Just Before Midnight

The first thing I feel is the weight of the air pressing down on my chest. Not pain - pressure. Like the night itself sat down on me and refused to budge. I open my eyes to the ceiling, waiting to remember who I am, where I am, and why the hell I can't breathe.

Then I heard the pipes gurgling. The roof whispering. The walls stretching like old skin. And I know...

Ah. Home sweet fucking hell.

I must’ve fallen asleep at some point. Could’ve been an hour ago or yesterday morning for all I know. Time is a goddamn riddle in this house. Days blur into nights, weeks into tighter knots. I don’t remember the last time I looked at a clock and gave a shit about what it said. Time doesn’t matter when your life is a fucking to-do list of disasters.

But tonight - tonight the panic woke me up like a jealous lover. Slapped me across the chest and whispered: “Get up, bitch. Something’s wrong again.”

And I listened, like always.

I dragged my ass to the front door, legs stiff, joints creaking like a haunted violin. Each step is a mental equation. Each shift is a tiny betrayal. The handle's cold, the door’s heavy, and the outside slaps me with the wet kiss of Irish fog the second it opens. But I need it.

I need the smoke.

I need the cigarette.

It’s already burning before I can close the door behind me. I suck the first drag like it owes me rent, like it’ll fix something. It won’t but lies taste better with nicotine.

I sit on the front steps. Or collapse. One of those two. The concrete is damp, but I don’t give a shit. My whole life is damp.

A car passes somewhere down the hill, headlights like ghosts swimming through fog. The silence afterward makes me feel like I’ve gone deaf. Then I heard it...

A cough from inside. Mila.

Nine years old and already carrying too much on that tiny back. Always so damn quiet about it, too. She’s the kind of girl who watches the world and says nothing, but her eyes write volumes. A week ago, she asked me if we’d still have Christmas next year.

What the hell am I supposed to say to that?

"If we’re lucky, we’ll be homeless near a Christmas tree lot?"

I flick ash off the end of the cigarette, watch it swirl in the wind. One left after this. One more damn stick of sanity. Mile says I should quit. I tell him I’ll quit the minute the government pulls its thumb out of its arse and gives him that bloody Carer’s Allowance. So yeah. I’m probably smoking until I die.

Bjanka murmurs upstairs. Probably dreaming of unicorns and explosions. That girl’s brain is a kaleidoscope - bright, chaotic, beautiful, and just a little broken. Her words tangle like her shoelaces, but her laugh... God, her laugh could punch holes through sorrow.

And Mila... Mila doesn't laugh much anymore. She watches me with those ancient eyes of hers and tucks Bjanka tighter when she thinks I’m too tired to do it myself.

I’m supposed to be the mother.

She’s already halfway there.

I sigh and drag from the cigarette again. The smoke curls up into the night like a prayer. A curse. A whisper to a sky that never answers.

The street lamp flickers once, then settles. I glance toward the window where the busted old kitchen clock lives. Barely visible through the glass. One hand's straight up, the other just kissing twelve.

Midnight.

Huh.

Figures.

I whisper to the night, “You’ve got a real shitty sense of humor, you know that?”

The wind doesn’t argue. Just brushes past like it’s ashamed.

I lean back, bones cracking, body humming with exhaustion. And then I laugh. Not because anything is funny - fuck no - but because if I don’t let it out, it’ll start eating me alive.

Just after midnight, I sit in the dark, a cigarette between my fingers, my kids upstairs dreaming of something better, and my husband probably curled up with a frown carved into his face.

And me?

I'm still here.

Still fucking here.

Because someone has to be.

And I swear - if this damn country doesn’t listen soon, I’m going to drag the whole housing office down to this moldy, leaky dump and lock them in with the rats until they feel what it’s like to live in numbers instead of days.

Tick-tock, assholes.

Five Days Later

The phone rang.

I stared at it like it was a snake. Unknown number. My first thought? Another goddamn scam or some “urgent” reminder to pay a bill with money we don’t have. I almost let it ring out.

But something - instinct, maybe - told me to pick up.

"Hello?"

The voice on the other end was calm, official, and somehow warm.

"This is the Mayor."

I nearly dropped the bloody phone. My heart thudded like it was trying to do a jig in my chest.

He said he read my email. Every word. Said he was deeply touched.

Not the kind of “touched” you hear from a politician who's just ticking boxes - but the kind that sticks in your throat like emotion does when you’re trying not to cry in public.

He told me he wanted to personally assure me - assure me - that he would help. That accommodation would be arranged. That my family wouldn’t be left behind. That our story mattered.

And for the first time in what felt like years… I believed him.

I hung up, turned to Mile, and said something very poetic like:

"Holy shit, we might not end up on the streets after all."

We didn’t.

Weeks later, we moved into a house. A real one. With straight walls and working heat and no ghosts in the pipes. The kind of house where you don’t have to apologize to your children for the roof. The kind of house where time starts to matter again - because suddenly, the future feels like a thing you can count on.

Mile started writing books. I always told him he had stories in him. The kind that needed a bit of space, a bit of hope, to crawl out and breathe.

And me?

Well… this is my first story.

And it’s true. Every damn word of it.

From the cracked walls to the cold steps to that cigarette at midnight.

Maybe someone will read this and understand. Maybe someone will feel less alone. Or maybe someone in a room full of files and folders will finally stop, pause, and realize we’re not just numbers.

We’re people.

We fight.

We break.

And sometimes - when the world takes a second to listen - we rise.

Still fucking here.