It hadn’t been a good day for Billy. His mother was at work and she had left an unusually long list of things for him to do. Not it was 4:30, a half-hour before she’d be home, and he wasn’t even halfway through. He tried to hurry, even cutting a few corners here and there, but by 5:00 he wasn’t sure he was any further than he had been an hour earlier.
He knew his mother would yell. She had been so on edge since his dad had dies six months earlier. Instead of dealing with her grief, she had chosen to throw herself into her job at the local textile mill. A normal week for her now included at least 20 hours of overtime. Every day was the same – work until night, come home, fall asleep exhausted. Billy had gotten lost in the shuffle.
He tried to do everything his mother asked. He knew how shattered her life was and so he just wanted to do as much as he could to keep things as normal as possible for her. All he wanted was her help, too, which, until now, wasn’t very much.
The phone rang and Billy was relieved to hear his mother’s voice on the other end. It meant she would be working late, and he’d have more time to finish the list. He hung up the phone and hurried to do the dishes.
Tomorrow: Courage – Part III
