Playing With Fire

You know that feeling when you wish that things could go back to what they used to be? It’s like you never really realize what you have until it’s gone.

Or how about when you take off in a plane and look back down at the place you used to know, thinking of all the memories you’ve had that made that place so special? You even feel like leaving that place hurts as much as leaving half of your heart.

And how about when you land? Does that feeling of resentment and fear swallow you whole? Do you wonder what the hell you’ve just gotten yourself into? Does it hit you that you’re no longer home, that the place you once were so familiar with is now replaced with the total opposite?

Not me.

Searching the waiting crowd in the airport for me, is like looking for a pathway out of hell. A one way ticket straight to paradise.

For five, agonizingly, long years, I waited.

I waited to be pulled away from my messed up reality.

I waited to be rescued from my own tears.

I waited for the perfect opportunity to leave my alcohol-addicted mother. I wanted to escape it all.

Only six months after the divorce, I’d see her come home late every night with a different man, drunk. I could hear things that I knew I shouldn’t have been hearing. I had to take care of and clean up after my own mom while she didn’t give a crap about me...And each and every single night, I’d sit in my room and cry, praying that my dad would just come back home.

Then, as I grew older, I started to talk more to dad over the phone. He would repeatedly tell me that I wasn’t the one who tore them apart. He simply told me that my mother and him fell out of love with each other, not with me...And then, one day in the middle of one of our conversations, he told me he had fallen in love again and was getting married. Then just like that, I was thrown out of the picture. I was so infuriated that I vowed to never speak to him ever again. He’d call and call, leaving messages, begging me to pick up, but I never did. It was only one week ago that I talked to him again: The night of my Sixteenth Birthday.

“Faye! Stop being a goddamn coward and answer the phone!” Mom yelled angrily from her room.
My stomach coiled in knots, tears immediately brimming near my eyes. I knew who it was. I knew who it was every time the phone rang. No one else dared to call here except for--him.

“Faye, you listen to your own mother!” Mom screamed when I let another ring erupt through the house again.

She was drunk. Which meant I was in danger when I didn’t listen.

I quickly wiped the single tear that had fallen and ran to the phone. All I planned on doing was saying don’t ever call again and hanging up, but he answered before I could even let a word out.

“Faye, listen to me before you hang up!” Dad begged, “All I want to do is wish my daughter a ‘happy sixteenth birthday’.”

I had to show dad that I didn’t need him. If it was so easy for him to toss me out of his life, then I could do just the same.

After a couple of silent moments, Dad spoke again.

“Faye?” He whispered into the phone.

“What dad?” I snapped bitterly. I felt bad at first, but when I thought back to the time he told me he was getting married, all sympathy for him went away as quick as it came.

“Faye I-” He began, but was cut off by mom’s screaming.

“Faye Williams! Get up here right now!”

I lowered the phone from my ear and placed it on my chest so that Dad wouldn’t hear her.

“Mom, I’m talking on the phone.”

“So you put my life on the line to talk to someone else!?” She demanded, so loud that I’m pretty sure the entire neighborhood heard it.

I rolled my eyes at her and put the phone back to my ear.

“Dad?”

“Hello--Faye! Who the hell was talking to you like that?” Dad replied, his voice laced with panic and anger. I could pretty much smell it across the line.

“Dad I-” I really didn’t want to tell him. He didn’t have to know about mom. He was in his own little world now.

“No, stop right there, Faye Williams.” He interrupted icily, “No one can talk to you like that, and you would never allow it, so tell me. Who the hell is it?”

I felt the first hot tear slide down my cheek, then the second, and soon, they wouldn’t stop flooding. I tried to take a deep breath to control the throbbing I felt, but it came out as a broken sob. My entire body shook as I slid down against the counter.

“Faye!” Dad sounded bewildered, “Faye, are you crying?”

I shook my head no, hoping uselessly that it would magically teleport to dad.

“Hello? Faye, you need to tell me what’s wrong. Is it school—Something at home? A boy?” He was going into hysterics, listing out everything possible, “I may be states away from you but I can-”

“It’s mom.” I breathed out, my voice no louder than a whisper.

“Huh? Honey what did you say? I could barely hear you.” Dad frantically inquired, his voice soft.

“It’s mom.” I repeated a little more audible.

I heard him take a deep breath.

“What about mom?” He whispered again.

I closed my eyes, willing him to take that question back.

“She-she’s always drinking...a-and b-bringing men home at n-night...” I heard my voice crack at the end, sounding nothing like the Faye I really was deep inside.

“She’s WHAT?!” Dad yelled so loudly into the phone that I cringed and had to pull it away from my ears.

“Dad-I’m—I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before! I was going to, I really was. Remember the last time you called? I was going to tell you then, but-”

“Faye,” I heard him say, but I ignored him. I knew he’d be mad at me. It was always me.

“—but you told me that you were getting married, and I was so mad that I just hung up. I shouldn’t have, I know I shouldn’t have, but I did and I’m so sorry that I didn’t tell you before! I just felt like-”

“FAYE!” Dad yelled into the phone, catching my attention this time.

“What?” I asked breathlessly.

“You’re coming to Miami.”

“I- wait, what?” I asked stupidly. He wasn’t mad?

“You heard me. I don’t care how much you hate me. You are coming to live with my family and me. You are coming to Miami and that’s final.”

…..................................................................................

The new million dollar question...what do you think?

I mean, moving from Boston to Miami...damn that's one crazy difference right?

I hope you guys will enjoy this story, because I am just as psyched to write this story. When I thought of it, I was so jumbled up with ideas, I couldn't even think straight. I've got SUCH big plans for this story, it's not even funny.

Most importantly, I want to give a 'shoutout' to one of my best friends on here: Nickymb. She has been such a great supporter for all of my stories. I feel like everytime I write with her, I get better and better. I never would have gotten this confident if you weren't here Megan (; So, a great thanks to her for knowingly (or unknowingly) inspiring me. Be sure to check out her stories as well!

So please, if you like it, prove it!

Comment, Vote, Fan

Summer

P.S. I'm so friggin excited to write this story, I might upload the next chapter tomorrow or the day after! (;

Okay, now I'm serious. Bye