Saige ripped off the eviction notice that was flapping in the wind off of her door. She looked around to see if anyone noticed before crumbling it up and unlocking the door with her key.
"Mom, I'm home!" She shouted as she entered the front door. The living room was a mess per usual. She shuffled some of the empty beer bottles on the floor from her path. The aroma of marijuana filled her nostrils causing almost an instant headache.
"Mom?" She called out again when she didn't hear a response.
She noticed the light was on in the bathroom through the crack of the door. There was a soft hiss, almost calming — like white noise. Her steps were light. Almost unsure, like she was afraid of what she may find when she opens the bathroom door.
She put her hand on the door and paused before pushing it open wider. The "white noise" was just the sink being left on. She rolled her eyes knowing her mom forgot to turn it off. It's not her just "forgetting". It's why she forgot.
She turned the water off and turned off the lights and closed the bathroom door.
"Mom are you here?" She finally checked her mom's bedroom and saw her mom passed out drunk on the floor. She didn't say anything at first. Just stood there, fists curling at her sides. Her mom mumbled something incoherent. The t.v blared in the background with no one watching it.
"Of course." She muttered under her breath. Pulling it together she walked over to pick her mother up from the ground and lay her in bed. "You don't have to treat me like I'm a damn ragdoll." She slurred her words out.
"You're lucky I'm even helping you at all." She said throwing a blanket over her barely naked mother's body.
"I was sleeping. Can a bitch get some sleep after working hard for so long?"
Her mom's bitter tone didn't upset her. She's used to it.
"We both know you don't work." Saige said turning the obnoxiously loud tv down. "If you did there wouldn't be an eviction letter on the door."
Her mom rose her head up. In a drunken state she had a confused expression. "That slimy negro." She said before plopping her head back down. "You and him are just slimy people that want to stick and take everything I got. I'm tired of you fucking disrespecting me Saige."
Saige rolled her eyes knowing her mom is having a bipolar episode right now whilst being drunk. "You're drunk. Goodnight mom love you."
"Fuck you!"
She closed her mom's door and went to hers. She hates how normal it's become. Holding her mom's hair back, tucking her in bed, making sure the stove is off. Nineteen years old and she's the one holding everything together. Working double shifts, paying bills, wiping her mom's tears, and sometimes her vomit. No one asks her how she's doing. No one notices she's drowning too.
Some days she resents her mom. Other days she just wants her back. The one she remembered, not this broken version.
Her mom wasn't always like this. There was a time she was warm, full of life, and filled with laughter. She was the kind to dance in the kitchen while cooking a good meal. The kind to sing silly songs just to make Saige smile. All of that faded the moment he left.
Saige was only six when her dad walked out. No fights, no dramatic exit, but quietly. He just stopped showing up. No calls, no texts. One day he was there. The next, he wasn't. He disappeared like their life meant nothing.
Holly (Saige's mom) at first, kept things going. Smiling through the pain while doing Saige's hair like he might still come back. But months passed. Then years, and hope soon turned into bitterness. The silence became loud and her mom started drinking to drown it out.
What began as a glass of wine to "relax" after work turned into bottles stacked beneath the sink. By the time Saige was a teenager, she was the one paying bills, doing the grocery shopping, the caretaking.
Holly, who was once loving and present, was now succumbed behind the fog of abandonment and cheap alcohol. The world doesn't see it as grief because there was no funeral. Holly wasn't mourning a death. She's mourning a love that chose to leave her behind. And Saige is now left to pick up the pieces of a mother who never got to be whole.
Saige has a jar that she drops money in when she can labeled 'Anywhere but here.' She's tired of being in survival mode. She wants to leave. Start over. No baggage, no dead weight. Her mom never left their small town. Saige fears being stuck in the same cycle.
She's also smart, even if people overlook it. She couldn't go to college immediately after graduation. Her mom didn't finish school and her dad left before setting any kind of example.
That's why she secretly applied to a few schools but never told anyone. She's scared of getting in or not. She's scared of getting in because she knows she has to leave her mom. But she can no longer take care of a grown woman who wakes up everyday with a choice to heal and be better. She needs to live her own life now.
Saige slipped on her hoodie, even though the apartment was already warm. Habit, maybe. Protection. It smelled like last week's shift and the incense she burned to cover up the smell of alcohol in the air. She stepped over a pile of dirty laundry near the couch.
The hallway outside was dim and stale. Her shoes squeaked on the stairs she was going down, ignoring the sound of someone yelling behind a closed door and a baby crying down the hall. The mailroom always smelled like dust and failed dreams. It looks like it gave up on delivering anything good a long time ago.
She went to their assigned mailbox and twisted the small key inside to open and reveal its contents. Looks like weeks worth of mail was stuffed inside. She shuffled through the overdue bills, store flyers, final notices. Her fingers hesitated when she saw a thick envelope with her name printed in clean, bold letters.
Her heart dropped to her stomach. Her hands suddenly didn't feel steady. She stood there in the heat of the mailroom, clutching the envelope. Out of state. The school I'd never thought I'd get into. She thought to herself. She let out a shaky sigh and then ripped it open.
Her eyes scanned the words.
"We are pleased to inform you..."
She read it again. And again. Just to be sure she was reading correctly. For a moment, she couldn't breathe. Everything around her went quiet. No cars, no people, no world. Just her heartbeat pounding in her ears. You're in. You're finally in. She mentally said to herself. A single tear trickled down her cheek, a half laugh and a half sob escaped from her lips. She pressed the paper to her chest, holding it like it was a lifeline—because it was.
This isn't just a letter. It is a door.
And for the first time in a long time, it was opening for her.
MoonRiver
-
-
-
To be continued...
