It's a bleak, dreary morning as the icy rain from above runs from the sky like a busted spigot. The crow's craw their heaviest craws from the dense wooded sectors scattered about the stomping grounds of man, echoing against the well-known dominant wails of man made industry. The sky churned lightly and cackled judgment from above.
The day was Monday afternoon, the month was December, Christmas was upon the slaved masses of the state, under the thinning delusion the season was about giving and not about capitalism, and the time was high noon. Though this was lunchtime for some in the formal population, in a neighboring town over on the west, was a young boy in a preppy yet stone dark black uniform, pacing up and down the sidewalk in the rain without as much as a top to cover his head with his limited belongings in a cheap looking tote bag. The road docking the sidewalk was slick and dead; no cars from either side of the road sounded off. Only the crisp, sharp air split and the petter patter of rain hitting the metal piked fence that basically walled out the outside world to the 'teaching facility'.
This boy was Lincoln Loud. However, to the institution he was now about to be ejected from, Student 1112-1995.
Lincoln was pacing outside the gate that led to the minimum security academy of Manducare Canis Academy for Michigan Juveniles.
As he tracked back in forth, rain coating his black attire so deeply, the shade has changed dramatically, he takes note once again of the dead road. Growing rather annoyed at his, he turns around to look at the almost animated lush green bloom of the academy. He watches as the other unruly boys he once bunked with in the dorms get lined up and marched into ashy white buses by armed orderlies monitoring them as they fall in line into the ashy box creates. He also notices the uniformed female students being talked to out front by one the professors, surrounded by guards and what looked like a line of well dressed females with briefcases and note packets. He assumed they were just parole officers and perished the thought with a cold sigh. He stuffs his chapped hands into his pockets and stares off into the vertical concrete abyss that was the quiet road.
As he looks down the road as the rain picks up, the drone hissing of the brakes from the buses as the side gates of the wall, leading into the parking area open, allowing the buses with the many of proper suited juveniles seated, head in various directions to allow society's scum buckets and crooks in training to their families for a limited amount of time to attempt to enjoy the holiday and stitch their tattered relationships with their now jaded families. Lincoln knew he was one of them.
However, unlike them, he wasn't returning.
Another hour has passed and Lincoln waits in the winter rain as the sky grows dimmer above him. He rubs his now soaked hands together, in a feeble feat to gain warmth. He hovers over his tote bag and looks inside to occupy himself by listing his contents mentally: A worn toothbrush. Half a tube of toothpaste, his reformed papers, his class badge, his damaged white community service jumpsuit with minimal blood on it, a pocket copy of the Bible, a few love letters from some girls from the academy and note of consideration from the marines.
He sighs and closes his eyes.
He couldn't believe how year and a half has passed so slowly and so quickly at the same time.
A car honks.
His eyes opened.
He looks up from his tote and looks to the road.
In a lightly dented Ruidoso brown 1978 Lelend L'accord was Lori. The car was basic in color with a boxy shape with dulled corners. It was truly long in length and was usually in procession of people who lived in the more urban areas. This car was indeed intended to be a luxury car, but time has not done this one any justice from the way it looked. The appeal of the car screamed out 'public housing', considering it looked like Lori went to the south side to buy this kind of car.
She turns her head and gave her brother who was fresh out a slight but still emotional smile. Lincoln, not seeing his sister in so long, smiles brightly. He grips his tote quickly and walks to the car. The sound of the heavy, ice cube like rain beams and tumbles off the hard surface of the metal Western Saddle Firemist paint job. The muffled sounds of the door unlocking from the inside sound off fresh enough for Lincoln to feel prompted to open it. He hops in the passenger seat looks through the lightly fogged windshield as they drive off.
Lincoln sighs sits his tote on the ground and looks at Lori.
She was wearing a light gray hoodie with an odd band name on it. It read in creepy dropping letters 'Money Store'. Her hair was roughed up, and she seemed to have teal colored vest on under her hoodie.
"Well…" Lori said looking at the wet road as she pulls out a cigarette from her hoodie pocket. "How was school?" she finished in an attempt to cast the silence in humor.
Lincoln looks straight ahead at the road and inhales.
"Well, school was fine," he starts off as Lori pulls out her refillable metal lighter. "Not bad for a year and five months."
"Going on six," added Lori.
"You got jokes, I see..." said Lincoln.
