The Rise and Falls of Melody Wilson

Part 4

It was later that night when everything was dead silent through the house, that I heard him finally come in. Come home.

That afternoon after tending to my passed out mother, now safely snoring it up in her own room, I had went into his room expecting to see him too passed out asleep or messing around on his stolen laptop. However, I only found an obviously slept in bed and a dirty, stinky room. I laid in my bed hoping that he might actually come up the stairs to my room and say something. Instead, I heard him stumble up the stairs, past my bedroom into his own room, slamming the door shut.

 After a few moments of low grumbles and grunts, I heard him drop down onto his bed and go out cold. A small, disappointed, sigh from the breath that I had accidentally held in, escaped my lips. I turned to face the window adjacent to my bed; a tall tree peeked in through it.

I felt a tear slide down my cheek and hit the pillow just before I finally closed my eyes and fell asleep...

***

Mariah never quite understood why having a hardly there mother and brother was such a big issue for me.

Why I still cared about them was an even bigger mystery to her.

With her over obsessive mother and no other siblings, Mariah would have loved to trade places with me. If she only knew.

I skimped through my school week, taking notes and doing homework in a daze. I hardly noticed anyone around me. April had come up to me a couple times during school, finally deciding to pay attention and ask where things were.

Mariah had nagged me all through lunch to come to the big party that was being held tonight by Jack who had big connections with "famous people", but I told her I was too busy with other things.

After spending her whole lunch period begging me she finally gave up and stalked down the hall.

As soon as the final bell rang I hurried out of school and zipped home, I wanted to get home and fix anything that needed to be cleaned so that I could have enough time to finally relax and take care of myself.

The whole week I had come back to a smelly and dirty house that had taken the rest of my night to clean up. I kept finding more and more rolled up paper ends shoved into ridiculous places. Under the sofa, some wrapped in tissue paper and left on the table, some were just left in the open for me to find.

When I arrived home, I found no other cars parked in front of the house, and I hurried inside. As I did a quick walk through of the house, I was pleasantly surprised to find it wasn't that dirty, and I could have more time to wind down now that I didn't have much to clean. After a swift, but thorough, cleaning I made my way upstairs and into my personal bathroom to start a hot bath.

It was dark out when I reluctantly withdrew myself from the calming bath. I wrapped myself in a white plush bathrobe and hurried to answer my phone.

 "I hope you changed your mind about the party!" Mariah said without a simple 'Hello'.

I rolled my eyes, feeling almost happy as I walked to my closet and started sifting through my clothes, "Sorry Ri, but it's still a no go." I could feel her frown over the phone line.

 "You know I'm now lying to my mother. I told her I was coming with you and that's the only reason she's letting me go, she knows you're too much of a goody two shoes to get into trouble."