Becoming the Luna

Dale leaves in a hurry, dressed in all black and I wave him out, rushing to go check up on my mom.

I haven't seen her since the time in the bathroom and I'm more than a little worried.

"Mom?" I call quietly, knocking on her door.

She doesn't reply and I wonder if she isn't in but where else could she be?

"Mom?" I try again, worry prompting me to push open the door when I don't hear anything either.

She's sitting with her legs tucked in on the bed, her blanket over her head.

"Mom?" I slowly move closer. "Are you okay?"

I move close enough to see that she's clutching a picture of me as a baby and I shake my head wryly.

"Mom?" She looks up at me this time and I get on the bed with her, throwing off the blanket and taking the picture from her.

Her wide eyes are filled with terror, like she had never entertained the thought of me growing older. "Hay?" She calls back in a whisper.

"I'm not going anywhere, mom." I tell her bluntly. "I don't even have a boyfriend yet."

She blinks at this, staring at me with wide grey eyes. "You don't?"

"No." I tell her because it's the truth, sure Virgil and Dale flirted around a lot but we hadn't made any commitments yet.

"But you will." She says bleakly, peak devastation on her face.

"Isn't that what you wanted?"

She pouts, her cheeks puffing out, her dark brown hair in a messy knot on the crown of her head. "Maybe."

"How about we eat breakfast first then we'll discuss more about this?" I say reasonably.

My mom just looks horrified. "No thanks, I don't want to talk about your relationships."

I just facepalm, remembering that I'm the adult here. "Sure, mom, let's just go eat."

"That reminds me, I'll go down to the store today and stock up, so that we won't always have to go down to the kitchens okay." She says to me as I make my way out.

"Sure." I throw back to her, going to my room.

Shana and Mae had texted to say that they would come by to escort me to the kitchens.

It seemed like a lot of work to me, considering that they stayed on the first floor while I'm on the third and the kitchens are on the second.

As expected, they crash in through the front door, immediately swarming around my mom.

I shake my head as I pull on jeans but then the living room goes quiet, too quiet.

I frown, what is going on down there? Then it hits me.

Oh my God!

My mom is telling them about Dale.

I hurry out. "What's going on here?" I call loudly, enjoying the way they all fall off the chair they were huddled on.

"Ow!"

"Ouch!"

"Eek!"

Their simultaneous sounds of pain makes me smile smugly. "I thought as much, let's go eat."

The flight of stairs down to the second level isn't as bad as the memory I had of coming up but it's still no fun so early in the morning.

The kitchen is shockingly not as crowded as I expected, it's not like dinner where everyone sat to eat at the same time.

Apparently, unless there was an important occasion, everyone usually made breakfast themselves, the kitchen was stocked up enough to feed the whole town and it practically did.

It had me wondering exactly how rich Virgil's dad is.

I opt for cereal while the rest bicker around, baking pancakes. I just watch them, quietly eating my cereal on a counter that's far away from their chaos.

"Hey." A familiar voice greets as someone settles in near me.

I look to the side, slightly startled and see that it's Luke. "Oh, hi, Luke." I greet politely.

"You're with them huh?" He asks dryly, inclining his head in my mom and friends' direction.

I look at them and wince, they're currently slapping each other around with wet dough and I wonder how no one has complained yet but no one seems to mind.

"Them? Nope." I deny them with a blank face. 

He laughs at this and I get up to rinse off my cereal bowl and return it to the rack. "Are you going to the pet store today?" I ask politely, deciding to wait a bit so I could keep my eye on them.

He looks down into his bowl and shrugs. "No, Suzy said that since the animals there aren't much except for the puppies you met the last time you came, although they're much bigger now, she'll keep them at home that way it's much safer for them than having to transport them everyday." He finishes up as well and cleans up his bowl.

"Oh." I nod. "That makes sense."

"So, want to come over and play games then?" He invited nervously, scratching his dark brown hair.

"Sure, anything to stay away from them." I agree. "Mom! Luke and I are going to play games!" I call to her when we pass by but I don't think she even heard me.

We make our way down the hallway, Luke is surprisingly funny and I'm introverted enough to not irritate his quiet nature.

We make it to the third floor without event, well at least I haven't passed out yet.

"You look fit, why are you panting like you just ran up a hill, while dragging a car?" Luke asks incredulously when I hang off the banister, trying to catch my breath.

"J-Just give me a sec, I'm full of milk." I try to defend myself.

"I ate cereal too." Luke says blankly, laughter in his brown eyes.

"W-Well you're older than me." I pout, finally able to process all of the air that I'd been gulping in.

"That doesn't even make any sense, you're supposed to be fitter since you're younger."

"Let's just go play games so you can ruthlessly kill off my avatar." I say grumpily, starting down the hallway.

"You're just horrible at playing." He replies, easily catching up with his much longer legs.

It's really horrible being short because I have to look up at everyone while they're talking and it also means that my vision is limited to their torso down unless I… lift my head up.

I'm so concentrated on huffing and puffing my way to Luke's apartment that I don't notice my path, I bump into something or someone that's really hard.

"Ow!" I exclaim, rebounding off the person's torso where I had whacked my head, the person obviously has really quick reflexes because big hands wrap around my arms to stop me from plopping down to the hard floor.

Luke freezes and takes a couple steps back and I wonder why, I look up and see Leon staring down at me with striking blue eyes that are similar to Virgil's yet very different. "I'm sorry about that, Leon, I wasn't looking at where I was going." I apologize nervously.

"It's fine, Hayden." He replies in his unnaturally low voice. "Try to not bump into me again, Virgil can be a pain in the ass." He says succinctly, continuing his journey.

I just watch him go with wide eyes, remembering Virgil expressive orders to stay away from Leon and I wonder why, he's not so bad really.

Until I look up at Luke and see him watching me with something like awe and horror in his wide brown eyes. "What's wrong?"

"You know Leon?" He asks in shock.

"Something like that, he's my friend's older brother."

"And he just let you go?" He demands, stepping back a little more.

"Yeah?" I reply in confusion. "Wasn't he supposed to?"

Luke just places a hand over his eyes. "You obviously don't know him then, he even knew your name." He monologues under his breath.

I just stand there, not knowing what's going on.

"What did Virgil tell you about him?" He asks me carefully, finally moving closer.

"That I should stay away from hi…" I trail off looking behind me again.

"You should." Luke says tightly, grabbing my hand and hurrying to his apartment. "He's bad news."