She slapped me when I turned to look at her. I couldn’t hold in the rage anymore, it felt like someone was sitting on my chest and the only way to release the stress was to back hand her in the face. She wiped the soap off her cheek and shoved me into the sink; dropping the sponge I shoved her back. I had always been able to keep my calm in situations like this with my mother. She has always had a temper, one I luckily didn’t inherit. I swear this woman had fangs and matching horns sometimes. We were trapped in this vicious dance; the music was our string of curses and grunts. I couldn’t believe things had gone this far over something so trivial.

It started with me washing the dishes, something I did a little too often, my hands resembled prunes and everything smelt of lemon dish soap. I pictured myself wearing tattered clothing, hidden behind mountains of bubbles and endless stacks of food-crusted dishes. My sister, Miranda, ran into the kitchen heading straight for the back door. I stopped her, pointing a crusty spatula at her forehead, and asked if she had done her homework yet. She groaned, her shoulders slumping and her eyebrows scrunched together, “no”. She explained to me that she couldn’t find a pencil, so she gave up trying. Now to me, that didn’t seem like a very good excuse. Not doing your homework because you couldn’t find a pencil, knowing your older sister in high school is bound to have some kind of writing utensil. So I decided to gripe at her about it and told her to fish through my purse till she found one. Well she ended up crying to my oh-so-understanding mother, who in turn yelled at me, telling me it was not my place to tell Shelby what to do. I turned my attention back to the task of eternal dish washing and told her calmly, and respectfully I might add, that the reason Miranda is doing poorly in school is because she doesn’t do her homework. That’s when I heard this loud ringing in my left ear, it felt hot and I knew without looking that it was beet red. My mouth fell open and I turned to ask her why she hit me. Then she slapped me, “oh it was on”.

It was like we were on the Roman battle field, a Roman soldier facing a Spartan warrior. My imagination took over and I could hear the clanking of metal as we squared off. Growling out our frustrations we charged, we gripped each others shoulders trying desperately to shove the other to the ground. When that didn’t work, I decided to knock her off balance so I shoved her to the side. She tripped over her feet and her stomach met the counter. Her body bent over till her chest lay uncomfortably over the countertop. I rested my palm on the breakfast table, my eyes glaring at the spot between her shoulder blades as she picked herself up. She growled out how incredibly stupid I was and swung to slap me again. This time I was a step ahead of her and instead, her wrist flew into my forearm. My ego soon deflated as her left hand connected with my face. I lifted my hand to my assaulted cheek, I pictured the indentions of my mothers’ fist on my face, as if she punched a bowl of silly putty and it molded around her hand. At least that was how it felt. I sudden rush of emotion filled my body as my eyes met  hers, it felt like every emotion she was feeling at that moment transferred into me, rage, surprise, disbelief, even a sense of satisfaction.  I could clearly see all these emotions inside her eyes as they pierced my body, and it hurt more then any physical damage she caused me.  I hadn’t noticed her fingers digging into my fallen shoulders until my body was forced in a different direction. I managed to get one last punch in, shoving my fist as deep into her stomach as I could before my back slammed against the tile floor. She held my wrists beside my head, letting go only to hit me, I tried to concentrate on her but I couldn’t ignore a stinging pain I felt below my right shoulder. I tried frantically to push her off me. She sneered at me, yelling things like “you can never win,” “you can’t beat me,” and “I’m better then you,” but I couldn’t ignore the pain in my arm. I finally gave up, yelling at her to get off.

She hovered over me a while, enjoying her victory and soaking in every last bit of my pride before getting off. All she said was “you’re bleeding,” and walked away. That was when I noticed the stinging pain was caused by a cut about three and a half inches long on my right arm. I walked upstairs ignoring it, my pain wasn’t physical anymore.

When I looked back on it, and all the stuff that happened after, I didn’t know if I regretted it, or if I was glad it happened. For about a month no one talked to me, I wasn’t allowed to eat with the family, wasn’t welcome to family activities and was an outcast in my own home. A part of me wished it hadn’t happened because of that. The other part was glad, because my mother finally understood that I wouldn’t take her bio-polar mood swings anymore. I still don’t believe what she did was justified, I did nothing wrong, it was the fact that I was brave enough to challenge her that made her see red. We have both come to terms with the fact that we will never have a mother -daughter relationship, and even though I lost that day, in the end, I know I won.