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work?” I
asked.
    “ They had a bomb threat to
the building so they shut it down for the night,” Mom said.
“They’re diverting all the calls to Edina’s station.”
    “ Oh.” I stood awkwardly in
between the kitchen and the living room, waiting for someone to
tell me what was going on.
    “ What were you doing out so
late?” Her voice lilted at the end, taunting me.
    “ I don’t have school, and I
don’t have a curfew,” I answered cautiously.
    In theory, I might’ve had a curfew, but we’d
never even talked about it and she always worked nights. On
weeknights, I tried to be in by midnight, mostly because Milo would
freak out on me.
    The only thing Mom really kept track of was
whether or not we went to school and passed all our classes. As
long as I did that, everything else seemed fine with her.
    “ So, you weren’t out with a
guy?” Mom asked pointedly, and I saw Milo looking ashamed out of
the corner of my eye.
    “ Well, yeah, I was.” I drew
my shoulders back a bit, telling myself that I hadn’t done
anything, no matter what my mother’s angry glare said. “Is that a
problem?”
    “ Who is he?” She flicked an
ash off the arm of the chair, looking down instead of at
me.
    “ His name is Jack.” I
shifted uneasily, and stole a glance at Milo.
    I felt very sorry for him. I had no idea how
long he'd been forced to stand here with my mother, and I couldn’t
imagine the kind of interrogation she had put him through.
    Let me be clear: she wasn’t a bad mother.
She was just a tired, lonely woman that worked seventy hours a week
and hardly ever saw her kids. She barely had time to try to
convince us not to make the same mistakes she did.
    “ I see.” Abruptly, my
mother put her cigarette out and exhaled deeply. When she spoke
again, her voice was sweet, much too sweet, and my skin wanted to
crawl. “I think I should meet this boy.”
    “ How? When? You work all
the time.”
    “ Well, he seems to be a
night owl, much like yourself.” She looked up at me, batting her
eyes exaggeratedly. “I’m sure that you could find a time within the
next two days.”
    A million different arguments ran through my
head, but I didn’t want to set her off further. I just nodded
instead.
    “ Okay. I’ll figure it
out.”
    “ You better.” She sounded a
little surprised that I had complied so easily, and I wondered if I
spent a lot of my time arguing with her just for the sake of
arguing. I was probably a very bad daughter. Maybe even a very bad
person. “And if I decide that I don’t want you to see this boy
anymore, then that’s it. Do you understand?”
    “ Completely,” I nodded
again. Of course I would see him anyway, but that wasn’t something
I would tell her.
    “ Good.” Mom got up,
grabbing her purse off the table. “I’m going to go the casino now.
I’ll see you sometime tomorrow.”
    She was apparently satisfied with the
conversation, and she hadn’t even really screamed at me. It was
actually a pretty good talk, as far as our talks go.
    Mom brushed past me on her way to the door,
smelling thickly of cigarettes and cheap brandy, but she paused at
the door, turning slightly towards me. “I am glad that you’re home
safe.”
    “ Thanks,” I said, unsure of
how else to respond. Then she nodded once and walked out the
door.
    Milo apologized as soon as she left, but I
assured him he had nothing to apologize for. He always looked out
for my best interest, and I knew that. Besides, I was too tired to
worry about anything else.
    I decided to get it over with and text Jack
to ask if he could meet my mother. When he messaged me back a few
seconds later, I realized what exactly he’d done with my phone. He
had bought the song “Time Warp” and put it as his ringtone, so when
I got a text message or call from him, that’s the song I would
hear.
    Thankfully, he agreed to come over for
supper the next night at 8 pm sharp, and I tried not to think about
how terrifying that prospect was.
    First