Zee Blog

Time to get out of here.

I have to get out of this house. Period.

A part of me thought that moving back in with my parents might be a good thing after being out of the house for roughly a year. I've been wrong before, and this time is no different.

My mother is still struggling with her alcoholism. Tonight, a night in which I really didn't need this, she finds herself failing. I gave her the benefit of the doubt. I thought she was just happy.

Shauna sent me a text message on my phone, because she was sitting across the couch from me and didn't want my mother to hear: "I think she is drinking."

I ask, "How so?"

"She has a cup next to her."

I stealthily sneak up to where my mom is sitting. On the window is a bamboo plant I bought a couple of days ago. I pick it up, admire it for a second, and then ask my mom where she thinks I should set it. She leads me into the front room, away from her chair and the glass. Shauna comes in, runs a bit of interference and I zip back into the kitchen to the glass.

I lift it up. A green olive is inside it, and it stinks. Bad. I take a sip of it. It's like acid. A mix of olive juice, lemon juice, and a distinct flavor I know all too well because I got thrashed on it the other weekend: tequila.

She comes back into the kitchen, and I'm leaning against the sink with the glass in hand. "What's this?"

"It's just olive juice and lime juice. Here, I'll make you one." And so she does.

I take a sip out of the one she made. Guess what, it isn't half as bad. I take it to Kris and Shauna who are sitting on the couch and make both of them try it.

Kris tastes them, but chooses to remain like he always does: a ghost in these situations.

Shauna tries them both and simply gives me the look.

I turn to my mom and say, "Just be honest with me."

Honest to her is, "I'm not going to be a prisoner in my own fucking house!"

I picked up my laptop and went upstairs to my room. Shauna comes up a few minutes later and half-jokingly says, "Don't stir things up and then just leave."

After she says that, I go to the loft and try to find the piece I turned in to publish: the piece about her drinking. Shauna stops me though, thankfully in retrospect.

My mom passes through the hall and says, "I don't even want to talk to you right now."

I, taking the bait, have a bit of wordage with her. I'm, of course, making her the bad guy. She yells for a bit, then goes into her room.

Shauna and I continue to sit in the loft, both of us with a cigarette hanging out of the side of our mouth. I tell her, "She'll probably pack up her shit and say she is leaving. Depends on how drunk she is."

Ten minutes later, my mom comes out of her room with a suitcase packed. Shauna looks at me and says, "You can't let her leave the house."

So, I run downstairs. I tell my mom, "If you try and leave this house I'll call 911."

She says, "I don't care. They can't do anything, I haven't been drinking."

This is her calling my bluff. The worst thing I could do for this family is call the police. She has already had one DUI, two will cause such a abyss I'm not sure anyone would crawl out of. For a moment though fate smiles upon me and she darts to the bathroom for an instant.

I grab her keys, her purse, my keys, Kris' keys, the Blazer keys, and anything else I can imagine her using to peddle herself out of here and dart back up the stairs. I stop for a moment in front of Shauna just to say, with my hands in prayer, "Please, please go to your room."

I duck into my room, throw all the shit in the closet and fall onto the bed. I quickly apply my headphones and begin to blast some music as I hear, "What the FUCK did you do with my purse?!" Moments later, when I'm hardly capable of hearing myself groan I can hardly make out her banging on my door, demanding her items back.

She went down, and I saw my cell phone glow to life. I turn it off. She slams on my door one more time, then I hear her stomp off into her room.

So, now, at 4:04 in the AM I sit here typing this all up.

I'm 22 years old. The only time I should be having to deal with this is if I begin to do this to myself. I shouldn't be putting myself into this situation.

Tomorrow is going to be a rough day. Hopefully, like every other moment of her life, she won't remember the night before.