Beeping trucks. All I here are beeping trucks.
My alarm clocks smirks at me mockingly, flashing to all the world the fateful digits that define my life. I go to school, work, art class, and orbit around my daily life, all because of a bossy little plastic machine that says I have to. Wow, I'm pathetic.
"Shut up," I grumble irritably, rolling back into the warm sheets that envelope me like a big, warm, hairy, grizzly bear. That's what beds are. Big, warm, hairy grizzly bears. Who said my metaphors weren't top notch? I was getting myself re-acquainted quite well when my door burst open, releasing a surprising draft of frosty, cold air.
"Rise and shine, little sis!" Jon sings cheerfully as he waltzes inside like the world's first cherubic saint. If it weren't for the angelic smile he had pasted onto his face, I would have sworn that I saw a devilish glint in his eye.
"Go 'way," I mumble, still drowsy and in the hazy dreamland between waking and sleeping.
"Oh, but where's the fun in that, Clary?" he queries, ruffling my hair. I catch his hand between my thumb and forefinger, deadly serious.
"If you ever ruffle my hair again, you die."
"I'll go get the shovel to dig my grave."
"No, I thought more along the lines of throwing you into the woods, off of a highway somewhere."
"Are you serious? Clary, everybody knows that when you commit fratricide, you dump the body off of the bridge and into the river. Gosh, you're such an amateur."
"I guess you'll just have to teach me then."
Jonathan sighs dramatically, painstakingly running his hands through his hair, and adopting a quirky Old-English accent along the way.
"I suppose that I could find it in my generous heart to tutor another young mind, also on the rewarding path to juvenile detention. Although my fees are not cheap, for family, I give a 10% discount."
"You're a regular Mother Teresa."
"It is trying work, yes, but I just find it so eye-opening."
I cracked open an eyelid, watching his slow smile. "You're just trying to wake me up, aren't you?"
"Ding, ding, ding, we have a winner."
He kneeled down next to me, eyes suddenly serious, debated with himself. Finally, he took the plunge. "Actually, Mom asked me to do the honours this morning. Clary, I don't think she can even take this anymore. She's starting to ask other people, and you know how much she hates reaching out...to anybody."
This was true. Marrying young apparently worked out for some people, but not for my mother, Jocelyn Fray. At 19, she had married my father, Valentine Morgenstern, her high school sweetheart. They enjoyed three years of marital bliss, and two children, until the union was deemed toxic for both of them. Valentine left without a trace, leaving my mother with two infants clinging to her legs and a handful of crushed dreams. The reason was clear: apparently my father's affections weren't enough for her, and she had resorted to another man's company.
After the divorce, my grandparents blamed the divorce on my mother. They had both greatly respected Valentine, envisioning a handful more of tiny ankle-biters, birthday and anniversary candles, laughs, smiles, and a couple with their arms around each other, loving each other until the end of time. At first they thought that this was but a momentary setback, a small error, a blip in an otherwise perfect record. When it became apparent that Jocelyn didn't want Valentine back, though, and that Valentine was not coming back, they disowned their daughter, claiming that their family did not condone "those kind of mistakes." Left alone, Jocelyn had no choice but to make a life for herself, relying on nobody.
I suppose I should feel sorry for her, and in my own way, I do. I respect what she's done and who she is; how she has pulled through. Like my grandparents, though, I don't condone those decisions. How can I, when they are the ones that left me to grow up fatherless? If I agree with her, then I'm agreeing to what she's done, to unfaithfulness, to cheating. While she seems to have done just fine, I am still haunted by the phrase "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree." I cannot, will not be like her, so I hide myself away, safe and sound, where her voice doesn't reach me, and where her influence cannot taint me. There was a time where she may have reached out, but that is not now. Hey, I'm surprised that she held out as long as she did.
I'm jerked back into reality by my brother's voice. "Can't you just talk to her, Clary? Can't you just try?"
I'm surprised by how calm and still my voice sounds. It sounds impenetrable and unbreakable. It sounds devoid of emotion. At least my voice sounds how I wish that I could feel. The one word breaks through the stillness.
"No."