Everything fell apart a year ago.
At the time, my two best friends, me, and my boyfriend at the time were living in an apartment in Terre Haute. We worked at Sony. My mind was failing me. It was a bad combination of lack of medication, stress with roommates, and 12 hour exhausting shifts. I almost killed myself a good few times.
We lost our jobs due to one of my roommates having a heart attack. By all rights, I can blame her, it was her fault. Painfully bulimic, taking lots of pills, never doing anything to assure her own survival and so she almost died at work. We drug her out, got her home and well, and received notice the next day that our jobs had been terminated. So much for working my way up in the world.
Then we couldn't pay the rent. Like we even really wanted to. There was a washing machine in the bathroom that had had standing water with black mold growing in it ever since we moved in. It'd been there from the previous tenants. Our landlord said he'd get rid of it... he never did. My kitten died there. Probably the mold. Later, the apartment burnt down, starting in the room that had been mine. Good thing we lost our jobs.
I left in November to go stay with my mom and my grandmother. My grandmother had had cancer for 3 years by this time. Lung cancer; she enjoyed her cigarettes. She got worse tenfold after the last round of chemo. My mom and I eventually had to buy a baby monitor to make sure she was ok on her own in her room. We basically watched her die. I take that back, we did watch her die. It was a midnight vigil with her in her hospital bed in the dining room. My mom sitting in a kitchen chair pulled up to the edge. Me sitting in the rocking chair by the wood-stove. The chaplain sitting to her right, near her head; eyes closed, sleeping. The hospice nurse on the love seat. All silent, save for my grandmother's cats purring on our laps. She passed.
We inherited the house.
All was going fairly well, well enough, until I realized I was pregnant. The day came when I'd noticed my belly was fatter than I remembered. And hard. I caved and asked my mom to get me a pregnancy test. I took it that night. Positive. I collapsed and cried. I went to my room, shut the door, and cried... and cried... and cried. I cried myself into the first nosebleed of my life.
Long story short, I'm a failure as a person so I gave my baby Annabel to a nice Catholic family in Chicago. They're just lovely and she is a sweet baby. That experience changed my life dramatically. I wouldn't say that was a negative point to the year, it was enriching. I wouldn't wish it undone.
My mother had hopes of getting back together with my stepdad. They've been on and off for years. The entire six years the man has been in my life, they've broken up maybe 30 times. They got married and have almost divorced about five times. Well they were taking a break, and unbeknownst to me, mom was trying to repair the relationship.
She got a call that he was going to go on a date with a nurse at work. She fell apart. Divorce was close. It stressed her out so much that she began missing work. She is bipolar and her meds aren't working completely yet, so yes, the stress was that bad.
We got painfully behind in bills. Pair the stress with the back pain from the accident she got into two years ago (still waiting on the settlement), she missed a lot of work. We got behind on a lot of bills. We piled up a lot more with my pregnancy and her hospital trips.
So to help with bills, we started staying with my stepdad at his house. We'd stay a few nights, then go back home for a while, come back, go back. That was the basic routine. Of course, I'd stay a few extra nights in town with my fiancee.
My mom has been paying on back taxes for years now. It's a long story, but she owes. About two weeks ago she got a letter telling her that the IRS was going to take from her whatever money they could. If she couldn't scrounge up one thousand dollars by the end of the week, they'd take it all. Of course she couldn't scrounge that up. We can't afford anything. That's why we've basically been living with my stepdad. I haven't stayed a night at our house since early September. That's about 3 months. So now we have no money whatsoever.
Where does that leave us with rent? Impossible. So my uncle is going to kick us out of the house. My grandmother left it in his name. So guess what that means? I've lost a home.
That house was the stereotypical home away from home. It had the most inviting smell. Nothing bad could happen at Mimi's house. That's where dreams came true. I've moved so much. Stability? I don't know what that means. The only constant place has been that house. And now it's gone.
I haven't had a room of my own for three months. I've been living out of Walmart sacks ever since September. Nothing is mine. I'm a guest wherever I go. Sure, I have a roof over my head. But do I have a place I can go to to be alone? No. I have to go to the bathroom if I want to cry. I have to go into the garage if I want a moment of peace. There is no place for any of my things. It's all in a pile in the guest bedroom. Which still isn't mine. My stepsister and her boyfriend go in there at will and lock me out for however long they choose.
I'm an intruder here.
The closest thing I have to a home is my fiancee's bedroom. The only place of comfort.
I'm losing my only constant place. I'm losing the concrete form of all my childhood memories. I feel like I'm losing the rest of my grandmother. I'm losing what little bit of "home" I had left.
I actually haven't had a "home" since, well, August of 2008. That's when we bought that god-forsaken apartment. I think if I never had done that, I wouldn't be here right now. I'd still have a place to call home.
I've gone too long living like a plastic bag vagabond.
It was fun at first.
But it's starting to break off bits of my heart... and they get bigger as they break.
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