The car journey home was excruciatingly long and painfully quiet. My insanity was clearly the elephant in the room. We had only just passed the town centre and had a 30 minute or so ride back home. The tension was already too awkward for my liking. So I turned on the radio. It burst into life, the smooth voice at the end breaking the stillness.
‘And now, a song by Gnarles Barkley’ he said and then the song started playing. I tapped my foot in time, trying to distract myself from mother’s unsteady glances that she shot my way every so often.
(I remember when, I remember, I remember when I lost my mind) Oh god. Awkward. Mum looked at me strangely and I turned up the radio, wincing when the chorus came;
(Does that make me crazy? Does that make me crazy? Does that make me crazy? Possibly) I slammed my palm into the radio dial and turned it off abruptly. I sighed. Wow, how appropriate.
‘Angel’ mum started, her voice soft and condescending, as though she was talking to a 3 year old.
‘Yes, mother?’ I replied, trying not to sound affected by her tone.
‘We need to talk.’ She said.
What do you think we’re doing now? ‘About?’ I replied instead of my original thoughts.
‘What Bernadette talked about earlier’ Ugh. I sighed heavily and cowered further into my seat.After I was dragged back to Bernadette’s office, I was made to sit outside for 30 minutes while they had a long chat about me. I huffed as I remembered it, only to see mum turn around with a worried look in her eyes.
‘This could be serious Angel. Tell me what’s going on.’ She said and I quietly snorted.
‘You don’t understand. And what do you mean serious?’ I said a bit too forcefully, though I tried to seem composed and calm.
‘Well, enlighten me then’ she said, anger starting to show through in her voice at my last comment, clearly avoiding the question. Woops. She shot me a glare and her grip tightened on the steering wheel.
‘OK’ I said slowly, trying to calm her down, ‘I’ll explain.’ I continued, calm and timid. Her grip loosened and her shoulders relaxed. ‘He’s back.’ I said simply.
‘Who?’
‘You know, him.’ I said, trying to edge around the subject. She quickly registered these words and turned around wide eyed.
‘You mean…?’
‘Yes.’ I replied, cutting her off. ‘What did you mean by serious mum?’ I asked, referring to her earlier point.
‘Zara… We’ve been through this. He’s not real.’ She said sincerely. I snapped round, infuriated.
‘He is!’ I almost screamed. ‘I saw him today, I hugged him, and He gave me his hat!’ I said and lifted up the hat that was placed on my lap. She looked down at the hat and sighed.
‘Angelica, you know he is a figment of your imagination. He’s made up. He’s not real.’ She said, trying to stress that to me, make me see sense or something. I growled. She was lying! What a bitch, how dare she even think that he wasn’t real… but I counted to 10 slowly and calmed down. I set my eyes on the expanse of road ahead and kept my gaze fixed on it. I tried to think of a suitable come back, something to persuade her, show her he was real! But nothing came to mind.
Then she sighed, ‘And Bernadette thinks…. Well she’s not a doctor so she can’t say yet, but she thinks….’
‘She thinks what mum?!’
‘She thinks the depression is back, Ang.’
I gasped, like the wind had suddenly been punched out of me, and searched around for any sign of hope. Defeated. Again. It had come back to haunt me. I closed my eyes and pictured his face, his wings extended, the wind tousling his brown hair, his arms open wide and his brown eyes sparkling.
We fell into an uncomfortable silence, and I kept it that way.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Hope you enjoyed it :) vote-worthy?:D thanks for reading, will upload soon hopefully!
