The Silver Screen Wars

14 - Laundry

 What was she going to tell her parents? How was she supposed to explain this?

Those were the questions that had run back and forth through Kodi's mind, and no answers were forthcoming. She knew what she was in for. She had known the instant she had signed the papers that there would be hell to answer when she got home, but she could only tell herself that she was doing this for the money. Thirteen large, that was how much she had made today, and somehow the amount was already sitting in her account, ready to be used.

How was that possible? Her bank always made her wait infinitely long times before her deposits finally cleared. Was this the power of rich people too? Making electronic systems work faster?

But that was nothing to complain about. Not when she had an envelope filled with four thousand dollars in cash in her hands right now as she pushed the door to the apartment open. She'd only been gone twenty minutes to skip down to the bank, and things were already in chaos.

"Kodi!"

"Hang on, Juno. I need to talk to mom -"

"She said you need to help me with my homework when you got back -"

"I know, Juno. Let me just take this to mom first."

She pushed away the eleven year old girl with a firm hand on top of the head and shoved past with a grunt. Hopefully Juno would get too impatient to wait for her and do the homework herself. Their parents were getting the girl way too accustomed to leaving it up to Kodi to make sure everyone's assignments were done, even though they already knew the kids pestered her for the answers just to get it over with.

Kodi didn't have a problem doing that since she didn't put much stock in the current state of public education anyway. The only problem was that the kids would then flunk their tests and then the blame would fall back on her. No, thanks. That just meant another trip home, more chaos than she could handle, and a shouting match that rumbled the whole complex (in which she herself did not participate but was most definitely subjected to).

"Mom."

"Oh, you're here." The small woman answered her with only a quick turn of her head before returning to chopping the vegetables next to the sink. "I didn't know you went out. I was going to ask if you could buy more milk."

"Mom."

"Your dad's sleeping, but he needs to take the medicine when he wakes up. I don't know all the new pills, can you check and see how many he needs to take and when?"

"Mom."

"Juno won't get her homework done, if you're leaving again tonight I need you to look over her worksheets. I got a note from the teacher yesterday about her being distracted in class, and she thinks it's because she's confused about the material -"

"Mom."

Kodi stared at the woman who had whipped around, brow furrowed in exhausted exasperation. She was getting old, she thought. Or she had been already. Did she always have so much white streaking through her dark hair? Ever since her dad's accident, all of the household strain fell on the matriarch of the Clyde household instead, from making ends meet with odd jobs to keeping all four kids in line. And occasionally Kodi, too, even if the latter didn't quite agree.

But this would change things a little, thought Kodi. She had to be careful about it so that the woman didn't suspect her of anything illegal or - God forbid, borrowing from loan sharks. She also knew she had to stave off the massive flurry of questions and horrified shock that would come sweeping in when she explained that she needed to stay at an unknown place for three months.

Especially not because of an acting role she had just picked up.

But her dad was sleeping, so this was as good a chance as any to unpin the grenade and let the shrapnel fly. There was less of a chance right now that the ferocious Mrs. Clyde would shout about how acting was a desperate job for desperate people and destined to end in failure if she continued to pursue it.

Like Kodi didn't know that already. But the alternative was to take out more loans to go to school and get a degree, and that was time that she couldn't earn money that they needed. It was a short term fix, pursuing this acting career with a half-hearted dedication that was mostly born of pure financial need, but at least it was some kind of fix.

Better than sitting in a classroom watching the clock tick and going home with only a part-timer's pay.

"So...I got an advance," she began, and the woman's eyes narrowed in immediate suspicion. "Hang on. It's nothing sketchy, I promise. From my first contract, I guess it did well after all? And they gave me this so that I show up to the promotional events over the next few months."

Her mom didn't reach over to take the extended envelope, which made sense since her hands were wet (and also holding a kitchen knife). Kodi quickly drew it back to herself and pulled out the wad of bills halfway.

The woman's eyes grew as round as golf balls.

"Kodi -!"

"And apparently this is just the beginning. So I've got to go around, do my rounds, all that."

