Sair:
Friday when I got home from school, everything was even worse than yesterday. I was alone in the house, and the silence made nothing better at all. I was sitting in the kitchen by myself, looking at the piece of paper in front of me. I didn’t even know why it was there. Why I had taken it with me home. Why I had even bothered to care to stuff it in my pocket. But there it was, the same note as always that had been stuck to my locker this morning. WHORE. I sighed, chewing my lip as I looked down at it. The front door clicked from the hall, and I wasn’t alone anymore.
“Hello?”. It was mum who called, she was home early.
“Hey”, I said back, and quickly put the paper away. Mum peeked into the kitchen, grocery bags in both hands.
“Hi sweetheart”, she smiled, and she already knew it was a bad day for me. The sympathy in her voice was obvious. I tried to keep the smile on my face, but it wasn’t easy.
“Would you like some help with that?”, I asked her, and was about to stand up. Mum shook her head, and just placed the bags on the counter.
“A bad day again?”, she asked me. I nodded. That’s when she saw it, the ticket I had just placed away on the counter yesterday afternoon. “What’s this?”, she asked me. “Is it yours?”. I nodded.
“It’s this premiere”, I told her, shrugging at it like it was nothing.
“Tonight?”. I nodded again. My mum came to sit by my side, and put the ticket in front of me. She didn’t know about the note that was burning a hole inside my pocket. “With Niall?”, she smiled, and bumped my shoulder. I couldn’t take it, and didn’t find it amusing or encouraging at all. Even though Niall had called me last night and told me to come, and even though it did sound quite convincing at that point… I was ready to take up the phone and cancel. “What’s wrong?”, mum sighed. I leant against the counter, not looking at her.
“Nothing”, I shrugged. “I’m just not going, that’s all”.
“But why not?”. She sounded like she couldn’t understand why I would ever turn down a movie premiere. Of course she didn’t understand. No one understood, that was the problem.
“I’m not feeling well”, I said, and knew it was the oldest excuse in the book. But not a total lie. I was feeling down, and exhausted. Not in the mood to go out and see a whole lot of people I’d only seen in magazines, and lie to them about my relationship with another celebrity. Besides, I was pretty sure my celebrity ‘boyfriend’ wasn’t too keen on having me there in the first place.
“Oh, but sweetie, now that Niall’s asked you I think you should go”, mum cooed, looking at me with that look. That sympathetic look.
“I don’t think it’ll bother him”, I scoffed under my breath, so she wouldn’t hear. I turned to my mother and sighed again, the side of my mouth twitching into a weak smile. “I don’t have anything to wear”, I said.
“Well, we’ll get you something”, she smiled, and stood up. “I’ll take you anywhere you’d like, and we’ll find something gorgeous”.
“No…”, I shook my head, and went over to take the ticket from her. “I don’t think so”.
“But Saoirse”, she sighed, and put a hand to my cheek. “I think getting out with your boyfriend is exactly what you need. You’ve been so stressed out lately”. Exactly. I wish I could tell her. But I couldn’t. There was no way I could untangle myself from this mess now. I just took the ticket in my hands and kept the weak smile on my face.
“I’ll think about it”, I sighed, hoping that would get her off my back.
“Good”, mum smiled, and returned to the grocery bags. “Oh, by the way!”, she pulled a cardboard box out of one of the bags. “This was out on the porch for you”. I took it, and looked at my name written in clumsy letters on the outside with a black marker. Just my first name.
