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Song: Enough, Goblins From Mars
I lay in my little brother's old room now (Note: His name is Toby if I ever mention him again). Posters peel off the dirty walls, his grey metal shelves coloured with the rust slowly eating away at where little toy cars sit on the shelves among books and books about monster trucks and such. The small closet in the corner is open, which is a rare sight. Almost as if in his memory, I walk over and shut it. In the small house you can hear my older brother making dinner. You can smell the smoke of my mother's cigarette as it trails in little grey clouds on the floor, like rust eating away at her lungs.
The room is on a downstairs level, underground, but the windows are high up near the ceiling, in a way that you can see people's feet as they walk by. I watch the breeze blow in a few leaves through the dirty windows while I slowly chew on crackers, crumbs falling from my thin lips onto the dirt and concrete ground.
A cat stumbles through the window onto the ground. When she stands up again and spots me, she doesn't run away. Instead, she is now tilting her head, staring at me, and then crouches and prowls slowly towards the crumbs beneath my feet. I pull my feet onto the little mattress lying on the ground, watching the cat nibble away.
She is so small. Don't ask me how I know that this cat is a she, but I can tell somewhere deep in the back of my mind. She hops onto the mattress, and I throw the remaining crackers across the room so she wouldn't be so close. Not that I'm afraid of her. She just seems so fragile. As if at any moment she could float away, turning to the smoke of cigarettes if I touch her black fur.
She returns agains, this time sitting on my little brother's pillow. She cocks her head again, and I see deep in her eyes how hungry she is. "We have no food," I tell her, rolling my eyes. She takes a step closer, her tail flicking, her yellow eyes begging.
Next to the closet is another door that leads up to the ground floor. I run up the wooden staircase, my bare feet lightly touching each creaking step and I let out a sigh. I spin around with a bad feeling in my gut. She still stares at me, her long fur blowing in the wind. Her large and wide eyes tell, "Keep going. Please. For me?"
I open the door and walk towards the living room. Our entire upstairs is actually just a living room with a bathroom, it's just that we put up little bookshelves as walls to make bedrooms. When I step past two metal shelves, I see my brother and his friends and a little evil monster next to them.
"MOM!!!" I scream at the top of my lungs, instinctively standing on top of the small dining table. The dog bares his teeth and barks loudly, it's fur rippling against its large muscles. He puts his paws on the table, and I back up to the wall.
"What?" My mom asks as she stumbles into the room. My brother and his friends are in tears like me, except for a completely different reason. She glares at my brother before grabbing the dog and dragging him away by his collar, throwing the screen door open and the bulldog out.
"Why are you up here? I thought you had schoolwork," she asks while Leo coos, "Aw, please don't cry," while trying to conceal his laugh. He scoops me up like a baby and wipes my tears away while the faint bark of the dog sends shivers down my spine.
"I wanted just to get milk and crackers," I tell her with a sniffle. My mom walks out the door, letting the breeze blow in, and she walks down in the direction of the store. My brother is still holding me, and I cuddle closer to him, his body heat warming my body that is only covered with a tank top and shorts.
And for a minute, I feel safe.
A/N: I just realized how much the music doesn't match the chapters :/
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