Side Story: Children

It felt like a sudden heavy rain. The feeling of everything falling down at once and crushing one's body.

Harriet arrived home right when she received a text about Penelope and Heinrich safely making up. She smiled in the car when she saw the text and then opened the car door to get out.

She closed the chat group, then opened back her email. Her step led her inside her mother's condo.

Her heels clacked down the floor near the front door. Her nails, which were freshly done, no longer looked perfect. She found her mother sitting in the living room alone, watching the television.

She sat on the sofa beside her.

"What's wrong?" the woman asked as she glanced momentarily at her. But just one glance was enough to tell her that Harriet didn't seem like the usual Harriet.

She looked at the young woman's nails.

It was an old habit. She thought Harriet had lost this habit of biting her nails, but she was wrong.

"Did you do something wrong?" Helena asked.