Impulse Control (ON HOLD)

Chapter 10

Cleo's POV

After that Taylor Swift song is over, a pang of nostalgia hits me. I miss home and I definitely miss Bree, my best friend. If Bree were here, we'd be talking and swapping theories about Taylor Swift's sexuality. Bree thought Taylor's gay. I don't. I think she's bi. 

A sigh escapes my throat as I remember middle school. Bree was the one who made it all possible for me. She's the one who punched the bullies in the face and walked protectively in front of my girlfriend and I when we decided to come out. In other words, Bree was not only a strong-willed girl who didn't give a fuck about what anyone else thought, but she was also my best friend.

On good days, I think about how long it would've taken me to come out if Bree hadn't come out first. I honestly don't know if I would've came out to Bree if she hadn't come out to me. I was expecting her to blow me off and stop being my friend. I truly was. Her family solely consists of die-hard Catholics, and it never would've occurred to me that she was part of the defying clan, too. Can you spell irony?

"Cleo?" Sierra asks, and I turn to face her. "Yeah?" "The storm's letting up," she says in that quiet tone of voice. "You should probably go home. I think there's some damage." "Okay," I say, disappointment lacing my tone. Sierra tips her head at me in that questioning way, but I refuse to acknowledge it. "I'm going into town to find Mom and David," she continues. "They'll need to buy some things."

I nod, rising to my feet and grabbing the things I brought. "So, I'll, uh, see you tomorrow?" Sierra asks in a timid, childlike voice. I exhale long and low. I didn't mean for her to notice my sadness. Forcing a smile, I reply, "Yeah. See you tomorrow."

***

Once I'm safely home and Sierra's car is safely out of sight, I let myself collapse on the old shag sofa. I drop my bags tiredly. I've already surveyed the damage outside, which isn't too much.

 I was planning on spending this trip inside the camper, anyway. Not that I don't love swimming - I just don't want to swim alone. I wouldn't even be here if Mom and Dad hadn't dragged me. In all honesty, they just wanted to get rid of me for the month so they could engage in their nighttime sex-a-thons. I tried to tell them that I didn't care, but they insisted that it wasn't "proper" for a girl my age to be forced to listen to her parents making love all night long.

I let a sigh escape my throat. Proper. Proper. I'm beginning to hate the word. Of course, my wearing of snapbacks and low-cut tank tops isn't proper, either. It makes me angry how much they try to control me. For God's sake, I'm seventeen years old! I'm going to live on my own as soon as the summer's over. I honestly can't wait until my eighteenth birthday, which is coming up this month. After I'm eighteen, my worries will be over. I can finally come out without fear that I'll be living on the streets.

Often, I feel like I'm carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders. And I know from experience that as soon as I'm out, that weight will magically disappear.  But I will miss my parents, that's for sure. I'll miss my mom's gingerbread cookies and the way she braided my hair for me when I was young.

Sometimes I wish I could be young again. Being young is so uncomplicated. Children have no real worries. Not anything like mine. Children don't live in fear of being kicked out because of who they are. Children don't have grief pangs or parents who won't acknowledge their daughter's problems. Children don't have to wait until their parents are gone to play their favorite songs or watch stuff on YouTube. Most of all, children don't have to hide anything they don't want to hide.

Groaning, I lift myself up from the coach. My legs and hips are sore from yesterday's yoga practice, and I still have yet another practice to do today. I wouldn't have even thought of yoga if my life hadn't been transformed into a tragedy.

But now it has, and yoga's calming effects help to quell the sadness of my everyday life. Sometimes I wonder if my brain just doesn't work like everybody else's, and that's why I have the inability to move on and make new friends. At times I convince myself that it really was my fault and that's why I can't forget it.

"I need to go outside and get things cleaned up," I tell myself, but my body doesn't obey the commands I give it to move. I'm sore, tired, and grief-stricken. As like almost every day, I simply don't have the energy to do what needs to be done.

Which sounds like a petty excuse, since I was just moving and grooving to Taylor Swift and Aretha Franklin. Not to mention the ball-of-fire sensation I got from holding Sierra.

But, there's something different about her, different from the other girls. Whenever I'm near her, I'm caught in a kaleidoscope of emotions, all tangled up and unidentifiable. Part of me wants to hold her and connect with her in as many ways as possible, while another part of me wants to run away from her and never look back.

Sighing, I shake my head. Maybe if I take a small nap, I'll have more energy and things will seem better and more clear when I wake up.

***

I jolt awake, panting heavily. Sweat makes tracks down my face. I shiver and shake, hugging my knees to my chest. I rock back and forth in a tight ball. Confusion clouds my brain.

It's gotten to the point where I almost expect the nightmare to happen. It's came every time I go to sleep since I was sixteen. But this time, it was different.

I'm standing in a room, white walls gleaming back at me from all directions. A claustrophobic feeling takes over, and all of the air seems to be sucked from my lungs. There's no window, no way out, except for a door at the far side of the room. I run to it, trying frantically to push the door open. But the doorknob won't turn. The door is locked.

The walls begin to close in on me, steadily moving towards me from all directions.

Now, normally at this point in the dream, I'd wake up just as the walls were about to squash me. But this time, instead of waking up as the walls were going to turn me into a human pancake, I saw someone in one of the walls and their motion stopped.

The person's face was clearly outlined in the wall, as was her hand, which was holding a small rope to which an object was attached. 

It was Sierra, and she was holding the key to the locked door.