My phone goes off and I look at the name before I silence it.
“Honestly, I don’t think I could give up the forest for full-time on station.” Feather sighs.
“Oh, I am going back to Earth to visit family all the time. I don’t feel like I’ve given up anything.” Peach’s head tilts to the side. “I bet Phantom could give us each a planet with the exact type of environment we want.”
“I bet they could.” I have no idea what I would pick.
My phone rings again and I silence it again. This time, they both look at me, but they don’t ask who it is.
And then, the phone buzzes. Not a call.
The text that comes through says “EMERGENCY” with twelve exclamation marks.
It probably isn’t, but what if it is?
“I am so sorry, I have to call them back.”
“No worries.” Feather says and Peach winks at me. “Have fun tonight.”
“I will.”
I pay for my food and slip out of the booth, dreading what my mother is about to say.
CHAPTER 3
My mother answers without saying hello. “They’ve sent a past due notice.”
I hear paper crumpling, like she’s holding it close to the phone, clenched in her fist.
“There are late fees. I can’t pay this, Jennifer.” All the words are sharp, but my name is the sharpest.
“Maybe you should have thought about that before taking out the loan.” I shouldn’t have said it, but I’m glad that I sound tired, not bitter.
She draws in a breath like I’ve slapped her.
“Have you found a job?” I ask before she can say anything else.
“No one wants to hire an old woman. And I can’t keep up with these changes.” She mutters something about technology being designed specifically to confuse her. “Besides, you know how hard it is for me to ride the subway.”
“Then have Jeremy drive you ifhedoesn’t have a job.Youbought him a car, it’s the least he can do.”
There’s a pause. “He got in an accident.”
She would have told me immediately if he was hurt… there would have been hospital bills too.
“Was he insured?” I already know the answer.
“It was the other person’s fault.” Always so quick to defend him. “You can’t just walk into the road like that.”
Wait… “He hit a pedestrian?”
“It doesn’t matter. He can’t drive me. We don’t need to talk about that anymore.”
Taking the phone away from my ear and exhaling heavily, I take three more deep breaths as she goes on a tirade I don’t want to hear. Then, I ask, “What,exactly,do you want me to do?”
“Pay the bills like you always have.”
“And after I pay off this loan, are you going to take out another one and keep making me pay? At what point have I made up for the fact that I couldn’t take dad to the Olympics?”
