NORMAL

02

"I hate you," Mara announces as she barges into the attic, beer ever-present in her hand. Landon Barnes, the blonde man sitting on his bed by the wall, looks up from the book he's reading and immediately sets it down. "I hate you and I'm never listening to you again."

"What, you didn't like group therapy?" he teases, grinning at her.

Mara gives him a hard look, gesturing for him to scoot over and plopping down beside him on the bed when he does. "Take a wild guess."

"Therapy sounds like fun to me," Landon says.

Mara glares at him over the top of her beer bottle as she takes a drink. "They're all insane. One of them is a murderer, one of them doesn't sleep, and one of them actually lost her mind in some freak accident."

"Sounds like you," Landon says.

"I didn't have an accident!"

"Yeah, so at least she has an excuse for being insane."

Mara glares at him. "I'm not insane," she says.

"Very funny, Mara, I'm impressed. You should consider doing stand-up, it might pay better than selling shit to people."

"I'm not insane, you shit," Mara says. "I'm not – I just drink a lot. I can't believe I let you convince me to do this."

"You'll be thanking me in ten years when your kids don't have PTSD from growing up with an abusive mother." Landon reaches across her and grabs her beer bottle, taking a drink from it while she squawks at him in offense. He makes a face and shoves it back at her. "This stuff is disgusting, Jesus Christ."

"I'm an atheist."

"That doesn't make it any less disgusting!"

"It's cheap," she says defensively. "At least I'm not too hooked to settle for convenience store shit and I still have enough money to take care of Hayden and Max. Imagine if it was Hennessy. We'd be fucked."

Landon snorts. "There's that, I guess."

Mara takes the beer bottle back out of his hand and drinks. "Are the kids in their rooms?"

"I took Max to his friend's house this morning after you left," Landon reminds her – which, right, Max had asked her yesterday if he could hang out with one of the other kids in his class. Mara had forgotten, which is probably because of how much she's drunk since last night. "Hayden's in his room, though, I think."

"Have they eaten?"

"Yeah, I fed them earlier."

Mara nods, satisfied. "Thanks."

Landon hums in acknowledgement, and apparently he's done with the conversation because he's already picking his book back up and starting to read again. It's a Percy Jackson book, Mara notices. She hadn't known Landon was into Riordan's works; she's lived with him for two years and has always had him pegged as the type to read little more than comic books. She doesn't know much about him at all, come to think of it. Maybe she should work on that.

Landon had been her next door neighbor until the woman he'd been living with at the time – girlfriend? sister? Mara doesn't know and certainly doesn't care enough to ask – had kicked him out rather unceremoniously and he'd come over to ask if he could crash at Mara's place, promising he'd leave in the morning. His housemate had refused to let him back in the next day, and the next, and the next, until he found out she'd sold the house and would be moving out entirely by the end of the week. Landon had gone back to Mara and said he'd pay half the rent if he could move in with her.

Mara's agreement to let him live in her attic was primarily for the financial benefits at first, but by now he's done so much more for her than just pay half the rent. He keeps her occupied when she's drunk so that she doesn't hurt her kids without meaning to; he picks them up from school when she's busy or running late with her work. It's more than she could ever have asked of him, although she'd never say so.

Out of everything, though, maybe the most important thing is that Max and Hayden love him; he jokes around with them all the time and treats him like his own kids, and they've both grown incredibly attached to him. Mara is sure that has something to do with the fact that they'd never known their biological father, but that's her fault.

"What's your favorite color?" she blurts out.

Landon glances over at her and raises a brow. "I don't have one. Why?"

"I don't know," she says, and she doesn't. "Just curious. I never asked."

"Yeah, I guess you didn't." Landon gives her a weird look; The Mark of Athena is still open in his lap. "What? What's your favorite color?"

"Black," Mara says.

Landon snorts. "You emo. I would've guessed green, with how many Heinekens you have every day."

"You have a death wish, Barnes?"

"You wish."

"Yeah, I do."

Landon's watch beeps twelve o'clock, startling them both. He dog-ears the page his book is open to and looks away. "Max is supposed to be picked up in half an hour," he says. "Do you want me to pick him up?"

"Yes please," Mara says, swinging her legs over the side of his bed and getting up. "I have to make a delivery in a bit."

"You and your cocaine, Amaryllis."

Mara slaps his arm. Landon cackles.