This is a slice-of-life story about friendship, romance, love and everything else.
This is a work of fiction. Any names or characters, businesses or places, events or incidents, are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or a...
Alicia Crawford is wet right through to her underwear.
Three hours ago, she'd tied her honey-brown hair in a half-up, half-down hairstyle and pulled on her favourite sundress, made of soft material covered in tiny yellow sprigs. There was no rain predicted for today and she was foolish enough to believe that and hurried to the library on foot without a rain jacket or an umbrella.
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That unpredicted rain is now coming down in torrents as if someone is upending bucket after bucket of cold water onto her head. To make matters worse, she forgot her wallet at home and, therefore, has no money for a taxi or an Uber.
During moments like these, she swears that she'll get with the times and put her card on her phone ASAP, but she never remembers to do it.
She has never felt quite as alone as she does right now, walking home in the rain. She's cold, bedraggled and without any hope of rescue. Her mother is off, hell knows where doing hell knows what with hell knows whom. Job hunting, she'd called it, while she was packing her most glamorous clothes, all her make-up, her jewellery, everything she had that was precious to her, except her two children.
More like husband hunting!
Alicia isn't even sure which number the next one would be. Four? Five? She can stomach the fact that her mother left her behind. She will be 18 years old soon, after all. She'll finish high school this year and already has a university scholarship lined up for next year due to her hard work. When all is said and done, she doesn't need a mother any more. She might want one, but she doesn't need one. Especially not one as high maintenance and unmotherly as the woman who gave birth to her. Besides, she never wanted to live with her in the first place.
But little Robin...
Bobby is only five years old and too young to understand that his mother is a selfish bi... she-dog who only ever cares about herself and her own happiness. No wonder their father took them and left her when Robin was still a baby.
Alicia knows that if her father hadn't died, she and her little brother would still be living with him. They would've always been fed, slept warm, and felt loved. Sometimes, she misses her dad so much that it is a physical ache in her chest. She might also just be developing pneumonia from walking sleeveless in this infernal rain!
To be fair, they're currently always fed, they always sleep warmly, and they do feel loved. Their lives are far from being uncomfortable. Their mother did the very least that she could've done for them. She'd pushed the responsibility of caring for them onto their father's best friend and his wife.
Alicia always liked Uncle Jonah and Aunt Bernice. When her father passed away three years ago, they were the ones taking care of her and her brother while their mother was making funeral arrangements and plans for their future, living with her.
