I'm Still a Little Crazy

All though I'm sure my weak and comfort-loving side would have loved to stay wrapped up in Sara's arms all Saturday morning, afternoon and night, there were certain responsibilities I had to take on that day.
For example, the impending doom I would face if I didn't pay a visit to my mother and father sooner or later.

Let me take a moment of your time to relay to you the joys of living on your own at nineteen.
One: My parents don't live with me.
Hmm… that seems to sum up everything perfectly!
No no, I joke. There are plenty of other wonders added to my solitary living. Such as doing my own grocery shopping; playing music as loudly and often as I please; having guests over at any hour of the day (or night); deocrating as I see fit; eating when I want; sleeping when I want … I know I've mentioned that I hated living alone – that much is true. I don't like being without a friend or two for a long period of time. But I could sacrifice the subtle loneliness for the sake of being without my parents watching me day in and day out.

There really was only one little important thing missing. (No, not my little brother. Though I love Matt unconditionally, there's no way I'd invite him to live with me, unless he really needed it.)

So as I approached the steps to the house I once called "Home", there wasn't much on my mind but getting back what I wanted from the house. That, and conjuring up enough patience to talk to my parents for at least an hour (by their demands, not mine).

"Peyton! Is that really you?!" my father's jovial laugh echoed through the front hall, ringing a little glaringly in my ears.

"Yup, I've returned from the dead." I said teasingly, giving in to Dad's tight embrace with as much eagerness as I could fake.

"And dead you would be, if I hadn't called to remind you to go shopping for fresh food." My mother's voice sounded kind, but I knew that sarcastic undertone far too well.

"I would have remembered perfectly fine on my own, Mom. A girl knows when the milk has turned." I forced myself to smile at her as she waltzed down the stairs to greet me. I wouldn't be starting a quarrel barely 30 seconds into my visit.

"Yes, you certainly do know when you're hungry, too." She laughed. Yeah, she would remember stuff like that – the way I would willingly eat us out of house and home when given the chance. But in my defense, eating contests between me and Matt were frequent in our house.

"So what's the occasion, Peyton? Come to remind yourself that you still have parents?" Dad asked.

"Oh that's really fair, Dad – already suspecting that I forgot who raised me. Thank you!" I raised an eyebrow at him.

I desperately didn’t want to be labeled as the rebelling daughter all my life. And I wasn't even the rebel! Matthew was the one who wanted to drop out of high school and be a rock star – it was due to my persuasions that he didn't drop out at the beginning of senior year. Mom and Dad wouldn't have even noticed he was failing before he'd have picked up and left for who knows where – Toronto, New York, Hong Kong… Sometimes I had to wonder if I was the only one paying attention.

"Oh, forget that he said anything, Peyton. Come upstairs and let me put some meat on your bones. Unless you haven't decided to drop being vegetarian during these past three weeks alone."

"I may not be very good at cooking, Mom, but I haven't yet turned away from tofu and vegetables."

"And what about all that Chinese food you insist on eating?"

"I only eat the chow mien and vegetable dishes, Mom. Friends have tried to lure me back to pork, but it hasn't worked yet." I replied, seating myself at a bar stool at the counter, looking down on her polished, stainless steel stove.

"Well then, what can I get you? It feels so odd, offering my daughter something to eat or drink in her own house."

"This isn't my house, Mom. It never was."

The faked pleasantry faded away and flash of indignity crossed her face, just as the small guilt I still felt for leaving panged at my insides.

"You know what I mean, Mom." I said softly, playing with my hair casually. "It's your house – and I need to be independent."

"You are independent, Peyton. You've always been. You didn't need to move out to achieve that." She replied, her voice having more honesty in it than I had heard in several weeks.

I bit my tongue to stop myself from contradicting her (again).

"… a drink, Peyton? Or it's almost noon, do you want lunch? I'm still always happy to make you something, you know." Her voice picked up its cheeriness, and must have caught Dad's attention from his office when the word "lunch" was mentioned.

And who should trail in sneakily behind him?! Oh, just a delightful little ball of furry orange, is all.

"Yeah, sure mom. Pepsi is fine." I said off handedly. Turning away from my seat, I knelt down to the floor and scooped my kitty Nala into my arms, rubbing her soft fur against my skin.

"Oh yes – Nala's missed you quite a bit." Dad chuckled, stroking Nala's ear with his finger. I smiled up at him, hearing the subliminal message that I was allowed to take her home with me.

"She's been missed, too. Even Sara misses the little scoundrel." I laughed, cuddling Nala as she purred loudly against my chest.

"How's Sara been these days, anyway? Never seeing her around has been awfully strange." Mom said, setting a tall class and a can of coke in front of me, then turning back to her fridge.

"She's been great. The scholarship from the Academy has totally directed her in a new direction for singing, and even though she has school work on top of all the practicing, she's still got plenty of time to drop by every day and watch movies with me." I answered pleasantly.

"Hopefully she's inspiring you to keep up with your schooling… right?" Dad evoked their long-standing question: would I drop out, or stay in college?

I sighed, but smiled in response.

"Yes, and no... I've been saving money all year at the arts store, and I've told you all this before… How Charlie has promised me a reference that will floor the proffs at SFU, and I can transfer my major from Social Sciences to Fine Arts."

