My First Attempt

Dear Diary,

Journal,

Hey.

To be completely honest, I don’t know how to start this. All I know is that I went to Google, and one of its suggestions on how to deal with things was to write about them. So I hopped in my car, drove to Walgreens, grabbed a journal (a cute little sparkly one to hide all the horrible stuff about my past - and present - I’m bound to say in here), and now I’m here. 

Let’s see, where am I? I’m at home, sitting at my desk, alone in the house, because Evan’s at his mom’s house. He’s at his mom’s house because I kicked him out after finding him with – get this, journal – Liv. Olivia. My own sister. Isn’t that hilarious? And to make it even better, they’ve been going behind my back with each other for a month. An entire month!

So, yeah, I’m currently not talking to Olivia either. Which is great, you know, because it’s not like she was the only person I consistently talked to or anything, besides Evan. Not gonna lie, I’m pretty lonely.

Actually, now that I think about it, Evan just said he was going to his mom’s house. He’s probably with Liv, as I stuff my face with ice cream and cry and write about all my woes in a damn diary like I’m thirteen.

Truth is, I haven’t journaled about my feelings since I was in middle school. And back then, I’m pretty sure all I had to write about was my crush on one of the popular boys who didn’t even know my name. I was a quiet kid. Kinda ugly, too. I did have a few friends, though, who sat with me at lunch and talked to me in classes. Other than that, I never saw them outside of school except for a few times. I was invited to things at first: sleepovers and the likes. But Mom never let me spend the night. She’d come swooping in at eight or, if I was lucky, nine, to pick me up, just when the gossip was getting good. So, my friends just stopped inviting me.

High school was a little better. I had a decent group of friends for three years, who I was actually allowed to go do stuff with. Of course, if my mom knew what we were doing, she would’ve pulled me out of there and locked me in my room for the rest of eternity. After all, she did have a tracker on my phone, so we had to be careful. But there are ways around that. There always are.

During all of this, Liv was the golden child. Mom’s favorite, the one who could do no wrong. If only Mom could see her now. But then, Liv really didn’t do any wrong. If she did, she never got caught. She always had friends and would always bring them over, because Mom loved Liv’s friends. She thought they were also perfect children. Of course, those were nights I’d leave, because the last thing I wanted as a “cool” high schooler was to be in a house full of middle school girls. I knew how annoying they were: I was one once.

College was the first time I made a lot of mistakes. It was the first time I was free, away from Mom’s tracking and Liv’s perfection, although I definitely got an ear load whenever I had to come home. Liv did this, Liv did that, Liv got straight A’s and was the captain of this team and got a solo in choir and everything I didn’t care about. 

I moved into an apartment with friends as soon as I could, which happened to be sophomore year. A huge mistake, I will admit. I had no money. I did have a job at the time, but I was a horrible saver. I would blow the majority of my paycheck on stupid stuff every week and hardly have enough for rent. I wasn't truly living, now that I look back on it. Life was just a blur.

It wasn’t until after I graduated college that Liv and I really started being on good terms. I had gotten it together (mostly), I was living with Evan, who I’d been with for a year and a half at that point, and I wasn’t so bitter towards Liv anymore. After she’d gotten out of Mom’s house, she started to mess up, and I think Mom started to see that Liv wasn’t the perfect child anymore. Mom started to see that Liv was more like me than anyone thought.

Of course, that’s just what Liv told me. I haven’t talked to Mom in years. And I’m not planning to, any time soon. But that’s a whole different thing to get into, for another day. I’m not ready for that tonight.

Anyway, to the present, and to Olivia’s betrayal of me. Although Liv did mess up over the years, she was still Mom’s favorite. And in reality, Mom probably wouldn’t care that Liv has betrayed me; she’d probably say it was my fault somehow.

So yeah, in one night, after finding them together in my and Evan’s bed because I got off work a little early, I told them I wasn’t talking to either of them ever again and I sent Evan away, telling him he could come get his stuff when I was ready for him to.

There was a lot of other stuff said, but honestly, it was coming out so fast that I don’t remember any of it.

So, there’s a basic rundown of my life and what I’m dealing with now. I guess I’ll come back tomorrow – is that how this journaling thing works? Or do I just come back when I want to vent about something else terrible that happened to me?

We’ll see. This is it for now, I suppose. I can’t wait to turn on Netflix and eat chocolate and sulk by myself for yet another night. 

‘Til we meet again, journal. 

Yours truly,

V