Surface Pressures {Fingers Crossed Series} [Isabella's Story] |1|

|PART SIX: LOST|

OCTOBER 3
Sitting in the living room, I stared off into space while my sisters played a game on the floor. It was another night that Aunt Penelope wasn't home on time to make us dinner and the macaroni in the cupboard was past its expiration date.

"Bella." Andrea snapped her fingers in front of my face, "Are you going to answer that?"

Snapping away from my thoughts the phone was loudly ringing in the kitchen. Pushing myself up from the couch, I walked lazily into the kitchen and picked up the phone. Sighing I held it against my ear.

"Aunt Penelope, when are you coming home?" I questioned before saying hello.

"It isn't her, Bella." Dad's thick voice whispered from the otherside, "Sorry for taking so long to get back to you. I've been out in the field and they just called me back to let me know what happened. Is everything alright?"

The sound of his voice was such a relief to me, "No it's not alright. Mom's locked up in prison, I'm stuck in Virginia, and the girls are having a blast here. You need to come back and take us home." I tried to keep my voice low so the girls wouldn't hear me, "I want to go home, Dad."

"Bell, I'm deployed. I can't just tell them that I want to go home. That isn't how this works." He tried explaining, "I've gotten in contact with a few friends and relatives. Uncle Steve says he can take you girls in but he can't do it yet because he's too busy working. Uncle Jethro hasn't gotten back to me yet so I'm not sure if he'll take you."

"I don't want to go with them." I stomped my foot even though he couldn't see me, "I want to go home. I want to go back to my old friends and be in my old room. I want the life I had back before you deployed and left us alone."

Static broke through the phone and my heart squeezed. If I lost contact with him that would be worse than the worry that I had since he left. But as the static cleared his voice got louder, "I can't give that to you right now, Isabella. You need to stay where you are until my full deployment is done. Do you understand me? Don't make any trouble for anyone there."

"Whatever." I mumbled, "I need to go. The girls are getting hungry."

"I love you, Bella. Tell the girls I love them too."

Without replying I hung the phone up. Throwing it down onto the counter, I wanted to scream but I knew that I couldn't. Silently counting to ten I needed to calm myself down before the girls saw me or I'd get thousands of questions about what was wrong. And if they badgered me enough then I'd eventually give in to them.

Picking the phone back up, I dialed Penelope's number and waited for her to answer. Leaning up against the counter my mind started wandering again.

"Is something wrong?" She sounded worried as she answered the phone, "Is someone on fire?"

"No, we're all fine. Just hungry." I answered, "Can you come pick us up so we don't have to sit here any longer. We're bored."

There was mumbling on the other end, "I'm in the middle of a case right now, Bella. I can't just drop everything to get you girls. Order a pizza or something. There's money in the drawer you can use."

"I want to get out of this apartment." I snapped, "I wasn't asking you if you'd come get us, I was telling you that you need to come get us."

A long silent pause made me question if she hung up on me. But the rustling sound informed me that she hadn't, "You listen to me, Isabella, you will not speak to me that way. I know you've gone through a lot these past few months but that does not give you any right to treat me the way that you do. I am not a doormat. You will start treating me with respect or you will be treated the same way. Do you understand me? I am done being taken advantage of."

This was a side of her that I'd never had to deal with before. I did suddenly have respect for her and it was an odd feeling. I'd always viewed her as someone who everyone took for granted because it did take a lot for her to snap. But clearly she was capable of sticking up for herself.

"I'm sorry." I softly apologized.

"Good." She huffed, "So as I said before I will not be able to come get you. If you need to get out then once the girls go to sleep take a walk. I won't be home until really late so make sure you lock up all the windows and the door."

Listening to her directions I already knew what to do but I'm sure it helped her calm down explaining everything again. After hanging up the phone, I set it back down and walked to my room. Keeping the door opened I needed to be able to keep an ear out for the girls. Laying down on the bed, my eyes followed the cracks in the ceiling and my mind started wandering again. Hearing Dad's voice tonight made me miss him even more than before. Knowing that he was alive helped me accept that this was the best thing for me but it wasn't helpful knowing that he wouldn't be coming to save us.

And as my eyes got heavy my mind wandered to Silas Waverly. The boy from my first day of school who was so friendly; the same guy that I'd been avoiding since that day too. After finding out about his girlfriend I just felt uncomfortable with how friendly he was being. But avoiding him was starting to get impossible since he was friendly with everyone and everyone was always so happy to give up their seats for him.

"Bedtime." I shouted rolling over onto my side, "Henley, lock the doors and turn the lights off."

There was grumbling from the girls but they did as I said. Once everything was locked and all lights were off, I climbed underneath the covers and let my mind wander. Thinking of escape plans wasn't helpful and no matter what I tried to focus on Silas' smile would always appear. Pulling my phone out from underneath my pillow, I opened my messages. Going through the last conversation I had with Dad brought up some horrible memories. Everything was so good at one point and now it's all gone bad.

~3 a.m.~
Sitting up in bed, I stared at my phone struggling to press the call button. I wanted more information about Dad's deployment but I wasn't sure if I'd get all the answers that I truly wanted. No one in his platoon was answering my calls and there was only one person left that I could think of.

Taking a deep breath, I pressed the button and held the phone tightly against my ear. Subconsciously I held my breath until the familiar voice answered.

"Hello?"

"I didn't mean to bother you." I quickly spoke, "But I need to ask you something really important."

He waited for a few seconds, "Bella? What's wrong?"

"Do you know where Dad's deployed or any way that I can make it so that he has to come home?" I questioned him quickly, "Dad needs to come home because I want to go back home, Uncle Steve. Please."

"I don't know anything. He can't tell me where he's at right now." Uncle Steve spoke in a whispered tone, "If you're safe where you are right now then that's where you are going to be staying. I'm sure your father would come back if he thought you were in danger. Now I think it's time you get some sleep because clearly it's really early where you are."

Grumbling to myself I hung up without saying anything more. Throwing my phone onto the floor, I laid back down and tightly held onto the pillow. Wiping at my eyes, I hadn't even noticed the moisture falling from my eyes. Quickly I was growing furious with myself for being so weak. Weak for allowing myself to cry over something so stupid. My job was to take care of my sisters and everyone else around me. They were supposed to come first and if they were happy here then I'd need to suck it up and move past my own feelings. And I would just need to keep reminding myself of that no matter how lost I felt living here in Aunt Penelope's apartment. This wasn't home but it would need to be until I was able to leave.

"This is home." I whispered to myself, "This has to be home."