September 22

I'm going to tell the truth tomorrow. Today wasn't a good day, and it's too late to confess today, so I'm going to do it tomorrow.

I got confronted by May right in the morning, as soon as I was forcefully awoken. "What is the tape doing on the axe? Why isn't it burned?"

I rolled over and tried to ignore her because she was only making me more stressed and anxious about telling the truth to Mom and Dad. But she ripped the comforter off my bed, and I groggily grumbled, "You were supposed to stay awake."

"Well it's not like you had to do laundry all day," she replied. "So why did you not get the plan done?"

"I couldn't, okay?" I replied. "Anyways, I'm telling Mom and Dad the truth today."

"Then go tell them right now."

"Not right now," I said. "You know how Mom and Dad are like in the morning, especially without any coffee since they used the last of the instant coffee mixture yesterday."

"Fine," she said with a loud sigh. "You're telling them this afternoon. Promise me?"

"Promise," I said, at the moment being truthful because I was going to tell them about the axe situation. I just needed to work up the courage and faith that everything was going to be just fine if I told them.

Unfortunately, life got in the way of that because the world is just like that.

Dad was really grumpy from last night, possibly because he didn't get much sleep. I'm wondering if he's still having nightmares about the ocean and the teens on the beach that were washed away at twilight. Dad acted like everything was fine the day after it happened, and he never talked about it ever because he wanted to stay strong for us. Or maybe it's because he's bad at being emotional.

Either way, he started getting pretty snappy and authoritarian in the morning. First, he got annoyed at Mira for putting the cups in the wrong drawer. Then, he got mad at Mom for disappearing the shovel that he was going to use to clean the rooftop (Eventually, later on today, we'd find it exactly where Mom said it was, just buried under a bunch of other tools). The last big argument he had was with May, which just had to rope me in.

"Where is my jacket? The one with the snowflake on it" Dad asked My as he paced around and threw clothes out from the closet. "I know that it was in the laundry yesterday, so where did you put it?"

"I don't know," May said. "Maybe you should do your own laundry."

"Can you just find it?" he said, clearly irritated before muttering, "Why is everyone being so frustrating today?"

"Just look in the drawers," she said.

"Just get up and work," Dad said before going onto a fairly unjustified rant. "I've been doing all the maintenance of the greenbox, chopping of the wood, boiling of the water day in and out while you've just been sitting here. So get up!"

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"Why don't you just get another jacket?" I very reasonably suggested, with May saying, "Yeah."

"Because I need this jacket," Dad said. "And you need something to do instead of sitting down and doing nothing. I'm going to teach you how to use some tools tomorrow, so that you can man up and do some actual repair work at home. And May, I want you to start looking. Now!"

Dad stormed out of the room, and May groaned before looking at me. "What is up with Dad? He's acting literally like a teenager."

"Mid-life crisis," I replied.

"More like end-life crisis," May muttered to herself before turning to me. "Remember. You have to tell them the truth today. Seeing as how Dad has been acting all day, he'll probably be awake all night being angry for absolutely no reason at all."

She then left the room, and I went back to sitting down. If there's one thing that I know about Dad is that he makes a lot of empty threats, and hopefully, his threat of making me "man up" will fade out of existence. It's not that I hate doing work, but it's just that I hate when Mom and Dad say that because it's like why do I have to repair things over Mira and May, who are a lot better at handling tools and practical work?

Anyways, after that, everyone avoided Dad all day like he was radioactive. There really was no chance for me to tell Dad the truth, and I doubt that he'd even be alright with the truth, given his behavior today. He'd probably explode at me or act super cold and unnaturally calm, like he'd act with Mira before the Mooncrash and even during parts of it.

I don't really know why I'm so scared of Mom and Dad not understanding why May and I did what we had to. Obviously, there's the part about doing something expressly banned, and there's the whole change part, but I feel like there's more to this. It's not as if I don't feel loved by them, but it's like they never really tell me how they'll feel if this ever happened, and anytime they talk about this, it's always in private and hushed whispers so that we'll almost never know. All of the parents on TV are so open about these emotions, but it's like Mom and especially Dad just bury them away a lot of the time.

Thinking about it, I wonder if this is what they are thinking when I'm not super emotional and confessional with them too.

Dinner was predictably tense, and there was little chitter-chatter outside the salt-passing and agenda setting items. Dad had calmed down by then too, and he carried on like his morning outburst had not happened, which left us all uneasy.

May spent the whole dinner motioning me to tell them the truth, but at that moment, I was still worried that Dad was angry, and that telling him and Mom would make his temper go off. I personally think that it's a smart move to lie back because I've only got one opportunity to tell the truth, and I need it to be in the perfect moment so that nothing would go wrong.

I've also been working on a script about what I'll say and am practicing saying it right now in my mind, as everyone (presumably) is sleeping around me. I'll attach it below so that I won't lose it, but hopefully, conditions will be good tomorrow so that losing it shouldn't be a factor:

"Hey Mom and Dad, I have something to tell both of you."

[Cue Mom and Dad asking what it is]

"I'm sorry that I lied to you about where I got the axe. I said I got it from the garden, but the truth is that I took it from the Hunters' house. I know that both of you said that we shouldn't be taking things from the Hunters' house, but I couldn't watch you guys struggle so much with using the tiny, little hatchet that took ages to cut down even a small tree. With this axe, we were able to gather enough wood that winter is looking more manageable now, especially also with the solar panels, which I borrowed from the Hunters' too. Sorry about that."

[Cue reasonable "Why didn't you tell me?" type response from the both of them]

"Because I was worried about you guys not accepting the axe. But next time this happens, I promise to tell the truth and not lie anymore since I know that it was wrong to do so, especially since it's important for all of us to trust each other."

[Cue happily ever after as Mom and Dad don't get mad, and we all rejoice]

Now I can only hope that this happens.