Caramel Sundae

One

~ONE~

"I crashed my car into a bridge,

I don't care, I love it, I-"

"Summer honey, can you please quieten down? Yeah, it's lovely, but your dad's still asleep. Oh, you know, he had a tough day yesterday- he was working until midnight."

I woke up and sat up, rubbing my eyes groggily. Icona Pop still blared from the room beside mine, which happened to belong to my sister. Of course she would decide to practise her vocals at this time in the morning. Believe me, it wasn't a very nice thing to wake up to. I mean, as much as I loved Summer, I had to admit that she couldn't sing for her life.

I looked blearily around the room, still in that state of sleepiness. My eyes set on the bright green digits of my alarm clock; 9:15.

I relaxed back in to my pillow, remembering that it was summer now. School had been out for three days, but it was still taking time to sink in that I was free from endless work, stress over tests, droning, lecturing teachers (that's excluding my music and French teacher, who I have to say are both laid-back, easy-going and fun; they are the only exceptions, though), hard plastic chairs, stuffy corridors with grey floors and early mornings.

I couldn't stay in bed once I'd woken up; I don't know why, I just never could. I mean, once I opened my eyes, knowing I wasn't going to get back to sleep, I just didn't see the point in lying there doing nothing. I guess you could say I had a short attention span; I got bored pretty easily if I wasn't doing anything. I threw back the duvet and walked through the dark to the window. I tugged back a corner of my red curtains to let in a little morning light. The bright sunlight poured in- well, it looked like it was going to be a good day.

"Morning Zara!" Mom said chirpily, pushing a bowl and a glass towards me.

"Hi, Mom," I smiled, spooning the chocolate flakes into my mouth.

I noticed that she was still wearing her running top, which was made out of pink, stretchy material and leggings made out of similar material in black, which meant that she must've just been out for her morning jog.

She was really into her running. She had taken it up a year or two ago, and now she went on a run at least every morning and was part of the local running club.

She was one of those stay-at-home moms, a housewife, although obviously she didn't stay at home all the time. She went out with her friends and had a meal or did something else with them, she went to the cinema with Dad to watch movies (well, clearly, what else are you supposed to do in cinemas?), she took us out shopping, she travelled north to visit her family and occasionally went for a haircut or pedicure (she hated feet- she couldn't stand them- so she wanted hers to at least not look repulsive).

In fact, now that I think about it, Mom's lifestyle was kind of similar to mine. We both liked to go out with our friends and go shopping, we were both enthusiastic about a particular sport, and I guess if I had a boyfriend, I'd go to the movies with him. Except that I don't. Not that I mind, really. But, then again, there's only a twenty-year age gap between us, which isn't much compared to other mothers and daughters. Mom was only twenty when she had me.

My parents were both young. They were childhood sweethearts. Mom was the popular girl at school, the perfect one with the looks, grades, everything, and Dad was the good-looking, mysterious boy who had just moved from Italy. It had been 'love at first sight' according to them, and their relationship grew and they became closer and closer.

As awkward as it is to listen to your parents' romance stories, I always loved hearing about this. Mom had my sister, Summer, a few months after she finished school, and left with her with my grandmother during the days so she could go to college. She decided to drop out altogether when she was pregnant with me two years later.