text: Mother was ill again. Mother was always ill. Lying in her bed, her face pale, her black hair spread across the pillow like seaweed floating on the ocean. She would be fine by tomorrow. It had been this way for years since I was 15 years old. This was what my life was. An endless cycle. One week she would be fine. Shouting at me, screaming, barking her orders, crying and emotional. The next she would take to her bed. Lying there so still, not making a sound, barely breathing. I would brush her long hair across the pillow till it shone like silk. Paint her lips crimson and rouge her pale cheeks. Mother always liked to look good, no matter what. I never called the Dr when she got ill. Mother did not trust them, and she never had. She blamed them for killing my father all those years ago. She told him not to see Dr Green. To take his poison pills as she called them. Things were never the same after my dad’s heart gave out. The heart of the family just stopped beating; we all died that day. Before that we were a real family, the kind you see in a magazine, smiling and happy. We took vacations, we played games and I went to school. All the dreams we had, my future and potential I had perished with him. Mother spiralled into depression after that. She drank. She stopped going out, eating even cleaning the house. Stopped caring about me, about anything. She still always had her crimson lipstick on. I think mother has died. She is no longer breathing, her chest still, and the gurgling noise had stopped. I wrap her in the bedsheet nice and tight and hoist her limp body over my wide shoulder. I carry her to the back garden that was once her pride and joy. Placing her gently into the waiting black, gaping hole. Dark night surrounded me as I gently shovelled the earth over her still form and lay her to rest. Finally, at peace and with my father again. I say a quiet prayer for her soul and go inside. I have a busy night ahead of me. I carefully packed the waiting backpack with duct tape, a knife and mothers crimson lipstick. Slinging it onto my back I head towards the front door. On route, I pass the pinboard hung on the wall in the hall. It is full of photos and newspaper clippings featuring pictures of my mother. Her pales skin, dark hair and big eyes looking back at me from every photo. For some reason, the newspapers never seemed to get her right. Calling her Mellissa or Mara. Mothers name was Emma. The headlines all announced she was missing or kidnapped. She was never missing; she was always here, with me and I was taking care of her. I lock the front door as I leave and walk towards my panel van. Being careful to not step any of the six graves of my mother as I cross the manicured garden.