birthday drabble.

6 - “Mama, mom..”

A putrid smell hung in the air. Delphine Wyatt lay in her own vomit. Her tiny daughter yanked at her arm to try wake her up, but the alcohol stole her away to a deep slumber.

Miranda had only just turned 6 that day, and in school the teacher had given her a cupcake, and everyone got a handful of popcorn on a piece of brown paper towel. The class sang Happy Birthday together to the young girl in unwashed clothes with a mess of blonde hair.

When the bell signalled it was time to go home. The young girl was cornered by some kids and asked if she was going to have a party, if it would be Halloween themed. Could anyone go? She shook her head and said that they had other plans, that her dad was having a big surprise party for her at Planet Hollywood and there would be a ton of celebrities there. Maybe even Madonna. The children looked at her with pity. They knew it wasn’t true, they all knew.

One girl handed her a small piece of construction paper, pink with a white plain paper insert. It had a messy scrawl of letters wishing her a happy birthday. The tiny blonde would treasure it forever. The girl wasn’t her friend, and this didn’t bond them in any other way, but she appreciated it all the same.

With that stuffed into her pocket, Miranda rushed home to see if her mom had some sort of surprise waiting for her. The year before, Del was supposed to go out to a Halloween party, but her ride had fallen through and nobody else came to get her. So they had scrounged up some money and got some tube cinnamon buns, and pull apart and bake frozen cookies with little pumpkins and ghosts on them. The small girl never knew that her mom was only doing it to kill time, to her? It was the greatest birthday in the world.

She had a box of pancake mix on the counter. They could make pancakes and maybe even use the cupcake tin to make cup sized pancakes in there. There wasn’t whipped cream or syrup, but a sprinkle of sugar would be okay. She just wanted to spend the day with her mom. The beautiful blonde she worshipped.

Her excitement dashed when she entered and found her mom passed out. She put on a pot of oatmeal knowing her mom hadn’t eaten all day. The younger blonde tugged her mom up into a sitting position, proceeding to wipe her face and hair free of the vomit. She turned and went to stir the oatmeal, then grabbed a dirty rag, wetting it and squeezing it out as best her small hands could, then went to wipe her mom’s face.

“Mama, look.” She ignored her mom’s annoyed groan and sigh.

“This girl Sara, she made me a card. See? The whole class sang Happy birthday to me, and we had popcorn and they made me a cupcake. I saved you a piece.” She pulled the partially wrapped piece and tugged it free from the paper, then put it in her mom’s hand.

“Pass me a ciggy, hon.” Her voice hoarse, her cornflower irises surrounded by red veins, glossy and swollen.

Miranda looked around the messy table for a pack that wasn’t empty, then found one on the floor. She dropped to her knees and dug under the sofa for a lighter. Putting it between her small pink lips, she sparked the lighter and brought it to the smoke. Once ignited, she coughed.

“Pass it here, what did I tell ya about inhaling?”

She got a light swat over her head before the smoke was taken.

“Silly girl. How old are ya again?”

“Six mama. Remember last year I was five?”

“Oh f***, right. Gimme a moment, hon. I need time to wake up.”

Her mom grunted, pushed herself up and sauntered to the bathroom to clean herself up some. She balanced the cigarette on the bathtub ledge, gave her face a splash. Rinsed her mouth out and looked at herself. She was still beautiful. Not wanting to stick around the house, she wondered if Allan Jones was busy. Maybe she could hit him up for some dinner.

Outside the bathroom, a tiny voice asked. “Mama, you wanna make pancakes with me?” She didn’t want to mention her birthday again, she didn’t want to annoy her because she might just go back to bed.

Hell, she already forgot it was the kid’s birthday.

“Hon, how about we go out for dinner, huh? It’s your special day after all. We can’t just sit around here and hide from the kids that come bangin’ on the door and beggin’ for free candy. If we had candy, we’d eat it ourselves, right? Whaddya say. We can go to Denny’s or somethin’.”

The tiny blonde’s eyes went wide and she grew super excited. “Really, Mama? You mean it?” She immediately dashed to the closet the two shared and looked for her one good shirt. It was dirty but it didn’t have any rips or tears in it. Mama told her that it brought out her blue eyes, and made them glitter like the stars.

They walked towards another house and mama told her to wait down at the bottom of the little pathway then made her way up.

“It’s Halloween, Del, I got my kids here. I can’t go anywhere tonight. Give me a call in a couple of days when they’re back home with their bitch mothers.”

“Allan, I miss you. Come on. Can’t you spare a couple of hours for dinner?”

“Del… if I could, you know I would but not tonight.”

“It’s my kids 7th birthday, come on. I promised her dinner.”

“Then take her to dinner.”

“I don’t have any cash Allan. Please, you don’t even have to stay.”

“Look Del… here” He pulled out his wallet and peeled some 20s free of the stack and handed them to her. “You take your kid out for her birthday. You can make it up to me later.”

The woman stomped loudly down the stairs and grabbed Miranda roughly by her little hand, and tore down the street towards town. Denny’s it was, and no company of a man.

Only her child.