My mother and I moved from Los Angeles to Toledo, Ohio, two days before my eighteenth birthday.

She said a move would be character building. In reality it was a veiled attempt to escape husband four and his angry temper.

So we moved like we always did, quickly and quietly. My birthday took place in a rundown diner on the highway instead of the underage nightclub my friends had booked. I hadn’t had time to mention the move to anyone but Tully, my best friend, and I had no doubt that there would be a lot of angry girls at Grey’s that night, disappointed I hadn’t made a special effort to inform them of my absence.

Not that it mattered.

Mom managed to rent us a ‘cozy’ two bedroom flat in the city. Cozy in the sense that it took four big steps to cross from one side to the other. I didn’t complain though. It was enough for the two of us and our few bags of belongings to fit quite nicely.

I never understood the need for a large house anyway…

Mom got a job pretty much immediately in a café down the street. Long nights, crappy wage, free coffee. Needless to say, we managed.

Two weeks after we settled in, I finally got around to enrolling at Toledo High School.

And a week after that, I finally showed up to one of my classes.

And bumped straight into her.