Jogging down the street, my ankles wobbly from my heels, I make a turn. My house, with its dark, blue roof and iron fence, stares at me. The mailbox stands ahead of me, splotches of paint scattered on it from when Evie and I painted it together. With a creak, I pull the lid open, with my two novels readily prepared inside in case I come home later than planned, and this is one of those cases. It’s to appear that I have been doing what I said. The sky darkens too quickly, much to my dismay, making it appear as I’ve been out for a long time. Holding my books against my hip, I ring the doorbell, hoping my dad would answer it instead of my mother.
Speak of the devil, it’s my mother. She swings open the white door, decorated with a painting of a faded flower, the knob jiggling from the harshness. Her eyebrows are frigid, her lips curled back. In a tight walk, she storms back into the house, sitting on the dining chair.
My mother scolds, “You’re back home awfully late.” She’s always a little tense after a bad day at work. Her dark hair is a mess, her silk blouse tight over her chest. Her black pencil skirt also seems to be stained with coffee.
“Sorry,” I mumble, placing my bag and books near the wooden staircase. My mother turns herself towards me, closing her thriller book, Mistress by James Patterson, while her metal chair creaks.
I hear her take a deep breath. Her tolerance level has always been very low. “Your father told me you were reading at the park.” She stands up, brushing her fingers through her hair, displaying her grey streaks.
“I was,” I lie, looking poise and aloof. I can feel her glare on me as I untie my shoelaces, after taking a seat on the couch.
“What were you reading?” My mother picks up one of the books on the stair. She skims through the blurb and places it down.
“It’s Clockwork Princess, the third book for The Infernal Devices trilogy,” I say, “it’s a good book, but you won’t really like it.”
“Ah, okay.” She glances at me again, this time with a scrutinising expression. “You sure cleaned up nice today.”
Where is she going with this? These long, questioning conversations with my mother always send me straight to Anxiety Town.
“Were you meeting up with someone?” Oh, come on.
“Of course, I did.” I roll my eyes. “Mum, I told you, I’m not even pretty enough for guys nowadays. Everyone wants the popular girl, not the girl that sits at the back of the classroom reading a book. At this rate, I’ll be alone forever, with my successful job, in a high rise apartment and my pet cat.”
“Right,” she says, slightly smiling, “let me know how that works out for you.”
“I will. Can I go now? I have to check up on a few things about my maths test.”
“Well, good luck on that test. You know what happens when you don’t get a high mark.”
“Of course I’ll get a high mark, and if I do not reach my standard, I will redo it.”
“That’s really good, Misty.” She sighs. I know that brings back bad memories of Evie, because if I’m correct, Evie would argue almost every day that she simply could not do better on a lot of tests.
Picking up my bag and books, I jog up the stairs and arrive in my bedroom.
***
Buzzing flows through my head, as my eyes open reluctantly. My hair, completely flattened on the left and the right utterly incapable of returning to its original state. I slide my finger across my phone to turn off the alarm. Pressing my hand against my forehead, I slump off the bed in a lazy manner. Hearing a clutter downstairs alerts me. My eyes fly open and I grab a butterknife from a plate I left in my room a few days ago. Letting my door click open, I creep down the stairs, probably looking ineffably ridiculous in my baggy pyjamas and a small knife in my hand.
YOU ARE READING
My Double Life
Teen FictionA tragedy changed me. Misery consumed me. The cataclysm that was my sister's death, transformed me into two different people. She died because of what people thought of her. And that is not going to happen to me. My parents wanted her to be a perfe...
