Evie and I spent the rest of that Sunday just as we had planned, on our couch stuffing our faces with popcorn and candy as if we were at an actual theater. I welcomed the refuge from my thoughts about my own life that were getting more and more complicated.
Later that evening, my mom called inquiring about my plans for Thanksgiving. I wondered aloud if she was serious, where else was I going to go? She then proceeded to tell me how I wasn’t the daughter that she raised, how she couldn’t believe that I could be so rude and unappreciative to the people who sacrificed everything for me… that was about the point I tuned her out. I wasn’t in the mood to really get into it with her so I just let her rant, and when she finished, I just said, “Okay, mom, you’re right. I’ll be there the day before and leave the day after. I gotta go study, see you then,” and hung up. I wasn’t sure how I was going to make it forty two hours in her house. Yes, I had counted the hours. As far as I was concerned, it was going to be as close to torture than anything I had ever faced. I was depending heavily on my grandparents and my brother and his family to act as a buffer while I was there. I figured if things got too bad, I could always retreat to Evie’s house. For the first time since I had stood up to my parents, I began to second guess my actions. When I had envisioned the whole confrontation, there was much less yelling and much more understanding on their part. But since that wasn’t the way it happened, I was faced with these awkward family moments that I had never considered before.
After hanging up on her, I picked up my guitar and immersed myself in my music, reveling in the sweet release. It didn’t escape me that I had spent most of the day engaged in activities that kept me from focusing on questions I needed to answer about what I was doing and what I wanted. But I wasn’t quite ready to have that talk with myself, so I opted for more music and less thinking. I literally played until my fingers hurt, and then I showered and got ready for bed. I checked my phone one last time before laying my head on the pillow… nothing.
The next several days passed quickly with classes and time spent working on a History project I had due the following week. When I woke up Monday morning, I had a text from Ash waiting for me, wishing me a good morning and telling me that he had finally got the timing down for a song he had been working on. We had a quick exchange of messages, and miraculously, everything seemed to be back to normal with us, or back to pre-Friday since I really wasn’t sure what we were was really normal. Mason made my Tuesday by texting the following morning when I was in class, and I couldn’t help but chuckle when I later re-read our conversation.
