One Tough Love

Foxey's

Summer 1993

Summer approached with a quickness and this Texas heat was NO. JOKE.!! We were barely in the month of June and already experiencing 100°F+ weather.

I left work early because I wasn't feeling too well. I had a splitting headache and I just really needed to take some medicine and get some rest. I unlocked the door to the house and a blast of hot air hit me.

Damn, I thought. It was hot as hell in here and there was only one reason why. I flipped the switches on and off just to realize that the lights had got cut off. 'You've got to be kidding me!!' I said to myself. Although business has been really good at the diner, I just wasn't making enough money. I was still paying of my grandad's funeral cost, on top of that trying to keep up with rent and other bills. I was steady stressing about money and how I'm going to make it. Marissa is helping out but not even her checks are enough to keep us afloat. This is exactly why I have these bad migraines. A girl can never catch a break.

I walked to the back and grabbed some meds from the kitchen drawer. I swallowed a couple pills and chased them with a nice glass of water before going to lay down.

"Hey...wake up!!" I heard Marissa whisper. She gently shook my shoulder and when that didn't work, she violently flopped down on me and yelled, "I SAID WAKE UP!!!!!"

"DAMN BITCH, OKAY, I'M UP!!" I yelled back, pushing her off. "What do you want?!" I was slightly irritated as to why she was bothering me. My headache was gone but I was still a little drowsy. "What time is it??" I asked peeking out the window. It was already nighttime and the street lights had just popped on.

"It's time you get dressed so we can go out." She coolly answered. She began ransacking my closet until she came across an outfit. "Here. Put that on."

"Excuse me, but I'm not going out." I said.

"You don't have a choice." She replied. "We haven't been out since..." She trailed off.

I know exactly what she was about to say. We hadn't been out since papa passed away. We've been too busy busting our asses to keep up with the struggles of everyday life. Papa died from cancer a little over a year ago and Marissa has been doing everything in her power to keep busy so that she doesn't have to deal with the emotions. I honestly don't blame her. We both have our ways of coping and hers happen to be going out, getting blackout drunk and occasionally bringing home some random guy. I, on the other hand, preferred to pick up extra shifts at the diner to help keep us in a house.

That's where our problem lies.

"How can you think about going out at a time like this??" I asked. "In case you haven't noticed, the lights were cut off today because we didn't have money to pay the bill!!!!!!!" I said aggressively flipping the light switch. The lights flickered on and off as I played with the switch.

"Yes. I did notice," She said, with a devilish grin. "And ya girl payed the bill right after i got off work!!" I followed her into the bathroom where she began combing out her hair.

"Alright, what about rent????" I asked, crossing my arms. "What are we gonna do when we get put out on our asses?! Are we gonna go out then???!"

"You're over exaggerating." She said calmly.

The fact that she wasn't taking this serious was my issue. It was truly irritating because I felt like I was the only one who genuinely cared whether or not we had a place to lay our heads at the end of the day. It's like she no longer cared. I walked to the other room and grabbed a piece of paper.

"HERE!" I slammed the paper down on the counter in front of her. It was eviction papers. We had until next Tuesday evening to pack our shit and get out before being escorted out by police. It was Friday. We had four days and it seemed like Marissa didn't give not one fuck.