Growing Up in a Broken Home

My Surprise Birthday Gift

YAYYYYY!!! Its almost my birthday!!!
It is currently January of 2004, my mom comes upstairs to tell me that there is going to be a new member of our family. I automatically assume it's a new puppy that will be arriving for my birthday which is in less than 2 weeks (my little kid brain doesn't even think that what she really meant was another human being will be entering our lives).
As my hopes continued get bigger and bigger for my new puppy, my mom keeps ""working late"". After a week has gone by, I ask my father where mom went and he replies; she is preparing for my surprise. At the sound of excitement in my father's voice I immediately got very excited from that one statement which made my hopes get even bigger. Once the 18th of January finally came around, I was basically bursting with excitement.
Of course I forced my self to get up extremely early just so I can sneak into my mom's closet so I can find my surprise before anyone wakes up. But once I moved all her fancy dresses out of the way, my presents were nowhere to be found?!? I start running through the house in search this big surprise. I walk into the kitchen to find a picture with a black background and a white ghost in the middle (I think nothing of it and keep rummaging throughout the house). I'm very confused as to what this picutre is. I pick up the picture and bring it into my parents room where my dad is still passed out from last night's drinking, as usual. I climb into his king size bed and jump on it until he finally wakes up. He opens one eye and makes a long groan and whispers, "Yes little one?". I immediately scream with excitement. I get up from sitting on the big bed and slowly make my way the side of his bed. As soon as I reached the floor I grab my dads hand and lead him down the hallway to the kitchen were this odd picutre was. Once we get into the kitchen I ran and jumped onto the big chair closest to the table in the center of the room. Once I got up onto the table I crawled over to the picture and sweetly asked, "Dad what's black picture of?". Looking up expecting this to be a really dark photo of the puppy I've been hoping for since last Christmas. My hopes where then shot down by what my father next said, "Don't tell mommy I told you, but this August you're going to be a big sister!".
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***The look on my face said it all that day, I was happy at all. This was by far the biggest letdown..... for now! ;)

^^^Do let me know if there is any spelling errors or even what you think so far!

°°°Thank you for reading!

-Alisandra Marie