Hey guys! So this is my first ever story on this website! Excited? Yes. Nervous? Oh yes. If you would please review for me with constructive criticism, tips on HOW THE HECK TO USE THIS SITE, and anything else I might need to know I'd be sooo grateful! And I know this first chapter isn't too full of action, but I kind of have to just set the scene. I just need to totally get my characters before I can really write well about them. I will try to update every other day, but my schedule can get pretty busy so we will just have to see! Thank you so much, and enjoy! (Or not... :))
Being the new kid in town is never easy. Especially when you get older, because everybody already know everybody. They know who to avoid, who can beat the stuffing out of who, who is at the top of the food chain, who is at the bottom, and more importantly, who your friends and enemies were. So, you can imagine the dismay I felt when I, being 16 years old at the time, was forced by my father to move to a small town on the opposite side of the state where all the kids had already figured out these things, and weren't very flexible nor welcoming to anybody who would upset such a fragile balance. Despite all of my begging and reasoning, my father would not budge on his decision-whether or not anything I said penetrated his thick, drunken skull however, is another question entirely. The only excuse he could seem to come up with was that it was "for work". When someone says that they are moving for work, you usually imagine that they have some high paying , fancy job in which you would have to transfer whenever you got promoted. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case with my father. Oh no. It simply meant that everyone within a 50 mile radius of our house had learned what a drunk lazy bum he was, and refused to hire him anymore. And so, as had been the pattern in the last eight years of my life, we were forced to relocate somewhere outside of our little bubble in which we were mutually looked down upon, if not disliked by all who had ever heard of us. Thus, we found our way to a little town in Oklahoma called Tulsa.
It was different than anywhere else I'd ever lived. For starters, we could only afford a house on the poorer side of town, whereas before we were usually on the bottom half of the middle class. That explained why things we had done in in our old neighborhood that had been deemed unacceptable was totally normal here. Another difference was that my dad wasn't the only drunk around. I'm not sure why, but it was oddly comforting when on the first night of having moved in, I could hear faintly one of my neighbors answering my fathers own drunken calls. I suppose it was because I wouldn't have to feel quite so ashamed at being "That crazy drunks kid," because there was another one, if not more, just like me.
When we first moved in, it was summer time. Again, not a good thing to a new kid. Since it was a new town and all, you had no idea where all the fun place to hang out were, or where you could hang out that was acceptable for you unknown social class. Even if such unanswerable questions somehow became known to you, it was still pointless: you had no friends to do any of these things with!
And so, my first month and a half in Tulsa fell into the melancholy routine of getting my father up and ready for work when I could (Like sending a young boy off to school, but to a mechanics shop instead) and the rest of my time reading what few books I had, or watching reruns of the same shows over and over again. I suppose the day that all changed was the day that I failed to get my father up in time.
I had woken myself up so that I would be able to force my father out of bed, put is uniform on him, and send him to work with his lunch of a ham sandwich, and a thermos of straight whiskey. (By personal request of course) My mistake was in falling back to sleep after waking up the first time. I awoke the second time to his screams.
"Spencer! Spencer you good for nothing kid! Get in here!"
I pulled myself up and blinked sleepily at the clock. It was 7:00. His shift had started a half an hour ago. I gulped and creeped into his room. "Yes sir?" I asked meekly, staring at a stain on the carpet at the very edge of his room.
His voice became dangerously quiet. "Do you know what time it is?" His eyes were red-rimmed from his perpetual pattern of staggering drunk to helplessly hung over.
I decided to play dumb. "N-no sir," I answered quietly, cringing at my own stutter. I had no back bone when standing up to him. To anyone in that matter.
"No?" He asked again quietly. He slowly reached for the grimy alarm clock on his bedside table, his eyes never leaving my face. I don't even know why he even had an alarm clock. It's not like he ever used it. He slowly grabbed at the clock and pulled it back until it was in front of his face. He studied it for a moment when suddenly, without warning, he threw it at me with all his strength.
I dodged my head away, but it still caught my shoulder pretty hard, sending glass flying. I felt some cut the side of my head. Normally he wouldn't be so upset about missing work, but for the first little bit he liked to play the role of model employee, so it would be that much harder for the boss to let him go. Give it two months, and he wouldn't even pretend to care.
"Well it's 7:00 in the morning!" He screamed, crawling out of bed and walking towards me, all while continuing his furious tirade. "I'm already a half an hour late for work you little bitch! Look at me when I'm talking to you!" He screamed. I snapped my eyes up from where they'd been fixed on the stain, and was forced to look at him straight on in all his glory.
