Imperfect Illusions [ON HOLD and probably CANCELLED]

Imperfect Illusions - Chapter 1

Most kids love Fridays. Me? I hate them. All they mean to me is having to spend time with them. My broken family I try so hard to avoid. My father is currently in jail for beating the crap out of my mom. It's always the same. He gets out, promising to change, then she takes him back and it happens all over again. I'm the one who has to listen to it. I learned to call the cops by age 7. Then I'm left alone to pick up the pieces of my broken mother. The hardest part? Nobody knows. I keep it all in. Once, when I was 11, I told my best friend at the time, Hanna. She laughed and called me a liar. So that's how it is. End of story.

Back to the present. I got home from school and went straight to my room. It was small, but it was my only escape. Practically every inch was covered with posters of my bands, singers, and celebrities. Especially Avril Lavigne. I loved her music. I quickly changed into shorts and my Elite cheer shirt, grabbed my iPhone, and left without so much as a word to my mother. 

I headed with a to the park about 3 blocks from my house. I lived on the more decrepit side of a whole-in-the-wall town called Eerie. The only way I was allowed to buy the clothes I wanted was because the State of Pennsylvania gave my mom money every month. I did't exactly know why, but I figured it was because of the whole, My-father-being-in-jail thing. My mom seemed to think that she could buy my love. She can't. I only take money from her when I have no other choice. The rest she spends on alcohol or who-knows-what. Don't get my wrong, I love my mother, I just hate the stupid crap she does.

As I waited to cross the busy street, I looked around. I could already see the parks big, welcoming gates. This was my home-away-from-home. I ran here every chance I got. As I walked through the gates, I stopped. There was a nice little pond off to my right, an old wooden bench looking out over it, ducks, with an old couple merrily feeding them bread.

I stepped on the path I knew well and started my afternoon jog. It was a wonderful day for one. The leaves were already starting to change on the big oaks and maples. There was perfect breeze that rolled over the neatly trimmed grass. I plugged my headphones in and just enjoyed the day. It                                                                                                                                                                                                       wasn't too crowded, by the time I reached the other side of the park, I had only seen a lady walking her schnauzer and a teenage boy lounging under an oak writing.

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At quarter of  6, I looked at my iPhone, I had to be at cheerleading in 15 minutes. Guess I was going as I was. I jogged all the way there, a good mile from the park. As I walked in, pulling out my headphones, McKenzie and Rachel ran to me from the bleachers. 

"Brigid! You're late!!" Rachel practically screamed in my face.

"Yeah, guess who's captain this year?!" Squealed Mckenzie.

"Who?" I knew exactly who.

"You!!" They yelled in unison, coming in to hug me.

I slipped into my cheerleading façade and grinned, "Are you serious?! That's awesome!"             

I walked over to the other girls and they congratulated me. The rest if practice was pretty uneventful. We started working on our cheer, stunted, and tumbled. I stuck all my flyer poses, landed all my tucks, and remembered the cheer. After that, I ran home, changed, and had McKenzie pick me up so we could have our Friday night sleepover at her house with some of the other girls. McKenzie was the only one I trusted enough to know where I lived. It's not that my house was too shabby, or small even; it's where it was. If the other girls new, they'd think my mother was a drug dealer, or a stripper, or worse. McKenzie kept quiet. She was the closest thing I had to a real friend, and even she wasn't there yet. I loved McKenzie, but she would be in for a big surprise if she knew half of the secrets I kept. That's why nobody knew. I liked it that way.

I got in her baby blue punch buggy with my designer ripped jeans and Abercrombie sweatshirt.

"Who's coming tonight?" I asked.

"The usual: Rachel, Maddi, Hanna, and Catelyn."

"Cool."

"Yeah. Wanna go see a movie or go skating?"

"Definitely movie. We worked hard enough at practice. Let's be lazy.

We all ended up agreeing to stay at McKenzie's and watch The Vow on DVD for the hundredth time. Everybody cried. Then we just watched Degrassi until we passed out around 4.

My normal weekend had just begun.