#I love telling stories to my younger cousins because I can embellish things and add so much to stories I already know

[shikai-the-storyteller]

I always tell my littlest cousins stories before bedtime (usually about gods and myths) but occasionally I tell them an original story, and I'm listening back to a recording I made the one time I thought to record myself telling one and I'm like "Wow, I’m actually a really good frickin storyteller."

(Yes, I’m a professional writer, but sometimes it’s nice to be reminded that I’m good at what I do.)

[hopelesslyunrequitedlove]

My Hopeless Love Life: Part Two

Nick became very important to me for many reasons. This was a dark part in my life, there was a lot going on with my parents, they were both in bad places, I had bad friends, I was so lonely. But as long as I had Nick, I had something to look forward to. I had a reason to do my hair and dress well, I had something to be excited for. Someone who made me smile when no one else even cared if I did. He was something to hope for when I had no hope.

I was deeply depressed. I didn’t know it at the time because I didn’t know what depression was and certainly no one in my family was going to talk to me about emotions, but looking back that’s what I was. I rarely ate, rarely spoke, rarely did anything. I cried myself to sleep every night. But every night I’d dream of Nick and wake up with a smile on my face. I’m not sure how much of my feelings can really be attributed to him, or to what he meant to me in that time. But I’m also not sure if it matters. He mattered to me for a reason, he was special to me for a reason. 

And in this dark time of my life I came to accept any attention I could get, even if it was negative. I acted out only a little in school, but when I found my parents still didn’t react, I stopped. At least once a day I told my mom I was failing school (I wasn’t) or that I was going to get drunk with my friends, or sneak out and meet an older boy. But she never listened. My dad wasn’t sober enough to. So even if Noah was calling me names or saying something rude, he was paying attention to me. Furthermore, Nick listened.

 After sixth grade our hostility faded a lot. Seventh grade we had no classes together but we ran in the same circles occasionally. Eighth grade year we were friends. No one ever listens as well as Nick . Nick’s mom, Nancy, was friends with my mom. Nancy wanted to go out with my mom but my mom said she couldn’t because my brother, (at this point he’s twelve and I’m fourteen) couldn’t be home alone at night. I also want to add that we had a 90 pound German Shepard perfectly capable of killing someone. And we lived in a town that was the safest in the state and consistently in the top ten safest in the country. But my brother has always been scared of everything. So Nancy had us come over and hang out with her four children in the meantime. Nancy had five children, four with her husband. Her oldest, Brian, lived at home with her occasionally. Then came Nick, Owen was a year younger than Nick, John was probably four or five years younger, and Zoe about eleven years younger. 

When the night first started, Nick couldn’t be bothered by me. He was just playing xbox. Zoe loved me and my brother, Luke, was getting on with Owen and John. Well the boys went outside to play basketball and Zoe was getting something so I was left alone with Nick. I was so nervous as I sat on the couch to talk to him. I don’t really remember what happened. He might have put his arm around me, or just sat close like he liked to. But I don’t trust my memory to not be embellished. He did end up leaving to go outside and play basketball and Zoe dragged me out there too.

Eventually all of us ended up back in their living room and Luke put on a wig of Zoe’s.“You look just like Kitty!” I said as soon as he put it on.

“Who’s kitty?” Owen asked.

“My cousin.”

“You have a cousin named kitty?”

“No, I have a cousin named Briza, we just call her Kitty.”

Owen then asked the logical question, “How do you get kitty from Briza?”

Nick’s hand shot up into the air. “Let me tell the story!” He asked. So I let him. And he told the story almost verbatim from when I had told it to him months ago when he wanted to know. I’ve felt ignored for most of my life. I’ve had to repeat the simplest of things to people who should already know. No one has ever listened to me before like that. It’s why he’s so important to me.

The story of my cousins nickname is that at the time her mother was pregnant, so was their cat. Their cat give birth first to a litter of kittens. My other cousin, Lily, her older sister, was only four or five at the time and thought her mom was also going to give birth to cats and used to always ask her mom, “When is the little kitty going to come out?” So the nickname stuck with her and is still with her till this day (I think she’s about fifteen now). But not only did Nick care enough to listen, he cared enough to share with others. He was always telling people facts about me. People I never met before in high school would know my favorite color or animal, or that I wrote a book, or the type of dogs I had. He was always talking about me. Do you know how special it is that someone likes you so much they just talk about you?