Little Sister

Dig Dug

Saturdays. What is supposed to be a day of freedom. No school. No work and any sort of free time that you needed. At least that's what I think it is. There was no sense of freedom when it came to my kind of Saturday. In fact, we were more trapped than on a regular weekday. On weekdays I at least had the ability to leave for school, but weekends? Weekends were stuck inside the house under Billy's orders while my step-dad took my mom out shopping. Every now and then, like today, he lets us leave, but the maximum time we'd spend out was two hours at most.

"You get one hour," Billy started. I tried not to visibly roll my eyes as I pulled Bailey out of the backseat. I went to put her on the ground but she insisted on being held. I didn't reject and carried her with me. "If you're not back by then-"

"I'm walking home, I know." I snarked.

"Hey!" I stopped but kept my gaze away from Billy. "Watch the attitude you little shit. Talk to me again and you're getting it. You understand?" I didn't answer and went to grab my board from the passenger seat, instead Billy grabbed onto my wrist and pulled me close. I felt Bailey stiffen as she tightly wrapped her arms around me. "Tell me you understand." I stared down, keeping quiet. Billy yanked my arm harshly to pull me closer, it hurt so much I was sure my shoulder was dislocated. "Say it Max." I didn't want to give Billy what he wanted, but I knew the longer I stayed around Billy the more scared Bailey would get.

"I understand." I finally said. Billy stared for a moment then finally threw my arm down.

"Get out of here." He said.

I quickly grabbed my board and stepped away from the car, slamming the door closed. Odd enough, I wasn't scared, in fact I was pissed off. I was so angry to the point that I didn't even want to play games, but I came here so I could get Bailey out and away from the house, even if it isn't for that long I wanted to get her away from the home as much as we can.

Inside the arcade Bailey finally felt okay enough to let me put her down. We went on and grabbed some coins from the machine and made our way to Dig Dug, I went to that one specifically because it was the game I was best at, there I could get more tickets and hopefully get something for Bailey, but when we got there I was met with disappointment, there was an out of order sheet of paper sitting on it.

"What does it say?" Bailey asked.

"It's out of order." I told her.

"Sorry about that road warriors." I looked up and saw Keith, one of the well known employees here.

"What happened?"

"Short circuit, but I got another one in the back if you wanna check that out." Oddest offer I could get. I didn't like the idea of that, following some random dude to the back of an arcade that hasn't heard of a vacuum, but I was here, waiting for him to pull his keys out for the door. "Hold this." He requested, I didn't get to answer and got a bag of cheese puffs placed in my hand.

When he got the door unlocked he opened it then took his cheese puffs back, letting us in first. I looked at him for a moment then pulled Bailey close to me in case I had ass kicking to do. "You've got to be shitting me." To the left of me when I entered was Lucas, he sat there on a stool with an uneasy smile on his face.

"You're getting me that date Sinclair." Keith said at the door.

"I know," Lucas started. Keith held his finger up and shushed him.

"You two keep it PG in here." With that he slowly left and closed the door behind himself.

I turned to Lucas already pissed off enough, but now that he had to take away from Bailey and I's time to lead us into this stupid room was about to send me to kick his ass. I think he realized this as I watched his face melt into terror.