Happy New Year people, at least here in Australia… writing this as the countdown goes off on TV. And there are the fireworks.
Kate breathed in the chilly night air, feeling the way that it burnt her lungs and grimacing. She wanted to be inside, in the warmth but everyone was there and she just couldn't handle it. The pounding music, the drunken co-eds, the blissful happiness of everyone she saw. It was almost a year but it wasn't getting any easier, she was still struggling with her mother's death and seeing people so unaware of the pain that life causes made her feel sick to her stomach.
She tugged at the hemline on her dress, trying to pull the too short material down to give her some warmth. Cursing herself for caving and wearing what her friends had called 'appropriate New Year's Eve attire' rather than the jeans she wanted Kate looked around for a seat. The party was at some rich kid's parents' holiday house in the Hamptons, so you would expect plenty of entertaining areas but looking around there was nothing, they must have been put away for the winter.
She could still smell the cigarette smoke and alcohol, it made her want to puke. It had only been a few months after her mother's death when she had started to get calls in the mid-morning to go get her Dad from some dingy bar. The calls were sparse at first but now it was all the time, finally she had given up, she would just call a taxi and leave him with the rest.
As a young couple followed her out the door, mouths interlocked and stumbling around a corner Kate headed in the other direction, wanting nothing more than to escape. She walked down the driveway on autopilot, not even thinking about where she was going until her heels hit the white road marking line and a car screeched to a halt beside her.
Kate could barely hear the insults that the driver was hurling, she was too focused on stepping back and running. She needed to move, to leave, to do something. Hearing the rumbling waves crashing on the beach Kate quickly walked in the direction, slipping off her heels as her feet sank into the soft sand.
Her pace slackened as she felt the icy water on her toes, then her ankles and her calves. She just stood there for a moment, letting the water wash over her feet, it was absolutely freezing but she liked it. After a while she couldn't feel anything. 'Wouldn't it be great if she could do that to her heart?' Kate thought to herself.
Here it was, her first New Years as a college student. Wasn't she supposed to be hooking up with some buffed up idiot rather than walking along an almost deserted beach on her own? Kate felt loneliness seeping into her bones and stepped further into the water, feeling it hitting her knees now.
Kate heard a rush of music and then a door shutting, followed by the same sound and footsteps on a wooden deck behind her. Kate didn't turn, she just kept looking at the dark sea swirling around her legs.
'Alexis, you need to come back inside, it's cold out here.'
'But Daddy, she's going to be cold.' The little voice stated, obviously pouting at her father.
Kate could hear the Dad ushering the girl back inside, trying to keep his deep voice down. Luckily for him and his inability to whisper Kate wasn't listening, she was too busy blinking back the tears.
Couldn't she just be normal for once?
As the door opened once again people began to pour out, Kate decided to leave the water but she couldn't face the party again. Instead she walked back onto the sand, shivering as the air made contact with her thin wet legs. They began a loud countdown and Kate walked to the edge of the sand where the grass met the beach and sat down.
Their voices carried over to her, ringing in her ears, 'five, four, three, two, one.'
Bangs, cheers and pops filled the air as people began to ring in the New Year, calling out well wishes and popping champagne bottles as the fireworks lit up the winter sky.
Sitting on the edge of the sand Kate laid back on the cold grass, watching the bright lights, 'happy fucking New Year to me.'