lemonade stand // c.h.

[04]

                Once upon a time… no, that’s too cliché, Evelyn thinks to herself, typing then backspacing on her laptop, screen open to Microsoft Word, before she gives it another try. There was once a boy named… no, that’s too nursery-rhymey. Ugh! Evelyn types, then backspaces once more, pushing her laptop to the other side of her bedroom desk, letting her forehead fall to the edge of her desk with a loud bang!

                “Ow,” Evelyn groans aloud to herself, lifting her head and placing her hand beneath it, to add a little bit of cushioning, even if it’s not much. She’s been working on a creative writing paper that her English teacher assigned a few days ago, and only now has she attempted to write in. Unfortunately, Evelyn isn’t creative in the slightest, and this assignment has turned out to be a massive nightmare.

                The house is quiet, to which Evelyn is sincerely grateful. Her sister isn’t blasting her music in her bedroom across the hall from Evelyn, and she hasn’t come and annoyingly started to knock on Evelyn’s door to grab her attention and complain she’s bored. No, Evelyn hasn’t seen or spoken to her sister since last night, but Evelyn doesn’t mind. In fact, she prefers it that way.

                That’s where the two of them differ most. Evelyn stays up late working on homework, and gets up early to work on homework. Emilie – Evelyn’s sister – goes to bed at a decent hour due to the fact that she isn’t attempting to do anything good with her life (at least that’s how Evelyn sees it), and sleeps in to the point where she’s completely wasted her day. In fact, her days are spent blasting music, irritating Evelyn to no end, and never working on anything for school.

“My social life is much more important than her schooling,” Emilie always tells Evelyn.

Evelyn just nods her head sarcastically, “yes, because a social life is going to get you into University. Definitely.”

The tension between the two of them was non-existent for years. The two of them were practically the best of friends before their lives fell apart over a year ago, despite the near five year age difference between the two. Their personalities were so similar, and they always spent a lot of time together.

But then everything changed. Their family and lifestyle was altered in the worse ways anyone could’ve ever imagined, and while Evelyn still thinks about what happened, still grieves about what happened, Emilie has successfully moved on with her life. She doesn’t dwell, it seems she never really did. And because of these changes, the two girls discontinued to get along. Evelyn knows it’s because Emilie doesn’t really understand what she’s going through (though, to her, it seems no one does), but she can’t help but hate her younger sister for being so harsh.

Phrases such as ‘just get over it already’ and ‘what, are you gonna go try and kill yourself again? Leave dad and me to pick up all the pieces once you’re gone?’ are common when Emilie speaks to Evelyn, but Evelyn never fights back. She doesn’t care enough to fight back, but like Emilie doesn’t care enough to dwell over what happened. And that angers Evelyn so much. Evelyn will never forgive her for moving on so quickly. So effortlessly.

Maybe that’s what Evelyn should write about. The misfortune of having to live with a sister whom you used to be best friends with, and now supposedly hate. But then Evelyn remembers that the assignment is supposed to have a happy theme. She groans when she comes to the realization. Flowers, rainbows and sunshine type of shit. Stuff that Evelyn doesn’t think about. She’s beginning to think this assignment is going to be a lot harder than she originally anticipated.

Evelyn groans again when she hears footsteps moving quickly up the stairs, knowing that she’s only seconds away from being bothered by her sister who seriously needs to learn how to entertain herself and be independent. She holds her breath as she waits for the footsteps to stop just outside her door, hoping that she’ll get lucky this time, and that her sister’s bedroom door will be slammed shut instead.