Tip of the Tongue [CMS Bk. 1 - BoyxBoy][Complete/Editing]

Chapter 20

Ren rushed through the front door and almost collided with his mom.

"Woah! Why are you in such a hurry?" Margret put her hand on his shoulder to steady him. She was holding her work bag and was still wearing her work clothes.

Ren furrowed his brows. "I didn't see the car."

Her face dropped a little. She turned away, sitting her bag on the couch. "I walked. The car went out on me this afternoon."

"Shit," Ren said, placing a hand on his forehead.

"Language." Margret looked too tired to reprimand him any more than that. She took off her jacket and hung it up by the door. "It's not a big deal. I need the exercise."

He marched into the kitchen. "It is a big deal. You can't be walking around in that neighborhood. It's going to take you forever to get there. Did you even think about how early you're going to have to leave?"

Shit. How much was this going to cost? He had money saved, but it wasn't that much. He still needed to leave some for her when he left. It would take a while before he got his first check and all that. There was no telling how much living there was going to cost and how much he was going to have to pay for synthetic blood.

He also had to think about paying the bills here. Though he made a bit from selling the synthetic blood for a higher profit, it wasn't a large amount.

And sneaking the money into her wallet without her noticing an extra twenty or fifty was going to take a long time before she had enough to pay for the car to be fixed.

Margret took down her hair. She rubbed her eyes and let out a harsh lengthy sigh. "I'm not going to argue with you about this. I'm a grown woman."

He made a loud racket as he shoved a large pot under the running faucet. "That's not the point."

The point was that she'd been taken advantage of before when she was young. Ren's father had left her barely alive on the side of the road when she was seventeen.

She was strong, but there were things out there that were stronger than she was.

"Then what's the point, Ren? Care to explain it in black and white for me?"

He slammed the pot on the stove. "All I'm saying is that all of this would be easier if you let me drop out and work! There's nothing for me here! While I'm wasting my time in that stupid fucking school, you're slaving away to pay for everything. I just want to help, but you're too fucking stubborn!"

The room was quiet except for Ren's harsh breathing. He stared down at Margret who was only an inch shorter than him, but at that moment, it felt like she was slipping through the floor. Yet, at the same time, she was taller than the house. She was this large looming figure who could squash him like a bug.

He regretted saying the words. They were true. They were his thoughts, the things that he'd been keeping down inside of him for too long. But he wished that he'd kept his mouth shut.