4 of 396

Write now Article Tools

Page 3 of 3

exciting to talk about too!" Mallory cut in, the shame washing over her again as she remembered.

There was a long silence and everyone avoided looking at Mallory.

"In all my years with my parents, I cannot remember ever seeing my parents smiling at each other or holding hands. They did not have time for that because they were always fighting!

Now they are getting divorced, it is even worse. I have heard my mother threaten to kill herself and my father promise to help her do it! Any time the fighting starts, my older brother would put on the music really loud in his room and I would put on my headphones too.

Now I think my brother has started doing drugs and no one is paying any attention" Jan said sharing with her friends the true horrors that lay behind the doors in her home.

Slowly, Mallory's friends began to talk and one after the other their real lives unfolded.

Fiona described the fear she lived with all the time her Mum's boyfriends came visiting. The way some of them looked at her and how scared she was that her Mum might get hurt from having so many boyfriends. How often she cried herself to sleep at night wondering who her real father was.

Kim started laughing remembering how she thought Uncle Frank was her father's younger brother. The laughter turned into a fond smile as she described some of the fun things they would do when her mother went on another assignment from the office.

Tears welled up in her eyes as she whispered the news her father told her. Her mother was not coming home again. Her mum had been involved in a crime and was in prison for a long time.

She started noticing the special fondness between her dad and her uncle. It was then she realized that Uncle Frank was her new Mummy. The tears dropped fast, as Kim told her friends how funny and confused she felt about her life. She told them how much she missed the love of a mother that was never there.

Turi spoke about the loneliness in the middle of many. Her sister either left her with strangers to look after her at home or took her along on shootings and then left her with strangers to look after there!

"It was fun, at first especially because, it's just me and Nina after our parents died and Nina winning that modeling competition made her rich and famous over night.

All of a sudden I could have many of the things I could only have on pages of catalogues. I meet stars and get treated like one too. But you know what? Now I hate it! I just feel like I am floating in a big ocean, no where to go, no one to return to!" Turi said, her face wet with tears.

"We laugh and smile hoping that we can find happiness in your life" Jan said, smiling sadly at Mallory.

"If only we could have a minute of it" Kim said, trying to stop the tears.

Turi nodded in agreement, unable to speak.

"I did not knowI am so sorryI did not know!" Mallory whispered holding her friends as they all cried, feeling their fear, sharing their sadness and living their lives in that single moment.

It was a moment that gave her life its true meaning.

Mallory knew she did not want a lie for a life; she liked the real one just the way it was!

Learn more about this author, Summayyah Sadiq-Ojibara.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.

• << previous page
• 1
• 2
• 3

Add your voice

Know something about Short stories: Children's stories?
We want to hear your view. Write now!