Open Window | Teen Ink

Open Window

December 21, 2018
By okkceli BRONZE, Stockton, California
okkceli BRONZE, Stockton, California
3 articles 0 photos 0 comments

Muffled cries can be heard in the room of such a large house, a family of ten and one of the eldest of the five brothers opens the door from which the sounds are coming from. One of three sisters named Victoria is laying in her bed underneath her covers, so bright her room was, filled with many colours, since she was young she was always fond of vivid colours, anything that was bright enough to make a statement, it really did express her character of having such a bright lovely image from everyone, but that’s what people see on the outside and not exactly what she is inside. Her brother carefully sits beside her laying body and gently puts a hand upon her head covered by her silk covers. Soft spoken words are told to Victoria in which it eases her pain, and for a moment stops crying, brings her head from under the covers and gives her brother a look, almost as if pleading for help.


The eldest sister walks up the stair wondering how her siblings are doing and as she takes her steps up, she hears faint talking in the distance, she walks down the hall heading towards Victoria’s room and peers her head through a slightly open door. Upon entering, she gives Victoria a kiss on the forehead in hopes of calming her, and it works, Victoria gives a small smile towards her siblings, in which they ruffle her hair and tells her to rest a bit before meeting everyone downstairs to celebrate their mothers return from the hospital. But before they leave the room the eldest sister ask Victoria to close her window since it's getting quite cold, in which she replies with a nod of disapproval, and her sister warns her of always leaving it open all day. Victoria seems to always be leaving the window open during the day and ends up forgetting to close it at night, but she enjoys having her window open, perhaps for the fresh air circulating in since it can get quite stuffy, so her siblings don’t force her into closing it. When the door clicks shut, Victoria sinks into her bed, relaxed yet rather sulking but she can’t seem to remember what had her so vulnerable. As she gazes towards the ceiling she begins to recall the past events that made her cry, something she doesn’t normally give attention to, keeps it in to herself until it finally explodes. She doesn’t want to start crying again so she grabs her covers, placing them on top of her, and closes her eyes shut tightly. She starts imagining what it would be like to live in a family that’s normal, the normal you see in the television in which they have family time together and no problems within them to the point that it would affect you physically. It’s almost euphoric to her as she starts to drift away into a deep slumber, she thought that this was her haven that kept her sane, a slumber that not even the ruckus downstairs would wake her.


The area below Victoria’s sleeping body was full of music and merry voices, the family dancing and singing, a celebration for their dearly beloved mother. She too was singing and laughing from the comfort of her sofa since the doctors had strictly instructed her to not engage in activities and just rest the whole month recovery. The two youngest are sitting on the floor near the mother enjoying some food the father prepared that day, and he was indulged in the music playing through the speaker that made it almost as if the live performance was happening in their house. The three middle kids are running around the house playing some pretend game of police, chasing each other, and the two eldest sitting next to their mother, conversing with her, letting her know of the status behind the household. They were the ones that were keeping an eye on the house and its condition, even if the father was there he was rather busy so obviously would help in taking care of the kids and keeping the house clean.


Laughter continues on in the house, the family are enjoying their get together with their mother who hasn’t been home for quite a long time. Victoria on the other hand was sound asleep, even if they were to enter and check up on her, she wouldn’t be awakened and the family were worried that she was in such a deep slumber but they took it as her working herself to the point of not sleeping. They do not want the mood to seem dread and full of sorrow so they just carry on with the party, they even put a movie on towards the end of the day just to calm everyone down and because of the fact that you can’t play loud music late at night. The movie is that of drama category in which the protagonist is trying to find their biological parents, it’s quite the cliche type of movie but it’s the mother’s favorite so they don’t mind it at all.  Sudden gasp come from all the family members as they watch the movie, even though most of them didn’t deem interested in the movie, they eventually became unraveled in it. The younger ones were sitting on the floor enjoying some ice cream, vanilla flavored with a few scoops of strawberry which was the whole family’s favorite combination. They were so entrapped in the movie they would just scoop some ice cream without looking and shove it into their mouths, the flavors so common to them that they would rather gaze upon the television and not stop to admire the taste.



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