blue ✓

thirty one

Harry sighs. "Well, what're you going to do today?"

I sigh. "Work." Harry gives me a sympathetic look. "Now get up." As I walk from my bedroom I hear the same childish groan escape his lips, earning a light chuckle from myself.

I smell coffee brewing in the kitchen as I enter, my father and mother both standing by the machine with weary eyes. My father greets me good morning, my mother merely searches the entire kitchen for something to look at instead of me.

I ignore her distaste and grab two mugs for myself and Harry.

"Is he still here?" My mother questions as I cling to the mugs in my hands.

I nod. "He's going to college soon."

"Oh wonderful," my father interjects, sipping the fresh coffee he had just poured before seating himself at the table with wilful eyes. "Mid-year exam preparations are today, I'm assuming?"

"Yeah." I smile.

My mother scoffs. "Majoring in fine arts is hardly 'wonderful'." Her comment is laced with venom and I scowl at the bitter woman, my father's eyes dim and I'm left speechless as his head lowers and his voice is scattered in silence.

I choose to ignore her, igniting an argument was her way of saying good morning and today I wasn't going to let her childish antics dim my mood. As she moves away from the coffee machine, I push my way to the counter and begin brewing more coffee to fill the mugs with.

An eerie silence echoes and as soon as I hear the shower upstairs begin, my mother's body stiffens. I count down from five until that annoyed sentence leaves my mother's mouth for the sixth time this month. "Make sure he doesn't use all the water." She scoffs.

Not once had Harry ever used all the water, even when we showered together it never got used up.

I quickly pour the coffee into each mug and exit the kitchen with a stomp. Annoyance surfaced inside me and my face heated with rising crimson blood, I could feel the color rise into my cheeks as I sipped my coffee, trying to lower the anger surfacing inside my stomach that my mother so elegantly summoned every day.

***

Dusk dawned upon my day as the golden rays of a summer's sun cast against the clear skies, the flowers outside the window glimmered and welcomed the warmth with open petals and dripping nectar. I sat on the couch with a half full glass lazily held against my fingertips, eyeing the changing skies with wonder as music hummed in the background.

"Lola?"

"Hmm?"

"You ready?"

I turn in the seat, noticing the eagerness behind my best friend's brown eyes. Her familiar soft vanilla scent mixed with roses and alcohol, her lips red and her cheeks faded against the contrast of a dimly lit home.

"Yes," I gesture to my body, her eyes scan my outfit. "I've been ready for an hour."

"Oh," she said in a low tone. "Well let's go." I noticed her eager smile fade when I nod a no, slumping on the spot.

"We have to wait for Sam," I replied with a certain knowing inside my tone.

Mona grumbles. "Fine, I'm going to get a drink then. Want another one?"

"M'fine thanks," I reply, placing the whiskey I had held onto for an hour now, down on the table in front of me.

Alcohol and I didn't get along very well anymore so I took to it with caution, it had been months now since I'd been drunk.