It's the Mess That Feels So Right...

Tugging at her new, immaculate dress impatiently, the girl looked up at her mother, a pout perched on her small, round face.

“Mother, I don’t want to go,” The girl whined, as her mother sighed again.

“Listen hunny, it’s your fathers big promotion dinner and you know you have to go,” Her mother said with a frown at how bratty her teenage daughter was being, “Now stop acting like a seven year old and go get your shoes.”

The girl mumbled a reply, and then trudged off to get her shoes, wishing terrible thoughts. At that very moment, she hated her dad more than ever. It was his fault she couldn’t go to the sleepover of the year, with the most popular girl at school, Chloe Williams. She couldn’t believe her luck when she was invited, you had to be somewhere near royalty to be invited to such an event. She also couldn’t believe her now bad luck, when her mother told her about the promotion dinner and how she would have to give the sleepover a miss. She was also angry with her mother, for not understanding how important this sleepover had been to her and how she would have officially been ‘cool’ if she had been able to attend.

As she slowly buckled up her shiny black shoes, her father jogged down the stairs, looking nervous and frazzled. He smiled down at his daughter, hoping that she would be proud of his achievements, and give his mind other thoughts to mull over. Instead of returning the smile, she stormed off to finish getting ready, still furious with her confused and slightly dishearten father. She couldn’t understand why Ben, her eighteen-year-old brother, didn’t have to go, and why he could just go out and enjoy his Saturday like she had planned too.

Finally, three quarters of the Blake family jumped into the family car, and headed off, the girl pulling out her MP3 player in her futile attempts to ignore her parents. Her father looked at her from the rearview vision mirror with saddened eyes, wanting to reach out for her and tell her that all his hard work was for her, so that she could have the right education and be what ever her heart desired. As he was focusing on his daughter, another car sped round the corner, sliding over the line and even over the blasting music, the girl heard her parents bloodcurdling screams as the impact of the car threw their bodies into the hard metal, and the sound of bones crashing into each other and flesh tearing poured out into the empty night, leaving one girl with a few scratches, painful guilt and no parents.

-X-

It became very obvious that karma didn’t like the young girl, who now stood in her torn black dress she had been wearing the night of the dinner, but now she was wearing it for not such a joyous occasion. Her bright eyes shimmered with tears that left silver trails down her ivory cheeks not understanding why this had happened to her. She tried to close her eyes, and forget the events of that morning, but failed.

She had been at not what she would describe as a sleep over with a close friend of hers, but more as a pity invite from her friends mother, just a day after she had to watch her mother and father be buried in the earth, the last time she would ever see them. She had graciously accepted, thinking it would be kind of her to leave Ben a night for himself to forget his pain in his own way.

Because he was eighteen and the girl had no other relatives, it was his duty to step in as an older brother and look after his sister the best he could. And he tried, the girl knew he was a wonderful older brother and would do anything for her, but because he was engulfed with the grief of losing his parents also, she thought it would be good of her to let him go out. She didn’t know that next time she returned home, she would truly be alone, without even her brother to be there for her.

She had been woken at such an odd hour of the night at her friend’s house that she knew something terribly wrong had happened. She was right of course. Her brother’s body had been found mangled between the metal of two mashed up cars, and he had been driving under the influence. So there she was again, at the same cemetery, close to where her parents lay at rest, saying goodbye to her brother and the last person who cared for her. This is the end, she had thought to her self, blinking away the tears that blurred her eyes, I will join my family once again and let go of this pain.

-X-

With a jolt, I realized I was awake and sat up straight, pulling the covers back around my shivering body. My face was damp, along side my pillow, as I groaned and ran my hand through my hair, squeezing my eyes shut.

The door creaked open and my eyes shot over to the doorframe to see Gabe smiling softly. I gave him a quick smile before beckoning him in; he seemed to have the right idea of gaining permission first before he entered my room. In a few quick steps, his long legs carried him over to my bed and he sat down beside me, his dark eyes looking at me with concern.

