Rebel Wrong

Chapter One: The Reason Why I Rebel

Cade didn't bother waiting for her brother to pick her up after her shift at the diner was over. After three months of him being at least half an hour late, she knew it'd just be faster to walk home. A forty minute walk at eleven o'clock at night in the middle of December wasn't a dangerous thing at all for a seventeen-year-old girl.

Cade didn't mind though. She had been taking care of herself since she was eight. She was basically left to her own devices when Axel turned fourteen and was deemed responsible enough to take care of not only her, but ten-year-old Bianca as well. Axel's idea of babysitting was to lock himself in his room to play video games while he left his little sisters to fend for themselves.

Both of her parents were pretty busy with their new lives, after the divorce. They never really got to live their lives since they had Axel when they were still in high school and were coerced by their parents into getting married. 

After twenty years of her father sleeping his way through half the women in town and her mother taking every drug she could get her hands on to escape her life, one of them suddenly realized that their marriage wasn't working out. 

Now her father was married to some rich b***h in California and her mother was so drugged off her ass that she couldn't hold down a job, which forced them to move into Axel's two bedroom apartment just off the college campus. It was a mother-daughter slumber party every night. There was nothing like making sure a forty-year-old woman didn't choke on her own puke to make a relationship stronger. 

It was nearing midnight on a Saturday night and that meant the last half of Cade's commute was filled with drunken entertainment provided by the students at the local college. 

There were a few frat boys making a snowman stripper right in front of the statue of the founder of the college. The boys, themselves, were dressed in women's snow boots, banana hammocks, and ugly sweaters.

Tonight's entertainment was extra special as there were cops and even an ambulance present. It had been a while since an emergency rescue had to take place. A whole four days at least. She was internally laughing at the stupidity of college kids as she got closer to the scene and noticed that all the action was taking place at her apartment complex.

Her stomach started to twist into knots. She knew this had to do with her mother. It wouldn't be the first time that her mom had gotten in trouble with the law. 

Cade pushed her way through the crowd of people until she reached the roped off police line. She was worried. This was much more extensive than any of the other times that her mother had been arrested. There was a good chance that her mom had overdosed and this time she could actually be dead.

"Excuse me, but you need to step back behind the yellow rope," an officer told Cade as she crawled underneath 'said' rope. 

"Excuse me, but I live here," she snapped. She didn't have much respect for police officers.

"I'm sorry, you'll have to wait until this matter is settled," the officer replied. He adjusted his belt and stood up a little straighter. 

Cade was just about to tell him off when she spotted her brother coming out of the apartment complex. He was pretty easy to spot with the bleach blonde faux-hawk spiked on top of his head.

"Ax!" Cade ignored the officer as she jogged over to her brother.

"Cade?" He looked startled to see her, like he had forgotten that she existed right until that moment. 

"Please tell me that the old lady on the 3rd floor finally kicked the bucket," Cade begged her brother.

"I found Mom on the bathroom floor," he sighed, rubbing the back of his neck.

"How bad?" she asked, her heart falling. 

"She was still breathing. I think she'll be okay, but they're gonna take her to the hospital to pump her stomach," he shrugged.

"Oh," was all she managed to say. 

She didn't utter another word as Axel ushered her to his car. He wanted to go to the hospital to make sure that their mother was okay. She really didn't care one way or the other. Was it wrong to actually hope that her mother died, just so she wouldn't have to deal with the drama anymore?

Cade sat patiently in the waiting room as Axel talked to the doctor. There were a few other people there. A particularly hysterical woman that was making odd screeching noises kept most of Cade's attention. It was hard not to stare at someone that had thick streaks of mascara running down her face.

The scene was becoming harder and harder to look away from. Cade was actually thankful for her brother's presence for the first time in her seventeen years.

"Mom has to go through a mandatory rehab program for 90 days," Axel announced as he walked back into the waiting room after speaking with the doctors.

"Awesome," Cade said, rolling her eyes. 

This was all she needed to add to her life at the moment, as if going to school full-time and working full-time wasn't enough of a hassle. If she wanted to take care of another human being, she'd go out and get knocked up just like half the teenage girls her age. 

"So, do we have to take her there ourselves or do they ship her there straight from the hospital?" she inquired.

"Cade," Axel warned. He was forever lecturing her when she showed indifference to their mother. 

Cade couldn't really care less about what her brother thought. She had been the one who wanted to put their mom in rehab over a year ago, when they first found out she was doing drugs. He didn't think her addiction was that bad. He still didn't think it was that bad when she lost her job and the house. Cade tried to bring Bianca in on it, but Bianca's idea of dealing with a situation was to ignore it. 

"I'm sorry Ax, but some of us actually work full-time to support our families and it just so happens that I have to be to work tomorrow at eleven and it's already after three in the morning," she snapped at him. 

She had no sympathies for a guy who worked part-time as a mechanic and only had two classes a week. She had to be in school for seven hours a day, five days a week, which ultimately was a major waste of her time, but it was easier to get grants and scholarships for college with an actual high school diploma, instead of a GED. 

"What do you know? You're still in high school," he sneered at her, giving her a superior look.

"Yeah, I am in high school, but I do pay half our rent and buy most of our groceries," she replied, giving him her own superior look.

"Well, how would you like not to have to pay rent or buy groceries?" Axel asked out of nowhere. 

"What?" She gave him a confused look.

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about," Axel told her. 

"Yes?" she asked, cautiously. 

Axel's track record with responsibility was just about as shotty as their mother's. He killed his pet fish by dumping an entire can of fish food into the tank, hoping that the fish could feed itself for the next month. This happened after he had graduated high school.

She was waiting for him to tell her that he had blown all their money gambling and that they were being evicted from the apartment. What he said next was far worse than anything she could ever imagine.

"I talked to Dad. He wants you to move out to California with him," he mumbled, not looking at her. 

She stared at him for a full minute before she exploded in anger. "Are you insane!?" she yelled at him.

"I can't take care of you for the rest of the school year and even if I did claim custody of you, Dad really wants you to stay with him," Axel said, giving her an apologetic look.

"I don't care if the man got down on his knees and begged, I will never live with him," she growled, angrily stomping her foot on the ground.

Her opinion of her father was pretty low. It had to be if she chose to live in the glorious luxury of a college apartment with her lazy brother and drugged up mom. 

Their dad had left without a word. He hadn't talked to any of them in over a year. The only reason he did make contact with them was because he got a letter from the bank about the house being foreclosed on. Even then, he just called to yell at their mother and call her a worthless piece of trash.

"Why does Dad want anything to do with any of us now? He's been ignoring us for the last two years, can't we just keep it that way?" she scoffed. 

"No. I already told Dad you'd stay with him," Axel said, as if his finite decision would be the end of the story.

"Ax, I've lived in Michigan my whole life! I can't move to California," she whined. She knew that she sounded like a whiny brat, but she really didn't care at the moment.

In the end, she lost the fight. She was allowed to finish out the semester at her school, but as soon as Christmas vacation began, she was shipped off to California, to live with her new rich family. 

If those money grubbing snobs thought that she'd be happy to live the life of luxury, they had another thing coming. No amount of money was going to change her mind. As soon as she saw a chance to escape, she'd take it.