Not quite living

Shattered Perfection

When I was growing up everything was perfect.

It was like a living picture frame. My parents were happily married. My sibling were happy. Our pets were cute and cuddly.

So it was perfect. Right?

My sister would tell me her stories and her life. She would sing me her songs and read me her poems. She invited me in on things with her friends when they were over.

My brother would show me his yugioh cards that I didn't understand. He would let me play his video games.

The three of us would watch charmed followed by supernatural then whatever disney original movie was on then how i met your mother every saturday and in the summer. We would play video games together once our parents got home. We played legos almost daily.

As we got older, my brother separated himself. We still did all those things, but it was a lot less. And it got less and less until it didn't happen anymore.

When it started, it was summer, me and my sister would watch the morning shows (charmed and supernatural) then we would walk to the nearby park. We would play at the park itself or we would walk around the forest-y area or we would hang out at the water.

That stopped when school started along with soccer for her. So I went back to playing video games with my brother in his room while he did his school work. The three of us rarely ever played lego's anymore.

It eventually all stopped. My sister stopped sharing her stories and her writing. I wasn't allowed around my sisters friends anymore. I wasn't allowed in my brother's room anymore. We didn't go on walks. And we barely ever watched tv together; only when we happened to be in the room together.

It was then that my parents started fighting more. They didn't talk anymore, they were barely ever in the same room as each other.

A few years passed and my mom stopped cooking, she was barely eating, but none of us noticed. We were always at school and her and dad at work. Dad was cooking everyday or not at all. My sister cooked the days he didn't. And the days she didn't, we ordered pizza or shitty fast food was brought to us by whatever parent got to the house last.

I eventually learned that all of the games and stories and keeping me busy was to protect me from the fighting and the mental abuse. They did such a good job that I didn't realize nobody was happy. So when I say "I don't know what 'parents' are, my siblings raised me" this is what I mean.

My mother was a depressed workaholic.
My father was depressed.
My sister became depressed.
My brother became depressed.
She stopped cooking, or caring.
He stopped caring or cared too much.
She stopped sharing.
He closed himself off.

It sucks being five years younger than your youngest older sibling. You have no idea what's going on and no one can tell you because you don't even know those words yet. Well, I didn't. but that's because I was over sheltered at my school.

I didn't understand anything that was happening, why things were stopping. All I understood was that they didn't want to be around me anymore. And neither did anybody else.