7:00 PM. Cooper got home from the ten-minute ride. His black cat, Jinx, immediately greeted him at the doorway.

"Hello boy," he bent down and played with him by rubbing his huge, warm belly. "Who fed you?"

"I did."

Cooper looked up and saw his mom descending the stairs in her nightgown.

"Mom!" Cooper came and kissed her cheek. "How was the game? I thought you wouldn't come home until next week?" He asked, referring to the basketball game his mom funded all the way in the Philippines.

She sighed, "It was terrible." Then she walked off towards the kitchen, Cooper trailing behind her. "The coach died during their flight, so we ultimately had to cancel our entry."

Cooper froze at the horrible news. "I'm extending my condolences." He awkwardly chuckled. "You lost money?" He asked as he sat on one barstool while his mom took out the microwaved leftovers for Cooper.

"The major chunk of the money is untouched, but I don't have time to think about it. It's not the right time to be selfish. And also, I'll just invest it on another team temporarily while they take their break." She poured water into a cup for Cooper. "But since I've spent money on their flights and accommodations, I think I'll go for a local team for now to replenish the loss."

"Have you found one yet?"

His mother lightly shook her head. Then, reached out to Cooper's nose and pinched it until it turned red while she chuckled.

"I missed my son so much."

"Mom, stop!"

Meanwhile, on the other side of the city...

"What the hell do you need?" Cale glared at the "stupid crying digital beaver" stuck in a "stupid egg gadget" who does nothing but make "stupid beeping noises".

He stopped walking in front of his house and looked at the window. The lights are still on.

He paused for a minute before ripping out the batteries from the noisy device, breathed in, and finally entered his house.

Cale tried not to make a noise. He watched as his father snored on the sofa while the TV blasted gun noises from the military movie left unwatched.

He walked past behind the couch, shoes in-hand, towards his room near the living room where his father was. And just as he was about the open the door, his father spoke.

"Cale." Then, the TV turned off.

Cale's breath hitched, but he answered. "What?"

"We're running out of groceries." His father spoke calmly.

Cale subtly peeked into the kitchen, just beside his bedroom.

Filthy. There were still unwashed plates from last week, and the garbage bin was overflowing with garbage from take-outs and cans of beer, which pissed him off.

"I told you to stop that college bullshit and start working that ass off."

Cale's grip on the doorknob hardened. This is the reason he avoids his father that he's willing to stay out in the cold for hours.

"It's the seventeenth, isn't it?" Cale referred to the date. "Your payout is on the fifteenth. Where is it?" He boldly faced his dad, who looked frozen in shock. "Saved in those beer cans?"

"Watch your mouth." His dad pointed to Cale's face. "I don't want my flesh and blood questioning me like that."

"Then why don't you become a better person so I won't?"

His father stood slowly with his crutches, struggling to move in the tight spaces between the furniture.

They came face to face. Strings of tension between them could play a whole guitar solo.

"Is it too hard to earn money?" His father stated under his breath, a smell Cale tried not to take in.

"Is it too hard to just die?"

Not long before that came an echoing sound of his father slapping his face.

"Get out of this place!"

And so... Cale did. He left the house that very night, with a backpack carrying everything he owned, including Cooper's ID chucked inside his pocket.