“That dream again?” He asked gently. I nodded, picking at the duvet.

“Yeah, except it isn’t a dream. It’s a horrible nightmare that I wake up from and realise that it actually happened. That I was a selfish, horrid little girl who didn’t know how great she had it, and was angry at her family for the stupidest reasons and because of that, lost them all,” I whispered angrily, closing my eyes again to keep from crying. Gabe pulled me against him as I breathed deeply, desperately trying to calm myself down.

“I’m so lucky I have you,” I muttered into his shoulder, and felt him tense up. I pulled myself back and looked at him, wondering why I could see guilt in his eyes. He quickly smiled and rubbed my shoulder.

“No, I’m lucky to have meet you,” He whispered. When Gabe decided he was going to adopt me, it seemed almost like a irrational thought, something on impulse, seeing as he was in a band called Midtown, and was doing okay to support himself, but to support a kid as well? But three and a half years later, with his new band Cobra Starship breaking the barrier into the music industry, we were doing fine, even with a decent flat in a good part of the city. Even though he legally was my guardian, we have always treated each other as equals, best friends and with my maturity level very high and Gabe’s, well, not so high, we got along like no one would believe. I always tried to ignore the fact that I know there was a reason Gabe adopted me, and I know there is a secret he’s keeping from me, but I tried to figure that if its that much of a secret, he will tell me in his own time.

“You okay?” Gabe’s voice broke me from my reverie, and I looked up and smiled at him.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. It was just with the…” I trailed off, knowing that Gabe understood when he nodded.

“Well, I always hate this part, but the gang is here and it’s almost time to leave…” Gabe muttered, he didn’t like to leave me on my own, afraid I would try to take my life…again, but I couldn’t miss school to tour with him so it had to be this way.

“Alright then, have fun and for crying out loud, be safe! No more stealing Carden’s underwear, you know he’s stronger than you and will beat you up!” I joked as Gabe smiled at me before giving me another hug.

“I will, I will, promise. Now, the other Cobras want to say goodbye as well,” Gabe said, pulling me out of bed and leading me out to the lounge. Standing by the door, all holding random objects of Gabe’s luggage, were Vicky-T, Ryland, Nate and Alex, who all formed the band Cobra Starship along with Gabe, and were, as they called themselves, my family. And I loved them all like a family also.

“Bee! I’m going to miss you!” Alex, or as he usually went by, Suarez cried out, pulling me into a hug as I began to laugh.

“You are going to see me next weekend!”

“That’s a whole one hundred and sixty eight hours away!” Ryland joined in, stealing me off Suarez for a hug, followed by Nate.

“Can you believe that this girl is going to be eighteen next time we see her? What ever happened to that cute little fourteen year old we all knew?” Nate joked as he stepped back, letting Victoria hug me.

“Shut up, Nate,” Vicky-T said laughing as I poked my tongue out at him, “We are all going to miss you, Bee,” Vicky-T said, engulfing me into a hug so that her perfume filled my nostrils, then kissing my cheek.

“I’m going to miss you all too, but have fun and like I said to Gabe before, try and stay out of trouble!” They all looked at each other and burst out laughing, followed by a chorus of, “Haha, yeah, good one Bee!”

Finally they had to leave or Lipski would blow a fuse. Gabe was last out of the apartment, giving me one last hug.

“Gabriel, you have to go,” I said, nudging him toward the door.

“Are you sure you are going to be okay? There’s money on the counter for food as always and a little extra to pick yourself up something nice to wear for this weekend and…”

“Gabriel, I’m not spending your money on clothes!” I said, shocked that he thought I would. Gabe wore a fake pained expression on his face.

“Fine! Consider it an early birthday present!” He retorted, exaggerating the ‘fine’.

I gave him a stern expression, before grinning and pushing him out the door.

“Bye, miss you already!” He yelled as I shut the door and leaned against it. As sappy as it sounds, I felt a small piece of me leave with them as I was left with a large, empty apartment with nothing to look forward to but a long week of school ahead before I could see them all again.