Love and Nightmares

My whole life is crumbling before me. Everything I've worked for is about to be taken away from me; even everyone I love. Well, not everyone. I'm moving away, so I won’t be able to see any of my friends again. Except for on breaks, but that doesn’t count. I'm still going to have my parents, though, that’s questionable at best. The thing I really don’t understand is why my mom had to accept a job in Minneota, Minnesota. That’s almost on the other side of the country and has such a low population I'm surprised it's even on the map. Actually, I don’t even think it is on most maps.

What’s even more surprising is that my mother has been offered close to twice the salary she's making here to move there and work at the hospital in that village of a city. Currently, we live in Bakersfield, California, which is over ten times the size of Minneota, so I'm surprised that such a small city would be able to pay someone so much.

“Madison!” Someone yelled my name from another room. It was faint and far away. I couldn’t tell who it was, but I could tell it wasn’t one of my parents. They would've yelled loud enough I would jump out of my skin. Today's stressful for everyone. Then I realized it's Natalie coming to say goodbye! I ran out of the room toward the front door so I could see who it was before they noticed me. It's Natalie and she's talking to Mama T as I call her. When I was in middle school, people would make fun of me for having two moms, but I never saw it as a problem. I don’t have that awkwardness of having to talk to a father about my “monthly problems” and there is always enough supplies around.

“Hey Natalie!” I yelled and ran to her, giving her a hug. I knocked her over, but she flipped us around so she was the one landing on me. Even though hitting the tile floor hurt, I'm thrilled that I'm able to see my best friend one last time. All of our things have already been packed up and are heading to our new home. The only thing left is us and some clothes.

“God, I'm going to miss you Maddie.”

“I’m going to miss you too, but at least there’s the internet and cellphones, so we'll still be able to talk everyday.” I was trying to keep both of our hopes up, but at the same time I knew that after a while we'll start to talk less and less and maybe even end up not even being best friends by the end of next year. That's how all online relationships end up. It's already September, so it would be utterly devastating for me if our friendship that had lasted eight years ended so quickly.

“Yeah, so don’t you dare forget to check your cellphone.” She looked like she was about to cry; which in turn made it impossible to hold back my tears. I really am going to miss this place, and all of the people here. Even Todd, the annoying guy who sat behind me last year. He had a few good jokes. Though, I'd never say that to his face.

“Madison, we have to go now.” Mama T called me. Those few words did so much damage. I always thought that it would be exciting to move, but now that it's happening, I want to take it all back.

“Bye Maddie.” Natalie said while headed out the front door after giving me another, quicker hug.

“Bye Natalie. I can’t wait until I'm able to visit over break.”

“Me too.” Was all she said before she left to go back to her home. I still have a few days on the road until I make it too my new home. I just hope that none of my things get lost on their way there, like my happiness. Mama A's already in the car waiting for us. She's going to be driving for the first day, and then Mama T was going to be driving for the second day. Along the way we plan on finding a hotel to stay at because the trip would be too long to go nonstop. I kept looking at my friend as she walked home. I’m not going to be able to see her again for months.

“Everyone ready to go? Also, if you have to go to the bathroom you should've already done that because we are not making any potty breaks. Hear that, Maddie?” Mama A said from the drivers seat as she started to pull away from the only home I've ever known. I could tell she's trying to make a joke about how I make her stop a lot on long trips, like this one is going to be, because I need to use the bathroom but I couldn’t find the humor in it. Not this time.

~ ~ ~

The trip to the new house seemed to take longer than I thought possible. To make it even worse, the hotel we got stuck at was under renovation, so anytime I left the room all I could smell was sawdust.

After all of that, we finally pulled into our new driveway. The house is more beautiful and larger than I imagined it would be. I had seen a few pictures of it from my mothers, but they had not done this place justice. It's an older style house which normally I don’t like, but the dark brown siding made it look fitting for the trees surrounding it. I’m not used to being in such a rural area, so having so many trees is exciting. Especially since I found at least one that I know will be a good climbing tree. Our furniture and other things had made it before us, so we started unpacking right away to make sure nothing had gone missing.

Once I finished going through my boxes of things, I decided to start adventuring around the house. It's only two stories tall, but Mama A told me it was supposed to have an attic large enough to be another room. That was the first place I went to look. The stairway to the attic seemed to be hidden in plain sight. I had to open all of the doors on the second floor to find it. I learned that the door to the attic stairway was the door in the middle-right side of the hallway; almost parallel to the staircase leading to the first floor. Which to me seemed like a weird place for another stairway to me. If someone fell down the attic stairs the might end up going all the way down and out the door.

When I made it up to the attic I was shocked at what I found. It really is the size of a room. I looked around the and took note of everything I found. There are a lot of spider webs. That didn’t bother me, as long as the spider doesn’t bite me I don’t have any problems with it. Which is a big difference between me and Mama A. She will kill any creepy crawly she sees. I also found a small box that seemed to have been left there by the previous owner. The box mystery of the box was intriguing, but the large windows pointing out at the forest gained my full attention. When I looked out the window I noticed a big backyard; we never had that in Bakersfield. I started to think that maybe this move isn’t going to be as bad as I thought.