Page 23 of A Vicious Rumor

Not to mention the extra cash that it brought in. I'd previously just blown it on whatever, but lately, I'd been putting it away because I knew I needed to.

"I'll compensate you for making appearances, but only if you behave yourself," Paper finally said.

I chuckled. "You're going to have to be more specific," I replied. "I'm supposed to be your muscle. If I suddenly get all soft, the fear factor will be gone."

"Just let me worry about optics, Rock," Paper said. "And to that end, the optics of you picking a fight with Scissors aren't great. So, at the very least, try not to beat up one of your own."

"That's a hard ask," I said with a bit of a laugh. "But fine," I said, when Paper didn't reciprocate. "Is that it?"

"Yes," he said.

"Thank God," I replied, clicking the phone off. I made my way over to the kitchen and switched the light on. The fluorescents blinked on, and I wished I'd just stayed in the dark. I opened the fridge to see if I could grab anything to eat for dinner. I don't know why I thought there would be anything there. I'd looked earlier and there had just been rotting food and beer.

I decided I'd just skip dinner for the evening and head to bed, or rather, to couch. I hated admitting it, but I was tired from today. I grabbed the quilt Coco had said was in the closet, stripped down to my boxers and draped it over myself on the sofa. Within a few minutes, I fell into an uneasy sleep.

Sometime later, movement and a small light in the kitchen roused me from my sleep. I blinked my eyes open and could see the clock over the stove read 3 a.m. My mother was standing in front of the fridge, opening up a beer. She was in a pair of sweat pants and a tee shirt and when she turned toward me, I could see that she'd clearly been crying and her makeup was stained.

I closed my eyes quickly, pretending to be asleep.

"Tyson?" she asked quietly, but I didn't respond. I turned over, facing the back of the couch. I couldn't face her right now, not with her looking like that. She stayed still for a moment before turning off the lights and closing herself into her bedroom.

My body zinged with guilt over what had just happened, but I pushed it back down and tried to fall back asleep. I didn't know what to make of Coco. I resented her for being my mother, but that wasn't actually her fault. I didn't actually even fully know the story of what had happened between her and my father, about how I'd ended up in this world.

All I knew was that everyone involved would have preferred for me never to have been born.

And I'd known that since I was a kid.

What a thing to know.

With that thought, I finally drifted back to sleep.

Sunlight filtered through the windows the next morning, and I groaned as I realized sleeping on a sofa the entire summer wasn't going to be particularly easy on my back.

I got up and dressed and made my way to the bathroom. Coco's bedroom door was still closed, and given the time she came home last night, I didn't think she'd be up for a while.

I took a shower and changed and made my way back out to the living room. The clock above the stove told me that it was around ten in the morning. My stomach grumbled, reminding me that I hadn't fed it dinner the night before.

I grabbed my keys and made my way towards the front door.

"Tyson?"

I turned around, and Coco was standing there in a bathrobe, rubbing sleep from her eyes.

"Where are you going?" she asked me.

"Food," I replied.

"Oh." She looked uncertain for a second. "Want any company?"

"No thanks," I replied dismissively, and made my way out the door, not looking back.

The engine of my Jeep growled down the road, giving physical form to my own frustrations. What was Coco trying to do? Be my friend? My mother? She'd never tried to contact me for all these years. At least, I didn't think she'd tried.

And I was frustrated at my response to all of it, too. I didn't know how to handle her. She was the reason for a lot of my frustrations, but I also knew it wasn't her fault. Maybe I should give her a chance. I just didn't know if I had it in me to give anyone a chance, anymore.

I ended up going to the nearest Dunkin' Donuts drive-thru and grabbing two coffees and two bagels and driving back to the house. When I walked through the front door, Coco was sitting on the couch, flipping channels on the television.

"Hey," I said, walking over to her and handing her a cup of coffee.

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