"Phase"

"Are you okay?" my phone buzzes. It's my friend, Cassidy. She is always checking in on me, to make sure i'm okay. It's hard to open up to someone like her. She has so many other friends, that I'm scared she will tell them all! But I ignore the text. I don't want to get into that habit, but I had no time to respond anyway. The school bus slowly came to a stop at the front of my house, and me and my brother stepped off and raced each other to the front door. I managed to grab on to his backpack zipper and pull it so I could touch the door first.

"Gotchya!" I exlamied, opening the front door.

"Hello!" My mom enthusiastically says from the kitchen.

"Hi." I said, with half the energy she had. I'm never in a good mood when I get back from school. All those teachers and grades making me feel worthless, there's nothing to be happy about.

"Howdy." My brother says in response to my mom.

"How was your day at school?"

"Fine." I lie.

"Great! The lunch you made me was so good. Thanks!" My brother says, taking off his shoes and kicking them towards the wall. When he says stuff like that, it stays with me, for longer than I would ever want it to. I hate it. A deep, deep hatred. Most of the time I feel as though he says that stuff in front of me on purpose because he knows I don't get the attention he gets. I always wake up, having to pack every single part of my lunch, while glancing over at his fully packed lunch sitting on the edge of the counter, gladly made by my mom. Oh, and he has all the time in the world to make it for himself. But he doesn't. He is only 2 years younger than me, and is perfectly capable.

"What's up with you?" My mom asks, stopping what she's doing in the kitchen.

"Nothing." I mumble under my breath. She takes a long look at me, then slowly look away and sighs. But it was one of those sighs that was mixed in with a grunt. Like she was annoyed with me or something. No surprise, I can't do anything to satisfy anyone.

"You keep an attitude like that, I take your phone." She says, slicing onions for a dish I probably won't even like. It always gets me whenever she tries to say that stuff extra loud, just so my father in the other room can here her, and come out to "lay the law down." It makes me laugh inside when it doesn't work because she really was eager for it to happen. It never did.

An hour passed, and it was time for dinner. My mom hollered at me to help set the table, so I quickly got up from my bed to go wash my hands. If I took another 2 seconds, I would've never heard the end of it.

"Poor the milks." My mom says, very impolitely. I reach to open the fridge door, before me brother steps right in my way. I awkwardly manage to reach and open the door before he could get through, so he had to make it obvious.

"Ow!" He dramatically exclaimed.

"I hardly even touched you!!" I say to him, while reenacting what happened.

"Leave him alone." My dad grunted, while his hand covered his mouth, and his big eyes towards my at a scary angle. Don't cry, don't cry, don't cry...