I have a theory that my family that lives in this town are the scum of the Earth. The town in Illinois where no one ever leaves. Where people would drink themselves to death if it weren’t too costly for their dirt-poor selves. The town where the world’s most unprepared people decided to “fall in love” and have a child. Betty and Jack Roche, the names you could always hear in the town’s whispers. My parents were a catch around here. 

Betty and Jack’s love was nuclear. Just like the power plant that was shut down merely 20 years ago. Maybe they were toxic like the pond they swam in as kids that was a garbage dump for the plant. My dad was a corrupt cop and a piece of garbage. He truly was. Wife beater, drunk, honestly anything fits him. The only good thing about him is that I could flash my ID when getting pulled over and it would have cops running. 

“Do you know why I pulled you over? May I have your identification?...You know, I think I’m mistaken, have a nice day sir,” they couldn’t scramble away fast enough.  

My mom was a pill-popping agoraphobic, a load of nothing. She was 15 when she met my dad. Don’t forget he was 23. A little unsettling now, but at the time I don’t think it was as worrisome. My grandmother couldn’t get her out of the house fast enough, I don’t think she cared what Jack was like, as long as he was going to take the burden of Betty off of her mother’s hands. 

Now look where I am, 18, no diploma, popping pills like my mother and mean like my father. I’m the same as them. I used to talk like I was better than my parents and this town but the apparent cycle didn’t end with me.