Collateral Damage

II

Empty house.

Homework splayed.

Music blaring.

Growing up in such a big house, it wasn't hard to find a quiet place, but when she was alone, Halle thrived. She could practice lines without her family judging, she could blast whatever musical she wanted without having to worry about the content or language scarring her siblings, and she could do whatever she wanted.

While the nanny was with the baby at the store, her mom was with a party planner planning papa's birthday, and her dad was at work. She shrugged the hood of her Les Mis sweatshirt over her head, and she focused on the slope of the least squares regression line, she tapped her pencil to the beat of the music, and began writing the slope-intercept equation. She puts the pencil down and pulls herself up off the ground. She walks into the kitchen, the only noise is the muffled harmonies of Hamilton and the soft patting of her sock-covered feet. She pulls the apple juice out of the fridge and pours it into a plastic cup. Usually her mother would insist on asking the maid to get it for her, but Halle sent her home early because she usually leaves at nine and her parents wouldn't be home until eleven at the earliest. They'd pay her for the missed hours and she'd be able to eat dinner with her kids and get a good nights rest.

Susanna was like Halle's best friend, she's been their maid since she was three, she was the only consistent friend she's ever really had, even when she and Maggie were in a fight or Kyle was being petty about something, Susanna was there, she has a three year old and an eight year old who she leaves with her parents while she's at work, and Halle feels like her parents are cruel to take her away from them so often. Most of the time Halle just feels like her parents are cruel in general.

She sighed and pressed the cup to her lip for a split second before taking a sip. She waved to Edgar, the gardener, who was outside trimming the hedges that lined the driveway. She wished she could send him home, but if the work outside wasn't done her parents would notice. It was only four now, maybe her parents wouldn't notice if she sent him home at sundown. Mary, the cook, knew not to come, Halle had texted her to leave when her parents left, giving them a few minutes head-start, of course.

If Halle had her way, life would be so different, but honestly, she's had enough change in the past few months to last her a lifetime. She sat back down on the leather couch and looked up at the smooth ceiling. Her sister, Elizabeth, used to throw markers and paint brushes up at the ceiling to make it more colourful. El was always the more fun of the two, the ceiling ended up like her personality. Looking up now, Halle wishes her parents hadn't had people paint over the colours, it would make the world a lot less dark.

~

"You know I love you, but do you ever sleep?" Maggie asks, looking at the bags under Halle's eyes before sitting across from her at the lunch table.

Halle blinks the sleep out of her eyes before raising her eyebrows and processing what Maggie just said, "I think the baby's teething, she was up all night last night. You know my parents are absolutely zero help."

Maggie sighs, "you could've called me, she's like my niece too."

Halle puts her head down on the table, "sometimes I feel like she's my daughter."

"... I mean, isn't she?"

Interrupting their conversation, as usual, Kyle plops down, sliding a plate over to Halle, "eat, kid. You look like you need it."

Halle rolls her eyes, "I need caffeine."

"I think you need to go home bud." Maggie says gently, putting a hand on her shoulder.

She shrugs her best friend's hand off, "in order to go home, one of my parents would have to excuse me, I'm still a minor."

Kyle sighs and sits back, inspecting his school pizza thoroughly, "and yet, you're the most adult out of all of us."

Halle takes one bite of her sandwich that Kyle grabbed for her, the bread was stale, so she put it right back down. She'd eat dinner with her parents tonight, which was usually her mom telling her to date people from respectable families, unlike her sister.

She scratched the back of her head, letting her hair fall down like a curtain, she closed her eyes and begged for the buzzing in her ears to go away. "At least go to the office," Maggie tries to reason with her.

Halle cedes the argument, "okay, okay. I'll go lay down for choir, but only a half an hour."

Maggie and Kyle nod, "good, not exactly what I wanted, but it'll work. If you end up feeling worse call one of your parents, or Susanna."

~

She fell asleep.

She. Fell. Asleep.

The secretary in the office let her fall asleep in the health room and didn't wake her up when she asked. So she slept through all of choir and was now going to be later for AP Stats. She ran to her locker and opened it in a rush, not noticing the blue sticky note that fell out until she slammed it shut and looked down. She picked it up tentatively and looked at it.

Meet me in the courtyard. Right after school.

Mysterious and intriguing. Something she very much needed right now. Something fun to get her mind off of everything else.

She walked at a steady pace to the math hall, calm and ready to solve this little mystery at approximately 2:20 this afternoon.

~

I tried to finish this before kay finished chapter one DID I DO IT

also my mom made a wattpad account just so she could read this and I think that's the cutest shit ever

-h