Today I stayed in my room making mixed tapes and studying.
Yes.
Tapes, the kind that are made of chunky plastic.
I listened to euphoric trance techno from my marvellous brother.
I got bored and fed up with the Industrial Revolution and the reign of Napoleon I.
I told my mother I was going for a walk and she asked me to return the DVD my brother rented last night.
"Sure" I said.
I got my coat on and my dyke boots and my woolly rainbow scarf and was headed out the door when she started to put on her coat and her mommy boots and her fleece scarf and she said
"Just a minute I'll go tell your father where we're going" and I didn't know what to say because I didn't want her to come and I didn't want to say anything because she'd take it the wrong way.
So I said nothing and there was my father putting on his boots and his woolly hat because he doesn't wear a scarf. I still didn't know what to say, so I said nothing.
I was out the door and they were behind me and I slid all the way to the video store ignoring their bickering and then arguing and then full out yelling, and I J-walked at an intersection because it's really stupid and no one crosses there anyway, and they stayed on the other side shouting by this point.
They waved their hands at each other in annoyance as I walked away.
They caught up at the store when I turned around, so I walked the other way, silently.
They were loud enough.
I slid down the hill like a skate boarder, but I didn't have a board, all I had were my dyke boots.
They followed, a long way back but I could tell they were there.
Until they were silent.
They were sulking now.
They had stepped on each others last nerve.
I could tell my mother was near tears.
I waited behind the trees and then walked away when they passed.
My father saw me crossing the path in the middle of the foot ball field.
I was somewhere between the goal posts of the soccer nets when he caught up.
'I can't stand your mother you know'
'she's off sulking now'
'I don't understand her.
'Neither do I, I want to say, but I don't say anything, and I keep walking and I listen to Ani playing in my head.
"Tiptoe" I know by heart, each syllable and each note, I listen to it instead of him, I walk away.
I slide down the road, past the alley through the streets until I'm home and obligatory family outing is over and I can go back to Napoleon and conquering the world.