Max and his mom drove through Belport toward their shop. They were among a second wave of citizens and workers allowed back into the city. It’d been three weeks since the end of the war, but it felt like it’d been much longer.

Max hung his head out the passenger window. Most of the trash and seaweed had been swept clear from the streets, but most of the damage to buildings was still being repaired. They passed countless shops and homes with busted windows and furniture piled on the sidewalk in front of them. It only seemed to be getting worse the deeper into the city they went.

He couldn’t begin to imagine how much work it would take to fix a flooded building. The floor, the walls, all of it had to be gutted and redone. His heart sank at the thought because that was only the beginning of what awaited him and his mom at their store. Most of the electronics and storage on the first floor were now garbage.

“Maximillian… I said, have you heard from Emmett?”

Max startled out of his daydream. “No. Sorry, Mom.”

Her frizzled gray hair blew in the wind. She reached over and patted his shoulder. “I’m sure he’s alright. He’s probably working. Or schmoozing with Clara—”

“Mom, you can stop trying to make me feel better.”

She glanced at him a couple more times—Max could see her out of the corner of his eye—but they stayed quiet the rest of the way to the apartment. They’d both managed pretty well the last few weeks, but that was when they’d both been on standby mode. Max had continued patrolling with the Summit, and Marlene had helped out at the shelter.

But now they were going back home.

Until now, all the flood damage and wasted merchandise were hypothetical. They existed out there in the abstract. Neither him or his mom had dwelled on it. She hadn’t brought it up, and Max was completely fine with that.

Max had unconsciously started holding his breath as they crossed onto the familiar streets. Circuit Surgeons was on the edge of South Side. The buildings in this part of town were older, all brick fronts with faded signs. Most stores had small apartments above them where the owners lived. Marlene turned onto their street and passed busted up and boarded-up windows of the pizza shop, the bookstore, boutique, flower shop, and corner grocery store. Even with the breeze, the air smelled musty and damp.

Marlene pulled beside the curb in front of their store, and Max let out the breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.

Circuit Surgeons had been hit hard. The first-floor windows were gone and the apartment ones on the second floor were cracked. The old neon sign was gone—just gone.

Max ran a hand over his short red hair. “Mom…”

“It’s exactly what we thought. Now, come on.” His mom was already walking to the door.

Max sighed and followed. Marlene unlocked the door and tried to push it open. Electronics had been knocked over and lay against the other side of the door. It took both Max and his mom pushing against it to get inside the shop. An old TV, the heavy, boxy kind, gave way with a squeal of metal.

The inside of the shop didn’t look any better than the outside. It didn’t smell any better either.

Max’s intuition had been correct. The entire shop was trashed. The shelves leaned perilously against one another. Boxes of electronics and spare parts were scattered about the shop. Even with the windows busted out, the smell of mildew hung heavy in the air.

“Fuuuuc—ow!”

Marlene smacked him across the back of the head. Not hard, but enough to get her point across.

“Sorry, mom.”

“That’s enough of that, Maximillian. The construction company will be here in…” Marlene checked her watch. “...In a little over three hours. We need to sort through as much as we can.”

Max sighed quietly to himself and got to work.

On the way over, his mom had explained the basic steps of what they’d have to do. First, an electrician would check the shop and help them get the power back on. Then they’d set up fans to finish drying the place out. Then the subfloor would need to be inspected, drywall removed and walls gutted…

It was a lot.

As they cleaned, both Max and his mom snapped pictures of all their inventory, the shop, and the damage. Marlene had records of their inventory, but it helped to have pictures when she got around to submitting the insurance claim.

They started by clearing as much of the floor as they could. Marlene went through most of the scattered electronics, figuring out which would be the easiest to repair or salvage, and which could be tossed. Water wasn’t exactly kind to electronics, especially complicated ones. Even if it wasn’t plugged in, wires and connections could rust, or salt and grime could gum up the works.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Max wasn’t sure what he expected, but his mom thought that most of their inventory wasn’t salvageable. Game consoles, TVs, phones, all got unceremoniously piled up in the center of the shop. A constant stream of trash trucks was coming through the city. When the next one came by, Max and Marlene would start dumping the lost inventory.

Max felt numb. The family shop hadn’t exactly been doing well before the war, and now… What the hell were they going to do now?

Marlene had run upstairs. She came back down, carrying two small fans. She set them down, and they immediately turned on without electricity.

Mom was a gadgeteer, just like Max.

She said, “They’re not much, but they’ll do for now. If anyone asks, tell them they’re battery powered.”

