If I Fell

Chapter Seven

Unconsciously bobbing my head slightly along with the music that was travelling from the headphones and straight into my ears, I typed a sentence for the conclusion paragraph in the English compare and contrast essay that set two poems against one another.

Pausing, I stared down at the words, rereading the sentence. As my eyes followed the words, a line appeared between my puckered brows with my thoughts.

After reading it, I pursed my lips together, my nose crinkling at it before quickly deleting the sentence.

Leaning my head to the side, I stretched my neck and let out a light moan as I rubbed my stiff shoulder. I wasn’t a bad writer; I just would never say I was a brilliant one. My marks on essays and such at school were always good, but that wasn’t due to my writing abilities, more for the facts that I shoved into them and that I wrote quite pointedly. There was honestly nothing creative about my writing, and at the moment I realized that sentence in the conclusion was enough to put anyone to sleep.

Letting my head roll back, I closed my eyes as I leaned my head against the headboard of my bed, shifting slightly on the pillows that I had built up for myself.

When my eyes opened again, they focused immediately on an empty space on the corner of my desk. There was dust all around it and then a shape that was perfectly clean. In that moment I didn’t notice when the song ended and my ears were filled with silence, I just felt that ache that happened in my chest whenever I noticed the empty spot that my camera always sat in.

Not for the first time in the past weeks since it had shattered, I forced my eyes away from the spot. It was like a dead body in the corner of the room, my eyes were just drawn to that place. Trying to assure myself that there was no point in being upset, it had been, after all, so long since I’d even used the bloody thing, I looked back down at the essay.

And I felt my mood dip dangerously as I stared at the document on my laptop.

So maybe a late Friday night wasn’t a good time to do homework.

However even as those thoughts were going through my head, I was saved as my bedroom door was slowly pushed open, causing a streak of light to fill my room against the soft light from my bedside lamp.

My chin immediately tipped up and my eyes widened slightly in surprise until I recognized the person that was peering through the crack of the door.

“Oh, hey mom,” I greeted with a smile as I yanked the headphones from my ears.

“Hey sweetheart,” she returned, her eyes shifting to the computer on my lap, “Are you busy?”

Shaking my head, I closed the laptop, pushing it off to the side of my bed. I needed to take a break from it anyways. “Not really,” I told her with a shake of my head, “I was just finishing an essay that’s due on Monday.”

“Did you eat anything for supper? I had dinner at the office, but I could order something for you if you need it,” she offered.

Crossing my legs, I let my hands rest upon my bare knees, my comfy cotton shorts letting me move easily as I straightened, feeling the tension in my back disagree very much at this new arrangement. “Don’t worry, I went out with a friend for dinner,” I assured her as I stretched my rigid back.

“Oh, was it Marcy? I haven’t seen her around this week,” mom mused.

Feeling that I would be pushing my luck to lie to her anymore today, I frowned slightly as I looked down at my comforter. “No, I just went out to get pizza with Mike, actually,” answered I, somewhat reluctantly.

And sure enough, the reason why I hadn’t wanted to tell her I had gone out with Mike occurred almost instantaneously; her whole face lit up with excitement. In a slightly bitter mindset, I felt like scowling and telling her to go date him if she liked him so much. I just couldn’t understand it! A week ago she’d had no clue who he was, and she didn’t remember ever having met him, though she had to with all those parties and fundraisers I’d seen him at. The extent of what she knew concerned his parents, but apparently knowing that was enough for her.