Walking Contradictions

"Where are we gonna go?" Anna asked as the three packed the car full of anything they could fit. Cindy had stormed out after breaking up with Thomas in front of his children, so they were a trio again. "The money's fake or traceable so we can't just buy a place."

"Wanna go see your Aunt Lacey?" Thomas grunted, slamming the trunk closed. "We'll go up to stay with her and grandma for awhile, I'll find us a place in a land far far away, and we'll be safe and secure by the end of the week."

"Sounds like a pipe dream." Brad snarled, throwing his bag in the front seat and getting in the white 1987 Toyota Camry and slamming the door. "Fucking son of a bitch." He grumbled, sliding down in the seat and putting his ear buds in and cranking up his iPod.

"Alright, come on." Thomas sighed, taking his child who wasn't pissed at him back up to their apartment one last time. "Make sure you guys have everything you're ever gonna need."

Anna sighed and checked the room she had shared with her brother all her life. All that was left was their furniture. She had packed up her pillow, clothes, books, music, and her Hello Kitty stuffed animal. She looked around at the now bare walls, the posters rolled up and packed. She traced the pencil marks beside the door where their father had marked their growth spurts for as long as she could remember. Nothing she needed was left and she didn't give two damns about Brad so she didn't check on his behalf.

"Come on, kid." Thomas said softly from behind his daughter. "We gotta get going before they come back."

Anna sniffled and felt her eyes burning with tears. She turned to her father and bit her lip. "What if they find us again?" Her voice wavered and threatened to crack with every word.

"They aren't gonna find us baby." Thomas said, pulling his distraught daughter into his arms and holding her tight. "Everything's going to work out, I promise." He smoothed her mohawk out with a smirk and kissed her forehead. "I'm not going to let anything happen to you guys."

Anna tried to smile and went to check her father's room just to make sure she wasn't leaving anything. All that was left was his bed, dresser, and the nightstand, not that there was much else to begin with. She pulled open the nightstand drawer and found it was empty aside from three rings. "Whose are these?" She asked.

Thomas sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Your mother and I's. Leave them."

Anna nodded and put the rings back until her father walked out of the room to tape the keys on the front door for the landlord. She slipped the three rings in her pocket and exited the room and the two left the apartment for the last time.

Thomas sighed and looked at the small apartment one final time. He remember when Brad learned to walk and got rug burn when he fell, when he and Kendra first rented the place out, bringing Anna home for the first time and raising his children there. With a struggle he finally close the door and they headed down to the car. "Ok kiddos, to Mount Shasta!"

"But that's all the way up state." Anna groaned from the back seat. "That'll take forever."

"Oh please, it's ten hours up Interstate 5." Thomas scoffed, turning the Toyota on with a sigh and pulling out of his parking spot for the last time. "Bye apartment." He said softly as he pulled out of the lot and drove away.

The drive was quiet. Brad kept his iPod cranked up and his mouth shut, still pissed that he had almost been killed because of his father's addictions. They watched as the sun set as they left LA and headed north. Thomas played Beck, The Black Keys, Nirvana, Seether, and The Beatles for the first five hours of the drive until they made a pit stop for gas in Tracy, California.

Brad was asleep and Anna perked up and went into the gas station to go to the bathroom. Thomas got out and filled the tank up and groaned at the price. "Please go through." He whispered, putting the cost on his credit card. "Come on...come on....yes!" He went into the small gas station and got a bag of Lays and a Monster and then returned to the car and waited on his daughter.

"Dad!" Anna came running around the side of the small building. "Come here!"

Thomas sighed and reluctantly walked over. "What?"

"I think he's hurt." She said sadly, standing over a fat little dog just laying on the concrete. "What's wrong with him?"

Thomas crouched down beside the panting pug and looked at him. "Go inside and get some water." Anna did as she was told and came back a minute later and took the cap off and poured some on the sidewalk. The dog roused and flopped over and lapped it up and then looked up at the two. "I think he'll be alright." Thomas stood up. "Ok let's go."

"We can't just leave him here." Anna said, scratching the pug behind the ears. "Let's take him with us."