His once dark full head of hair was now heavily balding on the topm and greying at the sides. His watery blue eyes were forever bloodshot, and seemed small, and sunken into his head. He had a steadily growing double chin, and a tendency to spit and drool a lot when he yelled. His gut spilled over his dirty pants, and had steadily been growing in the wrong direction for almost four years. He used to be considered handsome-something you could still discern, if just barely from his finely shaped nose, and his strong cheek bones, but any other mark of the man he had been before was erased by years of drinking away memories he's rather forget.
I snapped back into attention as he gave me an order. "Go fix my lunch, and bring me my car keys. Hurry the hell up!" he shouted. I nodded and scurried away, completing the task in what I was sure was record time. When I came back to his room, he had dressed himself. It was a feat in which I allowed myself to feel the closest thing to proud I'd felt in a long time towards my father. Proud. For getting dressed all by himself. That was just sad.
He snatched the items from my hands and started towards the door, all the while yelling abuse at me. I managed to block out most of it, while picking up any directions he had for me that day. It was a skill that I had been working on for a while, and almost had perfected. "Go to the store and buy a new clock," was his first order. "And while you're at it, buy some more food," He finished, before walking out the front door and slamming it behind him without a good-bye.
As soon as I heard our car leave the driveway, I collapsed in to kitchen chair and massaged my sore shoulder. I'd gotten off east today with just to alarm clock projectile! He was probably in too much of a hurry to do more, and I would most likely really get it when he got home. I worried about what he would do as I rolled my right arm.
After taking a few aspirins to keep my shoulder from getting stiff, and cleaning off the small cuts on the side of my head, I got in the shower and shampooed my hair, pondering my schedule for the day.
I really was glad to get out of the house. After living in this town for almost two months I still hadn't been allowed to leave the property. Sure I probably could've gone while dad was at work, but as I said before, I had nothing to do and didn't want to wander around like an idiot. Even so, my anxiety about what to wear and such had me worried. I finally turned the knob on the shower, knowing that stressing out about it would make me so scared that I might not get the courage to go out at all. I walked into my room and closed my eyes, sticking my hands into my closet blindly to see what I came up with just a simple pair of my blue shorter shorts, and a coral pink tank top. I was actually pretty pleased. It made me look pretty tan, and made my normally short frame look longer. I pulled on my one pair of shoes, black converse, and headed into the bathroom to do my hair and make up.
I studied myself in the mirror. I was really just average. I know some girls say that so people reassure them about how beautiful they are, but I know it's the truth. My face was oval shaped, with a dark complexion, and a nose that was just a little too broad for my liking. My teeth were pretty straight, but my lips were pale, and my bottom lip was just a little to full for my top one. My eyes were my most prominent feature, and I went back and forth day to day from loving them to hating. They were a clear blue, like the ocean on a clear day, but sort of darkened if I was angry or scared. They were real big in my head, and made me look young, and kind of childish and innocent. Most people would love to have eyes like mine, but they were too light in my head to fit in well with me. Like they didn't belong. Nevertheless, they got me noticed. I put on light make-up, trying not to look like a raccoon, and moved on to my hair.
It was a dark chocolate brown that was real shiny and silky and smooth. I wore it really long, and cut it myself into choppy layers because I refused to let anyone touch it. My bangs were long and kind of swept to the side, but usually I wore them so that they would cover my eyes. Everyone always said that I had my mommas hair-it's where most of my coloring came from besides my eyes. I got those from my daddy. When she walked out on us, I couldn't bare to cut it, and when I decided I had to to keep it from becoming a burden, I would do it myself. I just brushed it out and left it loose, not bothering to do anything with it. It would stay pin straight anyways. I was short. Like really short. I barely reached five feet, and even so I looked really skinny. I was just glad that I had started... developing... on time.
I on some of my perfume and checked the mirror one last time. I had to look good on my first day out! I stared at myself before cautiously smiling. That's when I looked prettiest, I knew, but finding things to laugh about was hard. Especially when you're alone most of the time. It was lopsided kind of, with a dimple in just one cheek, but I kind of like it. It made me different. Made me feel special. Wishful thinking I guess.
I heaved a sigh and tore myself away from the mirror, scoffing at myself. If I wasn't careful I was gonna turn as vain as the rich kids at my old school! I grabbed $20 from my dad's "secret" stash, and went to the front door, pausing a moment before letting in the bright light from my new neighborhood. I took a deep breath before stepping out, ready to make my debut.