Your Inaccessible Light

By about 7:00am, I am sick to death of tossing and turning, so I give up on sleep and get myself ready. Ronnie is still fast asleep, and judging by the state he was in last night, he won’t be waking up any time soon. Before I leave, I put a glass of water and some headache tablets beside the bed, because I can’t imagine he’ll be feeling too great when he wakes up. I feel so angry with everything and I so badly want to hate Ronnie enough that I can just leave him to fuck his life up, but I can’t because I care about him so unbelievably much and I couldn’t hate him ever. The whole situation is made worse by the fact it’s happened before. The whole point of moving here was that it would be a fresh start and I could finally live some sort a stable life, but Ronnie’s just like Austin. Once again, I am watching someone I love dig themselves deeper and deeper into a hole despite doing everything I can to help them. Once again, I wake up sick with fear because every day that drugs are involved in is a nightmare. Once again, I feel hopelessly trapped in the ongoing cycle that I know from experience won’t end until their addiction kills them. I’m scared and I don’t know what to do. I’m not strong enough to go through this on my own.

When I get home, I am surprised to see both of my parents. My mother is sat forward on the couch, her hands on her knees and her eyes vacant as always, and my father is sat at the kitchen table in on his computer. It’s strange to see my father at home for once, and it’s even stranger to see my mother out of her bedroom, but I don’t have the energy to ask questions.

“Noelle, where have you been?” my father asks, getting to his feet. His voice is loud and intrusive and it makes my head hurt and I am just not in the mood.

“Out,” I say bluntly, suddenly feeling a surge of anger towards my parents. This is all because of them. I wouldn’t be in this situation right now if we hadn’t have moved here, and we wouldn’t have had to move here if they had have just been proper parents to Austin.

“Out where?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“You’re sixteen years old. As your parent, I have a right to know where you’ve been all night,” he snaps, starting to raise his voice, which only makes me angrier.

“No you don’t!” I yell, making my mother tense up, “You’re only a parent when it suits you. Don’t act like you care. You probably didn’t even notice I was gone until I got back.”

“How dare you speak to me like that?”

“Just shut the fuck up,” I order, emphasising every other word, “You’re never here dad. You can’t come home for one day and suddenly think you’re in charge of everything that goes on in the house.”

“I work long hours to earn money to put a roof over your head young lady! Your mum’s here, it’s not like I leave you on your own.”

“You might aswell,” I spit, pointing to my mother who is sitting motionless on the couch, staring into space as always, completely tuning out from everything going on around her, “All she fucking does is sit in bed. I look after her, not the other way round.”

“Your mother is struggling at the moment. You need to support her.”

“And who supports me, dad? You may be content with pretending like Austin never existed, but I’m not!” My mother jumps to her feet at the mention of Austin’s name and I should feel bad because I’ve clearly triggered something for her, but I don’t feel bad at all, the same way they don’t feel bad when they leave their kids to look after themselves.

“Stop it right now,” my dad orders.

“No. I’m not going to pretend like he never existed just so that you can keep on playing happy families.”

“This isn’t about me Noelle!” he yells, subtly motioning towards my mother who is now quietly crying.

“You can’t honestly expect me to have sympathy for her. If she’d have stepped up and helped her son then he’d still be alive. Why should I pay the price because she failed as a parent?” My mother moves suddenly and then all I can feel is pain and shock as her hand collides with my skin, slapping me hard across the face.

For the next few days, I don’t leave the house once. Everything has gone wrong as I so badly feared it would and if my mother gets to hide away from all her problems then so do I. I don’t prepare the dinner like I always do and I don’t clean the house like I always do and I don’t take care of my mother like I always do. I don’t go to school because I feel too angry and upset with everything and I don’t want to see anyone. I struggle just to get out of bed so there’s no way I could cope with going to school. Everything seems pointless because all I’m doing is going in circles and it feels like no matter what I do, things only get worse and I’m scared because I’m not sure how exactly it can get any worse, much less if I’d be able to cope.

On the Monday, I feel angry; my mother has yet to apologise for hitting me. What sort of woman can hit her own daughter and not so much as have the decency to apologise? My father hasn’t even tried to make excuses for her. After what happened on Sunday morning, my mother and I went back to our rooms and early this morning my father fucked off back to work just like he always does and none of us have spoken to each other since. I’m sick to death of telling them time and time again what they are doing wrong and how they make me feel like crap, only for them to persistently ignore me. They’re not being proper parents and I can’t for one second see what drove them to have kids in the first place if they can’t actually take care of them. I feel angry because Ronnie hasn’t made any effort to contact me. I wonder if he remembers that I looked after him when all the rest of his friends, quite rightly, left him, or if he even cares. It pisses me off that I waste my time looking after him when he gets himself into a mess, only to get fuck all in return. All I want is some recognition or a basic thank you. I feel angry because Austin left me when he knew how much I loved him and how much I did for him. He knew I depended on him and he knew how much I needed him but he didn’t even think about me when he destroyed himself. I gave up my social life, my dream of being a photographer, and my peace of mind so that I could look after him because looking after a drug addict is a fucking full time job. I didn’t do it out of choice. I did it because I loved him. How I wish we got to choose who we love, because I sure as hell would like to love people who aren’t addicted to slowly killing themselves.

By the Wednesday, the anger has subdued and hurt comes into play. I’m upset by my mother because I never thought she’d go so far as to hit me. It makes me feel like shit that she’s gone that far because surely she must hate me one hell of a lot in order to do that. I’m upset by my father because he hasn’t once checked whether I’m okay. Does he not care enough to even wonder whether I’m hurt? I’m upset by Ronnie because he still hasn’t made any effort to contact me and it sucks that I keep trying to help him because I care about him so much even though it feels like he couldn’t care less about me. The good parts of our friendship are so good and I can’t bear to distance myself from him but I’m struggling enough to look after myself, let alone him aswell. I’m upset by Austin leaving because I miss his laugh and I miss how he would take me down town to get ice-cream whenever I’d had a bad day and I miss how he would help me with my English papers when I was inundated with homework. I miss him so much and I can’t cope without him. None of us can cope without him.

When Friday comes around, the hurt has been replaced by guilt. I feel guilty because I pushed my mother over the edge. She’s never ever been violent in any way, shape or form, so I must have messed up a lot. I feel guilty because I swore at my dad and didn’t appreciate how hard he works to keep a roof over my head and accused him of being a bad parent even though I have it so much better than some kids who don’t have parents at all. I feel guilty because I’m being so hypocritical towards Ronnie because I haven’t actually tried to contact him either. He always comes to see me when I’m ill or upset or whatever, yet when he’s having problems of his own, I’m not there to support him. Maybe he’s really struggling too, but I wouldn’t know, because I’m not there. I feel guilty because I didn’t help Austin as much as I could have. I let him die. I could have saved him somehow. If I’d have tried harder, he would still be alive.