Icarus | Z.M.

13 | Maturity

Victoria Tomlinson

November 2013

The wind was cold, it felt sharp, and was stinging my cheeks.

I had on my padded jacket to keep me warm, a hat, a scarf, and a pair of fingerless mittens to keep my hands warm.

Mum and dad were both here, standing on either side of me.

Cujo, my new puppy that I got for my birthday, sat patiently like he had already been trained to sit and wait. His long slobbery tongue hung out of his mouth, and his tail wagged back and forth as he stared at the three of us.

I focused on Cujo, he made me smile and I already knew he was going to be my best friend in the whole world.

We were in the forest behind my house. It was autumn and all the leaves had fallen from the trees, the ground was full of amber and brown leaves that covered the green grass. It had rained earlier today, so everything was damp. But I liked the smell of rain, so I didn't mind too much.

"Victoria," my mother's voice pulled my attention away from Cujo, and I looked up at her standing beside me, her hand on my shoulder. "I'm going to take him inside now, okay?"

"Okay," I nodded and waved goodbye to Cujo before he left.

My mum whistled once and Cujo was already up and waddling behind her to follow her up the big grass hill that led to my house. He was much slower than her, just a puppy and his legs were tiny. She had to walk much slower than usual so he could keep up with her.

Once she had disappeared into the distance, I turned to face my dad who was still beside me. They told me they wanted to give me something special for my birthday. I thought Cujo was the surprise, but apparently there was something else too.

My dad scuffed the top of my head, making me giggle as he smiled down at me, grinning with his teeth.

He had seemed pretty angry recently, not at me, or at mum, but just in general.

"You're getting older, Victoria," he said to me.

It was my tenth birthday, I was excited to grow up and get older. I hoped that it meant I would get to stay out to play later with Hazel and Niall more now that I was older, instead of being locked up in the house all the time. My dad didn't like Niall too much, I had to play in the garden with him in secret.

"I know," I responded with a proud and excited smile on my face.

He turned to face me more, placing his hand on my shoulder to squeeze the puffy warm coat I had on, "And you know that getting older means you have much more responsibility,"

I frowned and pouted out my bottom lip, "Do I have to get a job?"

"No, darling," he breathed out a faint laugh and shook his head, "You don't have to get a job,"

I was glad, I didn't want to get a job like my dad, he was always working, and he never had time for family game night anymore. It was usually just me and Lou, sometimes mum would join unless she was helping dad with work.

"You know that dad does a lot of important work, right?" he asked me, his eyes roamed across my face.

"Yeah," I nodded.

He hesitated, clearing his throat before he spoke, "And sometimes... I do things that make people quite upset,"

"Why?" I didn't like the sound of that, my dad would never be mean to someone on purpose.