Her Only Hero

Chapter 4

I dash around the corner and burst through the door to my mother's bedroom to find her on her queen-sized bed. Propped up by pillows behind her back. Sucking on her cigarette. Her eyes glued to the TV sitting on the dresser. She doesn't glance over at me and doesn't make eye contact until I block her view of whatever crap TV show she's watching.

"What?" she says.

"What did you mean by, do I have Misty?" My heart pounds against my chest. "Isn't she here?"

"Nah," she says, trying to peer around me to continue watching, but I step sideways and block her view. "Don't know where that girl is."

What?! "What happened?"

"Uh," she groans. "Well, I left for some cigarettes." She glares at me. "Because someone took my last pack, and when I got back home, she was gone."

"Gone where?"

"How am I supposed to know." She flicks her hand at me, telling me to get out her way of the TV program.

"Because she's your kid," I yell. "She's your responsibility." Anger burns like fire in my veins.

She reaches her hand out to the white ceramic ashtray resting on her wooden bedside-table, and flicks the ash off the end. "I needed cigarettes."

"So, you just left her home alone?" My voice bounces off ever wall.

"No, I left her with Nathan."

I scrunch my brows together, repeating the name in my head, searching for someone I know named Nathan. A neighbour? Relative? No. "Who's that?"

"The guy from last night."

My heart skips a beat. "Are you serious! Where did he take her?"

She sighs and rolls her eyes. "I don't know."

"Did you call the cops?" She called me. She better have called the cops too.

"No."

"No?! Why not? How do you plan on finding her?"

"I don't know. He'll probably bring her back."

"And if he doesn't?"

"I don't know, Dorian! Now, get out of the way."

A gasp escapes my mouth. She can't be serious. Her daughter is missing and all she cares about is watching TV.

Huffing air out of my nose like an angry bull, I turn and press the power button on the TV.

I whip back around to be hit by her furious glare. She sits up on her bed. "Turn it back on and and get out."

"Step up and be a real mother." I grind my teeth together to the point where I worry about them shattering into pieces from the pressure.

"Don't talk to me about being a mother!" She gets to her feet, walking to the end of the bed. "I've done everything for you two and—"

"You've done nothing," I scream. "You're still doing nothing!" I clench my fists at my sides. "You're daughter has been taken and you're doing nothing to get her back! Do something!"

She puts the cigarette to her mouth and I have to resist the urge to rip it from fingers and toss it to the floor. "For all I know, she wanted to leave."

"What?!" Does she honestly believe she left willingly while the house looks like it's been raided?

"Well, she's been begging me for years to take her to that water park. She probably begged Nathan to take her, and he did."