The Unexpected

23 || Tensions

"Skye!" my mother exclaims. She rushes over to hug me, my father following behind.

"Hello, Mother," I say as I return their hugs. "Hi, Dad."

They look me over as if they're trying to make sure nothing's wrong with me. The funny thing is, they probably wouldn't even notice if I was missing an arm. Being oblivious seems to be one of their many gifts and talents. I think the one thing that describes our relationship best is a twelve word story that I found a few years ago: I wanted to kill myself, and you were yelling about dirty dishes.

Don't get me wrong, I love my parents, but I don't really like them all that much. I've tried to have respect for them and to get along with them, but that's only what I project on the outside. Even though I'm better now, they made getting to this point so much harder. I was never good enough and it was so hard to just be me; being me was always wrong.

"You look good," my mother concludes after inspecting me. "Are you liking things here? Do you want to come back home? Go somewhere closer?"

"Susan," my dad warns. She gives him a look that tells him to step down, so he does. He probably doesn't want to get into it in the middle of a party. My birthday party that I should be enjoying right now. With my friends. Currently, you could cut the tension with a knife.

"Um, well, your friends seem nice," she says in a voice that tells me she disapproves. The look on her face disgusts me; she thinks she's better than them. "Are they that direction band or whatever you used to listen to?"

"No, but they are a band I listen to. It's a cool story actually, and Mi-"

"We'll discuss them after the party," she orders. "Go have some fun. We'll be heading back to our hotel now."

I watch as my parents walk out the door that I just came in through several minutes ago. I'm speechless and I'm incredibly angry. I know exactly what she's going to say, and I'm desperately trying to push the thought out of my head. My friends threw me this party. I am going to enjoy it. I can think about this later.

Michael walks up to me, putting an arm around me. When he asks if everything's okay, I lie and assure him that I'm fantastic. I thank him for today, trying to change the subject, but he sees right through me. He leaves a quick kiss on my temple, then heads over to Calum.

"Happy birthday, lovey!" Charlotte exclaims as she runs up to me. "Were you surprised?"

"Oh my goodness! Yes! I thought you'd been left out of my birthday plans, and I almost flipped. Thank you so much Char," I say as I wrap her in a hug.

She has Michael's place filled with food and decorations. Music is blaring, and there's easily thirty people here.

"Well, someone had to invite our friends and coworkers, and pick up the cake, and grab your parents at the airport, and set up the place! I had the scavenger hunt as a distraction for just you and Michael originally, but the other three were so excited so I let them go," she says with a huge grin on her face. You can tell that she's extremely proud of herself for all of this, and I don't think I could ever thank her enough.

People come and go, making conversation with me and wishing me a happy birthday. I'm somewhat shocked by the number of people I know here in Sydney. There's a maximum of four people that I don't actually know, and Charlotte informs me that they were brought along with other guests.

I decide to look around the room and find a table absolutely covered in presents. There's so many different shapes and sizes. This year, I hadn't expected a single present, yet here was what looked to be twenty or more. I squeal as I run up and look at all of them, earning a few chuckles from around the room.