Crash Into My Arms

I awoke the next morning of my own accord, no screaming mother bashing my bedroom door open. That was a first, I wasn’t used to such a peaceful awakening, for so long I had been yelled and screamed at.

My stereo was still on, but the Bullet For My Valentine CD had long since finished. I picked up the remote on my bedside table and turned it off, before checking my phone. I was shocked to find it was 10am, why hadn’t Mum made me get up for school?

I got up out of bed and checked Mum’s room, the door was unlocked and the room was empty. I checked the rest of the house, but it was empty. I was home alone. I shivered suddenly, realizing the house was freezing.

I pulled one of the blinds open, and found that it was snowing outside, that explained a lot. I decided I’d stay home today, both because Mum wasn’t home to say otherwise, and because there was no way in HELL I was going out in the snow.

I grabbed True Blood Season One off the shelf as I walked back into my room and put the first disk in my DVD player, before curling up under the covers in bed and turning my TV on. After laying there for 10 minutes trying to get warm I realized it just wasn’t going to happen.

I threw the covers back and walked into Mum’s room to grab an extra blanket. There was one in the bottom of her wardrobe. I pulled it out, and spotted a battered old suitcase hiding under it. I cocked my head to the side, I’d never seen it before. But then again, I hadn’t gone into Mum’s wardrobe for quite a long time.

I pulled it out, and dragged it into my room where I pulled it up onto my bed and opened it. I drew in a sharp breath when I spotted a photo of my father lying on the top of the suitcase’s many contents. It looked to have been taken shortly before his death, as he looked exactly the way I remembered him.

I recognized the long black eyelashes, the dimples, the dark brown eyes, and dark brown hair, the genes that he and I shared. He looked so happy, I wondered if he’d ever thought he’d be lying in a hospital bed taking his last breaths only a few months after this photo was taken.

I put the photo to the side, and grabbed an old tie. It was striped, with deep, dark red and black. I put it around my neck and tied it, it’d been one of my favourite out of Dad’s ties, and I’d had a tendency to steal it at times. I’d wear it with a singlet, Avril Lavigne style. I thought it’d gotten lost in the move.

There was a small plastic box, and I opened it to find it full of Dad’s old guitar picks. Underneath the box, was a stack of paper. I picked it up, and realized it was sheet music. I gasped; All of Dad’s songs. The was a song at the bottom of the pile, entitled “Daddy’s Little Girl”

My hand flew to my heart, I’d never known about this song. I’d never heard him play it. I grabbed what I instantly recognized as Dad’s old guitar strap, and pulled my own guitar out of it’s bag. It was a little dusty, and I brushed the dust off before attaching Dad’s guitar strap to it.

I wasn’t very good at reading music, but lucky for me, the song was simple enough, and I strummed a few chords using one of Dad’s picks. After playing the same 5 bars over and over for a mere minute, I felt a lump well up in my throat. Playing Dad’s old songs was too painful, I couldn’t take it, so I threw the sheets and pick back into the suitcase and closed it.

I laid my head upon its surface and remembered how Dad and I would sit opposite each other in the living room of our old home, as he taught me how to play guitar. Flashbacks of he and I spending our Saturday nights watching Dragon Ball Z and eating Ice Cream Sundaes, kicking the soccer ball around the back yard. Memories of the days we’d spent busking in the city; Dad would play his guitar and I’d sing. All those memories triggered an unbearable pain in my heart. The day Dad died, I not only lost my father; I lost my best friend. Since he’d passed on, my life had gone to complete shit. I was lost without him.

“Why, Dad?” I whimpered. “Why did you have to die?”