Title: Alone

Mum and dad were fighting again this morning, something to do with the phone call he took at the dinner table the other night. It’s all I can think about as I sit on the bus on my way to school. I know she isn’t my real mum but she’s been there for me all my life and the thought of losing her makes me feel as if I’m going to be sick. I’ve always been what you might call the “glue” of the family but if I’m being honest I don’t know how much more of it I can take. I’m a 15 year old boy, I shouldn’t be worrying about my parents they should be worrying about me. I should be out with my friends at weekends, getting drunk and getting into trouble like a proper teenage boy. But I can’t because I have to be the responsible one, the one who cleans up after everyone else.

I sit and think about things long and hard on the bus to school. I get a public bus because I’m out the catchment area. The weather is just about as dreary as it gets. The winds howling in a way in which I’ve never quite heard it before, moaning and groaning as if it is having the same sort of horrible day as me. The rain is hitting the windscreen of the bus with a thud which makes me jump now and again. The screeching of the windscreen wipers sliding back and forth sets my teeth on edge. ‘Could my Monday morning get any worse?” I think to myself.
The bus drivers got his old country music blaring at the front; it’s cutting through me like a knife and ringing in my ears. I just want to scream but as usual I manage to contain my anger and instead breathe deeply until I feel calm once more. A mother and her child have just stepped onto the bus. The woman struggles with her buggy but no one can be bothered to help her, least of all me. A gust of wind almost sends her flying and she only just manages to keep herself upright. She looks embarrassed as she looks around her for a seat seizing to make eye contact with anyone. The little girl looks about five, she glances at me now and again anxiously with her big blue bug eyes and long curled lashes. She makes me wish I was that age again, a time where I felt no worries. A time when the biggest decision I had to make was choosing which colour crayon I wanted to use on my scribble which I was to be so proud of.

That innocence I once had is lost now, I have to be strong for my family and be mature for everyone’s sake if I want to keep my family together. I snap out of my day dream and quickly press the bell before the driver misses my stop. The weather hasn’t got any better and as I step off the bus the cold penetrates my skin and makes me shiver all over. I feel isolated from the rest of the world, but more than anything else I feel alone. No one will ever understand me, not even my best friend has a clue what’s really going on at home. I’m almost inside the school gates, I wish I could just turn around and go straight back home. On second thoughts anything is better than home right now.