Ardor

One: An Imagined State of Being

My whole life I have been hidden behind my father, shielded by his wealth and important status. It doesn't matter that my mother is slightly alcoholic or that my sister is a slut (to put it kindly). It doesn't matter that our dog is so old that he runs into walls or that I am a three-sport athlete that only manages to catch the attention of his peers after a good game. It doesn't matter that my father is hardly ever home because he would rather be at work with acquaintances  than at home with his own family.

No, none of that matters because we are the family of a military leader and no one can see through the glamour to what really lies beneath the surface. None of that matters to the kids I have to go to school with. They all stick real close to me because I'm loaded and my dad is a government official but I never feel like I have their full attention. They don't really care about me. People say I'm popular, but my 'friends' just like standing next to me to look good. I'm an accessory.

How does one even begin to describe how it feels to be toted around like a designer purse dog? Here's a hint: you can't. Sometimes I just lie awake until odd hours of the morning, wondering if it's me, my dad, or them. Somehow I always come back to it being my fault. I'm too boring, I'm too bland, I'm not a good enough athlete. I just can't physically wrap my mind around the twisted social hierarchy of the teenage world.

Every day like clockwork my sister tells me for some reason or another that I am a sadistic creep and it's a wonder I'm so popular. I have to laugh at that because even she's been fooled by my clever disguise. One that was handed down to me from my father. But then again this family is full of secrets that have become so plastered to our minds that even we have begun to believe them. My mother still thinks she has a happy marriage, even as she pours her seventh glass of wine. My sister thinks our family is perfect, despite the wars that rage in the living room after we are supposedly asleep. My father doesn't even know he's lying anymore. Sometimes it's hard for even me to discern truth from farce. The Harris' live in an imagined state of being, and one way or another it's going to take us apart.

I feel like I am the only person that notices the earthquakes; little tremors that rattle the windows in the early stages of morning, the gray area between night and day. I probably am. Nobody else is worried about the tremors, so why should I be? Well for starters, I am not everyone else. I believe what my instincts tell me, and they say something bad is coming. And it's coming soon.