(Source: crucialtimeszine)
Snitching TX, USA.
A few months after my 18th birthday my parents kicked me out of the nest and left me to fend for myself in this ever ruthless world. Barely anymore stable than I am today, I was forced to stay with friends and hop around from sofa to sofa, picking up any extra hours at work just to have a place to be. With my first year of college only a few weeks away, and most of my attention being directed to sneaking into my friends basements without their parents seeing, my uncle decided to take me in until I could get a little more grounded. I was grateful, yet hardened by the adult life that was being laid out in front of me. I left Pennsylvania for Houston Texas to start some sobering life of earning money and going to bed early. I had a bed though, a shared bathroom, internet access and an easy retail job to keep me busy when I wasn’t at school. I didn’t try to make any friends, but I did keep a nice aliance with my cousin. His senior year of highschool and my freshman of college, and our shared love for Brand New kept us in good standings around the house, plus he was always down for a late night taco bell run. I would say my cousin was, and still is, one of those best friend types that you don’t have to hangout with to know they’re just your friend regardless.
After living in this house for a few months I was growing restless of the flat and humid landscape. I felt punished, and longed for green and seasoned Pennsylvania. My attitude definitely reflected this. If I wasn’t at school or work I was driving around the highways listening to Illinois or Drink Up Buttercup, or ANYTHING that reminded me of home. I started searching “Philadelphia” on Travelocity every few days dreaming of leaving my little bed and shared bathroom behind for a life of basement dwelling again. I was doing well though; the cost of living in Texas is so outrageously low, I had a car, perfect grades in school, first chair in the symphonic band, a decent job, a couple clothes in my closet…but it didn’t matter.
One afternoon I came home from school to find my uncle home early, waiting at my cousin and I’s bathroom.
“I hope you know I expect you to replace the counter you ruined.”
“What did I do?” Unsure of what he was talking about, and never one to take kindly of being accused, I stood unsympathetic.
My uncle moved aside to reveal a long straight brown burn mark in the fake marble of the counter. I instantly knew it was from my cousin’s hair straighter (bless him) and tried all in the same moment to hide this realization from my expression.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what that is.”
“I let you use this bathroom, in MY house, and this is how you treat it?”
Flash to three months earlier, hurricane Ike had just passed through Texas, and a curfew was issued across the state. The storm had long since passed over us, but it would still be another week until our power came back on. My cell phone and laptop were long dead, and showers by candle light had lost all romantic appeal. My cousin came to me with frizzy hair, “Let’s check out the damage.”
So we snuck out into my 98’ Monte Carlo, and put Your Favorite Weapon in the CD player. Relief replaced our boredom, as we cruised down stretches of abandoned highway, windows down, and hummed along to the first music we had heard in days. Two hours or so after we snuck out we were pulled over and escorted back home, but I still hold that memory of us in the highest regard.
“Look, I don’t know what happened to your counter, I can try to wash it off for you but I don’t think you have to replace it?”
“I TRIED washing it, it’s permanent hair dye, it’s not going to come out.”
Flash to two months earlier when my cousin and I were both home early and trying to figure out something to eat, when we came across an unopened bottle of rum in the back of the cabinet. “You won’t,” turned into my cousin taking back a huge swallow and us meticulously trying to place the bottle back juuust right as to buy us some time before we could replace it. Realistically though we were both 18 and I had no will or way to replace the rum, so I snuck out into the kitchen that night and hid the bottle in the trunk of my car. I never told my cousin, but rather me take the fall than him.
“I can’t replace that counter. I won’t.”
Brian’s hair straighter was under the sink, my uncle would only have to open the cabinet to see. My hair was a complete mess, I wasn’t even wearing makeup at this point.
“I expect this cleaned up by tomorrow.”
That night I called a transportation service to have my car shipped back home, using my old address. $350, and another $200 for my plane ticket home. Almost all of the money I had saved, with just enough leftover to make arrangements to move in with my best friend’s sister when my flight got in.
I flew out of Texas at 6am. I never kept in contact with my cousin, I’ve never called or written to him, but even now, five years later, I still hold our alliance very dear to my heart.
Anonymous asked: Is there anybody that you hate or truly dislike?
There’s a few people I would be completely unmoved if they just dropped dead. Kill ‘em with kindness is the moto though, so maybe that might work out for me.
@14 hours ago
