Beep. Beep. Beep. It was seven in the morning. Time to get up. Today, though, Norman didn’t want to. Yesterday had sucked. So he went back to sleep.

Fifteen minutes later, his mother entered his room.

“Honey,” she whispered, gently shaking him, “You need to get up to go to school.”

Norman shot up to a sitting position, nearly colliding with her. He glowered at the woman, completely done with her nagging.

“Get the fuck out of my room,” he spat.

She just stared at him sadly.

He lost it and started screaming.

“I said get the fuck out! Go get a job. Or go stare at your dumb letters. I don’t care. Just Leave. Me. Alone.”

She slowly nodded and left his room.

Norman couldn’t help but resent her. Maybe if she wasn’t so depressed all the time, his dad would be home more often.

Norman often thought back to the good times, years ago. When he’d been happy. When his dad came home everyday and played baseball with him in the park after work. When his dad bought him ice cream and didn’t yell when Norman dropped it.

Everything had changed so quickly.

For the rest of the day, Norman astral projected. He mostly spied on the neighborhood girls. It did, of course, get boring quickly, but it was the most interesting thing he could do.

His mother brought him dinner at seven. It was spaghetti, his favorite. He scarfed it down quickly. At least the woman could cook.

Norman laid in bed for a while. At around ten, he heard the signature creak of the front door. His mother was leaving the house. Again. Doing God knows what. He could easily figure it out if he wanted to. But he didn’t really care. He quickly fell asleep.