Nowhere Near Adulthood

I hate it when you leave the TV on. I drink more coffee, even though I feel full. I hear the angry edge to your tone and see the perturbed wrinkles between your eyebrows. I bend to your will. I'm obedient to you, since you're my guardian, but I take that fact for granted far too often to know what it means anymore. I presume all this new responsibility means I'm more mature, but it only means I'm getting older and maturity is rated on how I maintain it. Have I been maintaining it? Not nearly as much as I should be; I'm too caught up in my own menial life to take notice of how it's affecting my immediate family. I've been told that I'm a caring, compassionate person who regards others before herself, but that's a falsity. I'm conceited and take everything and everyone for granted. I indulge in self-pleasure: satisfying my needs before taking the account of others into consideration.

I hate it when you leave the TV on. That little red light and flat gray-black screen glares out at me. I continue to drink coffee, even though the outward curve of my stomach indicates with the lackluster expression on my face that I'm full. And you're quiet now. Upstairs, folding laundry, musing on slowly diminishing annoyance. I'll dull, tarnished, subconsciously recognizing my resilience against growing up but not acting in defense for myself. I'm eighteen, but I'm still very much a child.