Facade - Hemmings

Chapter 1 - Luke

Chapter 1 - Luke

"Sounds good. Okay. Yeah, no problem. I hope everything's okay."

I sat on the stool in my kitchen waiting for my Mum to get off the phone so she could drive me to school. I could tell we were going to be late - school started at 8AM and it was 7:50AM. Considering my Mum was a Maths teacher I was surprised, most days I was dropped off early at my school. She taught at a primary school, thank The Lord. I glanced over at her, she wore a worried expression. She caught me staring at her and smiled.

"No problem Jane. Anytime. Alright see you soon."

With that she hung up.

"What happened to Mrs. O'Donnell?" I asked her as I stopped spinning on the stool to give her my full attention.

"Do you know Lance, Jane's son? He goes to your school," my Mum asked me.

I nodded.

"This morning while he was biking to school he got hit by a car," she paused, "he doesn't have any life threatening injuries but is still pretty banged up." She told me.

I didn't know what to say Mrs. O'Donnell was one of my Mum's closest friends and even though I did not know her son well, I felt my Mum's pain. Lance had come over a few times but we never really got on that well.

"Is he going to be okay?" I pondered.

"Jane told me that the doctors said he'll be back to normal in a few weeks, a month would be the max. He has a sprained ankle."

I heard her voice crack, she used to baby sit Lance a long time ago when she was on maternity leave with me. I knew the next few days were going to be tough on her, even though nothing with life threatening, she was practically crying. I saw the water in her eyes. Man I wondered how she'd be reacting if it was me.

"If there's anything I can do to help Mum, let me know," I said as I gave her a half smile, I just wanted to lighten the load on her shoulders. My Mum tended to take on more than she could handle.

"Thank you Luke, go wait in the car. I'll be out in a minute, we'll talk in the car," she said and walked upstairs.

I grabbed my backpack and headed outside to the car. When I finally got settled in I saw my Mum walk out and lock the house door. She was on the phone again, talking to her employer, the school's principle Ms. Lambort. I assumed as she was explaining her reason for being late. When she hung up she looked over at me.

"Luke, there's something I need to talk to you about..."

"Okay, but if it's about the whole Ashton footy incident-"

"No Hunny, not that, but we'll talk about that later," she cut me off, "have you heard about the new program at your school? The one for troubled teenagers?"

How could I have not heard about it? The new program had been the talk of the school for at least the past couple of weeks. Rumors had spread like wildfire. Supposedly all the troubled teens were alcoholics, juveniles or crack-heads. Many parents opposed to the program but Norwest Christian College had to make a name for itself some how, besides the fact from being known for its music program.

"Yeah, it may have been mentioned before," I replied simply.

"Well Jane offered to take in a student in as part of the program because they're coming from all over the world. But because of Lance's state she won't be able to show proper hospitality," Mum stated.

"Oh," I stated, not knowing where this was headed.

"So I offered to be the host family."

There it was the bomb was dropped. I finally had just gotten my own bedroom because my older brother Jack just moved out and I wasn't ready for a 'roommate'.