Highway Princess - 1

And here it is, the first part of Highway Princess, a story I'll publish every 2/3 days, a story I know how it starts but I have only a very faint idea of where it is going.
I hope you guys out there will like it.
It starts a bit slow, but who knows... might get fast and hot in a few days.

They gave Emma a small cardboard box to clear her desk. She did not have much to bring back home. Praise the digital revolution. She put in the Star Trek mug with the pencils, the silver framed graduation photo with her mom and dad, her old-fashioned leather bound organizer. A spark of rebellion burned in her chest and she dropped in the box a pack of twelve yellow lined pads that, to be completely honest, belonged to the office. Screw them, she thought, drumming her out like this after five years.
She chuckled to herself. They’d probably bill her the notepads and the pens and detract them from her final paycheck.
Screw them.
She pushed the box to one side and sat down to clean her hard disk. She tried to delete her passwords and authorizations, too, but found out the admin had already taken care of that.
Screw them.
“Shit, they really did it.”
Emma turned on her chair. Her friend Missy was standing in front of her cubicle, making a face.
“I expected it,” Emma said. It did hurt, it hurt badly, but yes, she had half expected it.
“They are a bunch of wankers,” Missy said. Then she looked around, to make sure nobody had overheard her.
“Well, it’s over anyway.” Emma stood and checked the combs holding her bum in place. A single black strand escaped her do, and fell along her cheek.
“Listen,” Missy said conspiratorially, “I’ve talked with the girls and—we’d like to buy you a drink, to say goodbye in a proper manner, you know.”
Emma arched her eyebrows and checked her watch. “Yeah, why not—”
“Say in half an hour? We can go to Lonegan’s.”
Emma nodded. “Sure. I’ll make a few calls in the meantime. Might as well use the phone one last time.”
Missy winked. “Half an hour.”
But they had cancelled her line already.
With a sigh, Emma sat down on her computer chair, pulled out her outdated smartphone, and dialled her mother.
“Emma, darling, how are you?”
Emma shrugged. “I’m fine. I’ve just finished clearing my desk.”
Her mother on the other end sighed. “It is so unjust.”
“They told me clear, this is a business, they must increase profits and cut expenses.”
“It was not like that. It was not.”
Her mother was right, of course. When they had started, they were a no profit organization to help abused women and single mothers. It was naive and improvised and enthusiastic.
As an adopted child herself, Emma, fresh out of college, had been in charge of family services. It had been good.
It had been important.
They had gone for profit six months before.
One third of the employees fired, mostly women. Half the services closed.
“Do you have anything coming up?” her mother asked.
“Right now, a drink with the girls, and then I’ll see Ed for dinner.”
“You know I still have your room ready,” her mother said.
“They haven’t chased me out of town yet, mom.”
Her mother laughed. “You know you are welcome. It would be good to have someone around the house again.”
After her father had died, her mother had reinvented herself as a caterer first, and then had started a successful lifestyle blog. She made a decent living, but as a home business owner, she spent most time holed up in her place alone with her cats.
“I’ll call you tomorrow,” Emma said.
“Sure—oh, listen—”
“What?”
“I—did anything else happen?”
Emma frowned. “Anything else what?”
Her mother sighed, and chuckled. “Nothing. You know how we old ladies are. Forget about it.”
Emma stared at the phone for a moment. Then she shrugged and called Ed. She got the vocal box instead.
She told him to come and pick her up at Lonegan, then she sat back and waited for the last ten minutes of her old life to tick away.