Scribbled Excellence
Prologue
Ten Years Earlier
We’re Not Getting Separated . . .
She never knew life would be like this. At eighteen years old, Tomorrow should have been out with friends or with a boyfriend or preparing for her senior prom. She should have been able to be a normal teenager. Nope! That was not her life and hadn’t been for longer than she could remember.
It was two in the morning, and she had just come from work and walked into the small two-bedroom apartment that she lived in with her mother, her brother, August, and her sister, Tuesday.
Her life was a revolving door of school, work, and taking care of her siblings.
She had no children of her own, but you wouldn’t know that if you saw how she cared for her brother and sister.
In a perfect world, Tomorrow would have been at home with her brother and sister while her parents worked.
Her father or mother would be the one that came in at 2 a.m. from work.
Tomorrow, August, and Tuesday should have been tucked away in their beds.
That was not how it went in the Bennett household.
Shawn and Michelle Bennett were two people who probably should have never met.
Two addictive spirits could be a dangerous thing, and, in this case, it was.
Both battled with addictions for years, although one was to drugs and the other to the streets.
They seemingly got it together when Michelle announced her pregnancy with Tomorrow, but that didn’t last long.
By the time Tomorrow was eight years old, they were back to their good bullshit.
With the new arrival of a child, the couple slowed down long enough for a healthy pregnancy and a couple years of stability.
Once those stable years were over, weights piled on Tomorrow’s shoulders.
She was too young to have all the responsibility that she did. She’d been working since the tender age of fifteen, when she was able to be approved for a worker’s permit. The money that she made at her jobs was used for the basic needs for her and her siblings.
Things really took a turn when Shawn was convicted of drug trafficking a little over two years ago. Thirty years was the sentencing time that destroyed any solid piece that was left in Michelle. That was the point where it went from bad to worse.
Tomorrow sat at the dining room table with homework spread out in front of her that needed to be completed.
She got out of school at 3:10 p.m. and had to be at work by 4:30 p.m. When she called her mother around ten that night, Michelle was home.
Now at two in the morning, she was nowhere to be found.
August was asleep on the couch, where he slept every night, while Tuesday was asleep in her bed.
He and Tuesday shared a room, while Tomorrow volunteered to take the couch.
Even at ten years old, August felt that was not the way it should have gone.
Every night, August made his way to the couch so that his sister was forced to sleep in his bed.
She worked almost forty hours a week at eighteen years old, which was way too many hours for a high school student.
Her eyes were heavy, but she had to finish her homework that was due tomorrow.
Normally, she had time to finish it at the diner where she worked as a hostess and waitress.
The diner owners knew about Tomorrow’s home situation and allowed her to work as much as she needed, on and off the clock.
When she didn’t have a table, they allowed her to work on her homework.
Tonight, that just wasn’t possible because the diner was busy.
She didn’t realize that she fell asleep until her cell phone woke her. It was 4 a.m., and she would need to be awake in less than three hours to get her siblings ready for school. She grumbled at the sight of her caller ID. Unknown.
“Hello.” Tomorrow’s voice was groggy.
There was a short pause before a voice came through the receiver. “Yes, hello. Is this Tomorrow Bennett?”
The woman’s voice was professional, warm, and overly sympathetic. No one called anyone at this time of morning with good news. If you added the fact that Michelle wasn’t home, this couldn’t have been good news.
“Yes, this is her.” Tomorrow responded with a soft sigh.
“Yes, this is Lucy Atwell. I’m with Child Protective Services.” These were calls that Lucy hated to make, but it was a part of her job. A job that was heavy in and out of the office.
This wasn’t the first time that someone from Child Protective Services had called. Yes, Lucy Atwell was a new name, but the job titles were all the same. The social worker, the police officer, and, on occasion, the ones without job titles, . . . the good Samaritan.
“What happened?” That was the only question that needed to be answered at this point. Although she knew the answer, Tomorrow would ask anyway. There was a motion she had to go through.
With hesitation, Lucy responded. “Your mother was found unconscious tonight in an alley. She was rushed to the hospital and admitted.”
Not again. The headache was immediate. She closed her eyes as if it would remedy the headache like fast-acting medication. That was simply not how it worked, and she knew it. “Okay, thank you for letting me know. What hospital is she in?”
“Tomorrow, we need to discuss temporary placement.” Lucy didn’t address the question. To her, that was not of major importance at this time. The well-being of the children was. Michelle didn’t care enough to stay sober for the benefit of her children, so it was time to make other plans for them.
There was the sentence that Tomorrow had tried to avoid for a very long time.
She busted her ass to establish some kind of normalcy for August and Tuesday.
With their mother, it was the same cycle.
It was recovery, relapse, rehab, short stints of stability, then relapse.
The cycle styles changed from time to time, but it was still a cycle that they’d all rather not be in.
Well, everyone but Michelle it seemed. It all resulted in the same things.
There were broken promises, missed birthdays, empty apologies, and disappointments.
The more Tomorrow hoped, the more she was disappointed.
“They don’t need temporary placement. They are with me. I got them,” she told Lucy. Every letter in every word reigned true. She had them like she always had and always would.
Lucy expected the pushback. This was the first time that she interacted with Tomorrow, but she’d been told about her.
It was clear to everyone that crossed her path that she was a teenager with far too many responsibilities for an eighteen-year-old.
To most it was a burden, but it showed in everything that she did that it was not for her.
As hard as it was, Tomorrow saw it as a privilege to care for August and Tuesday.
The honor was given to her to not only watch them grow into their greatness, but she had a stern hand in it.
“I know this is difficult, but this is a conversation that we must have. Their placement would have to be separate at this time. There is hope that we can bring them back together at some point in the future. It’s not guaranteed, however.
” This was the unfortunate part of it all.
It was never the desire of social services to separate families. Sometimes, it just was what it was.
Now, Lucy Atwell had Tomorrow Bennett fucked up. She didn’t understand what this woman didn’t understand about they didn’t need placement period. “Miss Atwell, they will not be separated because they will be with me. This is a wasted conversation.”
Tomorrow had been there for them in every way that she could.
She was in the middle of teaching August his multiplication table and helping Tuesday better her reading comprehension.
There were nights that she had to sleep with Tuesday because of her fear of the dark.
Days of not having power developed that fear.
Bedtime stories that seemed to never end, dinners with ingredients that didn’t normally go together, but it was what they had.
Lucy heard the desperation in her voice. It hurt her soul. She didn’t want this for them any more than Tomorrow did. There was a job that needed to be done for their benefit. “Tomorrow.”
“I said no! I have been and am raising them. I am all that they know, and that is that. You will have to kill me to take them. Are you prepared to facilitate a murder, Mrs. Atwell?” It all sounded so illogical, but she meant every fucking word.
She would rather die than be without August and Tuesday.
Are you prepared to facilitate a murder? Lucy had heard a lot of words in the fifteen years that she’d been in her field. Those were the first that jolted her soul. In the break of her heart, she asked, “If the state pursues guardianship, are you prepared to petition for custody, Miss Bennett?”
It was at that moment that she made the decision to address Tomorrow like the adult that she was far before her time. The respect had been earned. She was not a child; she was a parent.
Graduation was in three weeks and prom was this weekend.
Prom dresses and outfits for graduation was what she should have been doing.
College applications were the only concern she should have had.
The art school that she had had her eyes on since she was fourteen seemed so close.
Instead, it was moved increasingly out of reach.
She was now faced with one of the biggest decisions that would permanently change her life forever.