Glass Facades

Chapter two

The guest's room didn't have any blackout curtains, so they light poured in around seven a.m. But even the sunlight hitting my eyes at seven a.m was a better way to wake up than with my parents yelling at each other or me.

The bag had fallen to the floor overnight and the medallion had rolled under the desk. I crawled under it and got the silver chain, without really looking at it I threw it in the bag. I never cared for it in my house I wasn't gonna start caring now, was I? I got a white shirt from my bag, the left shoulder had a tiny hole in it that I tried to hide by throwing my hair over it.

The house was quiet, not very surprising given the fact that is was seven a.m of a Sunday. I got out of my room and walked down the stairs which just like last night creaked when I walked over them. The light had flooded the living room and before going to the kitchen I took a minute to look at the place where I had created most of the best memories of my life.

One of the bricks in the fireplace was cracked. I scoffed and smiled when I saw it. Jay had broken it while we played baseball. Yes, we were playing baseball inside the house. When aunt Amalie came back from the shop she found us desperately trying to glue the broken piece back to its place. She yelled and kicked us out to the yard, we continued our game until I hit the ball too strong and sent it flying to the neighbour's house.

I kept walking around the place until I got to the pictures sitting in one of the shelves of the place. The vast majority showed aunt Amalie and Jay doing different things. There were pictures of them on a beach both wearing sunglasses, another one in which they were having ice cream in a park which I recognized. We used to play there all the time as kids.

Then I stopped when I noticed two other pictures. The first one showed my mother, aunt, Jay and me all smiling brightly to the camera. Looking at my mother made a knot form in my throat, she had changed so much over the years, it was almost unbelievable that she had once been the woman who smiled at me from the picture.

The other picture showed three kids. The tiny girl was me and I was holding a giant cone of raspberry flavoured ice cream, my favourite to this day. The two other boys were my cousin and his best friend who had become my best friend too during those years I spent here in White ridge. His name was Logan and his chocolate cone was on the floor in between his legs melting under the sun. My cousin was pointing at the ice cream and laughing with his mouth wide open. His own cone was dangerously tilted, the ice cream looking as if it was about to fall to the floor any second.

The pictures kept going and showing how much my cousin had grown over the years. There was another one of my cousin and Logan, they both had a shaved spot right on top of their right ear and they both had bright red cheeks. I definitely wanted to hear the story behind that picture.

I was about to turn to go to the kitchen when I felt someone tackling me and making us both fall to the wooden floor. We rolled around the living room in a mess of legs and arms until I managed to push the person off.

"Who the hell are you?" He screamed to my face.

"What the fuck?" I also shouted. "What the hell's your problem?"

"My problem? You are the one invading a house, you thief!"

"Thief?" I screamed not believing what the guy was accusing me of. "I'm living here!"

"No, you're not. I come here almost every single day, you were not here yesterday. Or any other day as a matter of fact. This is the first time I see you."

"I arrived last night dumbass!" I shouted back at him.

"Guys! Sundays are wonderful days in which we are supposed to sleep until noon. "Aunt Amalie came running down the stairs and almost fell down when she tripped on the last step." So what are you-" She interrupted herself when she saw us."Oh my God." She raised her hands and covering her face she let out a frustrated groan. She was still in her pajamas and she was wearing a grey robe on top of them which was loosely tied around her waist.