The Silent Fighter

Normal

It's 11:00 in the morning and Katrina isn't up yet, I guess she's still tired, or a little hungover.... Anyways my dad is up though, he always gets up around 7 and makes homemade hash browns, it's really good.

"Well good morning sunshine!" My dad says as Katrina walks into the kitchen.

"I slept really good last night, Samuel didn't wake up at all, at least I don't think he did. Did he Honey?"

"Not that I know of,"my dad replies. Do I say that he woke up and I took care of him? Or would that be stealing their thunder and should I not tell them?

"Actually he did wake up," I blurt out. They both just kind of look at me, "but I took care of it. I gave him a bottle and put him back to sleep in his room."

"Well, good job Kiddo!" My dad finally responds. I can't read Katrina's expression, but she doesn't say anything. Sometimes I feel like I let her down, but I don't let it bother me. I don't really let anything bother me.

The rest of the weekend I got up with Sammy, fed him his bottle, and put him back to bed.

It's Sunday now, time for me to go back to my mom's, Katrina always brings me there and my dad always brings me back. I feel like Katrina and I should know each other more and connect more, things are always so awkward between us. She's been around since before I was even thought about and she helped raise me a lot. We try to make small talk here and there, but then we decide it's just easier to watch the road.

I actually get to go to my mom's house today instead of Uncle Bob and Aunt Lyra's. Of course when I get inside my mom is in her room sleeping. I wonder if they're ever going to clean up the blood in the bathrooms. They already cleaned it up on the wall to go upstairs, which I'm glad.

Besides the blood on the walls, everything seems to be getting back to normal.

"Sissy!" Susana yells while bouncing down the stairs.

"Hi Susie!" We decide to go up to our room and play, I like to play with her, we get to bond when we play.

We play Barbie's, we always be ourselves with the Barbie's and pretend we have boyfriends, I admit it's actually kind of fun.

"Knock knock," my mom walks in.

"Mommy!" Susie says, "we're playing Barbie's!"

"Oh, I'm sorry I won't interrupt you again, but first I need you two to clean your room, okay?"

"Noooooo!" Susie screams out, I never argue because I know that's not going to work. My mom would just scream.

"Susana just listen to Mommy," I say calmly.

"I can handle it Autumn!" My mom yells.

"I'm only trying to help!" I yell back.

"Do not yell at me I am your mother!"

"Well I'm trying to do is help I don't see why you're mad! And you yelled at me first!"

"I'm allowed to yell at you if you are disrespecting me!"

"I am not disrespecting you! I'm trying to help!" I scream at her and stomp upstairs.

"You're such a child!" She yells up. I ignore her.

"Susie you need to come clean," I say.

"But I'm so tired," she whines, "Mommy do I have to?"

"Yes you do Susana."

"No she doesn't!" My mom yells, "she's tired and needs her rest."

"Susana is the one who made most of the mess why can't she help too?" I try to sound calm, but apparently it isn't good enough.

"Stop yelling at me Autumn! You need to respect what I say."

"I only yell whenever you yell at me! Sorry for defending myself."

"Go clean your room now and I do not want to see you until dinner, if you even get dinner."

"Whatever." After that I clean my room myself. I don't see her problem. Susana is five years old she's lying I know she is because she does it all the time. No one believes me, but I can hear her right now jumping around downstairs. My mom always takes her side, she always has. It's like she doesn't even appreciate me. I took care of HER daughter for about three months. I cannot believe her. Now she's pushing me aside like she did before. One time, when I was ten, we were in Tennessee for my grandma's birthday and we were all outside and it was actually very nice because my mom was actually out with my and my cousins and wasn't sleeping like she usually is, she still sleeps all the time. Anyways we were outside and Susie wanted my mom to lay down with her. I asked if she could just stay out here for just a little bit longer and she said no. I remember what she said too.

"Autumn," she said sounding annoyed, "Susana is tired and needs me to lay down with her. I don't get to see you girls much over the summer so when one of you wants to hang out I'm going to take that chance," Then I watched her walk away. I was tempted to put up a fight, but I figured that if she can't see what she just did and see what she did to hurt my feelings then it wasn't worth it. At first I thought that since I was just a kid maybe it was normal for grown-ups to act like that, but when I looked up at my cousins and my uncle and he just stared at me, he knew what she just did. He knew that I wanted to hang out with her, but she chose Susie over me. I looked around and everyone was looking at me too. They all knew what just happened, but no one said anything, no one knew what to say, neither did I. I don't know why it bothers me still, it was a long time ago. I just think that since she is the youngest in her family and I'm the oldest she favors Susie over me, I hope that didn't sound too selfish. I guess it doesn't occur to her that it actually hurts me.