The walk back home was a dreadful one. Who knew walking could’ve been so boring? Usually Mom picks me up from work, but since I was told by a robotic Mr. Hawkins to “leave the premises immediately”, I had no other choice.
I whipped out my cell phone, sending a quick text message to Mom.
To: Mom
Message: Hey, I’m coming home early.
I walked for fifteen minutes until I received a beep from my phone.
From: Mom
Message: OMG, what happened? Did Hawkins let U go 2 wedding? R U OK?
My mom never failed to unintentionally make me smile with her quirkiness. But lately she seemed to be mentally detached from this world. Either that, or she acted overly excited for no apparent reason.
To: Mom
Message: Explain later, C U soon.
As I grew closer to the neighborhood, I securely tucked my phone on the inside of my jean jacket. I passed the local Chinese restaurant that Mom and I usually ordered from.
The small identical houses of East Chicago came into view: Cement stairs with weak black rails, red bricks, uncut grass that slowly browned. The same people who hung around the neighborhood quite too often were walking around talking loudly. A women who usually smoked too much laughed out loud, a baby cried in his stroller, an older guy banged his cane on the garbage can while attempting to get it to talk.
A few of the middle school kids ran around the streets playing tag, while their older siblings smoked cigarettes like cool kids on the side of their houses. Said cool kids were usually up to no good. They were all in high school and I never actually caught them doing something bad. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but I knew they were up to no good. I think most of them were in some kind of teen gang, but they were harmless…
After walking past a few houses, I was finally home. The plastic, white puppy statue greeted me as I climbed the four steps to the door.
“Yo!” I heard from the house beside mine. I craned my head to see Mason Jones, my neighbor who usually skipped school to hang around the neighborhood with those cool kids. “’Sup, Ash! Long time, no see. Wanna uh…come over and have a cigarette?” He chuckled to himself as I analyzed whether he was high on drugs or not. His eyes drooped to the point where he was squinting and he just looked out of it.
I rolled my eyes at the idiot. After I was in and locked the doors, I went straight to the kitchen for food. I skipped breakfast this morning hence I was starved. I pulled open the refrigerator door only to be greeted by a few condiment bottles, half-gallon milk jugs, and a few Styrofoam containers of left overs ordered from the night before.
Closing the refrigerator door, I sighed deeply. Maybe I’ll just order pizza or Chinese again for dinner.
The situation from earlier crossed my mind again, and I wondered how I was going to tell my mother. How was I going to tell her that I no longer had a job…that she’d have to pay the bills on her own for a little while?
YOU ARE READING
Mr. Stupid Rich
Teen Fiction"He was made of money, and I knew anything but that. How was I supposed to trust him when people like him cared about nothing but themselves? If they did care, the poor wouldn’t be poor, right?" Meet Ashleigh Wills, your typical high school senior t...
