The Missing Soldier (Book One)

Chapter Two

*Dream*

After sitting there for what felt like twenty minutes, but it all honestly was probably more like three or four. I stood up on shaky legs with my head pounding, it was like my heartbeat was pounding in my ears and in my head. I whimpered as I walked forward, tears were still streaming fast down my face and I made no move to stop them. I saw my phone on the dining room table where I had set it before the soldier had come knocking on the door. I picked it up and began dialing a number slowly, I almost prayed she didn't pick up. I knew this would break her heart.

"Hello? Erica? Why are you calling so late?" I heard her ask through the phone. I knew I had to call Ann, Ann was Michael's mother. The only parent he had left, his father had died from lung cancer three years before. I heard the worry and fear in her voice as she began to ask me question after question. She knew I would only call this late if it was an emergency.

"Ann, somethings happened..." I began but broke off I began to sob but I quickly stifled them before beginning to speak again. By now all I could hear was dead silence from the other end of the phone. "Its Michael... he's gone..." I barely go out, my sobs began to get stuck in my throat evidentally choking me. I heard her panicking her over the phone as she began sputtering desperately trying to find something to say.

"Why? Just why?" I heard her sobbing, it broke my heart to hear her say that. She kept asking why and begging for this to be a nightmare. She kept begging god for this not to be true. Then she would repeat back to the why question. All I could do was say that I didn't know why.

*Wakes up*

I sat up in bed gasping for breath, and sobbing. I looked over to his side of the bed and just began crying even more, I laid down and hugged his pillow to my chest absolutely distraught. The first month after was the worst, I was almost catatonic. Which made it worse for my son, that's when my mother-in-law Ann had to step in. I stayed there for a while after I was done crying and just laid there for a bit. Once I realized that I wasn't gonna be getting back to bed anytime soon, I rolled over to get out of bed. I saw the clock with its blinking green numbers pretty much taunting me. It was about a quarter past six, I was pretty much used to this now and I hated it.

"Damn it" I swore as I trudged out into the living room. I turned on the news to see what was going on in the world, but kept it down low so I didn't wake Ann or Joseph. Joseph was a deep sleeper, I swear that kid could sleep through a hurricane. Ann on the other hand could easily be woken up, and I felt so bad if I did manage to wake her. I shuffled out to the kitchen to make myself a cup of coffee before I began to work. Luckily I work from home for the most part. There was a few instances where I will have to go into court or into the office though, but those are a bit rare.

"You awake too?" I heard Ann speak from behind me, it scared me just a little bit so i jumped and shrank in on myself. She chuckled as she lifted a cup of coffe to sip at, I just looked at her confused before looking behind me to see an emprt coffee pot which got me evenmore confused.

"How did you? Did I wake you?" I asked worried that I had woken her up yet again, me and her both have had trouble sleeping as of late. We would go to bed late at night and then wake up at the butt crack of dawn.

"No honey, I made up enough coffee just for me and then just read for a little bit, you didn't wake me up." She spoke as she smilied softly at me, before walking back out into the living room.

"Oh okay then" I said as I turned back around to finish making myself some coffee, as it was brewing I grabbed out some bread and some peanut butter for my breakfast. After all that was done, I grabbed my stuff and walked out into the living room. As I sat down, I saw that the Amazon Rainforest was still on fire and had been for about a month now.

"Isn't that terrible?" She spoke as she looked up momentarily from her book, before darting back down again. I hummed in agreement before focusing on the tv, I brought out my work bag and my computer. I set out a bunch of papers and booted up my compter. Being a lawyer was hard especially when there was a case involving a child, just like this one. The mom had snapped and attacked one of her kids, her other kid had seen and called 911.

"I don't know why you work so hard on those cases." Ann spoke up which made me roll my eyes.

"Because I am helping to protect someone." I snapped at her before typing away on my computer, she never did like what I did. Well, more like she couldn't understand why I do what I do.

"Oh really? Then why didn't you protect Micheal like you said you would?!" She snapped before storming out of  the living room into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her. What on earth did I do to deserve this?