by J. Bengtsson
When there was no response, I knocked again. It was what I always did – gave them some time to answer, hoping today might be my lucky day. I startled at the sound of movement on the other side of the door, and then suddenly it opened a crack and a little boy stared up at me. His hair was a wild mess, and he was wearing nothing but a pair of what I assumed to be hand-me-down pajama bottoms that were hanging off his little body.
“Hi.” I leaned down to address him. “You must be Quinn.”
He peered up at me, squinting in the sun, and I wondered how long it had been since he’d left the house.
“Who are you?” he asked, much too suspiciously for a child his age. “I’m not allowed to talk to reporters.”
“That’s smart thinking, but I’m not a reporter.”
“Are you coming to take me away?”
His question was unsettling enough that I bent all the way down to his level before I asked, “Take you where?”
The little boy’s eyes dropped to the ground, and then I understood. Quinn wanted to know if he was next – if I had come to steal him. He was too young to grasp what was happening, and so he had come up with his own conclusions.
“No, sweetie. Don’t be scared. I’m Keith’s girlfriend. My name is Samantha.”
“Quinn!” A young female voice cut through our conversation. “What are you doing? What did I tell you about opening the front door?”
Keith’s sister Emma appeared in the doorway, grabbed Quinn’s hand, and protectively pulled him back and away from me. “Who are you?” she demanded. “What do you want with us?”
“It’s okay,” Quinn said, peering up at his sister through impossibly long lashes. “It’s Keith’s girlfriend. Maybe she knows where he is.”
Emma’s gaze narrowed in on me. “You’re Sam?”
“Well, yes. Samantha.”
She continued to evaluate me, and for a moment I was afraid she would send me away. What I hadn’t anticipated was her arms wrapping around my back and pulling me in for a hug. A few months ago, such a scenario would have seemed impossible; the moors of popularity would have kept us a good distance apart. But I no longer felt inferior to this girl. Yes, she was still physically perfect, but life had a way of evening the score. And Emma McKallister had been humbled.
I’d seen her around school recently and had been shocked by her transformation. Once the leader of the most popular sophomore posse in the school, Emma now wandered the halls alone, preferring to spend her lunches in seclusion in the school library.
“I’ve seen you around, and I thought maybe you were her, but because sophomores have a different lunch period than juniors and seniors, I never actually saw you and Keith together. He showed me a picture of you months ago. You’ve changed so much since then I wasn’t sure.”
“Yeah, I…” I was about to explain to her the reasons for my metamorphosis but figured she had too much on her mind to sit through a drawn-out explanation, so I just asked the most pressing question. “He told you about me?”
A smile highlighted her beautiful face, letting me know she and Keith had, in fact, discussed me at some point. “He did, and I just want to thank you for all you’ve done for my brother.”
Tears sprang to my eyes. “It wasn’t enough.”
“There’s nothing more you could have done. Keith… he likes to take the easy way out. That first night, he didn’t even wait for the sun to rise before he was flying high. I get he’s trying to numb the pain, but what he doesn’t understand is, it’s not going away. He’ll have to deal with it at some point, and by then, it will just be so much worse.”
As I’d done every day since this nightmare began, I wished there was more I could do, because I was confident that if I could just get my hands on Keith, I could help him. “Do you know where he is? I can’t find him anywhere, and he won’t answer my calls. I’m scared for him, Emma. Really scared.”
“I am too.” She sighed, and it was a heavy sound. “He does come by once in a while, usually at night, but he never stays long. I haven’t seen him in probably five days now. It’s not good, Sam. He’s in a bad way.”
“Do you know what he’s taking?”
“I don’t, but I’m guessing pot isn’t his only vice anymore.”
None of this came as a shock, but at the same time, it wasn’t what I wanted to hear, either. I dropped my head. “That’s what I was afraid of.”
“Everything’s just gone to shit.” Her voice crackled with emotion. “Keith’s figured out a way to deal with it by numbing his brain. Honestly, I’d envy him if I didn’t want to beat the living shit out of him for abandoning me. I mean, we all know where this is headed for him. I thought maybe…”
I reached out for her, offering what support I could. “You thought what?”
“I thought maybe he’d pull it together for you. I don’t know if he’s told you, but he loves you, Sam. Like head over heels in love. Before… this… he was all in. He even talked of moving away to wherever you went to college. That’s how committed he was to you. I know you’re disappointed in him – I am too – but if I can find him, will you help me? Maybe together we can do something.”
Relief buoyed my spirits. Of course I would help. I was the one standing on his doorstep pleading for information. “I’ll do anything, Emma. Take my number, and the next time he comes home, call me. It doesn’t matter how late. I’ll sneak out if I have too.”
And I would. I’d do anything for Keith. The question nagging at me, though, was would he? Because when it came right down to it, none of this was up to me. Stoned-out Keith was running this show now, and if he hadn’t leaned on me for support weeks ago, what were the chances he’d change his tune now? I loved him, but I wasn’t sure that would be enough to save him – or us.
“Okay, thank you,” she replied, her shaky voice growing stronger. “Whatever you do, Samantha, please don’t give up on him.”
