Broken Promises

Chapter Four

I probably stood there, rapt and mesmerized, with my jaws open and my heartbeat rapid -- seeming stupid just standing there in the middle of a hallway, but damn, Julia.... Just.... Damn.

Such happiness and bliss I felt. It was intense.

I headed out of the school and decided I walk home. I may probably sound like a sap and a sissy, but I really did notice how the sky was then bluer and how the grass was greener, how the cloulds puffed up and floated about, how the birds chirped to their delight and how serene they seem, and how beautiful the day was. I actually felt like prancing around and about in free and frolic or spreading out wings to fly, fly, fly -- but I resorted, instead, to humming -- and hum, I did, I did, I just did. I was happy. I was.

I arrived at my house. It was a decaying one -- it was ripping apart by the seams in neglect and abandon, but it will have to make do. I carefully opened the gate and crossed our lawn, dried and untamed leaves snapping apart as I stepped on them and crunching underneath my feet. I swung -- slowly as I could -- the door open and saw, yet again, my father, drinking, slipping away again, closing himself on us.

But he never really did quite nix our existence in his life.

"What are you doing here?"

"I'm... Home, Dad."

"**** it, where the hell have you been?"

"School."

"School!" He banged on the table with his beer bottle, which shattered to pieces. Thank the heavens, Dad didn't wind up with wounded hands; if I ever had to mend them, such would become a one hell of a herculean task. He would berate me every chance he got. "You ought to just work, Peter, cause school will--" He wiped his mouth and spat, "do you no good."

He leaned back on the rotting couch we had, flickered on a cigarette, and asked me. "And where is your f---ck-ng brother?"

"I don't know, Dad. Probably working."

"Working! And yet we get no money. He better not be spending this on girls and booze."

So you yourself could engross in those stuff? I wanted to ask, but I bit my tongue back instead. I waited for him to say more, to drone on and on with his usual tirades, but then he kept silent afterward. And it was a green light that I could scamper off upstairs.

Usually he ruins my day quite so, but definitely he couldn't that day, for I was actually happy. Yes. I was happy. I entered my room and ripped off my polo shirt, then sat down, just thinking of the happiness I am feeling at the moment. No way. No, no way. No.

I sat there for a while, just pondering and reflecting, when...

My sketchpad.

I quickly pulled my bag towards me and let spill its contents. Such contents were void of my sketchpad. I thought of today's occurrences when...

It was with Julia.

I didn't know what to feel. Should I feel happy that she has it with her, or frightened (how the hell will I be able to claim it back, will I have to talk to her again, just why why why did this happen) that she did... My mind was racing, as per usual, a mile a minute again. It went on to thoughts of her, during the first months of school, to the time I first saw her with boys, to actually wondering if she ever got lai--

When the thoughts were too much to contain, I pulled out my canvas and began sketching with my pencil. Time had passed and the sun was slowly slipping away when exhaustion wrapped around me and bade I sleep, and I did, but not without glancing at what was done.

Despite the erasures and so, I ended up drawing the outline of a girl's face.