The Good, the Bad, and the Crazy. //+//A Complicated Love Story//+//

Chapter 9: Branson.

I woke up at eight-thirty this morning and was on my way to the front door when my mother stopped me.

“Branson, sweetie.” She called from the dining room “Aren’t you going to have some breakfast? Carlada made blueberry pancakes, your favorite!”

“No time mom. I got to get going.” I said sitting on the floor trying to lace my shoes…and failing.

“Well, where are you off to in such a hurry this morning? And with a picnic basket.” She asked coming to stand in the hall across from me “Going to see Layla?”

“No. I’m going to see Mary. I’m taking her for out today to apologize for dinner the other night.” I stood grabbing the picnic basket from the ground, both my shoes were now tied perfectly I might add.

My mother starred at me for a moment, a cup of coffee in both hands “Apologize? Why if anyone should apologize it should be her.” She raised her perfectly shaped eyebrows as high as they could go, making two little upside down ‘V’’s. “She stole my money.”

“Okay, mom let’s just say she did take the money, she didn’t,” I reassured her “but let’s just say she did for arguments sake. She’s poor, saving up for college, and barley scrapping by. It was only a fifty. If Layla hadn’t have pointed it out you wouldn’t have even known you were missing anything. A fifty to her is like a hundred to us. She needs it way more than we do. She didn’t take it but if she had I would have understood. And today when we’re hanging out I’m going to apologize for my mother’s terrible behavior at dinner.” I spoke quietly so that my father wouldn’t hear. But of course he did.

“Branson. Are you scolding your mother?” He asked declining the stairs.

I looked to my mother who still wore a shocked look on her face to my father who looked stern. But his face slowly turned into a light smile.

“That’s my job, boy. Please, let me do my job.” He smiled at both of us and took my mother’s hand.

She snatched it back “So you agree with him? You think it was okay that she took the money?”

“Trish, darling, she didn’t take any money.” He said in a soothing voice.

“Oh don’t you ‘Trish, darling,’ me. And she would have taken it if that angel Layla hadn’t have stopped her.” My mother gave a little gasp “Oh yes, you see. The girl must have taken it because if she hadn’t then that means Layla was lying. Would Layla lie, Tom? Uh? Would she?” She put both her hands on her hip, very proud of herself.

“Mom, I already thought of that. You don’t know either of them the way I do. Trust me when I say Layla’s more likely to lie than Mary.”

“I can’t believe what I’m hearing.” My mother threw her hands up in the air “Can you believe it, Tom?”

My father took a deep breath and then said calmly “Why, yes, Trish, I can believe it. I know what happened that night not because I saw it but because it’s obvious when you see people for who they truly are. Layla offered to take Mary, and then somehow slipped the fifty in Mary’s back pocket. When they came back down she acted like she had just noticed. Layla came in the room after Mary, which means she was walking behind Mary all the way down the stairs. Don’t you think it’s a little odd that she only noticed the money once she had an audience? I do.”