WRITERS BLOCK

Stick Says: They packed their bags and planned their escape

Okay, now, I could do the whole a boy and a girl run away with each other... But I ain't feeling it. Nope. Life is much more depressing. People don't always have to courage to do that.

The house was quiet. In any normal circumstance, that would be nice, seeing as it is 10pm. Not in their house. Their house is usually loud with screaming or fighting or bickering or... not silence. Older siblings with parents. Younger siblings with parents. Parents with parents. Older siblings with younger siblings... Any possible scenario would work. They were a fighting family. And the two eldest ones were tired of it.

So the house was quiet only because everybody was out. Parents were gone. Younger kids out cold; sleeping. The middle teenagers were in their own separate rooms, probably on an electronic device.

But the older teens were in the room they shared. Planning. Plotting. Devising.

Two backpacks were on the floor, stuffed with all the essentials. Earlier that week, they had printed out two bus tickets to Chicago. One teenager was 18... the other only 16. But it would work for the time being. They had a plan. They would buy a shack or an apartment or something.

Maybe they should go to a small town...?

But they were leaving anyway. Then their parents came home two hours later and checked on everybody... why, they don't know. But they did it every night.

They snuck out their bedroom window and left their family behind. It wasn't even a family, they couldn't work through any problems together. An uncle, a cousin, a best friend, anybody could start a fire in that house. The kids would fan the flame and the parents would sit back and watch.

So they left.

Eventually they came back. After a while had past, they came to check on their siblings. What they found was unbelievable.

Their family had come together in their time of grief. When they had run away, everybody worked with each other. Now, they were a real family. 10pm was always quiet... or loud with laughter. If they fought, they made up. By running away, they created peace in their home.  They created a family.