Fen and Mara - Open Novella Contest 2019 Short List

Chapter 8

Mara is still home alone. Earlier this evening she thought she heard a car on the driveway, though nobody entered the house. She's sitting in the tv room with her laptop on her lap, an old episode of Friends on the movie screen, the audio muted. There's rock music playing in the room; Mara is streaming the latest album of Hellcats, a band that is featured multiple times among the various patches and buttons on Fen's jacket.

Fen is probably at home, doing the English assignment with the book he got from Mara. Mara takes a picture of her laptop screen with the Hellcats playlist and sends it to Fen. For the next fifteen minutes she keeps checking her phone, but he doesn't send a text back. Maybe his phone is off, Mara can't imagine he would ignore her message. He almost kissed her earlier tonight, she's sure of it! Butterflies fill her stomach when she thinks about the tall boy that was standing so close to her.

Suddenly her phone rings, showing an unknown number on the screen.
"Mara, hi! It's Vic, Fen's brother."

"Uh, hello?" Mara answers awkwardly.

Vic is far from awkward, he cuts right to the case. "Listen, Mara, is Fen with you? He hasn't come home yet."

Mara bolts upright on the sofa, her laptop sliding to the floor. "What? No, he's not here. He went home after his mom called."

"Are you sure?" Vic presses.

Mara nods feverishly before she remembers he can't see her through the phone. "Yes, I'm sure. He got on his bike and went home."

"Shit!"

She can hear Vic repeat her words to someone else, probably his parents. Then there's another voice all of a sudden. "Mara, good evening. This is Henry Holt, Fen's father."

"Hello sir," Mara answers timidly. She's beginning to worry, Fen didn't come home!

"Can you tell me what time Fen left?"

"I'm not exactly sure, I think around seven." She can remember hearing the car around eight, yet Fen had been gone for a while by then.

"Okay. Did Fen say anything before he left you?" Henry Holt talks matter of factly, it's not hard to imagine him in a police uniform.

"No, nothing out of the ordinary," Mara says slowly, thinking about how she had watched him cycle down the driveway to the street. "He came to borrow a book for an English assignment, he was going to work on that tonight."

"Okay," Fen's father says like he has been taking notes. "Thank you, Mara. Good bye."

"Wait!" Mara calls out before the police detective can hang up the phone. "Will you let me know when Fen gets home?"

"Fen can do that himself when he gets here. Don't worry, Mara, I'm sure he'll turn up soon."

Don't worry. Yeah, right. Mara stares at the phone in her hand. Fen disappeared somewhere on the route between her house and his home. His father can act like there's nothing wrong, yet she can't help but think the police detective would only call her if he was worried about his son. She glances at the clock: it's been almost three hours since Fen got on his bicycle. What happened?

Mara grabs her laptop and pauses the Friends episode. In its stead she searches for a local news broadcast and turns on the sound. During the evening hours they play the news on a loop and Mara falls right in the middle of the broadcast. The host reads an item about plans for a new skatepark downtown and then switches to a reporter who cheerfully tells them about the hundredth anniversary of the local netball club. After that they cut to commercials; Mara impatiently waits until the news broadcast starts a new cycle. The host opens the broadcast with news about the break in at the police station, the report that shocked her earlier this evening because she had recognised her father's new robots.