Define ***ed-Up

The youth stood before a wooden door. Sighing, as he knocked it with a smooth rhythm.

“Yes dear?” A sleepy voice came though, hardly been heard.

“Uh…mom? Angela needs to be taken to school.” There was a long pause before the woman inside made out an answer.

“Frankie dear, would you mind bringing your sister to school? I’m not feeling well.”

“Sure mom, try and get some sleep. I’ll take care of it.”

‘Of course you don’t fucking feel well.’ Frank cursed under his breath as he walked down the stairs. He stepped into the kitchen and turned on the stove to make his sister and himself some breakfast. He inhaled deeply then breathed out again, trying to calm himself. He was so angry. No, maybe that feeling somehow changed. He’s not angry, not anymore. He’s frustrated.

Frank’s mother has been drinking a lot ever since their father left them for another woman. She comes home in the middle of the night every day, drunk, or maybe sometimes earlier but an equally drunken man beside her. If it was those days, Frank would sleep in Angela’s room, making sure that she’s asleep and not been woken by the noise from the main bedroom. Angela didn’t know much about her mother being all wasted every night. This made Frank’s life even harder. Keeping his little angelic sister from knowing the truth of her own family. He hardly got any sleep at night.

Frank has already classified his life as a shit life, he didn’t want his sister to go down the same path. He tried to give her a normal life, despite having a family without a father. He prepared three meals a day and told her that it was their mother who had made it for them. Tell her that her mother comes home late every night because she has to work hard to earn a living, to give them the damn chance for education. Well, that wasn’t a lie, it’s just that she came home four hours later than she should have.

He always wanted his mother to at least spend some time with Angela, before his sister starts to get any suspicious. Hell, he had felt suicidal for a while but he soon realized that it would only turn the situation even more complicated for his sister. He didn’t care much about his mother, though. He thought if one day he had a phone call from the hospital, saying that their mother had died in some pub fight or killed in a car crash, he’d be so grateful to accept it, seriously. He wanted so badly to be a grown up as soon as possible. Get a job, rant an apartment, bring his sister in and leave his mother alone. He can’t wait till his 18th birthday.

Frank placed two pancakes on the smaller plate and headed to Angela’s room. Frank stepped in as quite as possible and knelt down beside his little angel’s bed. He watched his sister stir as she smelt the sweetness of the sugar/honey flooded pancakes, the way she and her brother loved most. Angela propped up dramatically and flashed a beaming smile across her face, making her elder brother chuckle. For a long time, Angela was the only reason why Frank was still alive.

So now, he’s gonna take his little angel to school and then get himself to his own first period classroom before the bloody bell rings, so that he wouldn’t have to go to detention again and make Angela wait at the school gate for a whole hour like she did last time. Fucking alcohol. Is it THAT tempting that you’ve got to have loads of it before the day ends?

“You better hurry or you are gonna have to wait at the front gate for a whole sweet hour again, my little ‘Anglea’.”

“Hey, Frankie! Stop saying that! I knew how to spell my name a long time ago.” Angela pouted and turned away to avoid her brother’s skeptical smile. She once spelled her name wrongly (Angela->Anglea), so her brother just kept making fun of her. But even though it’s a bit annoying, she still enjoyed spending every single minute with her big brother, her only and truly beloved family member. She knew that something’s wrong with their mother and that her dearest brother is also keeping something from her. But she didn’t care. As long as her brother was going to be by her side every time she needed him, every thing was gonna be fine, and she knew it so well.

Frank walked hand in hand with his sister all the way to her school. They didn’t have much conversation on the way, but they both enjoyed the peaceful silence between them. Angela glanced at her brother, who was deep in his own thoughts. She loved the way he looked when he was thinking. Eyes staring into space, nibbling his inner lips. It’s just so interesting. She stopped and started to giggle when she saw her brother walked pass the school gate completely without noticing.

“Bye Frankie, keep on walking that way and try crashing a tree.” Angela smiled sweetly at Frank and waved.

“Shit.” Frank muttered to himself and walked back to Angela. Ooooo, a new word to express oneself, let me note that down, Angela thought.

It’s funny how your sister smiles so sweetly but talks in such a sarcastic tone. Where did she learn to talk like that anyway? Frank knelt down in front of Angela and sighed.

“Now you should really try to quit talking like that uh? Or when you grow up, you talk to other people like that, you’re just putting your ass up on the table and prepared to be kicked.” Oh, so maybe he did know where did his sister learned it. Frank tried to keep a stern look but Angela still managed to giggle without feeling sorry for what she had said.

“Ok Frankie,” she leaned forward to give Frank a big hug and turned to the school gate.

“Bye Frankie!” Angela shrieked and skipped inside. Frank stared as his sister’s little body skipped and hopped and bounced towards to school main building. He smiled weakly and sighed.

“Bye honey, bye.” He said to himself and started heading down his own school.