Max looked around the wreckage of their life. The pit that had taken root in his stomach was heavy now.

“Mom…”

Marlene turned toward him. Max knew his mom well enough to know that she was putting on a front. Underneath, she was just like him—about to crack from the stress.

So, how was she holding it together so well? Max was a cape. He hadn’t just survived the war with the Deep Ones, he’d fought in it! He’d helped protect Belport against hordes of bloodthirsty fishmen.

What the hell was wrong with him? Why was seeing the shop wrecked worse than having a fish-man trying to bite his face off?

Max just wished he could hold it together as well as her.

Marlene must have seen the turmoil on her son’s face, because she walked over and embraced him. Max wrapped his arms around his mom, afraid to breathe because he felt like he’d start bawling his eyes out.

His friends were gone. His home was fucked—

“Gah!” Max pulled away and wiped the single, manly tear from his eye. “Sorry. I don’t want to get snot all over you.”

Mom snorted a laugh. Her eyes were misty, but she’d held it together better than he had.

“I’m going to sell the shop.”

Max wiped his eye on his sleeve. It took another moment for him to register what she’d said.

“What?”

Marlene took a deep breath. “Insurance should cover most of the merchandise and the damages… and after we fix the shop up, I’m going to sell it.”

Max shook his head in disbelief. The pit in his stomach was already forgotten.

He stammered, “If it’s about the money, I can pick up more hours with the Summit. They need the help. Or I can get a job…”

His mom went over to the broken front window and brushed off the windowsill. She sat down and waved for him to join her. Finally, he walked over and took a seat across from her.

“Why?”

“It’s not all about the money. Alright, it’s a little about the money.” Marlene shrugged. “Now’s as good a time as any to sell. We can start over, Maximillian. I might even travel a bit. Not for a while, but eventually. I think Europe got hit pretty hard by tidal waves, but I’ve always wanted to see it… Maybe after it’s rebuilt.”

As his mom talked, the mist in her eyes gradually turned to a sparkle of excitement.

“You’re serious…” Max said quietly. “But I thought you loved this place?”

“I did. I do…” Marlene sighed. “This place is always going to be special to me, but it’s been hard too. Not just balancing the books, but just being here. It hasn’t been the same since your father left. We kept the shop afloat, but it feels like we’re trying to hold on to the past instead of trying to make something for ourselves.”

Max crossed his arms and leaned against the window frame. Ten years. Ten years since Dad left. To hear Mom talk, it sounded like the old man had actually been around. But Max barely remembered him.

Dad would sit hunched over one of the tables, “balancing the books”, while Mom taught Max how to fix things and make gadgets. When he was young, Dad popped Max up onto his knee while he worked, but Max could only stay there if he wasn’t a distraction. When those rare moments occurred, Max tried to stay as still as possible. He’d watch his dad write, or he’d even read over the pages of numbers over and over. Anything to try to stay still, to try to hold onto that moment.

Because as soon as he moved, Dad would shoo him away. It was like Max had to make himself as small as possible, to hide in plain sight… to not be a bother. That was the only way to keep his dad around.

Mom must’ve seen how much those days bothered Max because she would inevitably pull him aside to make gadgets together. Now that he thought about it, he wasn’t sure if Dad knew about his or Mom’s powers.

Those last few years, Dad barely said two words to his son. Maybe Max’s red hair and freckles reminded him of Marlene. Didn’t really matter—Max had never forgiven him for that.

Nowadays, Dad texted twice a year. Once on Max’s birthday. Once on Christmas. Like a machine. Sometimes Max replied.

Dad had a new family somewhere out west.

“Maximillian, say something.”

Max shook himself out of his thoughts and cleared his throat. “I, uh… I don’t know what to say.”

Max looked up and met his mom’s eyes. She’d put on a smile or a brave face for so long, and picked up the pieces of her son after his father had shooed him away. She didn’t need to do that for him anymore. More importantly, Max didn’t want her to do that for him anymore.

Besides, she got the same twinkle in her eyes when she talked about traveling that Max got thinking about being a cape.

Max started again. “I don’t know what to say… but I want you to be happy, Mom.”

Marlene smiled despite the tears welling up in her eyes. “We both deserve to be happy. And something tells me that you don’t really want to take over the shop. You need to stretch your wings and run the rooftops. You’re a hero, not a repairman.”

Max snorted a laugh and his mom followed shortly after. It wasn’t even that funny. Maybe it was the tension in the room finally breaking.

The shop was all Max had left of his dad, but the old man had moved on a long time ago. It was time for Max and his mom to move on, too.

~ ~ ~