Beach Bums

I Respect His Wish To Be Fat

I couldn't stop the lazy smile from spreading across my face as I finally smelled the ocean. I let the wind flow through the window and whip my hair all over like a sandy tornado. My parents sang along to some old song that I couldn't be bothered to remember the name of, not with the ocean swirling and shining in the distance. I could feel my past slipping away from me, not that I minded. It wasn't my happiest times ever. Illinois is never an exciting place. Just a bunch of rotten old cornfields really. 

We finally get to the new house and I indolently got out of the car, savoring the moment. I'm glad I went shopping before this for beach clothes. I helped my parents unpack and dragged all my stuff to my room. It wasn't the biggest house ever or the nicest, but I loved it anyways. My family was by no means rich, but my dad had found better, more stable work here so we did what we had to do. I didn't put up much of a fight though. Who doesn't want to move to the beach? 

I filled my room with all my stuff, struggling to fit everything in. My dad looked amused at my struggle from the doorway. I gave him an irritated huff. What kind of father just stands there and lets their daughter struggle? Apparently mine.

"You okay kiddo?" Oh now he asks. I give him a pointed look and roll my eyes. 

"Just swell dad." I reply, trying to shove my mattress onto my bed. I guess this is kind of my fault. Maybe I should exercise more. But that sounds like a lot of effort. Maybe I'll just not exercise. Yeah, okay that sounds like a better plan. 

Dad walks up beside me and helps push the mattress. I groan when I see the pile of sheets on my floor. I give my dad a pleading look.

"No." He says. I cross my arms. 

"I didn't even ask a question yet."

"No." He ruffles my hair and walks out the door. I flop down on the bed. Maybe if I ignore it long enough the sheets will just magically appear on the bed. That would be so cool. My mom walks into my room and flops down on the bed with me. I look at her, then back at the sheets, then her again. She rolls her eyes but laughs. 

"They aren't going to make themselves." She replies, reading my mind. I huff and dramatically flop away from her, but end up falling onto the floor. Mom bursts into hysterical laughter, holding her stomach and wiping tears from her eyes. I groan in pain, but she keeps laughing. I need better parents. 

"Yeah, real funny mom. What if I had broken a bone or something, huh? Would you be laughing then?" I say, perturbed. She tries to stop laughing, but fails miserably. 

"But you didn't break a bone, hun. So I'm going to go tell your father what just happened and laugh some more." She said, thinking my pain is the most hysterical thing in the world. I seriously need to show her youtube or something. Obviously she hasn't seen enough cat videos or other people hurting themselves if she thinks her own daughter's pain is so funny.

I get off the floor and slowly start to make my bed, taking multiple breaks in the process. I end up falling off the bed two more times, and each are just as painful as the first one. Obviously I'm not the most balanced person in the world. And my hand-eye coordination skills are somewhat lacking. But that doesn't matter. I can live without them. Maybe. 

There, now the bed is finished. I look around the room, pretty impressed with myself. I actually managed to get some things done. Now it's time for food. I sneakily walk into the kitchen where my parents are putting away not refrigerated foods. 

"Hey Mother?" I say, slowly walking behind her. 

"No, you cannot have the Nutella yet, Daughter. I will not have you make a mess of this kitchen when we just got here. You can have one of the pieces of fruit on the counter, though. One of the neighbors brought it over." She replies without even turning around. I dejectedly make my way over to the island, where the fruit is sitting. I grab some grapes and set to work trying to throw them in the air and catch them in my mouth. Let's just say most of them ended up on the floor for my tubby little kitty Mouse to eat. 

My mom turns around and stares at me trying to perfect my food-catching skills. I give her an innocent look, my cheeks stuffed full of grapes like a chipmunk. I love chipmunks. They're so adorable. She puts her hands on her hips.

"You know the cat is on a special diet." She says sternly. I laugh and grab Mouse, smooshing his cheek to mine.

"He is perfectly content to be fat and grumpy so I'm going to let him. I respect his wish to be fat.cBesides, grapes are healthy." I reply and give him a kiss on his head. He gives me a bored look and licks his paw. I put him back down on the ground where he grumpily walks off to another room. My mom laughs and gets back to unloading the food. 

Catching grapes gets boring after awhile, so I go to find my father.

"Dad! Daddy! Father! Parental figure! Person having to do with my birthing!" I shout though the house, taking in the Spanish architectural design of the house. I peek in rooms before finally finding him in his new office.

"Isn't this fantastic? I get my own office." He says excitedly. I give him a confused look. What was he so excited for?

"Why are you excited about having an extra place where you do work?" I seriously don't get my parents sometimes. I'm not ever going to have an office in my house when I get older. It'll just be an extra room for food or something. Dad laughs and shakes his head.

"You'll get it when you're older...or maybe you won't." He replies and ruffles my hair. I stick my tongue out and wander around the house. Then I wander around the backyard. Then the front yard. Finally I get bored of wandering so I go and find my mom again. 

I finally find her in the kitchen, still. I didn't realize we had this much food. I guess they might need alot of food to keep up with my appetite. I'm surprised I'm not as big as a house by now. Or maybe a whale. Whales are so cute. They just lay around in the ocean and make whale noises. I just love them. 

"Moooom", I drag out the word as long as possible until she looks at me, clearly annoyed ", I'm bored." I flop on a stool and wait for her to think of something for me to do. That's what moms are for. To love their child no matter what and make sure they aren't bored...and also feed them.

"Well hun I already canceled the strippers." She says jokingly. I give her a dry look. Now is not the time to be making jokes. I might just die of boredom. We try and brainstorm things I could do that wouldn't involve destruction and/or extreme amounts of money.

"Why don't you take your bike and go get icecream on the boardwalk? And then you can just go explore or whatever. Just try not to get into too much trouble. I don't want to have to be bailing you out of jail on our first day here." She says finally after many rejected ideas. I brighten up at the thought of icecream. Yay, food. 

"You know me so well Mom." I reply with a smile. This was one of the reasons I was so excited to move her, because of the boardwalk. Maybe I'll even swim at the beach. 

I throw a bathing suit on with a loose, white, see-through t-shirt and some shorts, and put my hair up in a loose bun. I barely ever do anything really complicated with my hair because I don't have that much patience. I'm usually really hyper all the time, but that usually comes with ADHD. I don't have it that bad though. I have medicine and stuff. 

I grab some flipflops and my wallet, and head off to the icecream shop.