Ambivalence

Chapter 2 - The Weirdo on Maple Street

reminder~~comments are always welcome here!

"All right Mom, Y/n, breakfast is ready" My brother spoke as he set down the plates in front of us. Neither one of us had an appetite. I tried to give the illusion of hunger as I tossed around eggs with my fork.

"No no wait," I move the posters around, annoyed with my oblivious brother.

"What? No, be careful of the poster." my mom speaks in between puffs. She had gone through a pack and a half since last night. Neither of us had it in us to try to stop her. She was falling apart. Who wouldn't.

"Yeah, okay. All right," Jonathan nods.

"I can't eat." Mom started, her voice strained.

"We need you to eat Mom," I reply. Trying to ignore Jonathan's glance at the eggs still on my plate.

She sniffles. Her voice in a hush, "listen. listen, the Xerox place opens in, like, 30 minutes." Oh no, she's starting to spiral.

"Yeah." Jonathan nods going along with my mom.

"And I don't want you going without your sister," Mom continues.

"No, I know, I told you I got it." My brother leans closer to mom. I give him a nod. She shouldn't be alone right now.

"So I'm gonna have Karen take you two, 'cause I should be here. And we need to make, what, 200, 300, copies?" Mom apprehensively grabbed the posters off the table.

"Mom it's alright we'll figure it out" I speak out placing my hands on one of hers.

"How much is a copy?" she babbles, eyes still pacing on the posters.

"Mom-" Jonathan pries.

"10 cents? If we... ten cents-" her speech and hands shaking as she grabbed at the cash on the table.

"Mom. Mom. MOM! You can't get like this, okay?" Jonathan cries out. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry,"

I pull my bag from the back of my chair and take out my coin purse. "I think I have ten cents."

"No, it's okay," Jon says as Mom takes another puff of her cigarette before a loud knocking on the door erupts everyone from their chairs.

"We've been waiting six hours!" I speak as I open the door revealing Hop. Mirroring the urgency in my mom's eyes.

"I know. I came as soon as I could." Bullshit.

"Six hours." My mom stubbornly states. This is Bullshit.

"A little bit of trust here, all right? We've been searching all night. Went all the way to Cartersville." I look at him with pleading and frustrated eyes.

"And?" Mom asks with desperation laced in her voice.

"Nothing." he looks down towards the floor.

"God-" Mom cries out, covering her mouth. Her eyes searching through all the possibilities.

"Flo says you got a phone call."

"Yeah," Mom and I walked towards the charred phone on the wall.

"Storm barbequed this pretty good." Hop chuckles.

"The storm?" I ask, confused.

"What else?" He looks at me, phone in his hand.

"You're not saying that that's not weird" I gesture towards the phone. Hop glances at it one more time before placing it on the hook.

"No, it's weird," He looked so exhausted. I almost felt bad. Almost.

"Can we, like, trace who made the call? Contact the-" Jonathan starts.