Page 4 of Mayhem and Minnie

“It’s enough that I’m coming. Don’t push your luck,” I tell her sternly.

“I don’t know what I did wrong, Marlowe. All your other siblings turned out fine except for you. Why can’t you be a team player too?”

“Because I’m not,” I grit my teeth. “Now if that’s all you wanted to talk about, I’m going to hang up,” I say, checking my watch. It will take me about an hour to get home. Since I always go to bed at eleven on the dot, that means I’ll have time to watch five episodes of Supernatural.

“Wait!”

“What?” I ask and roll my eyes.

“What about the job I asked you to do?”

“It’s done. But it’s high time Cristopher dealt with his own shit.”

“Marlowe! Language.”

“Sorry,” I mutter. “But he needs to learn to stand on his own feet. What is he going to do on his own?”

“Your brother is the artistic type,” my mother interjects. “He doesn’t have your affinity with computers. We’re a family and we need to help each other out.”

“Yeah, well, he fucking needs to learn that everything you post on the internet stays on the internet.”

“Marlowe!” Her scandalized voice makes me grimace.

“Fricking,” I amend.

Mother hates swearing. When I used to live with my parents, whenever I swore, she’d wash my mouth with soap. Old-fashioned, and it still didn’t work. It only made me want to swear more.

Fucking hell.

There. Better.

“You’re a good brother, even if you’re a bit surly sometimes. Cristopher appreciates your help.”

“Then he can say so himself. Why does he always need you to speak for him?”

“Marlowe! You know why!”

I take a deep breath and look at my watch again. The minutes are going by and that will mean one less episode of Supernatural when I get home.

I can’t do quarters or halves. It’s everything or nothing. But that will free up a small window of time before I go to bed. What should I do?

The noise of my foot tapping against the car floor interrupts my thoughts. I should stop doing this—but that’s what I’ve been saying for years and I’m still here.

Still, an episode is forty-five minutes on average. A quick calculation reveals that with my current delay, I’ll have about thirty minutes to spare before bed.

Anxiety rushes through my limbs.

What can I do in that time? What takes exactly thirty minutes and not one second more or less?

I bite my lip as I debate.

“Marlowe? Are you still there?” My mother’s voice startles me.

“Yes,” I reply.

Did she say something? I lost the thread again, damn it.

“About my birthday party,” she starts, her voice already dropping an octave. “Are you bringing anyone?”

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