Before The Petals Fall

Chapter Three

After a long day filled with avoiding Antoine, it was finally time for my father and I to pay the debt at the town hall. I was excited, because although we were giving away money, it meant that we could keep our house.

When I reached the parking lot, I saw Antoine staring longingly at me from a distance. He was sitting in the driver's seat of a bright red Lamborghini Aventador while I was over here waiting for my dad to pull up in his rusty mint green Cadillac that he's had since the 80’s. I try to avoid eye contact from Antoine’s stare; it's making me uncomfortable.

I can begin to hear the sound of a rustic engine quickly approaching.The sharp pop of a car backfiring shocks Antoine, who clumsily hits his head against the roof of his car.

I chuckle as he has a fit, swearing and rubbing the back of his head. My father pulls up on the slab of concrete in front of me; his geriatric vehicle grunting as it slowed to a stop.

As he rolls down the window -- it's crusted surface abrading against the car interior.

He beams at me. “Ready to go, kiddo?”

With one last look back at the academy building, I respond “Yep.”

I climb into the car and onto the faded leather seat. The engine sputters to life again as my father jams his keys into the ignition and we head on into traffic.

We finally arrive at town hall. It takes a few tries to open the glove compartment with its sticky handle, but I manage to do it in order to collect the money.

The man at the desk is inscribing something onto a piece of parchment; the sound of the pencil lead on paper being the only noise in the lobby.

I step up to the counter, careful not to disturb the man until he had finished with his task at hand.

Once I am sure that his work has concluded (since he began to roll up the parchment paper) I ask him for what we came for.

“I'm sorry to disturb you, but you wouldn't happen to know where we could pay our bills, would you?” I say sweetly.

He looks at me strangely.

“Miss, I'm not sure if you’ve realized, but this is the 21st century. Sure, people in France used to pay bills in person but that was years ago. Now we've been blessed with technology.” He says condescendingly.

I put my hands on my hips. “I am aware that people use electronic devices in order to pay their bills, but I'll have you know that it took my father and I YEARS to collect enough money to pay the rent, let alone have leftover cash to purchase a computer!”

He snorted. “Well that's unfortunate.”

I scoffed at his impolite behavior.

“Nevermind, I will find the office myself.” My arm brushed against the cold wooden counter as I turned around.

The man simply shrugged and returned to what he was accomplishing prior to our conversation.

My father trudged behind me, clearly having doubts on my ability to find the office that is qualified to receive our payment.

Many doors in the hallway were checked, yet none of them contained the specific person we were searching for.

At last, we discovered the room that we have been anticipating to  find.

As soon as my fist came in contact with the burgundy door in order to knock, it swung open, causing my knuckles to nearly hit someone’s shoulder instead.

“Sorry, I didn’t--”

My apology is cut short by a series of wails as an obese, middle-aged woman pushes past me. Her upsetting sobs could be heard as she rushes out of the building.