One of Those Things

this was an english assignment. it's also a true story.

             Twelve is a very unstable age, especially for a young girl. My mother was the most important person in my life, and in one night she was gone. My home was gone; my friends were gone; my foundation gone. I was up rooted and planted somewhere new expected to grow and survive.

            The day before mom had kept me home from school, my ankle having swollen up and turned purple from a sprain the day before that. Mom had gone out and rented some movies for me to watch so I wouldn’t be bored. I can still remember exactly what they were called: Monalisa Smile and The Haunted Mansion. The last was a kid’s movie with Eddie Murphy in it.

            At 5 in the afternoon I watched mom take her afternoon meds before picking up John, her fiancé. They were going to be married in a month, one of the many things stressing her out. Her dress wasn’t even close to finished.

            “I’ll be back,” she says.

            “K,” I mumble, absorbed in the movie. I had finished watching one movie and started on another by the time they got home. Mom could barely stand from the medication she had taken. I leapt up to help John lay her on the couch. I was worried, but this had happened before. She’d be better in the morning. Seeing that she was obviously in no condition to cook, I made dinner for John and myself. We ate and went to bed like any other day.

            I woke up at 5:30, the usual time if I was riding the bus, the next morning. I hobbled into the kitchen on my sprained ankle to turn on the coffee pot. That was the deal, if I wanted mom up with me in the morning; I had to make her coffee. I left the kitchen and went to the living room. She was still on the couch sleeping peacefully. I kneeled down and shook her.

            “Mom time to wake up, I’ve got the coffee started. Do you want me to grab your morning pills?” I said quietly since John was in the next room and didn’t have to wake up for another two hours. She didn’t move. I remembered something she’d told me before: if she didn’t wake up put cold water on her face, sometimes the meds made her sleep hard. So I put some cold water on my fingers and gently touched her face. She still didn’t move. Worried I grabbed her wrist. I felt nothing. I froze for about two seconds then leapt up and ran to her and John’s bedroom.

            “John!” I said loudly. “Mom, she won’t wake up. I can’t get her up!” He blinked at me sleepily then as the message sank in; he threw the covers off and pushed past me to the living room. He shook her. He tried the cold water. He grabbed her wrist. He put two fingers to her neck. Finally he looks at me and tells me to call 911. I grab the phone and dial stumbling over the address: 2200 Bafford Lane. They say they’ll be there soon. They get to my house. They tear open Mom’s shirt and stick these white electrode things to her chest. All I can think about is that she’ll be extremely embarrassed about this later.

            “Clear.” I hear them say and I watch her body jump.

            “Clear.” Her body jumps again.

            “Clear.” She jumps a third and final time. The paramedic checks her pulse again. She looks at John and I, who are standing off to the side, his arm around my shoulders, and shakes her head.

            After that time seems a little choppy. I sit on out family room couch with my grandmother. The paramedic is offering me anti-depressants. I strongly say no.

            Next I am sitting in my grandmother’s house watching my half-brother walk into the room speak quietly with my uncle and walk away, but not before I see a single tear running down his cheek.

            I’m in a room at my Grandmother’s house listening to the adult while they think I’m asleep. They say that the coroner thinks it was suicide. To myself I disagree. There was no way my mother would kill herself and leave me, even if she wasn’t already happy, which she was seeing as she was getting married in a matter of weeks to a man she’d been dating for seven years.

            I stayed home for the next month. I don’t remember much of that time. I’m not even absolutely sure it was a month, maybe that’s just what it felt like. When I finally did go back to school I was much too far behind to catch up. So I was suspended the last two days and left 6^th grade with nothing higher than a D in PE.

            After school was out my dad had me pack all my things and move to Idaho with him. I’d lived in Nevada all my life as Mom was my primary guardian. I don’t remember this but my dad told me later that I had told him many times I didn’t want to go. He came down to Nevada and helped me pack my things into a moving truck and we were off; new town, new school, new friends, new life.

            I was forced to grow up much faster then was necessary because of this. I was also given more responsibility as in watching my little sisters while my parents were away. I was forced to find things on my own with like how to get to school and how to get home. This one of those things you call a life changing experience.

Author's Note

Please comment good or bad I want them!