I gripped her arm, and an understanding passed between us. “Never.”
Worn but hopeful after meeting with Emma, all I wanted to do when I got home was veg out in my room, but life with my mother never went according to plan. I hadn’t even stepped one foot through the door before an object whizzed by my head, smashing against the wall.
“What the…?”
The second time I wasn’t so lucky, taking a direct hit to the head. I stumbled back in shock, my hands clawing at the wound. Blood dripped from my hairline.
“Did you think I wouldn’t find out? Did you think you could just hide your whoring ways from me? Is that why you lost the weight – so you could screw some boy behind my back?”
My mother was waving a pregnancy test in front of my eyes. I’d used it a week before when my period was late. It had come back negative, but that didn’t stop me from promptly hiding the evidence of its existence at the bottom of the outside trash bin. How in the hell had she found it? Upon closer inspection, however, I realized she was holding the second pregnancy test, the one I hadn’t peed on yet. I thanked my lucky stars for small miracles. Yet the fact remained, she’d been rummaging through my drawers… and I was bleeding from the head.
“Where’s the other test, Samantha? Are you pregnant? Who is the boy?”
“I’m not pregnant. And the boy is none of your business.”
She rushed me, and I was too dazed to flee as her open palm connected with my cheek, knocking me over the side table. I landed in a heap on the carpet. Eyes glazed over in crazy, my mother jumped on my stomach, pinning me down. The power she derived from insanity was a force I couldn’t dream of fending off. But even as uncontrolled as she became in moments like this, I could not have predicted what came next – a pillow placed over my nose and mouth. At first it didn’t seem real, like she was playing a game, but as the pressure increased, I began fighting for my life.
The head wound slowing my defenses, my breath became labored as panic set in. My mother, the woman who’d given me life, was now trying to smother it out of me. I struggled mightily
under her iron grip, but she was too crazed with anger, screaming obscenities at the top of her lungs. My nails ripped into her hands, trying to dislodge her, but I could feel the life draining away. I never thought… I never…
And then suddenly air flooded back into my lungs. The pillow was gone, my mother plucked from my deflated body by a force I was slow to understand. But as my vision, and wits, slowly returned, I could see who’d saved me from certain death: a nameless next-door neighbor.
“Calm down!” He yelled to my flailing mother who’d taken to using her teeth to dislodge herself from his grip. “Call the cops. She’s psycho.”
It was only then I noticed the woman kneeling beside me cradling my head in her lap. She was already two steps ahead of her husband, a phone pressed against her ear.
“You’re okay,” she said, repeating those two words until help arrived on the other side of the line. “Yes, my husband and I heard screaming. The neighbor’s front door was open, so we ran over to see if we could help, and found the mother trying to suffocate her daughter. The mom is crazy. The girl is bleeding. We need an ambulance… and the police.”
There is no greater love than that of a mother for her child. She can cure her baby’s sadness with a hug or lift a car off her trapped child or jump into the ocean to save her toddler from certain death. Once upon a time, I’d had that mother. Although faint, it was still a memory I carried inside. She’d once been loving and kind, and Sullivan and I… we were happy. I remembered in elementary school her picking us up from school, a radiant smile gracing her face as she embraced us and asked about our day. I was proud to be her daughter then.
But gradually something changed in her. Some evil force had grabbed hold and turned her into the monster I knew today. Instead of love, she spewed hate. Instead of building us up, she tore us down. What had happened to her? Where had the mother I remembered gone?
By middle school, Dad had all but disappeared, and Sullivan and I were living behind her cloak, quietly taking the abuse because we’d become conditioned to accept cruelty as a way of life. Maybe if she hadn’t been so sneaky, reserving her abuse for private times so others couldn’t see it, my brother and I wouldn’t have been so afraid to speak the truth.
Sullivan did finally speak the truth… but only after his body hit the ground.
And now it was my turn. I had to find my voice… to stop protecting her. That mother I remembered was gone, and she was never coming back. I had to look out for myself now. And so I spoke my truth – at the hospital to the officers who had arrested and escorted my mother to the county jail. With her vile words still ringing in my ears, I spilled my secrets to the sympathetic duo. Only after the cut on my head had been stitched up and the ER doc on duty cleared me was I released to the care of Shannon’s sympathetic parents.
In the coming days, my life would be turned upside down but, for now, I was safely cuddled up beside Shannon in her twin-sized bed. I knew this arrangement couldn’t last indefinitely. The O’Malleys were more than willing to take me in for a week or two, but I doubted their charity would last a school year or more. I needed a more permanent solution because even if my mother made a deal that got her home before dinner tomorrow night, I would never return.
Moving in with my father was not an option; I knew he’d never make space for me amongst his new family. My dear ol’ dad had checked out long ago. That left only one family member I could turn to – Auntie Kim, my mother’s estranged stepsister. Although not a blood relative, she was the closest thing to family I had. The case worker assigned to me had already contacted her and she’d agreed to take me in. But going to her meant leaving behind Shannon and Keith and the beach I’d come to love.
Speaking of Shannon, she turned suddenly in the bed, nearly catapulting me to the floor.
