23^rd March, 2012. Friday

                I hate my life! Everything is going against me and I can’t even do anything about it. Strict teachers, nagging parents, troublesome brother, what else? Take today as the perfect example of my oh-so-not-perfect life. I woke up at half past 6, just to find out that my obnoxious baby brother had finished the hot bath, got nagged by mom for “waking up so late” and a continuous lecture on why I should change, courtesy of my dad, along the ride to school. Just when I thought the day couldn’t get worse, the stream of bad luck had just started. Turned out that I completely forgot all my homework – some of them were already ruined by – what my mom called “innocent” – Hasril who thought ripping his big brother’s homework jotter was completely reasonable. As expected, I received another 1 hour and a half dose of lecture from my caring Biology teacher and got to stand outside the class for every subject whose homework I didn’t do.

                Returning back home didn’t even cure me, it worsened the situation. Unfortunately, one of my teacher was kind enough to call my mom, informing her of my wrong doings this morning and nothing – I repeat, NOTHING – can stop my mom’s mouth from the endless blabbering.

“You woke up late, didn’t do your homework, came back looking like a tramp and don’t even make me remind me about your .......” and so on it went.

“But mom, Hasril ripped my homework jotter, and I woke up early at 6.30!

“Don’t you dare put the blame on your brother Azril Mazlan! He’s still a toddler. You, on the other hand, is a full grown young adult, You should know better than leaving your homework jotter lying around the house. And don’t talk back to me when I’m talking to you” she replied with a swift speed as her anger rising rapidly.

That’s it! I won’t stand the kind of treatment anymore. I dropped my bag, stomp all the way to my bedroom and did the most typical thing a sulking brat will do – slamming the door hard enough to be heard by my mom. Turning on the radio, Simple Plan’s song seems to mock me even more:

Do you ever feel like breaking down?

Do you ever feel out of place?

Like somehow you just don't belong

And no one understands you

Out of pure frustration and anger, I grabbed my diary and wrote the most horrible wish I had made in my life boldly with a pen;

I WISH MY FAMILY IS GONE

            Tears trickled sown my cheeks as I wrote these down in my diary. Being known as being too sensitive for a 17-year-old boy, tears always come whenever I’m frustrated. I’d learnt from a seminar last year the method to channel out my depressions using the gift of written words, this explaining why a guy like me even possess such girlish thing.

24^th March, 2012. Saturday

            A knock was heard, followed by the door opening, revealing the figure I’d been loathing to see, my mom.

“Ril, are you still mad?” My mom said softly, fully aware that I’d been sulking for the whole day after the event yesterday, refusing to leave my room even for dinner.

            Seeing no response, my mom sat besides my bed, stroking her son tenderly.

“Look, I’m sorry that I’d gone overboard yesterday. It was a really stressful day for me. You’re not the one to be blamed for all of it Azril.” Her gentle voice slowly creeps into my heart, healing the wounds the same voice had created.

“Yeah, like you’ll ever blame Hasril for anything.” I replied with a croaky voice – my throat dried for not being used for a long while.

“I already did” my mom said flatly. “Hasril wasn’t allowed to be outside his room for the whole day”

The revelation shocked me as much as it rapidly changed my mood, Looking up from my “sulking position”, I looked at my mom closely, searching for any sign of a lie.

“You did?” I asked for confirmation.

So Azril, where to?” Greeted dad with a rare smile he usually wear whenever he has a really good day, surprising me again for the third time as I got down the stairs.

“Hi Dad, sorry about last night” I said sheepishly, trying not to ruin the good mood.

“Teenagers, we don’t know them, they don’t know us. But let not get into that shall we? So, going to town or not? Your friends are already waiting there” Yep, it’s my dad alright. Apparently my friends called this morning but my dad picked up, they asked if I’m free to join them to town and so my dad convinced my mom to allow me to go. “It was the least I can do to make up for everything, junior, now come on!”

            What happened next was like a dream. My friends greet me as we arrived, commenting on how cool my dad was – he even gave me an extra allowance for that day! –, and we pretty much rocked the whole day. Back from the town, my mom prepared the best dinner I’d tasted, and we chatted about what I do the whole week, complimenting me on my achievements and offered useful advices for me. Even little Hasril was less naughty than usual – probably learnt his lesson after being grounded yesterday.

25^th March 2012. Sunday

            Today was, perhaps, one of the best Sundays I’d experienced in my life. I’d been to the library and borrow some new books there, thought little Hasril to walk a little – he still crawl most of the time but he was rapidly getting use to walking – and spent some quality time with my families.

26^th March 2012. Monday

            After driving me to school, my families left to went back to our village. Last night we received news that my grandfather was sick with a bad fever. After some family discussion, my mom decided to visit her beloved in-law without me since I’m still in my teachers’ bad list so I can’t really request for an excuse for the day. I’m completely fine with that, I mean, having the whole house for myself will be awesome! The whole school was completely normal with no nagging teachers.

