Limonene |H. S.|

1. pilot

This story and this chapter definitely have gone through some grammatical and overall literature changes. My writing in 2016 was... BAD. I hope I've progressed, at least I feel like I have. Now remember, this is written from the perspective of a late-teen, technically, still a child. I'm not saying I'm writing about an immature little girl who's always thinking about Care Bears and Nando's, but just keep in mind.
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Their screams have always been loud, the animosity they were said with was something that made me cry when I was younger. Now, the heightened voices and slamming doors awake a differing sentiment. I'd call it frustration, maybe I'd even call it anger, but the truth was, whenever my parents fought over the same, silly things, I could feel a whole spectrum of negative emotions just begging to take control of the neutral, stable, smiling girl sat in my mind, innocent and chewing on a cotton candy cone.

"What do you want me to do, May? Ignore him?" My dad never had much of a yelling voice, or a stern one at that. As a child, it was hard to take him seriously when it came to punishments, usually it was my mom who'd make me flush with guilt and trepidation whenever I'd done something worth a scolding. In the past years, my mother remained the same but my father, he started changing in a couple of aspects. One of them was his tone, how it always seemed to be wavering and drastically changing from a soft, soothing voice to a  rasped seethe that would make my throat run dry. "He's a Styles."

"Since when do you enjoy changing diapers, Adam? He's a kid, aren't you embarassed to go out and get drunk with a boy that's almost your daughters age?" My dad once told me my mom was a very problematic person, granted, he said this after she'd dragged him out of a neighbors barbecue because he was too drunk to stand.

"He's way older than we were when Emily was born," His laugh is cynical, somehow believing that anyone over the age of sixteen is suddenly old enough for whatever he has planned tonight. "and no, no ones getting drunk, for gods sake, it's s a Tuesday. I'm not an alcoholic, and neither is Harry."

Ah, yes. Harry. Bringer of corruption, promoter of use of illegal substance and most importantly, my dad's new found best friend. The Styles, a whole clan of people that arrived one day and decided to settle their illegal, English affairs here, in a small Virginian town that's apparently full of people willing to look the other way as long as they were on the payroll. An influx of missing people, handfuls of policemen who'd ignore their protocols and codes if they were told to and beside all this, we'd reported a lower crime rate than years prior. And it wasn't because the Styles were upgrading our towns security, rather they were making sure to cover everything up, leave no loose ends.

"I don't care. We were just fine before those delinquents got involved with you. I don't want them coming near the house, Adam." Harry had taken some kind of a liking to my dad, some friendship that came in the fine print of many contracts and deals they'd done. Legal, of course... well, I hope. My dad owns a company that arranges and deals vehicles for a number of automobile divisions, it was easier to have a little bit of everything rather than nothing at all, because no manufacturer would open a whole distributor when we had a population of thirty thousand. I reckon the guy just didn't have any friends and saw my middle aged dad, who's been in a mid-life crisis the past two years, as an easy in to the townspeople.

"I've had enough of you for tonight." He sighs, my scoff inaudible. Stomping footsteps resonate like a chime, and I'm quick to remove myself from the indoor balcony, rushing into my room. I have a vast view of the front of my house, where my dad currently is, walking down the pathway that leads to the front door, creeping past the column fence as he steps through the opening of the house. Almost happily, he hurries to the other side of the street, climbing into the passenger side of a sleek car with glaring lights, not even giving the house a second look. The driver hesitates for a minute, and I hold my breath as I peer through a crevice in between the curtains, silently cursing them both.

When the car finally drives off, in a noisy screech, I align the curtains and turn to my bed, where I was jus ten minutes ago before the discussion started. Almost midnight, tomorrow I had a full school day and extra curriculars to catch up on, we'd barely gotten back from winter break, and senior year was breathing down my neck, shocking me with a paranoia of how many credits I had and if my GPA was decent enough to apply to the colleges that I wanted to apply to.

I confirm my alarm was still properly set, settling in bed and hoping my dreams, like my life, don't fall into the same viscous cycle; the one where my parents can't decide if they're on good terms or not, the one where I don't esteem my dad the way I used to, and the one where some British ass was unknowingly straining this already damaged family even further.