Watch the Birds by Nicole Sheehan (list of ebook readers .txt) 📕
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- Author: Nicole Sheehan
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I believe that if this day had never come...I may have been consumed by rage. The house was warm with a feeling I had not experienced in many months; it was...joy. My mom called me into her bedroom and I arrived surprised to see a smile on her face. I wasn’t the only one who had been unhappy. She said, “sit down,” gesturing to sit beside her on her bed. I smiled, somehow already knowing what she was going to say. With a toothy grin, she said, “Chris got a really good job offer...in Camarillo! We're moving back!” I exploded. Although a small part of me was still sad I was not going back to Quinne, I knew it was finally going to get better. Unable to even control myself, I jumped up and just started running. I ran out of the room, through the house, and into our spacious backyard where I could run even more - all the while with my black labrador puppy nipping at my heels excitedly. Even though it was probably fifty degrees outside, I ran out in my pajamas and played with my dog for over an hour - not even noticing the cold.
Chapter 4
We had only been in Tennessee for about seven months. I wasn’t even finished with the fifth grade when we settled into our new place in Camarillo. It was comfortable, and since I knew in my heart this time that we wouldn't be moving again, I was ecstatic. Finally...I was home.
I didn't think about my dad during all the years that I had been away from Camarillo - simply unable to cope with that on top of all the stress of moving around. But now that I was home - back in the same town as my dad - I thought everything would be better. I thought now that the matter of distance between us had been eliminated, it would be easier for him to visit me. I didn’t quite know how to think about my dad at that point, after all this time had passed without speaking to him. All i knew was: he was my father, and fathers are supposed to be there for their daughters - consistently. About a year went by...still no sign of him. And he knew I was back and where I lived...he had no excuse now. I was about a month into sixth grade, junior high, when I finally pulled all the facts out of the depths of my brain and looked at them clearly enough to see...that my dad just didn’t want me.
What I didn’t know was…my father was still in his little imaginary world - where I was simply gone forever because of my mom, and that was that. Daniel and my grandma on my dad’s side had come to visit me when I came home, which I was overjoyed about, but neither of them ever explained to me what the story was with my dad - and I didn’t have the nerve to ask, thinking they would start to blame me for not calling him. I had been wrought with guilt my entire life for never calling my father - but how could I? I thought he didn’t want to talk to me. It wasn’t until I was in the seventh grade when I went from being sad and confused about the situation to being angry. I thought, “Wait...I’m just a little girl. He’s an adult. He’s
supposed to be the one to seek me
out. What’s wrong with him? Why does it have to be this way? Why can’t I have a dad like all my friends? Why shouldn’t I deserve one? What’s wrong with me
?” I was home…but my problems were not over.
I had developed a certain habit, but it did not last long. Thank God for that, because I would be covered in scars had it prolonged. During seventh grade, the constant confusion became too much. I couldn't comprehend why my dad would abandon me, why it felt like nobody
liked or cared about me, why it all had to happen to me
, why God was punishing me, what I had done wrong. I don't really understand how this happened, but at some point, it became so painful to think about that my brain...shut down. Suddenly...I could feel nothing. I went numb. All that was left was melancholy. I remember many months going by in a dense fog, like I was on auto-pilot. It was only my subconscious mind that was aware of this shift, but I knew on the surface that something was wrong. I don't remember how, but I had scraped my knee one day. I sat and examined the open wound. I felt it sting...and...I liked it. I touched it with sweaty fingers to make it sting more. I'd found a substitute for my lack of emotional feeling - physical pain. I cannot describe the frame of mind I was in that made me do these things, and unfortunately, only a select few people will understand my motivations behind them. I spent many nights inflicting wounds on my own body, just to feel human. I was sick - mentally ill. It took months for my brain to finally turn back on. I suppose it just needed a break. I no longer felt an urge to cut myself after my emotions came back. However, the horrendous scars on my body will continue to serve as a reminder of just how disturbed of a child I was for the rest of my life.
Middle school was a horrible experience. It was the period of time in which I was finally realizing my dad didn’t want to be in my life - that he probably never really did. I envied every girl I saw bonding with her father, now knowing that was a love I was never going to have. I desperately craved male affection - any male affection.
Without even realizing it, I began to see the boys at my school in a different light. Instead of just being boys, they became alternatives. The day a boy showed me a significant sign of affection was the day I realized that boys can fill the void in my heart - at least for a moment. When I had my first “boyfriend” in seventh grade - it was extremely nerve-wracking. I wanted affection - badly - but any wrong move and he could leave me. And any form of rejection to me is salt on a life-long wound. I could not handle being rejected. But of course, I was - multiple times, by multiple middle school boyfriends. And my self-esteem dropped to a dangerously low level. I didn't understand why no one could love me. Then, Isaac happened.
We’d been good friends for a few months when Isaac and I finally expressed our feelings for each other at the beginning of eighth grade. At first glance, one might feel no thirteen-year-olds could find real love. Typically, that is true. But this was something clearly extraordinary. Our relationship was very different from anything either of us had experienced before - it was genuine. We truly enjoyed each other’s company and were not dating just for the sake of dating - as middle schoolers often do. I was completely overjoyed to be with him because he was not too shy to show me his real affection for me - and I lived off of that affection. It was pure bliss to me - like ecstasy. Someone loved me. But one day - it went too far. We'd been dating for about a month when it happened. We were alone in his room just kissing when he shyly noted that he happened to have a condom…Now remember, I’d spent a lifetime believing there was something wrong with me because of my father not wanting me. I was extremely insecure. I believed that if I did not have sex with Isaac, there was a very good chance he would feel I was not worth staying with. I needed
him to stay with me. So, unable to handle the thought of being left again, I caved. I was thirteen years old, and had never even considered sex before.
I had thrown away my innocence. Then, when word got out at my school that “Nicole and Isaac are having sex,” I became the school slut and lost all of my girlfriends. More rejection. In addition to that, the impression I had gotten from society was that sex was a bad thing, so I thought I was a terrible person for doing it. I often felt terrified my father might discover what I’d done - and then found myself furious for still caring about what he thinks. I was still very much in a state of confusion, sadness, and anger. Nonetheless, I felt I had all I needed, which was Isaac. And somehow, despite my emotional instability and neediness, we stayed together. I was damaged, but he was okay with that - it made me different from all the other girls. With my lack of independence, extreme insecurity, horrible fear of change, and the ever-worsening heartache for every day that I didn‘t hear from my dad, I don’t know how I would have survived high school without Isaac. Though it was his stubborn hormones that provoked the moment of weakness that only further damaged my soul, he truly loved me - and I truly loved him. We both knew in our hearts it was real. And since I was in desperate need of real love, it was incredibly healing for me. Years went by and the longer we stayed together, the more secure I felt about my future, feeling more and more confident that I will never have to face the day when Isaac leaves me. By the time I was a junior in high school, I was feeling substantially better about myself. Things had become stable for the first time in my life; I found friends I could relate to, learned how to eliminate my dependence on Isaac without having to leave him, and found the closest thing to peace as I have ever had. I was doing well…or so I thought.
Chapter 5
I was eighteen years old and had just graduated high school when I realized that the discomfort I’d been feeling in my lower back for the past few months had evolved into a sharp pain. I ignored it as best as I could for about a month until I became concerned. The doctor prescribed antibiotics, physical therapy, ultrasounds
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