The P.O.E. & a Gateway in the Basement

Chapter One

Chapter One

Jacob is now sixteen and he pulls his car into a parking space outside an apartment complex. This will be his seventh new place of residence since his father left. He turns off the engine and steps out of the car. Once outside he scans the entranceway into the parking lot and his mother is not there yet. So he walks back over towards the trunk of his car, opens it and sees three small boxes inside. He grabs only two of them, places each box under each of his arms and then closes the trunk with his right elbow. He begins to walk up the sidewalk and possibly enter the new place. But he quickly remembers that his mother has the only key in her possession; so there isn't any way he can get inside at this precise moment. So he turns around to walk back towards his car and sees his mother's silver BMW pull right up beside his own car. Once she exits her vehicle, she looks upon her son and smiles.

"What took you so long to get here? It feels like I've been waiting here for over an hour."

"Serves you right... I told you not to go fast because I specifically told the moving men to be cautious with our belongings." A big white box truck pulls into the parking lot and back-up right in front of the sidewalk. Ms. Whitmore begins to walk up the sidewalk, followed closely by her son. The two moving men are also walking behind them but at much farther of a distance. They finally get into the main entrance to the apartment complex, walk up a flight of steps and immediately stop abruptly that Jacob almost runs into his mother. Not giving into the fact that he is not paying much attention to where he is going. He just wants her to open the door. Instead Ms. Whitmore decides to stand there and look at her son. She buries both of her hands into both of her pants pockets. She pulls out a single key that is attached to a string, places the key into the door handle and pauses.

"Before I open this door I would like to say something," she turns back around and looks upon her son once again.

"And what might that be?" He already knows what she is going to say. She says it every time they move into a new place and it is staring seem a bit redundant.

"Home sweet home," she opens the door and allows Jacob to enter first.

"Why thank you... and I knew that you were going to say that." He walks into the apartment and gets kicked in the butt in the process. "Now what was that for?"

"You don't suppose to be a smart-ass towards your mother."

Jacob thinks nothing of it and walks through the apartment. After walking through the living room and dinning room, he enters a very short hallway. There are three opened doors in this hallway; one is on the right hand side and it is a bathroom. Exactly across from that is the master bedroom, and that would be reserved for his mother. So with only one room unsearched and out of process of elimination, he enters the only door at the end of the hallway.

About an hour-in-a-half later Jacob's bedroom is looking a little bit more furnished. As the paid movers carry all of his possessions inside; Jacob is sitting on top of his already made bed telling the men exactly where to put his furniture and belongings. But he is more focused on finding his speaker wires, which he could have sworn he put them in one if the three boxes he carried inside himself. But he realizes that he put more junk in those boxes than he originally thought. After the moving men have all of Jacob's furniture inside his room and exactly where he wants it placed. There is a knock upon the door which echoes throughout his small bedroom. He all ready knows who is on the other side.

"Come in mother." Jacob finally states after letting her wait out there for a couple of minutes.

"You know I shouldn't even have to knock since I pay all the bills." His mother enters and looks at her son a little disappointed. But she immediately afterwards begins to look around and inspect everything that her son did to his own bedroom.