Loretta of the Lamp

My cocktail of misery

[Loretta's POV]

Bright. Everything was bright. Like that kind of bright when you are in the dark and someone shines a torch straight on your face. I didn't like it. In fact I hated it, but this was a tell-tale sign that it was morning. Already.

It took me a long moment to realise that I wasn't breathing much, if at all. I inhaled suddenly, and somewhere near me someone drew in a sharp breath of surprise.

"Letty, baby,"

"Mum?" I blinked my eyes open twice and put my hand up to shield my dilated pupils from the pain of the sunlight shooting between the slats of the venetian blinds. I gasped in surprise as I rolled over, forgetting that I must have fallen asleep with the padlock in my hand. It had slipped down the side of my sheets, hair pin still in the keyhole and all, and now it was jabbing my ribs, the metal so cold. I shivered and looked up at my mother, "Were you watching me sleep? Because that is kind of weird."

"Letty I watch you all the time – you are my daughter, you came out of my own womb. I am allowed to admire my handiwork."

"That is so gross," I scrunched up my nose at her. "My hair must be a mess," I yawned as I ran my fingers through my curls. They didn't get far. I'd slept hard, even if I'd woken more times than I could care to count.

"It is," she told me honestly.

"What time did you get home? I put Claudia to bed," my younger sister was asleep on the bunk above me.

"My shift finished at ten, like I said Letty. I did over time until two,"

"Two," I said, trying to sound sympathetic when really, I could have just fallen asleep again. "What time is it now?"

"Six thirty."

I grunted, I couldn't help it, "I'm going back to sleep."

"You weren't breathing," she said suddenly. She wanted to keep the conversation going.

Claudia stirred on the bunk above. I put my finger to my lips to hush her. My mother had been a little over the top with her interference in my life lately, well ever since dad had been gone. I didn't know what to say to her to make it better.

Better was moving into a two bedroom flat that we could afford, and mum taking on a bar job to support us as a family. Better was when she stopped making us visit his grave every Sunday. Better would be when I got out of here and could support myself, then she would only have to take care of Claudia.

I didn't want to talk to my mother about breathing and sleeping. My father fell asleep and never woke up. By the time they tried to resuscitated him his soul was gone. Forever alive, but forever asleep.

It fucking hurt to see him sleeping, because I always had hope. When they finally let him go and turned the machines off, it hurt less.

In death there is no hope.

And without hope, we move on.

"I think you should go to the doctor," my mother said.

"I think I should go to school," I countered, "in an hour and a half, which means I will get up in thirty minutes," I pulled the sheets back across my body and rolled over.

"Loretta! What is that?!"

Oh, no.

"Loretta!" she repeated.

"Please calm down," I begged as she slammed her fist down onto the bed and snatched the padlock up in her hand.

"Loretta! We talked about this."

"Mum—" I began.

"With your counsellor!"

"Mum—"

"With the school!"

"Please—"

"With your youth officer! Loretta, we had a deal. No locks in the house. No picks, and no things that look like they might be used for breaking into anything, at all!"

"Mummy?" Claudia stirred and sat up, then leaned down over the edge of the bunk. Her mousy brown curls fell between the battle-stare my mother and I had engaged in.

My mother put her hand up, all five digits stretched out. I moaned. Her face had contorted into a grid of horizontal and vertical frown lines. Her eyebrows were twisted almost forty-five degrees toward her nose. Her lips, normally rounded and plump, were pursed thinner than a hair-width each.

"Your school," finger number one, "our family church," finger number two, "the cemetery," finger number three, "the town hall," finger number four, "and of course the hospital." She lingered on finger number five, which was in fact her thumb.

"The last one doesn't count." I said.

"You broke into a hospital morgue, Loretta!"

"You can't bring dad into this." I was so angry I could hardly think clearly. I wanted to punch the bed. I wanted to kick the wall, and I wanted to throw something heavy at the window and smash it. They were all stupid solutions, but all would have made me feel better. I went for punching the bunk ladder, it was nearest.

Claudia started crying. I got out of bed, cradling my now bruised fist, and growled at my mother before snatching up my towel from the floor and heading for the door.

I heard her say, "What is wrong with you Letty?" under her breath.

There was nothing wrong with me. I was angry, but the anger quickly melted away once I was under the spray of the shower. Hot tears mingled with the droplets of water and ran away down the drain hole, my homemade cocktail of misery.

It was clear to me that she did not understand. My own mother had added up all these little pieces of my life in an equation that had "my daughter has mental health issues" as a product at the end of it. Why didn't she understand me? Why didn't she believe in me?

I was dared to break into the school. Why else would I want to do something so pointless? The church was locked every night with the biggest, oldest padlock you had ever seen, and I was learning a new skill, I just wanted to see if it would open for me. The town hall I opened at four one morning because it had a new brand of five lever mortice deadlock, one I'd never seen before. Unfortunately that time I'd been caught with my pick in the lock, and I'd ended up in counselling and with a youth officer to report to once every fortnight. The cemetery was another dare. I'm led to believe it is some kind of teenage rite of passage to run through a graveyard in the dark alone without screaming. At least in my neighbourhood it is, and everyone involved was pretty impressed that I could provide the service which opened the gate.

And the hospital, well she was never allowed to bring that up. Now she had.

I was so tired. The hot water of the shower was not waking me up. Instead it was putting me back to sleep like a warm blanket in winter. I leaned against the wall of the bath tub and just breathed. My mother didn't know half of what I'd done. She didn't know I'd only just made it back into the house before she got in from her shift at three this morning. There was so much night, and so many things that could be done between putting Claudia to bed at ten and my mother coming home at three.

My eyes drooped with the weight of the water hanging in my lashes, I could see the droplets as they ran, a blur so close.

I could fall asleep again.