"...You didn't get another acting job, did you? I thought you were going to look at enrolling -"

"No, but it's too late to enroll for the fall semester because financial aid won't disburse soon enough. It's fine. I'm enrolling in the spring since the financial aid will be available by then. I figured a few weeks of picking up extra money will help me figure things out. You know some of the other people in the cast had degrees too, I was thinking of asking them what I should go into. Maybe computers or something."

The woman's face relaxed, but only fractionally. "You promise this isn't from something bad, Kodi?"

"I promise. There's more coming, but only for a limited time since it's only until the director moves on to his next show or whatever. And if I help out now, I might get in good royalties later so that I don't have to take out those student loans in the spring."

"...How much is that?"

"Four thousand -"

"Four thousand!"

"Mom, shh. You'll wake Dad."

And that worked like a charm. The woman struggled to keep herself contained, visibly shaking with the effort.

"It's fine. He told me it's because he really wants me to join on the promotional tour. So...at this point, I feel like we owe him. It'll be scummy of us not to thank him for it, and besides, he said there's more. It's...not something I should turn down for a lot of reasons."

One thing Kodi had learned how to do very well, she mused as she watched her mother's face travel from one end of the emotional spectrum to the other, was lie very well - when she wanted to. She didn't often feel the need to filter herself to the point of dishonesty, but when she had to...her exacting precision was unparalleled where her parents were concerned.

"...He's a nice man, but we can't accept that money."

"Well, Mom. Are you going to be the one to do it? He's just going to beg you to let me come work for him again. And I've only just persuaded him to drop it since I'm starting school up soon."

The woman sighed and turned back to the counter. "...Leave it on the table so that your dad and I can take care of it. Take what you need out of it first."

"I'm good until next week. That's when the next batch comes in. If it does really well, Mom, this might help take care of the credit card bills. It'll take a lot off Dad's mind. You know he feels guilty that he can't help. It's going to kill him if things don't get better, and this feels like our chance."

Her mother's shoulders hunched slightly, and Kodi felt a flash of guilt burn through her. She knew she was playing dirty, but it couldn't be helped. She had taken the job already, and to avoid a catastrophe, she was going to have to keep it secret while explaining where the money had come from.

While also making it totally believable. Hence not revealing that she had 126,635 dollars sitting in her account at the moment. Definitely not opening that can of worms. Now all she had to do was funnel the money to her parents every week and pretend it was just pay from her old director.

"You promise you didn't borrow this money from someone?"

"Mom. We're not that desperate yet. Borrowing money now just means more debt later, I get that. Maybe in the future if we're rock bottom and have no other choice, but right now, we have a little bit left, don't we? Enough to pay the rent next month?"

Kodi watched her mother's back carefully. Despite everything, the woman was old school - refused to let her children (even the grown one) know the exact numbers. Not your responsibility to worry about, she always said, both her and her father.

Except it was her responsibility. She was an adult, she could contribute. She deserved to know exactly how bad the straits were. The only reason she knew they were well over a hundred thousand dollars in debt was because she had rummaged through the medical bills before Mr. and Mrs. Clyde had stashed them away as if she had no business knowing, as if she had no business helping.

Not your responsibility.

Yeah f*****g right.

Well, they were out of that hole now. Or they would be soon, at least. She just had to do the simplified equivalent of laundering the money so that they didn't suspect anything too amiss.

"Well, okay then," she said stiffly when there was no reply and the woman began chopping the vegetables again. "Uh, just one more thing. I have to leave tomorrow."

"Tomorrow!"

"Calm down." Kodi motioned at her to continue what she was doing, all casual boredom and matter of fact reassurance. "We're not going far. Think we're only going as far as Long Beach, but I'll have to stay with them since we're going to be going around and meeting people, all that stuff. I can always take a bus home if you need me, won't ever be more than a few hours away."

"...Do you have to go?"

She grimaced. That tremulous fatigue, she recognized it so well. She wished she didn't have to do this, and if she had a choice she would try to help out at home - but breaking her back under Bishop Cassius's 260,000 dollar yoke was going to solve all their problems. Her mom just had to stick it out for three months, that was all.

And in case there was an emergency, that much was true. She wouldn't hesitate to run home and help.

"How long did you say it would be?"

"Just three months, Mom. And then after that, everything will be fine. I promise."