Desperation (standard:drama, 3547 words)
Author: Paul	Added: Nov 19 2000	Views/Reads: 3712/2343	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
A young boy is driven to self distruction by self indulgent parents

Desperation 

I rose from the bed and peered at the sun beaming through the window.
This should be a cheerful April morning, cool but bright. April was 
nice in Maryland, some days cool and some warm but never too hot or too 
cool. However, the cloud handing over me made cheer impossible. I 
though of the day ahead, all of the days ahead, and started to tear. 
Why couldn't I have some happiness like everyone else? Why didn't 
someone care. I didn't even have a friend. 

I got dressed for breakfast and proceeded downstairs, where I was
greeted by Bob's mother. They wanted me to call her grandmother but I 
wouldn't. I called her Mrs. Huff. That was respectful and acceptable. 
But to myself I called her bitch. She was the one who was home most of 
the time. She was self-centered and cruel. How could Mother leave me in 
her care, knowing that she hated me? I guess it was just convenient. 

"Good morning, Mrs. Huff," I said as I entered the kitchen. 

"Make your breakfast and git out uff here," she growled in her thick
German accent. 

"You're going to be late." 

"Why do I have to make my own breakfast? You make everyone else's," I
said. 

"Don't argue; just do as you are told," she replied as she stormed off
to the living room. 

Mother had told me that the bitch would make breakfast because we were
paying to stay here, but that didn't seem to matter. 

I made my breakfast and hastened to the bus to go to school. I had
started this school only three months before, when Daddy left and we 
moved from Northwood. I'd had to leave a school that I loved. Here I 
was in a religious minority and they let me know it, kids and teachers 
alike. I guess I had to pay for the sins of others. 

I hoped to make it through this day without mishap but that was more
than I should have expected. After I took my seat in Math class, the 
teacher came over and handed me a piece of paper. 

"This is a deficiency slip. You are failing, and you need to get more
help at home," Mrs. Stern stated. "I looked at your transfer records 
and you are capable of much better than this." 

"But I had two A's and a B in three tests. How could I be failing?" I
replied tentatively. 

"You have an A and a B and a zero," she said. 

"I have the test papers to prove it. Please let me bring them in before
I have to take this home. If I take this home to get it signed, they 
will never believe that you made a mistake, and I will be punished 
severely. They can't take the punishment back after I prove that I am 
right," I pleaded. 

"I didn't make a mistake" she replied in a tone which indicated I might
as well shut up. 

I walked home that day. It was a long walk.  I could have taken the bus
but I wanted to be alone with my thoughts. I had wanted to cry out loud 
all day but boys don't do that.  I could sob for a while when I was 
alone like this and no one would know. God, I needed a friend. No one 
knew or cared how much I hurt. Not just because of school or this day, 
but because of the torturous thirteen years that had preceded it. 

Left to my own thoughts, I walked, paying little attention to what was
going on around me.  I needed someone to talk to so that I could get 
some idea of what was real and what wasn't. But I had always depended 
only on myself and that was as good as it could get. 

Why was I here?  Mother told me how much she had suffered with Daddy for
my benefit, but I didn't understand why that was my fault. She told me 


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