"Baby, we don't even have a home right now. How are we suppose to give him one?"

"He can stay in the car or outside." Anna offered, picking the dog up and checking his underside. "Yup, he."

"Who's gonna watch him?"

"I'll stay with him." She smiled. "I'm not leaving him here."

"Anna, sweetie." Thomas sighed, putting his head in his hands. "We can't rescue every animal you find."

"Dad." Anna pleaded, holding up the overweight pug, who panted heavily. "I love him! I can't leave him!"

"Fine!" Thomas finally growled. "You're taking care of him and keeping him fed."

Anna hugged her father and put the fat ass dog in the car. He automatically laid down and rolled on his back and let Anna rub his tummy while he panted heavily. Thomas sighed and got in the car and they were on the road again. "What are ya gonna call him?"

"Tre." Anna smiled. "Pudgy, cute, and he has a personality."

Thomas rolled his eyes and saw a sign for Oakland. "Well there's the names originator."

Anna rolled her window down and leaned out the window. "I love Green Day!" She screamed into the night towards Oakland before rolling her window up with a giggle.

"Shut the fuck up!" Brad yelled, rolling over in his seat and adjusting the jacket he was using as a blanket.

Thomas rolled his eyes and sighed, putting Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band into the CD player and adjusting the volume. Brad remained asleep, the sounds of his iPod drifting out from underneath his Bob Marley beanie. Anna and Tre were laid out in the backseat; Anna mumbling and Tre making weird groaning noises.

The CD was put on repeat and the timing panned out perfectly. The Camry rolled into the town of Mount Shasta, California at exactly five o'clock on Wednesday, right as Paul McCartney sang Wednesday morning at Five O'clock as the day begins. Thomas shivered at the eeriness of this but kept driving up the now sloping streets of his home town. He passed a liquor store (yes, there really is a liquor store in Shasta), a grocery store, and Jack's. He smiled and vowed to drop in before they left town.

The exhausted car came to a rest in front of the rat shack that was still his mother's home. Thomas got out and stretched, taking the last sip of his Monster energy drink before tossing it on the floor board. His children were fast asleep, as was his mother, but he forced himself to go up the two plywood steps and knocking on the front door. He waited patiently for a minute before knocking again.

The locks on the door unlocked and the door creaked open. "Michael, do you know what time it is?" His mother hissed before realizing which son she was looking at. "Thomas!"

"Hi mom." Thomas smiled sweetly, pulling his mother into a tight hug.

"My baby!" She cooed, holding onto her son for the first time in years. Then it donned on her. "The hell are you doing here?'

"I need help."

"Your best hope for help is Lacey." Thomas's mother sighed as she flipped the last pancake in the frying pan and putting it on top of the stack, placing the plate on the table between her starving grandchildren. "You two need to eat. A lot."

"Thank you." They both mumbled at once, piling pancakes onto their individual plates, already filled with scrambled eggs and bacon, and digging in. Tre laid happily at Anna's feet, chewing on a piece of scrambled egg.

"Where is she now?" Thomas asked, rubbing his temples.

"She came back for a month, and then headed for New Jersey. But last time I talked to her, she was somewhere in North Carolina."

"You said we needed to go far far away." Anna pointed out in between bites of her breakfast. "That'd be the perfect place."

"Yeah but that's all the way across the country. I was thinking somewhere in Colorado or something." He sighed. His mother smacked the back of his hand with her spatula. "Ow!"

"You need to eat! You're nothing but skin and bones." She snarled, pulling bacon out of the frozen pack and putting it into the pan. "You can think later. Let mama take care of you for now. You guys can stay here for the next few days. Your brother would be happy to see you anyway. And you haven't seen Sam or Sarah since Bradley was born."

"Mom, if we get comfortable and stay here-"

"I'm not saying get comfortable. Just make this your base camp for a day or two before you head out again." She admitted a sigh and sat down at the small, packed table. She took her oldest son's hand and smiled warmly. "You've taken care of Michael and I for years. Let me return the favor, if only for a few days."