Angela walks in as I’m making a cup of coffee and she slams some notebooks down onto the table.

“Well, there’s your homework. That you apparently couldn’t get for yourself because…??” She stops and glares at me. “Are you drinking coffee? Mom will FLIP.” She interrupts herself.

“Soo? Do you at least have a good story? Migraine? Lady cramps? Gawd, what amazing excuse do you have for hopping off the bus and taking off on the FIRST day of school? Mom is going to kill you. Especially if she founds out WHILE you’re drinking coffee.” She’s grinning wickedly. None of these things actually bother her. She enjoys when I get into trouble.



She stops again, waiting for an answer. I don’t have one.

“And what the HELL are you wearing?” her nose turns up in disgust. I have to smile at the last dig. The outfit is horrific but I’d had a decent day, it was a reminder that things didn’t start out so miserably. I’d spent at least an hour lying in bed trying to figure out how to do this. Angela hadn’t taken the divorce well. She wanted life to be perfect. Being told we were moving sent her on a spiral of tantrums and sobbing.

Now I was going to tell her our mom had taken off? I take a breath and hold the coffee cup in both hands, the warmth seeping through my hands and into my arms.



When I sit, Angela does too and she starts telling me about school. Immediate switch from snarly to pleasant.

“It wasn’t so bad.” She tells me. “I made a friend, Harper. She’s cute, stylish. Definitely a good start.” She rambles. She goes on about classes, teachers, a few kids.

“Met a guy…” Her voice trails off. I should probably just blurt out the crappy news, but she seems so content.

“I thought you were still with Dustin?” I question. She shrugs.

“I am. And it turns out the guy is Harper’s brother, so I should probably steer clear. But, Lil...he was gorgy”



“Probably more your type than mine. But still. Eye candy for sure. Maybe I’ll introduce you tomorrow. When you ACTUALLY go to school.” She’s looking at me again, waiting for more details on my day. I’m not sharing. She likely wouldn’t believe me anyway.


“Mom left.” I blurt without thinking. Well, ok. That’s one way to do it.

“What? Where? Do we have to make our own dinner?” She asks. I take a deep breath and try again.

“Mom’s gone. Gone gone. Like, packed her stuff and left, gone.”

“Lil, that’s ridiculous. She probably just went to the store.”

“With all of her clothes? Ang, I’m telling you. She’s gone.” I tell her. She watches me take another sip of coffee. I watch a swirl of emotions cross through her eyes. Her brain not sure how to react. Sad? Angry? Hysterical? For once, none of those emotions are directed at me.



“I knew it.” She whispers. My eyes shift up to hers.

“You knew it?”

“Yeah. You said you felt it too. Her stupid weird vibes yesterday. Staring at us like we were ghosts or something. What the hell, Lil? What are we going to do? Like...are we just supposed to LIVE here?” She gestures to her general surroundings. “Do we call dad?”

“What?!” I snap. “We are NOT calling dad. Can you imagine? Living with them? Dad and his tramp?”

“Ok, ok. I know. I just...now what?” She sounds defeated and while I may not get along with her much, it breaks my heart to see her defeated.



“We can stay with Aunt Vi.” I say quietly. “She seems nice enough. You said school was ok.” I’m trying to reassure her but honestly, I have no idea if we CAN stay.

“She’s not even our aunt.” Angela groans, leaning down. “She’s not going to want us here.”




Out of nowhere she jumps up and storms out of the room and asks me not to follow. I sigh. Suddenly I feel like I’m not a teenager anymore. I look down at the coffee in my hands like it’s to blame for suddenly feeling like I’m 45.

I sit quietly and stare into space for awhile, wondering exactly what we WERE going to do. I’m sure I should have bigger feelings, like my sister. Anger, sadness, abandonment. But she feels them enough for the both of us, so I let myself be numb.



Eventually I’m hungry and find the leftover pancakes from that morning in the fridge. I call up to Ang to eat too. It’s dark now, well past dinner hour. Still no sign of our Aunt Vi either. She’d said she worked long days. She wasn’t kidding.



Eventually Angela joins me, and I’ve started working on some of the homework she’d brought home. Skipping school didn’t bother me but I was also pretty conscious of my grades. Plus it kept my mind busy.

Angela sits directly beside me and eats her pancakes like a starving rhino. Food flying everywhere. I’m trying to be the mature supportive sister so I stay quiet. Despite the fact that a piece has landed on my paper.



“We’ll just start our new life here. It will be fine. It will be great!” She announces. Suddenly thrilled at the idea of being abandoned on an island with strangers. She rambles on about how resilient we will become. And surely mom will be back eventually. Didn’t take long for her to change her tune.



When she resumes eating, I refocus on my homework. Denial is a peaceful phase. I’m not going to shake her out of it.



It’s quite late when Aunt Vi pops into my room.

“Hey…” she says tentatively. “You girls are still up.”

I set my book down and look at her. She already knows. I can tell. She thinks she has to tell me and she has no idea how.

“We already know she’s gone.” I say. She breathes a sigh of relief but then sadness fills her eyes.

“I think she’s just scared.” She explains. “She’ll come back.”



After some more reassurances, Vi leaves and I pick up my phone. We’d sworn we’d wait a few days, but I can’t help it. The days weren’t supposed to be like THIS.

