Second Snapshot (Picture This Sequel: Niall Horan)

-Discover your weakness. [Chapter 55]

CHAPTER FIFTY FIVE- Discover your weakness.

That whole night I couldn’t shake it from my thoughts. It was something so innocent, so pure; it was that little scrap of happiness that proved that we ever were a family like that. But maybe that was what she despised: The thought of me being the part of our happy family. I was no stranger to feeling unwanted by my Mum, but as I thought back, I never really realised it as a kid. I thought that was how all families worked; I was the oldest therefore the more responsible so I wouldn’t require as much attention as Ellie. I was the cooperative kid. I was the one who made life easier for my Mother; at least I was for the first few years of my life as a Dawson.  It wasn’t as if things were completely contrasting. As an innocent four year old, my Mum clearly had to treat me like that was what I was; an innocent four year old. So at the time I never thought anything of it when she would coincidentally forget to bring my water bottle on family days out so I would have to go without for the whole day since there was no point buying one when I could wait until I got home. Or when there was coincidentally never ‘enough time’ for me to get an ice cream but there was enough time for Ellie when we went to the beach. Or how I wasn’t allowed to go into the sea because I had forgotten to remind her to apply my sun cream in the heights of summer; was that supposed to be my responsibility at the age of four years old? I had been brought up to think that it was, but apparently not. Apparently this wasn’t what all families were like. While Ellie got toys for birthdays and Christmas I got books, educational things. From a tender age it was clear was I was supposed to be when I was older – intelligent. That was pretty much the only thing that I didn’t hate that my parents planed for me to do. It was always different to walk into primary school that first day and be taught the things you already knew, to take the tests you learnt the answers for a year ago and to be explaining what a word meant; not asking what it meant.

Even though I knew I was different from the other kids, more serious, not knowing what bubble mixture was when I was handed a pot. In a way I kind of liked it. It was clear in my family what life was like; if you were intelligent you had a chance. If you were stupid; well then you might as well start picking your street corner and drug dealer now. I’d always been afraid of that life; that life of emptiness. Of unemployment, of lack of knowledge. Which was why I never did complain when Ellie spent her summers singing and writing lyrics and I spent mine at the library; reading, researching, studying. It was always like this, until I said I didn’t want it anymore. I think that was always where things went wrong between my Mother and I. Ten years old and two school years ahead of other kids my age I was doing well for myself, everything was fine. I was intelligent, I was collected and to me; knowledge was everything. But I suppose the real trouble started when I enrolled in a P.E class instead of taking English lit like I was supposed to. I want to run Mum, I like running. These were the eight words that changed our relationship forever.

It wasn’t the fact that I liked running. It was the fact that I actually wanted to do it. It was never clear exactly what I was supposed to be in their eyes as soon as I reached the legal age to get a job but the one point was clear; I was going to be intelligent. Things were slow at first, she would stop answering my calls for her to pick me up from track practice and I would end up walking home in thunderstorms. Which I didn’t mind, but it was just another sign, a sign of how I was slowly being detached. Or then if track ran overtime and I was late home there would be no dinner for me, and the leftovers would have already been chucked away. I brought my own track kit: If I wanted this hobby, it was my own responsibly. They weren’t going to make me quit, but they weren’t going to be on my side and help the situation either. I think they thought that if I found it hard enough, then in the end I’d just give it up. But that was always the thing; I loved it so much I never did give it up. And I kept going, that was until I turned thirteen. Hearing that I was quitting track and becoming a girly girl was like music to my Mother’s ears. And maybe it did benefit me, climbing to the top of the social ladder just as Ellie got her big break things were going pretty well for me. Or at least that’s what everyone thought. But it’s never always quite as pretty on the outside as it is on the inside. I may have had a football player boyfriend, rich parents and a big house but that doesn’t mean it was what I wanted. Because it wasn’t, I knew girls that didn’t have half of the stuff I did and they were happy, they really were happy. I’d always kind of wanted to be one of them, nobody judging, free to do what you want. The type of family that got the standard Tesco brand of food, not the value and not the finest, just average. The type of girls who got their clothes from Primark, and didn’t pay up to eighty pounds for some sweatpants.