*****
By the time the seven and five year olds loaded into their school bus, their mother had found and collected her older sister's clothing and returned them to her, who doused herself in the shower to try and sober up. An hour later, Aurora emerged from the hallway bathroom dressed in only her jeans still unzipped and just her black bra looking like hot mess standing there in the hallway. Her once neatly pulled back hair now nothing more than a wet chaos of dark strands running over her olive colored facial features like a spiders web.
"Good God, you look like shit!" Athena said as she watched the 30 year old make her way to the kitchen table all hunched over, reminding her of their 80 year old grandmother back in Italy.
"Please tell me you have some coffee here someplace," Aurora requested as her sister reached for a hot pot of the liquated rejuvenator.
"Here, I knew you were going to need this," she said as she poured the dark fluid into a coffee mug and sat it before her sister.
"How do you want it?"
"Black will do," the drunken woman said as she took hold of the cup in both hands like it was made of gold and placed it to her lips.
"Careful it's hot!" Athena cried as her older sibling chugged the steaming brew like water. All she could do at that point was watch in amazement at Aurora's tolerance for pain.
"So tell me, what the hell brought you here like this anyway?" Athena asked as she took a seat beside her older sibling.
"I came with good news for you."
"This is how you celebrate good news."
"Well…..yeah."
"Okay, let's have it," Athena asked rolling her eyes in disbelief.
Reaching into her jeans pocket, Aurora pulled out of wad of cash and placed it on the table with a thud. "Here," she said with a bowed head but raised her eyes to meet with her sisters. "This is for you and the kids," she added before gulping another large sip of coffee.
In a state of somewhat shock, Athena looked upon the money. "Where did this come from?" she said as if her sister robbed a nearby bank.
"Don't worry about where it came from, just take it," Aurora told her between sips.
"Aurora, I just can't take money from you and not know where it came from."
"Look, I worked my ass off to make that and I wanted to help you and the girls, I know you're having trouble with the mortgage since Dean walked out…..please take it I want you to have it……I would only drink and piss it all away anyway," Aurora said laying her head upon the table.