The Toy Train

It was a warm sunny day when I saw dad for the last time. I still remember everything about that day. I was ten years old and my brother was six. Up until then I thought we lived the perfect life. But that morning our dream was shattered. My brother James and I woke to mum's quite voice coldly urging us to get up and pack all of our stuff. "What's happening?" I asked. I never got an answer.

The rest of that day happened in quick succession. We packed all of our things, got into the car and drove away. As simple as that we left our previously perfect life behind. We just drove away.

"Mummy, I left my toy train at home." My brother whined. Mum ignored him. "I need my toy train, it was my favourite." My brother said, crying now. "We can't go back there," my mum says, her stare ahead unfaltering. My brother starts to sob, but mum just ignored him as she continued to stare at the road as she drove along. "Why?" I asked "Why did we leave?" "When will Daddy be back?" She didn't answer me, she just kept driving.

That night we arrived at a very small townhouse. "This is our new home," mum declared as she turned the keys in the front door. My brother and I were so tired we had nothing to say, we just shuffled inside.

We slept on the floor that night, with no mattress and nothing to keep us warm but our body heat. James woke up in the middle of the night and started crying, I held him while he cried, I held him and just let him cry until he fell asleep again. Mum didn't even stir in her deep sleep, she had gotten so drunk earlier that she'd thrown up and then passed out in her own vomit. The person lying there was not the Mother I thought I knew. I felt like I lost both of my parents that day.

It took about a week for it to truly sink in that I'd never see dad again, that my old life was gone. At first this filled me with such terrible sadness, that I felt I could hardly breathe, but my troubles had just begun. My childhood had come to a crashing end and the hard realities of life were going to force me to grow up instantly.

The second week of our new reality Mum enrolled us in a new school. She used a different surname and told us not to talk about our old life. Everything was really different to our old school. I found it really hard to fit in, I felt like an alien, like no one could understand the world I was living in now. When I was there my mind was never just in schoolwork.

At home mum started going out with different men each night. She'd come home really late and pass out. If I woke her too early she would yell and scream. I started to realise I could no longer feel sorry for myself. If James and I were to survive then I needed to be the mum. I needed to make sure that we were going to be alright. It was up to me to keep us going.

I got into a routine, I would get James up before school every morning and try and find us something to eat, if there was nothing there I would sneak into my mothers room and see if I could find any money in her purse, I knew she wouldn't remember if she had any or not. If I found any I would use it to buy bread and Vegemite from the corner milk bar. That would make us toast for breakfast and a sandwich for lunch. The days when there wasn't any money we just went hungry. Usually when we got home from school mum would be awake, preparing for another night out. She would make us dinner before she left, baked beans on the last of our bread or plain pasta with tomato sauce were the usual fare. I never had time for homework. Mum would leave after we had eaten and it was up to me to get James bathed and into bed, most nights I would try and tell him a story. I would either read from one of my school books or make up adventures about his trains, these were his favourite. He would ask me to tell him over and over again until he fell asleep.

This was our life for about a year. I never knew why we had left Dad, I thought something terrible had happened. Finally the night came when I found the answer I had been waiting for. It was not what I expected. It was a Thursday night and Mum came home earlier than she usually would, she had two bottles of wine in a brown paper bag, she seemed strangely happy and wanted to talk. At first I was excited because she hadn't wanted to talk to us for as long as I could remember. She told us that things would soon be better, that we would be moving in to a mansion in no time. By this time she has finished the first bottle of wine and was opening the second. I though this was the perfect time for me to ask the questions that had been burning inside my mind for over a year. "Hey Mum, can I asked you a question?" I blurted out in a rush.
"Sure honey, shoot." She slurred taking another sip of wine.
"Why did we leave Dad? What did he do?" I asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.
"That loser, he never did anything. That was the problem." She said with a cold laugh.
"What do you mean?" I asked not understanding why she would laugh.
"It wasn't my fault you know, the family breaking up. He left me no choice. I needed things that he refused to give me. I wanted a better life I wanted more things. Your father said we had to save. He said we needed to buy a house and put money in the bank, but I needed stuff now. We left because he wouldn't buy me a new car. My friend Marcie got a new car. Her husband bought her a BMW. I wanted one too, but your father just wouldn't do it. He said the money in the bank was for your schooling, he just didn't give me what I deserved. So we left. If he wasn't going to give me what I needed, I was going to find someone else who would." She said, everything just coming out.
"But you don't have anyone now." I said not really believing what I was hearing. She blew up our life over a car? Suddenly a change came over my mother all merriness evaporated. Instantly I regretted my words, I knew I should have been more careful. Her eyes narrow in a glare as she spat her next sentence right in my face. "It's your fault you know. Yours and your useless brother's." Sitting at the end of the table James began to cry. This had no effect on my mother as she continued on. "I could of had any man before you two were born. Men used to fight over me before my life was ruined by you and your father. If I had just left you with him, I'd be living in a mansion right now, driving my very own BMW."
Her words unleashed the tide of my feelings, washing away my self control. I didn't care anymore not even for James, my anger got the best of me. "Why? Why did you take us? Why didn't you leave us where we were happy?" I yelled at her. She got deadly calm. She looked me right in the eyes as she quietly said. "Why? That's easy. You and your father ruined my life, I had to repay the compliment." Her words hurt me more then what came next.