The Kids Are All Right by Diana Welch

Author:Diana Welch [Welch, Diana]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-46254-1
Publisher: Crown Publishing Group
Published: 2009-12-26T16:00:00+00:00

AMANDA

THEN THE MOANING started. Liz and I heard it first thing the next morning, these ghostly noises coming from Mom’s room and floating through the rest of the house.

Thanksgiving had been more than Mom could take. The nurse told me that after dinner, Mom went back to her room, got wretchedly sick, then slipped into a state of semiconsciousness. She had started having seizures a couple months ago, but after Thanksgiving they got so bad that the nurses had to keep her doped up. Still, she moaned in her sleep. I’d come home from school and hear her all the way in the kitchen. It was awful.

Liz and I escaped to Manhattan as often as we could. We’d go to clubs, drinking and dancing—anything to get away from the misery that was our house then. In the city, we could forget about everything. We were wild. One night at Danceteria, we were drinking margaritas. Liz went off to find some lifeguard from the Bedford Golf and Tennis Club she had a crush on. But after a while, she was nowhere to be seen, so I went looking for her. It was late and we needed to go home. I found her slumped in the men’s room, wasted. My friend and I had to carry her out of the club because her legs were like Jell-O. As we were stumbling toward the car, we passed a group of guys. Liz looked up and slurred, “Hey, guys, wanna party?” I wanted to kill her! She couldn’t even fucking walk! I threw her into the back of the Jeep.

It was 4:30 a.m. when we got home. Liz managed to stumble upstairs. Then, suddenly, a shoe came flying over the banister. I looked up to see Liz’s swollen face peering over the balcony that overlooked the great room. She was spitting onto the floor below. I was furious and whispered loudly, “What, are you going to puke, now? Go into the fucking bathroom!” Her face disappeared, and I heard this huge crash. The night nurse came running out to see what was going on, and I told her everything was under control. I went upstairs to see what happened, but the bathroom door was locked. I could hear Liz crying on the other side. When I finally got her to open the door, I saw that she had somehow managed to smash the full-length mirror into smithereens. She was barefoot, standing in a pile of broken glass, whimpering.

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