            This evening, I felt like updating my diary, since I got nothing else to do for the whole day. Writing is now one of my favourite past time, I’m even planning to be a part-time novel writer one day.

            Completely submerged with my writing, I missed the first ring of my cell phone, so I was pretty shocked to see a miss call from my uncle when I finally pick my phone up. But then the phone ring again, this time it’s from the same uncle who lived with my grandparents.

            “Azril, I’m sorry to tell you this, but your family just got into an accident. I’ll come and fetch you as soon as I can”, thus came the concerned voice, delivering the harsh truth to me.

            I was not even sure how to react; I sit there on my study desk, holding the phone, with emotions stirring inside of me as I felt my whole body going numb. A cold wind blew from the window, flipping the pages of my diary, revealing what I had wrote three days before, almost as in that particular sentence had came to haunt me for the rest of my life, going in and out of psychology centres, schools for problematic kids, and orphanages.

I WISH MY FAMILY IS GONE

On my final test last year, I wrote this because I’m out of fresh idea for the essay. Changed a normal essay into Percy Jackson style!

            It was a cold and stormy night; I was alone in my house watching movies in my laptop. I could’ve watch the television if it was not for the blue text that read “Service Currently is Unavailable” on the big screen. Typical Astro, they earned millions from Malaysians yet they can’t even solve a simple signal distraction during a storm.

            Alone. My parents were gone to the village with all my siblings. The only reason why I didn’t join was because I had school tomorrow and I dreaded every single second in the village. Unfortunately, they forgot to leave me something to eat and I’m NOT going out for dinner. With a storm like this, I could’ve been zap by lightning and nobody would know. The headline tomorrow will leads to – unexpectedly – “Suicidal Boy Killed by Lighting”.

            Silently foaming as the night got worse, I tried to think positive, “Hey, it’s not like it’ll get any worst!” the optimistic side of my brain said – and it got worse. Suddenly all the lights are out. “A blackout” my pessimistic side said, “thanks a lot”. No replies from the optimistic one. As I was fumbling to find a candle, I heard a crash right in front of my house.

            “Great, like anything else can’t go wrong” I muttered to myself as I dashed to the front of my house gate.

            There was an accident. A car was hit by a lorry right in front of my house. The strange thing was, there’s no groaning. “Maybe they all died” I said cheerily (my teacher made a ???? note on the paper. Just in case, YES teacher, I said CHEERILY) to myself. A groan was heard, “Okay, maybe not ALL”. I called the ambulance and quickly went to the place of accident. Apparently, I had no sense of fear of blood.

            The lorry driver was dead silent (not sure if he’s actually died or not but I’m using this word only as an expression) so I checked the car. There was a guy stuck on the driver’s seat between the airbag and crashed windows. Nice, a thing designed to help was actually KILLING him. I tried to help but he mumbled something, “My wife”, he said in a gasped voice – as in he was fighting from intense, excruciating pain – “save my wife, she’s holding our daughter”.

            A panic suddenly jumped into me, I’m a licensed St. John so as my the teacher said it, I have to help or be sued. Continuing on, I rushed to the shotgun seat to help the woman.

            Four words; Not. A. Pretty. Sight.

            The woman was bleeding all over and clutching the baby, It’ll took the ambulance five more minutes to get here and the woman was dying, Taking priority, I took the baby first and laid her safely on the undamaged part of the car, away from the storm and potentially harmful objects.

            Checking the woman’s pulse – unstable and she looked like she passed out. Thinking again, I shouted for help from my neighbors, nobody heard it due to the terrible storm and I lived quite a distance from other houses (thanks Dad for picking this wonderful spot as our home). Right, no help, I positioned her as comfortable as I could, couldn’t pull her out though because her leg was stuck. In a rush, I returned back to the driver. Astoundingly, he didn’t pass out and I tried freeing him using sticks lying on the grass.

            Despite his pain, he enquired, “my wife?” Trying to contain my panic, I said, “stuck, the baby is OK”. He looked like trying to both smile and cry at the same time. Fortunately, the heavenly - most of the time, I call it annoying but this was a special case – sound of the ambulance siren was getting closer. I called them and told them about everything. Like a professional, they freed the woman and the driver and also took the lorry guy into the ambulance in a jiffty. A medic – he looked like their leader- patted me on the head and hurriedly rush them all to the hospital.

            So there I was, standing on the road like an idiot as the storm still raging. Returning back to my house, fortunately the blackout was temporary and I took a shower. I felt good for awhile, at least I did the right thing – I hope.

            On the next day, as I was answering the final semester examination, an announcement came and informed me to go to the office immediately.

 Wait a sec, I didn’t even cheat ( yet)!

            Fortunately, that wasn’t the case. The guy who patted me last night was there in the office and praised me for my *ahem* brave *ahem* action last night. The only comment I could think of was; “So, I’m not going to be sued for not helping the lorry guy?”