Rae

When Mr Newman drove away she could see him staring at her from his rear view mirror, as she waved. It seemed stupid to her that she was waving, but she knew that it was expected of her.

As she started the short walk home, she realised that she was slightly intrigued by Mr Newman. He had been listening to Slipknot who just so happened to be her favourite band. She could not however see whether it was a coincidence or not. After thinking this she realised that she sounded paranoid.

It was not as if Mr Newman was stalking her and he could not have known her favourite music. Just because she thought that he stared at her a lot did not mean that he was crazily obsessed with her.

She realised that she was at her house and she stopped. A sudden urge to flee overcame her as she looked up at the place that she had called her home for so long.

It was not the house itself that scared her though. It was more about what was waiting inside.

Because it was a Monday she knew that her father would be in one of his bad moods, which was a reason why she was so wary of going in the house. However she knew that she could not wait outside all night so she walked up to the house and opened the door, trying to keep herself calm.

She did not call out, knowing that if her mother was hung-over then she would not appreciate it.

Instead she took off her jacket and hung it on the coat hook, before taking slow and quiet steps towards the living room.

Although she did not want to see her parents at the present time, she knew that they would get angry if they did not see her.

When she entered the living room the first thing that hit her was the smell. Vodka. Vodka was her mothers poison as she so often put it. Mixed in with the vodka was the stale scent of puke,

Her mother was sitting on the sofa, her bleached blonde hair draped in front of her face in big wet clumps. She looked around expecting her father to be there, but he was not in his usual place on the sofa.

She walked closer to her mother, until she was standing above her. "Mum?" she asked softly, not sure whether she wanted her to wake or not. All the same her mother did stir. Rae touched her mothers arm, flinching slightly at how cold she was.

To warm her up she turned on the electric fire that sat in the middle of the living room and placed it in front of her mothers bent form.

Her mother lifted her head up slightly and smiled a lopsided smile at Rae before her head flopped back down and she settled back down in her drunken stupor.

Rae sighed softly before leaving her mother and closing the living room door softly behind her.

She was worried by this point. Her father must be in a really bad mood if her mother was this drunk.

However she knew that she could not go to her room before she knew that her father was well.

She found him in his study, staring out of the window at the cars and people below.

"Dad?" she asked, her voice just above a whisper.

Expectedly he did not answer her. He didn't even react to the sound of her voice.

"Dad. Come on. You need to get up." She wanted to touch him so that he would react, but she was scare that he would lash out as he so often did.

"Go away," he said, so softly that she would've thought she'd imagined it if not for the moving of his lips.

She contemplated what to do for a brief moment, but soon came to the conclusion that it would be best if he was left alone. Nevertheless she left the door open so that if he needed her she would hear him.

When she got to the room she resisted the urge to collapse on her bed. The events of today had exhausted her both mentally and physically. She needed to relax her mind and at the moment sleep scared her. She was certain that she would have bad dreams. Instead she sat down at her desk and took out her notebook filled with drawings. Turning to a blank page, she picked up a pencil and pressed the pencil hard into the paper so that it was now blunt. Sharp pencils were so much more difficult to draw with.

She was not sure what to draw so she placed the pencil against the paper and let her mind wonder.

Strangely the first thing that came to her mind was Mr Newman's warm brown eyes. She felt a slow blush spread up her cheeks as she thought about his intense gaze.

She was still confused about what to think about him. He was very handsome, she already knew that, but he was so much older then her. It was most certainly wrong to be thinking about him. After all he probably had no desire for a seventeen year old school girl. She realised how pathetic she was and placed her head down on the desk, trying to stop her thoughts.

When she finally did lift her head from the table a wave of anger consumed her as she looked at what she had drawn.

Before her lay a roughly drawn picture of Mr Newman's angular face.

She crumpled it up quickly and hurled it into the bin, before throwing herself on the bed and trying to stop the sobs that overwhelmed her.