Lori flicks the top of the lighter up and strikes up a flame. With the cig in her mouth, she leans in quietly and lights the tip. The loud empty sounding click of the top being flicked back sounds off in the car as she sits the lighter in her cup holder with her phone.
"All seriousness…" started Lori. "Are you okay?"
Lincoln looks at her.
"Are you?" he asked. "When did you start smoking?"
"Don't worry about it. Mom doesn't know. It took me eons to get her to agree to let me drink in the house, I don't want to her bitching at me for smoking," she said.
"And you're cursing and drinking?" asked Lincoln.
Lori sighed
Lincoln looks forward, dribble lines in his mind.
"Look, that place wasn't peaches. It was basically jail and school fused into one, Lori…" said Lincoln.
"So...it's school in general?" joked Lori dryly.
"In normal school, you don't have to worry if one of the students are going to try to take on your teachers with socks full of soap bars-swinging and beating them while you were just taking a quiz in a math class. One second you're stressing on a multiple choice quiz, chewing on the eraser of your pencil in anxiety. Next, you worried if those gang members from the other side were going to come after you-"
"I'm sorry…" Lori said, feeling as if she offended him. "I know it was basically juvi."
"Metal detected every morning, random handcuffed searches in your rooms, mandatory therapy sessions-it was all the things you'd see on television…" said Lincoln quietly. "But it doesn't matter...I don't plan to go back."
"You made a mistake and you learned from it, right?" asked Lori, growly slowly concerned as she ashes her Cadillac cane in the near ancient ashtray.
Lincoln nodded.
"Then that's all you have to say," she finished.
Lincoln looks out his window.
"I thought mom was picking me up today...I-I wanted to ask why her and dad didn't visit me-"
"Don't…" Lori said out of nowhere.
Lincoln turns to her with a confused face.
"Don't what..?" asked Lincoln.
"Don't mention….him…" said Lori.
It didn't take a genius to figure out she was talking about their father.
"But...why? What's wrong?" asked Lincoln, clearly in the dark.
"Look…" started Lori, clearly upset about the topic. "The reason mom wasn't able to pick you up and why she wasn't able to see you was because-"
Lori's cell phone rings, stopping her.
"Lemme guess-Bobby?" asked Lincoln.
Lori digs in her hoodie pocket and stares at the screen and groans, genuinely annoyed.
"Leni…" she said under her breathe. She stares on the road and answers the phone.
"What?" Lori growled at Leni through the phone.
"What do you mean you need a ride? You clocked in literally two hours ago…"
"What?! What the fu-you were what?!"
"Again?!"
"You stupid-oh my god! I swear!"
"Deadass!"
"I-I dunno what it means, either! I'm mad and I'm yelling stupid shit at you!"
Lincoln clears his throat.
"I-It means deadass serious. I learned that from some classmates of mine…" said Lincoln to Lori uncomfortably.
Lori nods and returns his attentions to Leni and the road.
"Deadass serious, you can't keep screwing up like this!"
"N-No! Mom asked me to take Lincoln home!"
"I-I know you missed him too, but-"
"I-I….I know…"
Lori sighs with her caddy hanging idle on the side of her lip.
"Fine. I'm coming to get you….just be outside…"
"Yeah. Love you too-whatever."
Lori hangs up and stops at a red light.
"Okay...Lincoln, there's a change in plans...we were going to go straight home so I can make you lunch BUT our 'darling' sister, Leni, needs us to get her," Lori said.
"I-I know, Lori-I was there…" Lincoln said, rattled by Lori snapping at Leni.
Lori covers her face, tired and angry.
"The fourth time…." she said to herself.
Lincoln, not sure rather to just leave the issue alone or press for clarity on the situation, looks to Lori and gulps lightly.
"What happened…?" asked Lincoln with caution as he hovers his hand over the door handle, in case Lori's rage were to show and force him to jump out to make a daring escape.
Lori takes a drag and ashes.
"The fourth time Leni has been fired...in the last six months…" said Lori.
Lincoln's eyes widen with disbelief.
"She's been fired THAT many times already?" asked Lincoln. "Wait-why is she working?"
Lori sighed as the light turned green.
"You got a lot of catching up to do, Lincoln…" she said looking at him. She turns her signal on to show she is going right on this road.
"Welcome home…" she says as they turn from the light.