The Dark Side of the Moon

Chapter 6: Florence

-Florence’s P.O.V-

I awoke this morning to the usual ringing of my alarm. My hand shot out and I slapped the sleep button to turn the sound off, but forgot that clocks were generally made of hard plastic. My hand throbbed and I leapt out of bed and hopped around on the floor in pain, cradling my hand to my chest. They forgot to let you know in movies that when the character slaps their alarm clock that it does in fact hurt.

Seeing as I was wide awake already, I set to pulling on my school uniform. The school uniform actually wasn’t as bad as everybody claimed, it was quite plain. A navy, pleated skirt and white blouse for the girls; and navy pants and white shirt for the boys. Of course the school had various blue, black and white jumpers and cardigans to choose from so I slipped on a dark blue hoodie that radiated warmth, and pulled on a pair of black tights because it was particularly chilly today. Once I had fixed my hair, I bounded downstairs into the kitchen and was greeted by dull silence and a dim room.

Flicking on the lights, I popped an egg and some bacon into a pan and began frying up my breakfast. Usually I was a lot healthier but this morning I had an unusual craving for meat. Whistling as I flipped my tantalizing food over, I heard angry grunts and complaints of the noise from upstairs. The boys must be awake then.

After I had put the egg and bacon sandwiched inside two pieces of toast, I skipped upstairs and walked into my oldest brother Jeremy’s room. He was laying face-down on his mattress, with a heavy comforter barely covering his waist and below.

“Good morning oh wonderful brother!” I sang, munching through my breakfast while managing to grin at him. Jeremy was twenty two years old and hence spent most of his time mulling around bars and attending parties. This resulted in many sleep-ins and hangovers, which I just loved to tease him about. Waking him up early was a habit that I had slipped into every morning, no matter how many annoyed replies I received.

“Morning,” he grumbled, not lifting his face from the mattress. His floppy brown curls were messed around atop his head and I reached a hand over to ruffle his hair.

“Wakey, wakey boy, it’s time to rise and shine. I’ve got school today so I need a ride, seeing as the doctor said that I couldn’t drive,” I told him.

“How are you feeling?” was the barely understandable sentence that I got from his mumbles. I knew he was talking about my wounds yesterday.

Actually, now that I think about it, I wasn’t experiencing any aches or sharp pains this morning. Usually when you’re scratched up as much as I was there was an aftermath of painful twinges and aches if you moved the wrong way, but I had none. “I’m completely fine,” I said in amazement, almost to myself.

“Good,” he mumbled, pulling the covers up over his head.

I shook my head and left his room, shouting back to him at the last second. “You better be awake by the time I need to leave, or I'll be pissed. You know that I don’t like detentions for being late,” I warned. He didn’t reply.

I looked down the hall at the two shut doors of my other brothers, both older than me but I couldn’t have the heart to wake them up. They were probably sleeping off hangovers too and you don’t want to get on Jackson’s bad side if he’s cranky...

I was ready no more than five minutes later, teeth brushed and bag packed as I tapped my foot impatiently by the door. The sound resonated through the house and soon Jeremy was jogging down the stairs, hair mussed and t-shirt barely on. He wore no shoes and I laughed at his just-out-of-bed appearance.

“You’re going to be cold,” I told him.

“Nonsense I never get cold,” he shrugged it off, grabbing the keys and stepping out the door.