Chapter 1

"Let's go, Kiddo." Rachel Montgomery poked her head into her daughter's bright yellow bedroom.

Frankie peered at the clock radio on her bedside table, softly playing a local Christian radio station. 7:02 blared in big red numbers across the face.

"Are you okay, Mom?" she scrunched her face in disbelief. "You are never on time, much less early."

"Oh hush, you! I have a big meeting at work this morning, and I can't be late. Move it!" Rachel disappeared down the hallway towards the kitchen, her heels clip-clopped on the hardwood floors.

Frankie glanced down at the journal she had been doodling in just before her mom popped in. Her youth pastor asked her last week to design the banner for the church's annual Father/Daughter dance in December. She, of all people, is the one without a dad. What was he thinking? Although the sketch was good in her estimation, she slashed a large X through the drawing and tucked the journal under her pillow. She knew her mother would never infringe on her privacy, but she liked it better, hidden from plain sight. You know, just in case. Grabbing her backpack and phone, she flipped off the light and followed after her mom.

Frankie entered the kitchen to what could be described as a scene straight out of a science fiction comic strip. Her Mom's hair had come entirely out of its neat bun, drawers were wrenched open, and the contents were strewn about the countertops.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

"What in the world are you doing?" Frankie looked at her mom, eyes wide, a playful smirk on her lips. "If my room looked like this, I would be grounded." She shook her long silver locks in disbelief.

“I can’t find my keys!” Rachel blurted out in complete frustration. “But I know I left them on the counter.” Pens, note pads, hair ties, and the odd shrimp fork flew across the countertop. Frankie lurched sideways to avoid being impaled.

“You mean these keys?” Frankie twirled the keys around her index finger. “I swear, Mom, you would lose your head if it weren’t for me.”

“Oh, you are a doll,” Rachel gushed. “How did I get so lucky to have a daughter like you?” She knuckle-rubbed Frankie’s head as she walked past and snatched the keys.

“You couldn’t make it a day on your own without me.” They laughed, arm in arm, and headed out the door.

Frankie and Rachel were a lot alike. They acted and looked more like sisters than mother and daughter. Both were tall, standing at over five feet five inches, and slender. They both had long wavy blond hair streaked with silver. The exception was that Rachel’s came from nature, and Frankie’s came from a salon. Regularly they could be found raiding each other’s closets. Their unique similarity was a perfect heart-shaped birthmark below the right eye. Frankie cherished the birthmark just as she cherished her mother. Rachel was striking with her ice-blue eyes. Frankie always felt like she missed out by having “humdrum brown eyes,” as she liked to call them.

The Montgomery girls hopped in Rachel’s little red Toyota Camry, cranked up the radio, and took off toward town. It was just the two of them, closer than best friends, just as it had always been.