Chapter 2

I take after my mom in the worst ways, and I think that’s why I naively believed my life couldn’t get any worse. Without anything to do, I was sitting on my futon, my chin resting in my hand. The tiny room was still, except for the sound of the electric fan echoing off the walls. I was hunching inelegantly, feeling annoyed by a heat wave that hadn’t even waited for summer to start. The night got later and later until another sound reached between me and the whirring of the fan blades. My mom was home. I decided to at least say hello, but as I was about to stand up, I noticed something was different. I heard not one pair of footsteps, but three. Alarmed, I sat back on the futon. All the footsteps were headed toward me, and all I could do was wait, immobilized as if someone had bound my feet together. I pressed my hands into the soft duvet, watching the door to my room until it opened to reveal my mom. That wasn’t a surprise, but the woman behind her was. No, two people. The gossamery lady, and a petite girl. “Hi there,” the girl said flatly, which helped pull me out of my thoughts. Who the hell were these people my mom had dragged home with her? I’d never seen either of them before. “I’m home!” Mom chirped, and the gossamery lady took that as her cue to peer at me from behind her. “Evening!” There was something limp about her hair and face. She didn’t inspire confidence. Her frame was thin, her legs like sticks ready to snap under her. What were they doing in our home? “This is my friend,” Mom said. As if sensing my thoughts, she put an arm around the gossamery woman, who chuckled. “Still only friends, huh?” Even her laughter was insipid, as if she didn’t have the energy to form it properly. I found it very unpleasant and draining to hear. “And this is my friend’s daughter.” The girl bowed her head slightly. My mother responded with her usual pleasant smile, but the girl quickly averted her gaze, clearly communicating she did not want to be friends. So the girl was the lady’s daughter… Wait, what? I took another look at the wispy woman. She didn’t seem the type to have a child. She made me think of a fluttering strip of cloth that would fly away in a strong gust of wind. She was still smiling. “So here we are!” “Okay…” I felt as if all emotions had dried up in my heart. I had nothing else to say to these people. So Mom had brought a friend over—that was her business, not mine. It was unusual, though. And I could understand bringing a friend over, but why the daughter, too? “We’ll be living together for a while.” “…Huh?” The words stuck to me like eraser crumbs. Living together? What? Something was banging against the side of my head, but I wasn’t really feeling it. I rolled the eraser crumbs around and around in my mind, pressing them together. By the time they formed a solid shape, time had flowed on without me.