ꜱʜᴀᴅᴏᴡꜱ: ᴊᴜᴅɢᴍᴇɴᴛ ᴅᴀʏ

003 Just The Beginning

[three years before]

The air was stiff and hot and heavy and Leah felt like she was going to suffocate. The rumble of an old air conditioner could be heard, making her anxiously rub her hands together as she bounced her denim-clad knee.

It was the summer of 2007 and Leah had just turned eighteen, making her official entrance into her adulthood. It was funny really -the girl felt like she was born an adult. Hell, sometimes it felt like she was even aging backward.

The smell of rust and residual cigarette smoke lingered in the air, drenching her clothes like the layer of thick sticky sweat covering her entire body. It was humid and it made her hate summer even more.

Her feet tapped on the once green linoleum floor, her eyes switching between the clock hung on the wall in front of her and the old woman behind the counter obnoxiously licking her finger as she swiped through the pages of her magazine.

A drop of sweat collecting on her brow fell onto her lap, making the girl scoff as she untwined her hands and wiped the remains of sweat on her forehead. Her ears were ringing as she put her hands on her knees, trying to stop bouncing them up and down.

The lights above the three flickered a few times, making both the Hernandezs' heads snap up towards the lamp that hung from the ceiling just in time to see one of the bulbs shut down completely.

Leah began bouncing her knees again while Jamie's eyes kept staring at the burnt bulb as he fidgeted with the toy in his hands. His feet didn't reach the floor so he just let them dangle in the air.

"Hey, lady!" The older Hernandez finally spoke, "How much longer is it going to take?"

The woman adjusted her blue rectangular glasses on the bridge of her nose before raising her eyes and looking at the girl in front of her. Leah wanted the ground to swallow her as the woman behind the counter took in her raggedy appearance, from the hole in her jeans Leah hadn't realized was there until she sat down to her tank top that sat too big on her shoulders, causing one of the straps to fall down her arm every five minutes.

"What is it that you need?" She questioned with a raised brow.

Leah threw her brother a glance before walking towards the counter, resting her elbows on the cold wooden surface as she whispered something to the woman. The woman nodded towards Jamie, who had now stopped dangling his feet and was staring at his sister with those big round eyes of his.

The girl nodded and the woman pointed at a door behind her shoulders before sending Jamie one last glance and returning to her magazine. Leah signaled to her brother to get up and Jamie obliged, his red sneakers squeaking against the sticky floor.

Sometimes Jamie felt like a puppet, not a human. He just stood around his sister, waiting for her to do the things he was never going to be able to do. Jamie watched as the lady said bye to him as he walked to his sister. He didn't say anything back.