The White Wolf

Three: Big Brother

Sydney

Emily and Meg dropped me off at my house before driving off and singing at the top of their lungs.

"Idiots," I laughed before walking up the long drive­way to my family's isolated home. My eyes couldn't help but still drift to the empty parking space in our slanted driveway.

Keying in the pin to the front door though I calmed my nerves. The moment I first stepped into the house I was bombarded with questions.

"Sydney! Is that you?" My mother hollered. Not waiting for me to answer she rushed out from the kitchen to see the front door. "Why weren't you answering your phone!? I was worried sick!" She yelled whirling the spatula around in the air. Once she was finished with her shouting she placed her first balled up onto her waist as she huffed a string of loose hair out of her flushed face.

Sheepishly smiling I fibbed, "I left it in my locker at school and by the time Em, Meg, and I finished studying, and I realized I was missing it the school was closed."

My mother let out a sigh of relief. "Alright. I was just really worried. Come talk to me while I cook." My mother invited.

Walking down the little hallway to the kitchen I kicked off my dark blue Vans and dropped my book bag by the stairs then proceeded into the kitchen.

I went to snatch a water bottle from the fridge, only to feel my shoulder ache with a sharp pain reminding me to take it easy on the arm that connected with the tree. Hopping up on the counter, I took a sip of cool refreshment.

"So how was your day, Sweetheart?" My mother asked as she browned some sort of meat on the stovetop.

"It was alright. Gym class was a good refresher for my body. Statistics we had a test. I am pretty sure I aced that. And my English teacher-"

"That's Mrs. Hays the older woman right?" My mother inquired.

I nodded, "Yeah that's her. She's suggesting I submit some of my work into the school's journalism team to see if it can get published."

"Oh, sounds fun. Do you already have work you want to submit, or are you going to launch into a new project?"

I had already thought about this, "I'm going to submit older short stories and poetry, but I proposed the idea of doing interviews with random seniors I've never met and having a small collection of short anonymous stories about them. I want to only include the class I meet them in at, kind of to show the connectivity of school despite not quite realizing it while also showing interesting like mini-bios of the different students at our school."

"Well that sounds interesting," My mother mused giving the pan a shake to flip some of the ground up pieces of meat. "I'll still never understand why you didn't join the journalism team."

It reminds me too much of Dad.

"So how was work?" I asked turning the direction of the conversation before taking another gulp of water.

"It was good. Lindsay is trying to drain my kind-heartedness."

With a small chuckled I asked, "What'd she do this time?"

Lindsay was an intern fresh out of college and three months pregnant who worked for my mother.

"She mixed up blueprints! I looked so foolish showing the clients the wrong plans. Gave them a quick scare too, they thought I was completely demolishing their restaurant. I just can't find it in me to fire her. She clearly has dreams and ambition if she finished college, and she definitely needs the money for the baby on the way, but goodness help me she needs to get her act together or-"