I'm a stripper, doesn't mean I'm a slut

Where I'm at

Things I want for Christmas:

1) Santa to come and play with me.

2) More paint and crayons.

3) A real family.

4) A pony.

5) A book about fairies.

His finger was on number three.

"You know." I said. "You and Mummy to play with me all the time. And do stuff together, like make picnics and drink wine and kiss like all my friend's families do."

I got the pony.

My father was hardly home because he was always away at business meetings or conferences or work or work parties (he was the CEO of some major company), and, now that I think about it, he may have been avoiding me or my mother too (I suppose I reminded him too much of her - we look very similar, except for my boring brown hair which I got from him - bleergh. I got my mum's boobs though, not my dad's so score!). My mother - well she might as well have been at work too.

She was always locked up in her bedroom upstairs with the curtains drawn, doped up on sleeping pills and anti-depressants, curled up on top of the extravagant silk duvet in the fetal position.

She only came out when father or I dragged her downstairs and forced her to converse over a lavish three course dinner which she just picked at and sat in the polished wooden table, looking around dazed and rubbing her eyes every so often at the unfamiliar sunlight streaming through the windows.

She also came out when father was having one of his big dinner parties with his colleagues, and she would slowly put herself back together with her sparkly dresses and high heeled shoes and diamond encrusted jewellery, and zip up her mask with a few coats of foundation, lipstick and expensive perfume.

I liked it when she stitched herself together again, it made it seem as though I had my mother back again. She laughed and spoke politely with father's friends, and even with me. I got a hug from her once, inhaling her perfume and clinging onto her bony waist engulfed in a sea of expensive fabrics for as long as I could, because I knew by the next morning she'd be back in that dark room again that always seemed cold somehow no matter how hot it was that day, in the exact same defeated position on the bed.

The smudged makeup and faint scent of perfume lingering around her from the night before was the only evidence that she had been normal again.

I think she may have been depressed. Okay, scratch that she was depressed (like, who takes anti-depressants and sleeps all day if they're not depressed, right?). Maybe all the pressure of being perfect got to her. She was expected to be the perfect wife, the perfect mother because of my father's status as being a king in the world of business.

Sometimes I hated her for being depressed. I know that's horrible - to hate your parents (although most teenagers say they do)- but I did. I know she couldn't control it, couldn't control the invisible monster that ravaged at her mind every day, forcing her to stay in bed staring blankly at the wall or the ceiling, but she wasn't there when I needed her, when I needed someone to brush my hair and neatly braid it like all the other girls in my class, to bake cookies with me and let me lick the bowl, or to go shopping with me and embarrass me by choosing an extremely frilly bra or granny panties or pointing out hot boys my age and telling me in a loud voice that I needed a boyfriend. Where was she when I needed my mum? Doped up on pills every colour of the rainbow, that's where.

I was all alone in a big empty house full of material things with no family or friends to give me something I'd always wanted - love. Gosh, I know that sounds so cheesy, but it's true.

I had friends, just not ones I would invite over. More like school friends, ones that I would hang out with in class and lunch just for the sake of not being alone. And they didn't really like me for me anyway, not really. It was more the fact that they could go home and tell all their friends and family that they were friends with that quiet girl with the big shot millionaire father.

And I mean, my parents love me don't get me wrong. Like what kind of parent wouldn't love their child (well besides some of the girls I work with - their parents are just pure evil). But even though I knew they loved me, and with all the awkwardly mumble out "I love you's" on special occasions like birthdays and promotions and graduations, I still didn't feel it. I wanted them to show me.

Show me that they loved me. That I meant more to them than all those stupid business meetings and important phone calls and magic pills of all shapes and sizes imaginable that make you sleep for hours on end.

So maybe that could explain it - why I was doing this - that I had no love as a child. That I got this job so that it would fill up my emptiness with the love and attention of countless men.

But truthfully, that's not how it is at all.

I guess I don't really know why I ran away from my picture perfect life and became a stripper.

I just did.

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What do you think? This just popped into my head last night. I'm sick of writing serious stories and planning out the plot. I'll just see where this story takes me.

Comment. Vote. Fan. Please?

Sheesh, where's your New Year's spirit?