Somebody Else ✔

And so it goes.

Corey.

Edited.

I am calm, I repeated the mantra in my head, I am so fucking calm.

I stared at myself in the reflection of the microwave. So maybe everything wasn't okay, but damn my eyeliner looked great. I had just finished work, my feet ached and my wrists and forearms had bruises dotting them -- from lugging plates at work. What I wanted to be doing was to be in the bath, with a book and some bubbles. What I was doing, was vastly different.

I could feel mums boyfriend, Kevin, staring at me. I gritted my teeth and focused on the leftovers whirling in the microwave. He soured the scent of rosemary and bacon and red wine. I turned and went to flip him off -- until mum sauntered into the kitchen. She took in our distance, and my clenched jaw and sighed. Mum placed her purse down on the grey kitchen bench, tying up her long, honey coloured hair, "And what's going on here?"

"Corey won't do the dishes." Kevin said, his voice blending into the groan of the microwave.

"They're your dishes." I ground out, my lips pulled back over my teeth.

"Corey, just do them." Mum sighed, resting her arm on Kevin's shoulder.

"I'm not cleaning up after him."

"Corey!" Mum snapped and my hand curled into a fist at my side.

I mean, I know I could've just done the dishes. I know I didn't have to make a big deal about it. I'd just gotten off work, though, and I didn't wanna deal with it.

I looked down at my fingers, where my pink eyeshadow had smudged against my skin and focused on the sparkles glinting in the light. I breathed in for one, two, three, four, five and held for one, two and exhaled one, two, three, four, five, six.

I did the dishes. Even though at one point I hesitated, my hands wrapped around a plate and thought about hurling it at the wall. But then I peeked down the hallway, and caught mum and Kevin talking on the couch. I crouched down and laid the plate flat against the tiles, my head in my hands. My legs hurt so much from being on my feet all day, I struggled to get back up. But I did.

Kevin Waldorf, in my mind, had a lot of bad points. Unfortunately, he also had one glaringly positive aspect that was hard to ignore. He made mum smile and sing like she had when I was a child. So I couldn't do anything to jeopardize that -- aside from the few times I slipped up and got disparaging. I couldn't do that -- not to mum.

I finished Kevin's fucking dishes and limped slowly back toward my room. It was a long way away from the sounds of Kevin and mum, laughing.

I fell down in my bathroom -- still uncharacteristically empty since Jamie went to live with dad. In the divorce it felt like I hadn't only lost my father, but my brother as well. Everything was empty now they were gone. What was worse, was the things left behind in the house still had traces of my dad and brother caught amongst them. They had left pieces of themselves everywhere; and I hated them for it.

I laid down and glanced up at the ceiling, feeling warm tears trickle down the side of my face. It's okay, I told myself, it's just a bad day. It's okay.

I could only think how badly I wanted Isaac by my side; not Izzy or Sam or Sloane or anyone. I just wanted Isaac to hold me, to kiss me, to lay with me. And he wasn't replying to my texts. Why did he always do that?

But I wasn't motivated to do anything. I could barely take off my makeup. In the mirror, I told myself to hold it the fuck together. It didn't work too well. Instead, I Snapchatted a photo of my bathroom floor to Izzy, hate life