Year of Oblivion [On Hold]

Chapter 6: Erasure

                                                                            -6-

A week had passed me by without word from Janelle. She’d barely been at school, and when she was I’d avoided her. Though by the time the week came to an end and Christmas break began, my anger at her had passed along, replaced with an unfortunate feeling of lonesomeness. I’m not pathetic; I don’t wait around for Janelle until she’s free and bored. I do have other friends, if you can call them that, but Janelle drew me in. As much as I loathed her sometimes, as much as she blew me off, I still needed her. And I hate myself for that. I don’t even know why I need her. Perhaps because, contrary to my beliefs, I am in fact, pathetic. Or, perhaps because she’s a remnant from when I was younger, a relic from the days that summer was sweet and winter a wonderland, a time when I think I was happy.

Now it was as though Janelle, preoccupied with Lucas and god knows who else had retracted into Oblivion as well. Maybe there was a statue of her there waiting for me on my next visit. Who knows, really? Surely, I don’t.

Sighing, I set down my copy of The Stranger. Oh Camus, you pretentious, existential Frenchman. The windows in the living room revealed the cold, gray world of winter outside; the wind moving the boughs of trees in a frenzy, falling leaves whirling about on the grass. Just watching the movements sent a shiver of coldness down my spine, and being in this house didn’t really help. The house looked sad and forlorn, stripped of any holiday cheer that had ever enveloped the halls. We hadn’t had a Christmas tree since my father left, and the ornaments, lights, even the holiday cookie cutters had long ago been packed away in tape sealed cardboard boxes, left to collect dust in the garage. Even the decorations had left me alone.

I’d woken up to a note from my mother on the kitchen counter informing me that she’d be flying to New York to visit her sister. She wouldn’t be back until January 7th, coincidentally, the day I resumed school. So we don’t talk on a regular basis, but did she honestly leave me to spend Christmas alone? At the most on Christmas Eve we would share an uncomfortable, albeit meager meal and attempt to make conversation for one day out of the three hundred and sixty five of the year, but this year she was actually leaving me to my own devices. Well Mother Dearest, I can’t say I expected much more of you.

I wasn’t furious at her. No, I was past that. The days of us screaming relentlessly at one another, once voice desperately battling for dominance over the other, had fallen in the past long ago. Since then we’d simply figured it was better to swallow our anger in favor of ignoring each other, or at least being passive aggressively pleasant. No, she didn’t deserve fury; she deserved every bit of the cold indifference that I rained upon her in that moment. Still, no matter how many times I’d been abandoned, it still hurt. It still hurts.

Suddenly, my pity party of one was unexpectedly interrupted by a rapping on the door. My mouth curved on the right side slightly upward. Maybe it was Janelle, bored of her new boy toy already. Hastily, I pulled myself off the sofa and walked to the front door. Expecting to see an ecstatic Janelle, I frowned with disappointment and disbelief when I opened the door. Blake? You must be joking.

“What are you doing here Everheart?” my eyes narrowing.

The prick ignored me, ever rude, and pushed his way past me into the house.

“Yes, by all means, please, come inside,” I scowled, hurling the door shut behind me. “You know, usually when you show up unannounced at someone’s house and they ask you why, it’s polite to answer them.”

Blake turned around to face me as we walked into the living room. “Yeah well, I’ve seen a lot of Janelle lately because”

“Because she’s with Lucas.”