L: Hey…

I stare at the phone, willing a response. It comes almost immediately and I’m flooded with relief when it does.

D: I knew you’d cave first.

I desperately want to type “I miss you.” I start to and then stop. Then retype it and delete it again. Damn it. Why was this so hard? It wasn’t weird to miss him. It was perfectly normal. But to type it.. UGH

D: I miss you.

I feel tears welling up in my eyes and I let them fall.

L: So much.



“Mary-Sue Pleasant, you have two devastated girls here and you need to get your ass home now. Stop with your nonsense and grow up. If I don’t hear back from you by tomorrow night...I’m calling Daniel.” Violet hangs up the phone. What was she going to do now?



Violet wakes up in the middle of the night to the sound of her buzzing phone. A quick glance at the time. 3:30am. She yawns as she reaches and answers. The number familiar. It was Beth Wilson. She’d been having trouble with her newborn calves and if she was calling at 3:30am, it was an emergency.



Violet stares at the phone and pauses before shooting back a quick text. COULD she just jump up and leave? She had to. But she had two teens in the house. Was it ok to leave them alone? This late? Would they be nervous? Should she wake them up to tell them?

She had no idea what the rules were with teenagers. She’d never had kids. She’d never spent time with kids. It didn’t seem right to just sneak away in the night. What if THEY had an emergency.



She quietly tiptoes into their room and of course, both girls are sound asleep. Surely waking them up can’t be right either. Damn it, Mary-Sue. This was not supposed to be how this worked out.



She opts for jotting a quick note and heading out into the night without waking them up.



When we get up the next morning, Aunt Vi is up and out already. If we hadn’t chatted late last night, I’d have guessed she’d stayed out the entire night. This was a new feeling. Back at home, I don’t think we were ever left on our own. Not unless our parents had a date night or something. Dad was always busy with work, but he’d do that from his home office. Mom was in and out often but we ate dinner as a family most nights. Watched tv together most nights. We’d even be forced to join family games night once in awhile.



I had of course agreed to attend school but I had NOT agreed to go to all of my classes. Baby steps into this new life. I find myself in the library browsing books and hiding out. I’d gone to 3 classes already and the first thing I’d noticed was how small they were. 10 or less kids in each. It was unsettling. No way to hide in the back when there are only two rows of desks.



“No fishing today?”

I look up as Anthony comes in and sits down. I smile. “Nah, figured I should check this place out.”

“The library?” He asks. I laugh and shake my head.

“School. Apparently we’re supposed to come here daily?”

He shrugs to that and asks how the day has gone so far. I tell him. I leave out the home stuff. It’s nice to just chat.



I decide I can manage my last class of the day and walk in to find the principal is subbing for the regular teacher. Angela is already sitting down in the front row. I gratefully find a seat behind her...as close to the back as possible. The principal, Mr. Ghasem acknowledges my arrival with a brief nod and begins the lit class with a question about morality.

His attention seems focused on a guy in the front row who is, in my sisters words ‘gorgy’. Being in the back row means I can get a decent look at him without being noticed. He’s lean and has longer hair, pulled back into a small ponytail.



Mr. Ghasem suddenly stops right in front of him, an angry look on his face.

“If you think pulling a stunt like this in class is going to embarrass ME, you’ve figured wrong.” He says firmly. I can’t quite tell what the stunt is but the class is silent. The kid just shrugs.

“March yourself to the office. I’ll be there when class is over.”



As he gets up to leave I notice he has a cell phone and a pack of cigarettes sitting on his desk that he’d have plunked down out in the open. With the principal as the teacher? Interesting. Surely he WANTED to end up in trouble? I’m intrigued.



“Girl, I saw you making eyes at my brother.” Harper says, making kissy faces in the mirror. “I have to warn you. He’s no Prince Charming.”

Angela makes a face. “I wasn’t making eyes at him.”

Harper laughs. “Oh yes you were. You and every other girl in this place. Doesn’t bother me but all he does is break hearts.”



The girls continue to fuss and primp before heading home for the day.



“You forgot something.” I say casually, tossing over the phone and cigarettes I’d snagged off his desk after class. He looks down at his stuff and up at me in disbelief. Then he laughs.

“Bold move, Pleasant.”



“It’s Lilith.” I correct him. I hate how everyone in this town knows who I am. He nods and continues to sit.

“I see you didn’t make it to the principal’s office?” I am genuinely interested. In a town like this, surely you couldn’t get away with much before they called your parents.

“Nah...but I’m sure I’ll hear the lecture when I get home. Just delaying it a few hours.” He replies. “You not worried my dad will call your parents?”

“Your dad?”

“Mr. Ghasem. Principal of Pepper Island Public School. Thinks he’s the boss of the world.” He says again. The principal was his father? It explains his attitude. Double interesting.



I sit down and take one of the cigarettes out of the pack. He’s watching with curiosity but hands me a lighter. I’m not a smoker but I’ve done it before. And well...at this point why not? What was going to happen? The principal might call my parents? Good luck trying to find them.



Neither of us says anything for a while and to be honest, the quiet is nice.



Eventually I get up to leave and he gets up at the same time. For a brief moment he stands quite close and my heart rate picks up it’s pace just a little.

“See ya around, Lilith.” He says, grabbing the rest of his stuff off the bench. He heads off down the stairs of the building and I’m left watching him. Realizing moments later that I didn’t even learn his name.