“Oh, geez. Sorry,” she giggled, grabbing my waist and pulling me back from the brink of disaster. “I’m not used to sharing my bed with a hot surfer chick… or, you know, just with anyone. Not that I’m a prude or anything. I mean, I’m into guys, but I’d totally go for you if I wasn’t.”
“You really didn’t need all that explanation,” I said, adopting my best pouty face. “I get it. I’m not your first choice.”
“Well, now hold on there.” She snorted. “You twisted my arm. Why not? Come here, chicky.”
We rolled around, laughing, as I swatted her grabby hands away.
“Honestly, though.” Shannon flipped herself onto her back. “Is it not possible for an awkward six-foot-one redhead to get a date in this town? I swear I even put my feelers out to that greasy-haired nerd Pete in AP English – you know, the one who gets spontaneous erections during the reading of Hamlet? Anyway, I’m not lying, Samantha, even he wasn’t interested.”
“Because he was probably too nerdy to know you wanted him to ask you out. You need to find a guy with at least an ounce of swagger.”
“Says the girl who has options.”
How wrong she was. Yes, maybe since my transformation there’d been an uptick in interest from the male species as a whole, but the only boy I’d allow to lay his hands on me had simply vanished from my life.
And very soon, my speckled bestie would be gone too.
Shannon sat up, gasping. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean that you weren’t still with Keith. I just meant you could do better than me.”
“I could never do better than you,” I replied, biting back the emotion threatening to overcome me.
Brushing her fingers over my bruised cheek, my best friend provided the comfort I needed.
“Shannon?” I whispered, depleted.
“Yes?”
“It’s not safe for me at home anymore. I have to leave.”
Her eyes instantly filled with tears. “I know you do, Samantha.”
I turned one of her spectacular spiral curls through my fingertips. “You will forever be the best friend any girl could ever ask for.”
“I know,” she replied. “I’m pretty special.”
“Yes, you are.” I wiped the tears rolling down her cheeks.
Her voice heavy, she asked, “Where will you go?”
“My aunt was already contacted, and she agreed to take me in. By next week, I’ll probably be gone.”
“Okay, then,” she said, putting on a brave face. “If that’s the case, we need to find Keith and let him know.”
“How would I do that, Shan? I’ve been looking for him for weeks. He doesn’t want to be found. Maybe… maybe it’s best to just go.”
“But you love him.”
“Yes. But sometimes that’s not enough.”
“That’s not how romance novels end, Samantha.”
“Yeah, well, mine sucks. The end.” I gripped Shannon’s hands and looked her in the eyes. “But enough about Keith. I need to know if you’ll be okay by yourself at school. I hate the thought of you sitting at the lunch tables by yourself. Can you sit with Mia or Nicole maybe?”
Shannon lowered her gaze and looked away.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she hesitated. “It’s just… I’ve sort of been lying to you. I don’t have a fifth period class. I can actually leave school before lunch. I just stayed so you wouldn’t have to eat alone.”
The space in my heart reserved just for her expanded. I might have been unlucky in family and unlucky in love, but I was a winner when it came to Shannon O’Malley.
17
Keith: The Debt
I was too out of it to hear him coming. It wasn’t until his hands were lifting me off the sofa and throwing me across the room that I got the memo that Steve was in the house. After hitting the wall and sliding to the floor, I struggled to pick myself back up, but it was useless. I was too wasted.
“Where is it?” he demanded, before the toe of his boot connected to my stomach. I could pretend I didn’t know what he was talking about, but we’d both know it was a lie. I owed him money, which he in turn owed to his bosses and so on and so forth. We were all heads on
the same totem pole, mine being the one at the very bottom.
Placing my hands in front of me in hopes of calming him down a little, I said, “I was given three days, dude, and I still have one to go.”
“No, idiot, I was given three days. You were given two. The way it works is you pay me, I pay them, and everyone’s happy. But see, now you’re breaking the pattern, and that doesn’t make anyone happy.”
Once I’d started using again, I found it wasn’t as easy to get my supply as before. Brett Valentine was bitter over my abandonment and resistant to feed the newly resurrected habit of his rival. He’d all but driven me out of his district, forcing me to go straight to the source for my stash. And sadly, that source was a smarmy dude named Steve who was always there to offer bigger and better highs, all at a price that was getting harder and harder to afford. But I was willing to do anything to ease the pain and keep my brain in a perpetual state of lethargy. I’d found my way out… but at what cost? Because cannabis wasn’t doing it for me anymore, I’d been forced to move on to opiates, and from there, I’d worked my way down the ladder to hell.
Another swift kick to my ribs smacked the breath clean out of me.
“Get up so I can beat your ass to the ground again.”
“Come on, man,” I tried reasoning. “Look, you know I’ve got issues right now. My brother, he’s missing, and I’m doing my best to keep it all together. I promise, Steve. Tomorrow you’ll have your money.”
Jake. I hated myself for dragging his good name into my mess like it was some excuse. He deserved better… so much better. Weeks had passed with nothing. No miraculous reunion. No waking up from a horrendous dream. Not even a body to bury with a proper goodbye. Jake’s absence had left a gaping hole that was getting wider every day.
