He doesn’t laugh. Figures. I have very little faith in the sense of humor of the people who walk these obsessively manicured grounds. “Angela, your room is this one.” He points to the door across the hall from mine.
My mother nods at him, and then the stranger is gone after giving both us our keys. We never even got his name.
My room is small—seven feet by seven feet, with just a dresser and a twin bed that stretches from wall to wall. But that’s not the point. The point is it’s safe.
Which is more than I can say about anywhere we’ve lived in the past thirteen years.
Mom pretends not to notice the way I pause in the doorway or how my chest tightens at the sight of a bed that doesn’t sag, a window without bars, and clean sheets.
“We’ll be fine working here,” she tells herself more than me.
I don’t say anything, just toss my backpack onto the bed and nod in satisfaction when the frame doesn’t collapse into a heap of rotten wood like my last one.
“Go keep yourself busy. I’ll check out my room.” Mom pushes me out the open door. “Maybe go for a walk? Just stay away from the main part of the house unless someone asks for you.”
“Trust me.” I slide my phone into my pocket and back away from our room. “Buttering up to rich people isn’t my hobby.”
To be fair, her warning is warranted. My only concern for as long as I can remember—hell, probably for my whole life—has been making sure Mom and I had enough money to eat.
We’re poorpoor.Walk-to-work-in-the-snow poor. No-new-shoes-even-when-my-feet-grow poor. The only three shirts I own were scrounged from the stained discards of our local Salvation Army and bleached to unsightly hues, courtesy of the dish bleach from Mom’s last job as a busser.
“I need this job, Lorenzo.”
Not sure who she’s trying to reassure—her or me.
I edge backward, dragging my feet. “You’ve said that seven times.”
“I mean it. We’re lucky to be here. This job pays well.” Mom sighs, brushing invisible lint off her blouse. She’s always obsessed with keeping up appearances as if cleanliness can hide the stench of poverty on us. “Keep your head down. Be polite. Work hard. No trouble. And for God’s sake, don’t talk back to anyone.”
I hear it then. It’s not the warning or the worry. She’s scared, and it’s more than just about the job and the house. It’s about me.
The possibility that I might fuck up my life beyond repair downright terrifies her. Hence, her banging on my door this morning at the ass crack of dawn and demanding that I pack.Within two hours, out of nowhere, my life was uprooted. All because I got into a bit of trouble.
Or . . . I guess, a lot of trouble. Depends on who you ask.
“Okay.” My voice dips. “I’ll behave.”
It’s my fault we’re here, after all. I might as well play nice.
Mom shakes her head, smiling the way she does when she worries I’m turning into my father—cold, distant, and mysteriously absent.
I don’t want to be him.
Especially since that’s basically all the info I know about my dad, and I managed to scrounge it all up on my own with some subtle clues.
Ditched his kid for eighteen years? Distant.
Not even a Christmas card? Cold AF.
Not a phone call, either, by the way—absent.
So, no, I don’t want to be like my deadbeat dad.
But I don’t want to be a charity case either.
I escape before Mom can keep lecturing me.
The estate—correction:summer home. Apparently, these are a thing—is quiet in that expensive way. It’s the type of silence that feels purchased. Even the ocean breeze seems trained, brushing the hedges like it’s been ordered not to rustle them too loudly.
