Unravelling

Chapter 14 - Sleep Deprived

I am sleep deprived.

That became clear the moment my alarm clock went off this morning. And now, more than four hours later, I still feel like a walking zombie. It is 11:30am and I have been struggling to keep my eyes open in class all morning. My teacher has already given me two verbal warnings for not paying attention, and I would not be surprised if she gave me a detention next.

It was close to midnight when we finally got home from the festival last night. Alex was not at all amused that things had gotten so out of his control. His initial plan had been for us to return home no later than by 9pm. From previous experiences, he should really have known that this was a plan that was bound to fail the moment he made it. Because, as was to be expected, the festival was awesome and nobody was inclined to leave it quite as early as Alex wanted us to. The line-up was great, too. We were all in agreement that there was simply no way that we were going to miss the Fleetwood Mac performance at 7:30pm.

They played for one and a half hours and we immediately hit the road once they were done. But traffic was really bad once we had managed to make it back to our cars. On top of all the festivalgoers flooding the roads at the same time, there was also an accident about halfway home. This cost us another half an hour, and we eventually arrived home at 11:45pm, which is almost three hours later than my usual bedtime.

I didn't even try to hide my bad mood this morning. My brothers know that I don't react well to lack of sleep, so they were not exactly surprised and they gracefully tried to ignore it by just leaving me be and staying out of my way. But Alex gave me a good talking to when I almost ripped Aidan's head off when he accidentally bumped into me, making me spill my juice. It was not a good start into the new week.

Gracie elbows me, which causes me to almost fall off my chair in shock. I glare at her.

"Your eyes were closed and your head was about to hit the table when Ms. Miller was just about to look our way," she whispers.

I immediately switch from glaring at her to giving her a small, tired smile. The last thing I need today is getting a detention or – worse – being sent to the principal. Alex would kill me.

When I was still in middle school, there had been only one incident that resulted in me being sent to the principal's office. They called Alex at work. Luckily, I didn't get suspended, but he had to come into the office himself when he picked me up after school, to have a word with the principal about me. His reaction was horrible.

It wasn't that he yelled at me or anything, but he remained silent the whole ride home, which almost drove me crazy. Once we got there, he took me to his room and told me that he was very disappointed in me. That was it. There were no other consequences, like a grounding or additional chores or whatever other punishments he could have dished out. Those, I would have taken in my stride. But the serene and almost sad look on his face, when he told me how he felt about me getting into trouble at school, was enough to convince me to never get myself into a similar situation again.

Today, I am very close to breaking that promise to myself.

"Thank you," I whisper back.

"Would you like to share anything with the class, ladies?" Ms. Miller asks.

"No, Ma'am," Gracie replies for both of us.

"Then I suggest you quit talking and start listening," our teacher says, sounding a bit exasperated.

I don't know all my teachers very well yet, since we have only been going to this school for a week, but Ms. Miller seems to be one of the nice ones. She has been very patient with me today, so I force myself to pay attention for the last fifteen minutes before our lunchbreak.