I eventually made it back upstairs and shared dinner with my sister. It wasn't till I was about halfway through eating that my mind seemed to clear enough to realize I probably had a concussion. The faded regeneration rune in sharpie on my wrist must have been doing something, because I gradually felt better the more time passed.

I still didn't actually feel good, but recovered enough I didn't think I had a brain bleed that would kill me in my sleep, so even though it was barely 5 pm and I had a ton of things I wanted to accomplish, after I was finished eating I went to bed.

I woke up abruptly with my mom's hand on my forehead, a grim look on her face filling my vision.

"Mom?"

"What's this I hear about you getting hit by a car?"

"Uh, I got tamales for everybody. Yours are in the fridge. "

"Oh, you'd like to change the subject? That's fine, where the hell did you get money for tamales? If you've been running errands for Ernesto I will beat your ass."

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It took me a second to realize that Ernesto was Mr. Reyes' first name. It popped a weird thought in my head wondering how long my mom and the local drug dealer had been on a first name basis, but then the import of her question set in.

"Jeez, mom. Chill. I sold some electronics. I'm actually starting a little side hustle, fixing phones and stuff. "

"Since when do you know how to fix phones, and why has my broke ass been replacing the ones you've got if you can do that. "

"It was a ...uh... recent development. The trials. "

"Hmmmn, about that. Have you seen the press conference by the president yet?"

"Like of the United States?"

"Well, sweetie, the President of Mumbai might have had a press conference too, but I doubt it would affect us much. I'm guessing you didn't see it. Get up, watch it, then come talk to me, son. I'm glad you're not roadkill. "

I grinned at that last part, and as my mom left the room snagged my phone out of my hoodie pocket on the floor and tucked it back into my homework dock. I pulled up my favorite news aggregator, they were a biased ad everyone else, just in the same direction I preferred.

The headline and commentary weren't flattering, but they also had a video clip of the speech itself, so I cued it up as my mother had directed.