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So you can iine my relief when I knocked on the front door and received a welcome that was almost the coht ahich, of course, made me cry Even Dad, a man who spoke maybe the equivalent of twenty words when I was a child, including grunts, got a little misty-eyed

My folks, Jiht? But when I first saw theain, it shocked me For the first time in my life, they seemed, I dunno, old? It’s funny how your e of thes interesting

Anyway, after the initial shock of that wore off, we spent a fair bit of tih they appeared to be interested and attentive in the afterer-wagging wouldn’t be far behind

At some point, the conversation veered towards the predictable questions about Trevor Like, for starters, where was he? They’d warned s the way I’d done them and now here I sat, prophecy fulfilled

Parents one, Maddie zero

Side note, but that was another thing I resented about the way things wound up between me and Trevor He had fared better than ot the Hollywood life He never lost touch with his parents and on and on In the end, his entire world outside of the two of us remained intact while mine -- imploded

Sitting on the same chocolate-brown sectional my parents had owned since I was six years old, I twirleda pause in the conversation My mom sat to ht, in his easy chair

“Maddie, sweetie” My an as she touched my knee “Do you want to tell me what’s on your mind? Why are you here?”

I released , I replied, “I just needed to get away Aside froreat for me”

“I see,” my mom replied “Well, you’re welcome to sleep in your old room, of course”

I turned and looked at her “You kept my room like I left it?”

“Of course, dear After all, I knew you’d be back sooner or later”

My mom wasn’t the sort of person who tried to be clever with her words, so I didn’t take the ‘sooner or later’ part of her response as an insult Sheway Even so, I’m sure she would rather I had come back to it under happier circumstances

“How long will you be staying?” she asked

I glanced at her, then at , I said, “I don’t know I hadn’t thought that far ahead yet”

Myet your father and me a cup of coffee Would you like one?”

“No,” I began, as I looked at her “No, thank you”

With that, she s me alone with my father for the first time in over half a decade I sed hard as she disappeared into the kitchen As she did, I drew my vision towards hi down atat the tip of his nose

He nodded as he began to speak “Maddie, if you’re going to stay here, you’re going to have to pay your way Youron fixed incomes You understand that don’t you?”

Although I didn’t care for the tone, I got the e

“Yes, Dad”

After I finished, he remained cross-arether in an expectant look, fra his face in impatience

“What?” I asked

“I’, Madeline”

Ugh, Madeline I hadn’t even been here for an hour yet and already he was using that

“For what, Dad? I heard you”

He shook his head “I’m not sure you did”

Thinning estured towards the kitchen and parroted his comment to me from a moment before “Uh, you and Mom retired Fixed income I heard you I’m not deaf”

“Okay, then,” he said “I suggest you begin looking for work first thing toive you until the end of the week to find so If you don’t, you can’t stay here Got me?”

Of course, I didn’t have to work anywhere if I didn’t want to The business brought in plenty of money Hell, with that kind of incoht around zero chance my folks would approve of the sort of business we ran And I couldn’t just sit around the house and pay them because they’d want to knohere the money cainal proble them what I did

So, instead, I lied “Yes I understand I’ll start looking first thing tomorrow”

MADDIE

Not wishing to pissho some temporary e See, the best part about co from a small town is half the population never leaves And sooner or later, all those faeneration steps in and assumes control