Mean to Me

Meet Cully

The room smelled of disinfectant, bleach and @#!*% . All the walls had recently been scrubbed, but the evidence of profound graffiti remained in the grout surrounding the tiny tiles. Squeezing myself through the window, I tried to drop silently into the garden below. Unfortunately it was a lot less graceful; I fell from the window and landed clumsily on top of an unsuspecting young couple. Despite the fact that their mouths were very much pre-occupied, they still managed to make enough noise to alert my pursuers to my presence...god @#!*% it. Within a second I was surrounded by six ratty children. I hate children. Yet still my parents have decided that my natural born gift as a woman is to have and love children. So once a week in my shameless attempt to escape from this duty, I am chased by my older brother and his girlfriend who had made it into a game for the ‘little ones’. Sometimes I do manage to hide and I get the evening to myself, not tonight however. I ran around with the children for a while and played a very one sided game of dodge ball. In which I was the only one allowed to have the ball and the only instructions given to the partakers was to (within the designated area) run. After my parents and their friends either took away the messy ankle biters, or put them to bed. I could finally immerse myself in some activity that would block out the rest of the world. Sometimes it would be music, or sketching or YouTube. However tonight it was the ‘wonderful’ world of George Orwell’s 1984. As I read I find myself thanking, someone, that we aren’t living in a post apocalyptic world where our every word, action and thought were being monitored by ‘Big Brother’.

I hate the cold; it kept me awake most off the night. Right now the idea of staying in bed, rugged up and warm all day, reading my book or feeding my girlish fantasies with endless hours of YouTube vloggers, other good looking celebrities and searching for new bands would be beautiful. But unfortunately school as always is in my way. I force myself from under the thick, warm layers of blankets into the painfully cold, crisp winter morning. I sluggishly strap myself into the school uniform and drag my heavy body to the kitchen for breakfast. The first person I see is my Dad; he’s already finished breakfast and is having Mum tie his tie, even though she is undoubtedly impatient to leave for her own Job. My older brother doesn’t live with us anymore, but he drops by regularly. He says it’s because he wants to keep in touch with his parents, but I know he does it to get on my nerves. Finally my younger sister sitting at the table, in her uniform that she’s had “fitted” so it would “look better” on her.  This was done three years ago, and she refuses to get a new uniform even though the buttons on the blouse are almost bursting from the development in her chest. I find it odd sometimes, how different I am from Lacey (Alisha). She is one of the most popular girls in her year. So was my older brother (except his popularity spread school wide). Whereas I am, to put it simply, am not. At all. It could be something to do with my appearance, my siblings both have blonde hair and brown eyes, they’re fair skinned and rosy cheeked. I, on the other hand, have brown hair, pasty skin, no chest (and nothing of that sort to offer) I wear glasses that magnify my eyes to an impossible size due to my short sightedness; and worst of all I actually follow the school dress code. This is a massive DON’T if you want to be considered popular. But the way I see it is, I would much rather go to a party (not that I’m ever invited to any) and have everyone be amazed that I can actually look decent than go to school every day looking good and have a bigger expectation to look better if invited to parties. But there is a key difference between Lacey and Matt (my older brother), they both have very different personalities, and I prefer Matt’s. But now that he’s moved out I’ve lost one of the best people I know, and he’s left me here with this...Moll. It amuses him to watch my stew in my dislike for my sister, and mother who is just a fifty-something version of Lacey.

They all just make me sick. So in my lack of popularity and love of reading I have all but three other friends. Two of the three, unbeknownst to the rest of us had a suicide pact and, well-you-know’d about 12 months ago. I haven’t seen the other one in about six months, her and I were never really close anyway.