aspirations and probably wouldn't have wanted to keep me, and I don't think that dad cared either. But it was Gram. Gram told them that no way was anyone related to her having an abortion. 

That's how I imagine it anyway; I've never been told any of this stuff. 

So my parents got married when they were barely out of high school - they had to - and I was half raised by Gram, half raised by mum when she went to university with my dad. I don't know how she managed. Dad didn't do anything, but he was still sticking around mum, and he did until I was six - by that point, Lucy had come along and we were all living where we live now - before that I'd been living with Gram and grandad.  

Dad didn't give us much attention, and mum only fed us and sang to us and then Gram would do the rest. When I was seven, my grandfather died and Gram wasn't alright for a while. She had to go to Ireland for a while to see all her relatives and I was left alone with mum.  

By then, dad was gone. He didn't like me and Lucy. I didn't think he liked kids in general until he married Gillian and then stupid, snivelling, snotty Leo was born.