I asked my mom to teach me how to play piano.
She’s a prodigy, you know. She could play Beethoven better than the man himself.
She said, “I just took my medicine. As soon as it kicks in, I will come down.” She smiled, and I said okay and went downstairs to wait silently.
2 years later, I’m still waiting, I’m still laying down in my bed, because my mother should be down here soon. My room is messy, but I doubt she’ll be around to care. My blankets are warm, and even if she were to come down I would no longer feel like playing the piano. It is such a pretty instrument, and I do not have any pretty notes to play. How am I supposed to learn without a mother to teach me where to put my hands?
For no reason at all, I feel empty and alone. And I called my mom, but she didn’t pick up, and I called my dad, but he is too sick to spend time with me. I grew up around annoyed friends who were bothered by my clingy and annoying personality. For no reason at all, I grew up loud in class. My teachers and peers all roll their eyes, frustrated. It hurts when they call me annoying, but I play it off as a joke. And it’s funny, it is, but I keep forgetting to tell the punchline.
My mother doesn’t reply to the playful text messages I send her when I’m feeling happy, which is okay. That’s okay. Really, it’s fine. I’ll move on, I will. Which is why I know I shouldn’t be crying while I write about feeling confined to a bedroom that I could easily walk out of, and I would if there was a reason to. But there isn’t.
I thought about this today when I wondered how much I see my mother on a day-to-day basis. The answer I came up with once a day, when she walks through the door. She says hello to her boyfriend, Cameron, and she goes to her room. And I don’t see her for the rest of the day. I’ve no one to help me with my homework, so if I don’t understand it I just take the F and move on. My mom will be disappointed in my grades, but she won’t say anything to me. She’ll just glare at me as she passes by. My mom just… doesn’t talk to me.
Which would be fine, if it didn’t cause me to grow up an attention-seeker with attachment and abandonment issues… I lose more friends that way. I don’t have anyone anymore. I scared all my friends off, and it’s not like my mom is around to help me.
I am still so very excited to go to my manipulative father’s house, only because his lies require him to talk to me more. His apologies require him to spend more time with me.
The importance of an adult figure is commonly disregarded, and it is that neglect that has caused me to feel this empty and alone. Because I am constantly left alone with my very talkative mind, and the thoughts always make me question whether or not I am truly loved.
Am I?
Who knows. I’d ask my mom, but…
I doubt she’d reply.