The Cold Ones

Chapter Eight - Dates

I woke up to the sound of my alarm, ‘22’ by Taylor Swift.

I drifted out of bed and headed for the bathroom, doing my usual routine; brush my teeth, re-apply my bandages, get dressed, clean my room and then eat breakfast.

When I was done, I headed downstairs to the kitchen, where my entire family was eating already.

‘Marney, pull up seat. I made scrambled egg and tomato salad.’ Jasmine said dishing food onto my already laid out plate.

‘So, Marney, how was the party last night?’ my dad asked, over his newspaper.

‘Fun.’ I said trying to remember snippets of the night before. Everything was such a blur.

‘Just fun?’ my dad asked curiosly.

‘Very fun.’ I said with more enthusiasm.

‘You got home easily?’ my dad asked, still in a very curious voice.

‘Yes, dad, Ashley dropped me off.’ I said just saying what I thought happened. I seriously couldn’t remember anything that happened last night, no matter how hard I tried.

‘The big day’s coming up soon.’ Brad suddenly said.

‘The big day?’ Jasmine asked confused.

‘Yes, our birthday.’ Ben said smiling widely.

My brothers would be turning 16 this year, and they want to make a big deal out of it, as usual.

‘We want strobe lights.’ Brad said.

‘And a cake made out of chocolate ice-cream.’ Ben added.

‘You guys are going on like you’re gonna be on My Sweet Sixteen.’ I said rolling my eyes. For my 16th birthday last year, I didn’t have anything fancy.

In fact, half of the population in Earnest Peaks didn’t know it was my birthday.

‘I’m not doing anything extraordinary, you guys can have a couple of friends over in the garage, and that’s it.’ My dad said sternly.

‘What about the strobe lights?’ Brad asked peeved.

‘You can use one of the old lamps and swing it around the ceiling. It has the same effect.’ My dad smirked.

I burst out laughing. My father was such a cheap-skate it wasn’t even funny.

‘What about the cake?’ Ben asked with edge to his voice. It sounded as if he was about to burst into tears at any second.

‘You can have pizza.’ My dad said, not taking his eyes off of the paper. He seemed to be engrossed by whatever its contents were.

‘Fine,’ Ben muttered quietly.

‘We never made that big a deal of Marney’s 16th birthday.’ My dad said suddenly.

Yay. Finally, someone understands.

‘Because Marney’s not important.’ Brad said under his breath.

‘I heard that, you know.’ I said gulping down my glass of orange juice.

I put my plate and glass in the sink and washed and dried it off at the same time.

I took my seat again to hear more of this interesting conversation.

‘Whatever,’ Brad said sourly.

‘I guess the garage and pizza will do.’ Ben said brightly. He seemed to have gotten over the fact that you can’t get everything in life.