[Loretta's POV]
When I got in from school, she was at the table, smoking.
She never smoked indoors. She also never even used to smoke, but my father had changed that when he fell asleep.
"That's disgusting," I told her. I meant it.
She shrugged, and took a long ugly suck at the orange and white stick before smooshing it out on the saucer I had decorated for her in ceramics class when I was eleven. The matching tea cup had broken a long time ago.
She smooshed it right into the head of the childish cartoon of me that I had painted on the saucer, holding my cartoon mother's hand and smiling my cartoon smile. It was a strong, symbolic image, and would have done well in a poem or a short story. In the few English classes I had attended and not slept through over the last months we had had discussed the use of figurative language and symbolism.
"Mrs Dunn called?" I asked, my question intending to provide an answer for her slovenly behaviour.
She shook her head.
So I continued through to the bedroom and dumped my bag down.
"Mr Davidson called." My mother said to my retreating back.
I turned, "Who?"
"Mr Davidson," she repeated with a pause, like it was self explanatory. "From child services."
I stopped and turned. "Where is Claudia?" I asked. My mother understood the alarm in my voice.
"She is at after school care. It's not about her. It's about you."
"Me?" I reeled back. I had been about to dump my bag on the floor and take a step toward her, but now I clutched it desperately and kept it close.
"Yes Loretta, it's about you. What could Claudia have possibly done that would require child services?"
"I assumed it was something you had done," I said, harshly. I held my bag closer and couldn't help but stare at the cigarettes and the empty glass that smelt of whisky on the table.
"No Loretta, it's always been all you."

YOU ARE READING
Loretta of the Lamp
FantasyLoretta bit her lip and took a deep breath before she peered into the keyhole and slid the pick into the narrow opening. "You will open for me," she murmured. Loretta knows how to pick a lock faster than you can say "juvenile delinquent". But the si...