Claiming Innocence [#wattys2015]

Two

A/N: Please help my story grow by voting and/or commenting xx

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I was woken up by the sound of my alarm clock ringing through the room. I lazily stretched my arm out towards the ringing sound, tapping my palms and wiggling my fingers, in search of the damn alarm clock to shut down the noise. I realised that I wasn't going to be able to find it quickly with my eyes closed, much to my dismay. Slowly, I began to peel my eyes open, groaning at the light that filled my room from the makeshift curtains I have made from my brothers old bed sheets.

6.30AM.

Lovely. Time to get up and go for another routine day of slaving around for my poor excuse of a father, but I guess it's my fault anyway. I made him like that. This is my fault. Everything that's happened in my life is my fault, and I need to accept that and try to carry on with life.

I slowly slide out of my single bed, and grab my clothes for the day, which consists of some plain denim shorts and a loose fitting red shirt. I wash up as best as I can, pulling my dirty blonde hair into a high pony tail before walking out of my room and into the hallway.

As I slowly crept past my dads room, I'm careful not to wake him up, if I do something like that I'll risk dad using his abilities on me again.

I entered the kitchen as quietly as possible, making sure to slide the sheets used as a makeshift 'door' closed behind me. The time now sat at 7AM, that means I have fifteen minutes to make breakfast ready then another fifteen to go to work.

I made my way over to the fridge pulling out a couple of eggs, orange juice and some butter, then retrieved two slices of bread from the shelf by the door. Scrambled eggs on toast and a glass of orange juice do not sound like something that is too fancy, but in my world it is. We don't have much money to be spending on lots of food to make omelettes or buy the top kitchen gadgets to cook with.

After grabbing the fry pan out from the shelf by the sink- that has no door- I continued to wiz away and make the eggs as quickly as possible while toasting the bread using the oven grill. Toasters are something we just don't have; we only have the basics, a stove, an oven, a small microwave and single fry pan.

I set the ready made breakfast on the kitchen table along side a glass of orange juice just as my father walked through the doors with a blank emotion covering his face.

"I made your favourite..." I spoke quietly in hope that I would get a small ounce of appreciation.

"Okay. So why haven't you left for work, Natasha? You don't get money handed to you. Move!" he harshly bit back.

"Sorry, I'll leave now" I said hurriedly as I walked out of the room as fast as I can, slipping my white converses on then walking out the door. I really wasn't in the mood for another ability-used-torture-session for 'slacking off' or for answering back.

Once I got to work, after my fifteen-minute walk, I arrived at 7:31PM, my manager Dave walked over to me with a very 'you're-late, I'm-not-impressed-look', and told me to get to work- after I apologised- before he threatened to fired me for being late.

A minute late? Really. Gee, sorry for being a minute, I'm sure that this place would have gone under massive pressure with such a high amount of customers. The only people in here at the moment is a old man who can barely recognise where he is, and a small family that always come here for breakfast every day. No wonder their kids are so fat, like honestly who eats 2 main meals to themselves at breakfast then finishes it off with the largest sized milkshakes we have? I don't even know how they can afford any of that! They must be on the richer side of town.

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After a long 15-hour shift at work, I got asked to close up.

"Tash, you're on close up!", Dave said as he chucked the keys to me.
Great. Just what I needed. I'm already on a crappy wage, hence why I need so many hours a day, and now I'm going to be late home and my dad is going to be pissed off at me. Maybe I'll just steal something from here, say money, maybe then he wont use his abilities on me.

After cleaning of all of the tables and sweeping the floor, I walked over to the till, and took two twenty-dollar bills out of the register. I don't want to take too much that it will be too noticeable, just enough to make it look like a miscalculation or staff error.

I spend an extra hour at close-up; meaning by the time I lock the doors and get out of the joint it is 11:30PM at night. This isn't a very safe neighbourhood, and I know that because I've been jumped a few times on the way home from work. That's why a carry a small pocket knive with me for self-defence. It has scared off men before, but I've never had to use it.

I pulled the keys from the now locked door, checking one last time to see if the doors are locked, and placed the key gently into my pocket.

Okay Tash, you can do this; it's only a 15-minute walk, just a few blocks down. Keep calm and act like you have a set goal. Look strong. Look like you know what you're doing and you know how to fight, I thought to myself.

After a few wearily looking glances from one or two people from the streets, I successfully made it to my run-down street. Yes! I made it. I'm safe. Woo!

Or so I thought.

As I got closer and close to my street, I saw a small white van parked across the road.

Strange, I thought. No one ever parks down this street, no one else lives near here expect for us. This was out hiding place.

As I got closer, I saw two men dressed in dark suits walk out of the front door along with my father. What the hell? Why is he with them? They are too far away to see who they are. As soon as I thought that to myself I heard one of the two men say, "We will just wait for her to come home, she couldn't possibly know that we would find her here".

Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit.

The collectors. They found us. They found me. They are going to take me away and put me into one of those horrible houses, to be picked by a man and treated like dirt for the rest of my life.

I'm not going to go so easily, not without a fight, a damn good one at that.