Life On The Go

• Elizabeth Ween, Grade 7
• Short Story
• 2017

I walked down a crowded hallway, hopped in a taxi and set foot on new soil. This is my life! For the past six years I have been a tourist at any country that you can imagine (only real countries!) though I’m visiting Australia and Russia this year. I might sound like I like to travel but when you travel more than 3 times a month it can get really tiring. My dad works in the hotel business, so we travel a lot for his work and I rarely see him unless we’re on a plane/taxi or there’s a really special occasion like Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter or a family member’s birthday.
My friends are my books, they have a comforting warmth every time you turn a page and give me hope for what’s outside of our own individual worlds. Everywhere I go I have a library card that I can use anywhere that I travel unless there isn’t a library, but there is always a library! My favourite book is Charlie and the Chocolate factory by Roald Dhal because it lists a range of jaw dropping sweets - just imagine a never ending gobstopper that I unfortunately can’t eat because dad says they are bad for you and he won’t pay for dental cleaning.
My mother was amazing, she would tell me to just forget about what might go wrong and just go for it! She passed away when I was 6 and ever since then my life was never the same. I had never even left my hometown, my life was so ordinary and simple - I loved it! But ever since my dad got a phone call saying that my mum had passed away he was never quite the same. The first thing he did was sell the house that my mother loved and barely spoke a whole sentence to me without stuttering. He changed my last name and got a new girlfriend every month for a year. I know that he’s torn from this experience and probably doesn’t want anything to remind him of what he misses.
So after we moved house everything was new, I was seeing things for the first time and meeting new people. But I should have known that nothing lasts forever (well except diamonds), but I was always moving house and it was always too hard to keep in contact with my friends, I was always the new girl who was an outsider. But it felt like my dad was running from something or completing some sort of mission. My mum would always say that she wanted to travel around the world, do a gap year and see everything! That was her dying wish, but her sickness that she developed after giving birth to me kept her from leaving the house so my dad did everything for her as he loved her deeply - she was his life.
My mother’s name was Kyla Bridges and she wanted to be a professional singer. She had the most beautiful voice that she would share it with me every night just before I went to bed. Every night I sing to myself and can feel a special connection with her almost as if she is singing with me. My mum would always say that my dad loved me, that he was just caught up with work. And when I was with my dad he told me that I look like a mini version of my mum and that I would one day grow up to look just like her. Maybe that’s why he doesn’t talk to me anymore, because I remind him to much of her. But all I want is someone to talk to, someone like my dad that I love very much.