"Mmm…" my mother nodded, quietly mulling over my words.

"I have told you this before, right?" I asked, arching an eyebrow.

"Yes… I think we're just concerned with the outcome of you majoring in Art, instead of a Science… the future isn't very stable when your degree is in something like that, Peyton."

"I'll manage. I'd rather be happy than wealthy, anyway, Mother." I said, trying to sound authoritative.

"Alright, I understand – or at least I see that you can't be pursuaded." She shrugged the matter off. My father looked between me and my mother quickly, probably confused that she had caved so quickly.

"And how is Joshua doing?" Dad asked slowly. I raised my eyes to meet his face, trying to read the expression. Blank – great.

The weirdest part of my relationship with my parents is that, no matter how I convince myself that they don't know me at all… during my darkest times, they seemed to easily see past my walls and some how could tell that there had been a falling out between Josh and I, though many months ago.

"Fine." I said decidedly. I didn't like them knowing too much of me.

Just as I didn't like the feeling that I'd just revealed all too much with that one word.

After another painfully awkward half hour with my parents, I was allowed to go – and bring my beloved kitty with me.

"You were worth the entire effort, Nala." I giggled as the little orange-and-white tiger striped cat flicked my chin with her tail happily.

"…And this is the toilet, Nala. You're not allowed in there, Sweetheart. Nor are you allowed to drink from it." I solemnly looked into the big feline eyes, my childish fun masked pretty impressively with a very sincere tone."

"You're absolutely nuts."

"WHOA! Nala! Your voice… resembles a very teenage boy voice. This can't be true – I was so positive you were a girl!" I exclaimed to my kitty, probably obliterating any doubts she had about her owner's sanity.

With a laugh, I set the cat down and raised myself up from the floor, and looking to the face that owned the voice that had spoken (sorry guys, my cat can't actually talk).

"Hi, Josh." I said, with just a little contempt. I could just imagine the verbal-beatings I was going to get for talking to my cat the way I do. Even though he'd already spent most of his life doing that.

"So it looks like your brain cells haven't recovered from being ill, yet. You're still talking gibberish to a cat." His grin could have won him an award for the best presentation of kindness, but to me it only looked like a heavy coating of sarcasm.

"I'm sorry your not a cat person, darling, but I just can't be bothered with believing my Nala isn't the second most brilliant thing to grace the earth." I said with justification, striding past him into my bedroom. Josh followed easily.

"The first being me, yeah?" He flopped into my fuzzy purple desk-chair, swivelling around freely.

"Hah! As if." I laughed, taking the back of the chair and spinning it harder, effectively flinging him off of it and onto the floor, and taking the chair for myself.

"Ouch." He mumbled, but quickly scrambled out of a heap and sat cross legged at my feet. I said nothing else, and he said nothing else, so I was left with a boy looking up at me with Bambi eyes, obviously waiting for something.

I coughed nervously. "So, you broke into my house?" I smiled casually, as if this was an every day occurrence. Probably because it is - almost. Sara would be the only other who waltzed in uninvited more than he did.
"Yeah. I'm bored, and you're not sick, and I'm kind of hung over."

I rolled my eyes. "That's encouraging." As much as I loved having Josh around for company, I couldn't get the panicked mental image of him declaring his hidden feelings while getting drunk yet again. Cause that's what he does when he's hung over – drinks more.

He must have seen the pessimistic look on my face, and quickly turned the conversation in the other direction.

"Awe, come on, Pey. I just want to chill and watch movies with you, I won't disturb your perfect life in your perfect loft and your perfect brilliant cat." I couldn't help but laugh at all this. What was this, angry ranting?

"You came over to my place to get drunk again, didn't you?" I rolled my eyes when he eventually nodded. The idea of drinking tonight wasn't a totally awful one, but pretty lame none the less – especially so when he seemed to be saying it was the only reason to be here. If he was going to drink through whatever was bothering him, fine. If he didn’t want to be doing it alone or with the guys, fine.

But if he was expecting me to join him in this escapade, he had another thing coming.

"Have fun with that." I brushed past him into the kitchen. Stopping at the cupboards, I took down a small bottle of tequila and one shot glass.

"Where's yours?" he asked as I handed the glass to him, raising an eyebrow. Hah, like he couldn't read my face well enough to know when I was not in the mood for his immaturity.

Getting intoxicated with Josh had just proven to be a bad decision for me on too many occasions. Even if I knew now that I was smart enough, sensible enough (or maybe just scared enough) to avoid any consequences when not in my right mind, I couldn't be too trusting that Josh was that responsible. No, if I knew anyting about him by now, it was that adding alcohol to the manic depressed boy would deffinetly speed along the process of loosing all judgement and reasoning ability. Not the most happy picture, in my mind. Especially now, when it seemed like my life was unintentionally getting more complicated day by day.

So I shook my head pleasantly, but gestured to the tequila bottle now on the counter.

"Like I said, have fun with that. I'm not going to be apart of this right now." With that, I left my apartment soundlessly, leaving Josh standing in my kitchen alone.

And what was I going to do now?

Probably just go up and down the floors on the elevator, waiting until all the confusion in my head decided to settle down into sense.