God Save the Queen by Amanda Dacyczyn Read Free Book Online Page A

went to open it and there was the man with my cake. Linda took it and placed on the dining room table. I stared at it for a while, and I remember thinking, it was almost the perfect birthday. Almost. Then I snapped.
    The next thing I knew, Linda had her arms around me, whispering in my ear that everything was going to be fine, but I had to stop, just stop, please stop. But stop what? I didn’t know what she was talking about! Then I looked down and saw that I was stomping on my birthday cake. My shoes were covered with frosting and bits of cake and what was left I was stomping into the rug.
    After I was done killing the cake of my dreams, I ran upstairs and went to destroy the rest of my almost perfect birthday. I ripped up all of the streamers and I stomped on all of the hats, flattening them completely. I was trying to pop the balloons by ripping them apart, when Linda walked in. She scooped me up and tried to cradle me, but I wouldn’t have it. I wanted to kill every last reminder of my supposed-to-be perfect birthday, but also of my parents. After all, who can a five-year-old blame for the death of her parents? It was my parents who shielded me from such ugliness in the world. How could they let this happen? How could they leave me alone? I was blinded by rage and unhappiness, or perhaps just the tears that wouldn’t stop spilling from my eyes. I finally gave in to Linda’s strong embrace and collapsed in her arms, shaking with every breath. This couldn’t have happened, I told myself, it couldn’t, it couldn’t!
    After I had calmed down, Linda and I went downstairs and she tried to coax me into eating, but I wouldn’t. What was the point?  It took another six hours of tears and bouts of madness until I finally collapsed and fell asleep. And I slept for two days straight. After that day, I never had a birthday party again. I always made sure of that. I made a point of never telling people when my birthday was, just to prevent and traumatic surprise parties.
                  Even though I never had a birthday party after that, this dream would always haunt me on every birthday that I had. And every time I would wake up crying, knowing as if for the first time that my dream birthday never happened. And it was always the same. We would celebrate my birthday the exact way that I wanted it and then Linda would show up and just as I would begin to open my presents, I would wake up, never knowing what it was underneath the pretty wrapping paper. Was it the sweater that I really wanted for my teddy? Or was it some new outfit my father got for me, that would either be way too tight, or I would be swimming in it? I never found out.
                  What was strange was that I was having this dream now. My birthday wasn’t for another seven months, so why now? I wasn’t thinking of any of this while I was dreaming, of course, continued to watch the dream I had seen millions of times before.
                  Then suddenly something changed. My mother looked up at me--the real me, not the little girl in pigtails and the mismatched outfit. Then my mother beckoned me over to the table. I was not only shocked; I was skeptical. Was this dream going to turn into some horrible nightmare from which I’d wake up screaming and make me afraid to ever sleep again? Still, I walked over to where she was standing.
                  The moment I took my first step towards her, everything changed. Little me was gone, the streamers disappeared, and the cake changed, too. It said Good Luck instead of Happy Birthday. However, my parents were unchanged.
                  As I approached my mother, she opened her arms to me. I didn’t care if a rabid horse-cow mutant zombie jumped out and scarred me for life. I didn’t care. When I hugged her, and although you’re not supposed to, I felt the warmth of my mother for the first time in almost fourteen years. As she ruffled my hair, I felt my