Skeletons

Falyn Fitzpatrick stuffed an old quilt into the top of the box and taped it up, setting it by the front door with the other two boxes. She looked around at the now empty house, feeling a mixture of dread and nervousness in the pit of her stomach. She didn't want to leave this house. She didn't want to uproot her life.

Now that her mother was gone, she had no family left in Portland. She loved everything about the city and she hated to leave it, but she missed her father. He was still relatively young and healthy, but he was all alone in the small town of Charming, California and he was now the only family she had left. Falyn had grown up there, but she ran away to her mother in Portland when she was seventeen years old. She hated Charming.

Tonight was their last night in the house where she'd spent the last twelve years. Everything was already packed up with the exception of an air mattress, a change of clothes for the morning, and their german shepherd, Gage. The doorbell rang so she quickly moved through the living room to the front door.

"Savannah, the pizza's here!" she yelled up the stairs and then opened the door to get the pizza and pay the delivery boy. She headed back into the living room with it and flopped down onto the air mattress. Savannah shuffled into the room a few moments later, falling down next to her mother and taking a slice of the pepperoni pizza.

"This move really sucks, Mom."

"I know, kid."

"Do we have to go to California?"

"Sav, I told you we're going to live with Papa."

"But it's going to take forever to get there. I'm gonna be so bored."

Falyn rolled her eyes at her daughter as she picked up her own slice. Savannah was eleven now, which meant she was already developing the dramatic preteen attitude.

"What's it like there anyway?"

"Well, it's nothing like Portland. The weather's always good. It's a small town so everyone knows everyone."

"You know everyone there?"

She sighed, nodding her head. "Unfortunately I do for the most part."

Falyn spent the rest of the night answering her daughter's questions about Charming until Savannah finally fell asleep around eleven. She had a hard time falling asleep after thinking over her past life in Charming.

The next morning, Falyn woke at the first light and got dressed then woke her daughter. Once they were both ready, Falyn put the dog into the back seat and grabbed the last boxes that were sitting by the front door.

After the last box had been shoved into the car, Falyn locked the front door of the house and climbed into the driver's seat of her suv while her daughter begrudgingly climbed in the passenger side. She started the car and fastened her seatbelt then connected her ipod to the stereo system. Savannah rolled her eyes at her mother's choice of music as they pulled out of the driveway and started the drive to Charming.