“Well then you can just help me then, I mean you do our taxes so you must be good with numbers” I reckoned “What do you say?”
“Err nah” my father mimicked Michael off ‘My Wife and Kids’. We were the only two in the house who actually enjoyed watching it. The others said it was boring. They just don’t know good TV.
“Why not?” I droned. He helping me with my homework would save me a lot of time.
“Because that would be cheating, you have to do your homework by yourself with not help and only then will you achieve true success”
“Yeah, yeah” I waved off “But why not just help me a little bit you know, show me your tactics”
“Cassie, I have work remember?”
“Yeah but you’ll be back in like what two months tops?”
He sighed not answering my question which bubbled up my suspicion so I repeated myself “two months maximum right”
He shifted slightly in my seat, griping the steering wheel more firmly. “About that…”
“Yeah?” I edged him on.
“This trip is going to be slightly longer” he announced hesitantly. My heart dropped into my stomach. Longer than two months? The longest time he’s ever been gone was ten weeks and even then I was moping around, sad about him not being there. Sure, I was close with my mom but there was a special bond that only my father and I shared. I loathed saying goodbye because it was like the end of a short story. Why couldn’t we just be a regular family who lived together ALL the time?
I gulped “How long is it this time?”
My dad delayed his answer as he was turning a corner but even after that he started checking random things like the rear-view mirror, the amount of gas in the tank etc. He was really testing my patience.
“How long?!” I asked again a little louder
He sighed once more, scratching the back of his neck a little “Its six months Cassandra”
Silence. That was the only sound lingering in the ambience besides a car that passed us every now and again. A tense emotion-filled silence. And mixed in with all the emotions that were brewing inside me the most evident one was anger. Yes anger was defiantly the biggest.
“Cassie, are you okay?” my papa asked after several minutes of pure silence
“Of course I’m not okay” I shouted, tearing through the atmosphere “You are about to leave the family for SIX months to go and-“
“Cassie, calm down”
“I don’t want to calm down!” I exploded angrily “You always leave when everything is going back to the way it was, and this time it’s worse because you’re missing Christmas! What kind of father misses Christmas?!”
“Now Cassie” my father raised his voice to be heard over my yelling “You know how my job can be-”
“But it never takes you away for this long! I mean, six months?! By the time you come back I won’t even remember you”
“I think you’re slightly over reacting”
Well I probably was, but at the time I was engulfed in fury.
“No! I’m not over reacting. You’ve never been there for me for long. Do you know how hard it is to go to someone’s house and see their whole family together having a good time? Then realizing that yours can never be as perfect as theirs because your own father has chosen a job which makes it harder to be a real family? It’s only when the time suits you that you can come back and ‘pick up where we’ve left off’. Don’t you actually get that you haven’t been there for half of my life? My first day at pre-school, my first cheerleading competition, to see my first science fair project. You have missed the biggest milestones of my life!
YOU ARE READING
Finding Me
Teen Fiction"You can pretend it isn't true, but I turn you on, without even trying to" I quoted confidently to Valentino. Well except for the last part, I added that on because it's true, I think. Maybe. Possibly. Probably Not Click that...
Chapter 16 - Footballs & Forgotten Things
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