Someone Like Me

Chapter Thirty-Nine: Everything Seems To Be In Peaches's Ballpark...

It was starting to become late into the night and I knew I needed to get home. Home was the last place I wanted to be right now but I couldn't stay with Dalton nor Charlie. So that was my only choice. Dalton followed me on the drive home, so that he knew that I got home safe, before heading home himself.

Everything seemed to be normal when I stepped into the house. Everything was turned off in the living room but I could see a light in the kitchen. I would have ignored it but I heard my mother's voice call for me. She didn't sound so happy. As much as I wanted to just go up to my room and lock my door, I knew she wasn't going to let it end like that.

"Cherry, come here," She called out again with an eerie calmness. Oh, why couldn't there be a robber or even a kidnapper in my kitchen.

"What?" I grumbled while standing at the entrance of the kitchen. She was sitting at the island drinking some wine and reading a magazine. I could see Dalton's image in the corner of the front page. She wore her pajamas and her feet were propped up on the counter.

"Where were you today?" The calm tone in her voice sent a shiver up my spin.

"Out with friends," I answered without showing emotion because I knew she would use that against me.

"Oh," She took a sip of her drink. "I hope not with Dalton."

"Really?" I was ticked, "Why is it such a big problem that I'm with him? He wants to be with me and no one else."

"It is a problem," The steadiness in her voice was making my skin crawl. I grabbed the edge of my shirt to keep from shaking and clenched my fist. My shirt was going to be wrinkled after the action but I didn't care at the moment. My mother was really bugging me. "I don't want you with him, he's not for you. Out of your ballpark, but for Peaches...it's a perfect fit. Don't you think? I think they would be wonderful together. Imagine the fame they could have and how happy they would be together. It would be best if you let him go and find someone more suitable for your...ballpark." Someone who is more suitable for my ballpark?! Did she just base me on a level of popularity and fame? My own mother was trying to make me break up with a man who wants to be with me. Me! No one else. He's already told me this. He wants to be in my life and I want to be in his.

"No!" I was pissed, "I'm not breaking up with a man who wants to be with me. I'm not dumping him because my selfish mother wants my sister, who has all the fame and popularity, to be with him. Why can't you be happy for me!? No, you want everything to go to Peaches. Everything and I don't get any love, attention, or complements from my own mother! And now, after you find out that this man, Dalton, is giving me all this attention and affection that has been missing in my life and you want me to break up with him!? So that Peaches can be with him? So that her fame can rise more, so that you can feel more proud about your perfect daughter, and so that you can forget more about your other daughter who has been unhappy and ignored all her life?! Do you not listen to yourself? Do you not see the way that you treat me? Do you not get how much you're hurting me? No you don't, because you're always focused on Peaches."

I didn't even listen to her because I left the kitchen and went to my room. I locked my door behind me before crawling into bed trying to calm myself down from the anger spew that I had just given to my mother. There was silence in the house after that. I knew that Peaches heard me shouting at our mother from downstairs.

There was a soft knock on my door as I drifted off to sleep. I heard it again, this time a little louder, but I ignored it. Once more there was a knock until finally the person left.

I heard Peaches's bedroom door close quietly after that.

I forgot about the knocks in my sleeping state.

j9