My life has been spent imitating those around me. A person here learns quickly on the streets of Shark Town that in order to survive you either stand out in an extreme show of power and crush all those who dare to defy you thus establishing your own hierarchy or you learn to blend in and become a part of your surroundings. I have chosen to develop mentally and use my intellect to keep my head above the water; so to speak because you see the neighborhood that I live in is not a peaceful place. I mean from an outsider point of view we’re the typical rundown lowlife infested neighbor hood that middle class America passes by daily with an up turned nose. But unless you’ve lived in Shark Town for at least a year or more you start to observe the comings and goings of your fellow neighbors and at times you find things that you wished had never been uncovered.

When I was a little girl my mother, my younger brother, and I moved to Shark town Louisiana to escape her abusive relationship with a man that I refuse to call father or acknowledge as her husband. It seemed like the right idea at the time seeing as how my mother had no known family to turn to for help being that she was an orphan and my father’s family had disapproved of their relationship from the beginning citing her lack of money and family history as the two main reasons. Beside why would they believe her over the word of their own kin? At first we were just so glad to escape and feel safe on our own, living by our own rules that we hardly paid attention to our surroundings. We didn’t mind the bugs crawling around at night or the standoffish couple that lived to our right; we even managed to ignore the occasional gun shots heard from a distance outside our windows. As my mother used to say, as long as they are not pointed at us we can make do; and so we did.

Mostly we just kept to ourselves. Aside from the few greetings we got from neighbors at the supermarket or at church we rarely exchanged more than a few pleasantries with the other people in our neighborhood. We were content to just stick it out together. My brother Sam, being only two years younger than me, and I were pretty close. And we grew even closer over the years that we were home schooled together. My mother didn’t believe in the public school education and she couldn’t afford to send the both of us to a private school on the salary she made working for the post office so she just taught us herself.

Everything changed a few months after my sixteenth birthday when she was forced to get a second job at the library seeing as how the super decided to up our rent from $1000 to $1500. We could barely afford the original price what with my mom refusing to allow us to get jobs so she was forced to get another. Because of her second job she wouldn’t be able to teach us anymore and we were promptly enrolled in Shark Town high school.

To soon the day arrived when my brother and I were forced to leave the safety of our home. It was an unusually somber occasion with all three of us unwittingly matching in head to toe scarlet and black making it apparent that we had lived together in solitude for way to long. My typically calm brother seemed unusually restless sitting down at the kitchen table. Perhaps he was just feeling as nervous me.

“Hi there honey bunny”, my mother called out cheerfully from behind the island counter in our kitchen. On her face was an extremely fake smile that perhaps could’ve fooled others but never me. We had been through to much, my mother and I, for that to ever work and yet still she tried. For her sake I decided to let her keep up the façade and allow her to believe that I was fooled

“Are you hungry Mel? I made pancakes”, she asked as I sat down across from my brother, who in turn sent me a wink signifying that he too was aware of my mothers antics.

“No thanks mom”, I replied flipping my hair away from my face. “I think I’ll just wait until lunch to grab something”.

“Are you sure honey? I know that they’re your favorite”, she asked her voiced tinged with a hint of concern. My brother and I have learned through years of experience that with situations like these it is best to tread lightly, my mother has been known to go off the deep end over the littlest of things. Last year she made my brother lie in bed for two days because he had a runny nose and a slight cough. I said it was his allergies but my mother somehow got into her head that he had SARS. Yes, her over protectiveness can be a bit of a nuisance but we love her.

“No mom I’m fine”, I told her putting a little emphasis on the word fine to let her know that I was serious. “I’m just not the mood to eat. I guess I’m just a little nervous” I said.

“Well that just normal honey” my mom said pushing back her sleeves while leaning over the counter. “I remember my first day of school; she began to reminisce during which my brother and I exchanged eye rolls. Ever since it had been decided that my brother and I would be attending the high school our mother would regal us with words of wisdom and tales of her many high school exploits, some of which where funny and others helpful, some were just plain gross.

“I used to get into so much trouble but then I met your father and I knew it was time to settle down” she said quietly trailing off. My mother and father met her junior year at Roosevelt high school. During those times class rank was everything; my father was a senior and a football god and my mother was a shy mousy drama geek, no on would have pictured those two ending up together. But they did becoming something of a high school fairytale. After those two started dating my mothers name suddenly began to rise through the ranks making her one of the most popular girl at school. By the end of her senior year she had every girl jealous because it was a known fact that those two were going to get married in a huge southern fairytale of a wedding. Flipping through old high school yearbooks it’s hard to imagine that the all American boy staring back at me with a football in his hands and a huge smile on his face would one day become the abusive drunk of a father that I had come to know so well.

“Alrighty then, enough daydreaming and wasting daylight, my mother began abruptly waking me from my unspoken reverie. “It is time for us to be heading out or you two will be late on you first day”, she said signifying the end of our trip down memory lane.

“Yeah let’s get out of here”, my brother said grabbing my hands and dragging me to my feet. “Let’s get going out the car. I got shotgun, he cried racing to the car”.

“The hell you do”. I replied before chasing after him.

“Watch your language Melinda and stop all that running around”, my mom chastised us with a smirk on her face. Showing us that that she wasn’t really angry.

But still, we are southern bred and manners do take you through the world

“Sorry mom”.