Millie
I walk through the front door of my new home behind Lo, and a feeling of contentment washes over me. “This is where we’re going to be living?” my little sister asks in shock as she walks into the open living room. It’s the nicest home we’ve ever had—and the most expensive. I don’t tell her that we can hardly afford it at the moment. She’s had more worries than any sixteen-year-old should ever have on her shoulders.
After working every shift she could manage at the tiny grocery store in town to help pay bills for the last ten months so I could finish school faster, she deserves the chance to live without rent payments hanging over her head once again. There was a time when neither of us worried about whether the bills would be paid, but all of that changed ten months ago when our dad suddenly passed away from cancer.
We had found it too late. The doctor told us he may have a month or two to live, but in reality, we only had two more weeks together. The most torturous two weeks of my existence.
Daddy didn’t have a lot of earthly possessions. We sold what furniture we could and moved Lo into my tiny, one-bedroom apartment with me. It was cramped to say the least. I’m really looking forward to being able to walk without tripping over or bumping into something.
“Millie, look at the size of the bedrooms!” Lo shouts from down the hall. A smile spreads across my face as I walk to where she’s standing in her new bedroom.
“Do you love it?” I ask, leaning against the door frame. She holds her arms out and twirls in a circle. Her girlish giggles remind me just how young she is. Too young to be without a parent. She stops her spinning and looks me in the eye with a sweet smile.
“I do,” she says as she walks to me and wraps me in a tight hug. “Thank you, Millie.” Tears prick my eyes. It has been a hard year for the two of us. Lo and I both agreed that it would be best for me to switch from working full-time to part-time so that I could finish up my master’s degree in one year instead of dragging it out for another two years. I hated having her work so much, but it has paid off.
I am now the children’s and youth librarian at the City of Waverly’s public library. And I have the possibility of promotion to head librarian in the future. Between you and me, I think it’ll happen sooner rather than later, because the current head librarian is older than Methuselah and looks like she hates every second spent in that building.
“Well, the movers should be here any minute to unload the truck. Let’s go figure out where we want all the furniture to go,” I say. She grabs my hand and pulls me down the hall with a squeal and a skip in her step.
“Okay, I really think the TV should go here along this wall. You don’t want it here,” she says as she gestures to a bare wall. “The sun would shine through that window and create horrible glares. Couch here, and loveseat here,” she suggests as she moves around the living room, gesturing with her arms. She looks at me with her eyebrows raised, waiting for my thoughts.
“That sounds perfect. The piano can go over here.” I gesture to the entryway. The piano is the one thing of my dad’s that I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of. It has been sitting in a tiny storage facility since we emptied his house, and it cost me forty dollars a month to store it. It was worth every penny. Daddy was a wonderful pianist. Some of my fondest memories are of him pounding on the keys when he was frustrated or his fingers playing a jaunty tune when he was happy.
I did not inherit his gift of music. I wasn’t patient enough to excel at it…and others would also add that I’m a bit tone-deaf. I’d rather spend my time lost in a good book, escaping to a fantasy world. Lo, however, plays beautifully and is bursting with excitement to be able to play again. I don’t mention to her yet that the piano will likely need to be tuned after sitting in storage for so long.
“And we’ll need to get a big rug to put down in here to cover up this hardwood floor!” Lo says. That’ll have to wait. With the security deposit and the first month’s rent, we don’t have any money left for anything fun at the moment. We’ll be eating rice and beans or peanut butter and jelly until I get my first paycheck from the library in two weeks.
The sound of tires on the gravel drive pulls our attention away from our planning. Assuming it’s the movers, we both rush to the window at the front of the living room. It’s not the movers, however. It’s a state trooper. The black-and-white patrol car sends shivers down my spine.
“Oh my gosh, Millie. What have you done?” Lo exclaims and whacks my arm with the force of a two-hundred-pound linebacker.
“Ouch!” I yelp and rub my arm. That’s going to leave a bruise. “I didn’t do anything. Do you have something to tell me?” I look at her with my most menacing face: eyes narrowed, eyebrows lowered, mouth pinched.
“No, of course not. I’m an angel,” she says and bats her eyelashes dramatically.
We stare out the window as the patrol car comes to a stop. One black boot touches the ground and then another. A tan cowboy hat rises out of the black-and-white Tahoe—and rises and rises. Holy moly, that’s the tallest man I’ve ever seen.
Lo and I gasp simultaneously and lower ourselves until just our eyes and the tops of our heads peek up over the window frame. “What do you think he wants?” Lo whispers. I shrug in response. My heart is pounding too fast for me to even speak.
The trooper opens the back door of his car and grabs two bags of what appears to be groceries and a bouquet of flowers. This is so bizarre. Why is a state trooper bringing groceries to my house?
“Do you think he accidentally pulled up to the wrong house? Maybe he doesn't realize this isn’t his home,” I suggest.
“Who does that? That’s so weird.”
He’s walking toward the house now and appears to grow taller and broader with each step. He glances toward the window, and I watch his mouth quirk into a restrained smile before he clears his throat. Lo and I both turn and flop down on our backsides. “Do you think he saw us?” Lo asks.
“Without a doubt,” I reply. I cover my face with my hands in embarrassment.
The doorbell rings, but neither Lo nor I move to open it. We watch each other breathlessly. “Go answer the door.” I nudge her with my shoulder.
“You go answer it! I’m too young and naive to go to jail.”
“He’s not going to arrest you. Look how sweet you look with your blonde hair and your freckled cheeks,” I say with a pleading look. She gets up and runs to her empty bedroom, leaving me alone, wondering what to do about the man outside our front door.
He knocks on the door and says with a deep, booming voice, “Hello. I know you’re still sitting by the window. I saw you as I walked up, and I’m not here to arrest anyone.”
I assume that means he heard our conversation. I take several deep breaths to calm my pounding heart before standing up and walking to the door. I plaster a smile onto my face and swing the door open. All thoughts immediately leave my head when my eyes land on the man standing in front of me. My legs turn to Jell-O, and my heart stops. I grab hold of the door frame to keep myself from falling over.