by Brook Wilder
“I have to go.”
He reached out, sliding a thumb across her cheek and Lori gasped at the sudden contact and the heat in Tex’s gaze.
“I’ll be back, sweetheart.”
Lori watched Tex and Porky leave, still feeling his touch against her skin.
It was another hour before the last few customers finished their beers and left, and her head was stuck on Tex the entire time. She started wiping down the tables for the night, so wrapped up in him that she didn’t hear Gears sneak up behind her until it was too late.
He grabbed her by the upper arm, his grip so hard that she knew it would leave a bruise, and he pulled her around to face him.
“You must think I’m a fucking idiot,” he snarled, and Lori cringed from the anger in his gaze and the booze on his breath.
“Wh-what are you talking about? Of course not…”
“You know exactly what I’m talking about, whore!”
Gears leaned even closer. With the table at her back, there was nowhere for her to run.
“I saw you with that smart ass! I saw the way he looked at you! You’re sleeping with him, aren’t you!”
“No! No, I’m not. I swear, Gears. I’m not.”
“You’re lying! You’re all liars! I know what I saw. I know what you did with him, you bitch!”
Lori was frozen, paralyzed with fear, as visions of her nightmare came back to haunt her. She couldn’t even open her mouth to scream. She couldn’t do anything.
“You’re mine! No one else can touch you. You belong to me!”
Gears drew his hand back and Lori braced herself for the blow, but he stopped himself just before he hit her. His expression transformed from rage and jealousy to wide-eyed and pleading in an instant.
“I would never hurt you, Lori. You have to understand that. You just… You can’t do that. You can’t do that to me. It was a misunderstanding. I would never hurt you. You’re mine.”
Terrified and fighting back tears, Lori watched Gears stumble away from her.
She didn’t wait. She turned and ran from the club, not slowing the whole time as she ran towards her home, praying that Tex could do what he said he could.
Her life depended on it.
Chapter 23
The sound of the doorbell echoing through the small house made Lori’s stomach churn with dread. Instinctively she glanced down at her cell phone. Of course there was nothing there. She didn’t know why she expected there to be.
It had been weeks since she’d last seen Tex. No word from him. No call. Nothing. She’d even given in and texted him a few times, even after she told herself she wouldn’t. But still – more nothing.
As the days had passed, that little bit of hope that Tex had made her feel had dimmed like a shadow settling over her. Ever since that night with Tex at the bar, things had gotten so much worse.
She didn’t blame Tex, not really. She should have known, going into things, that he wasn’t the type to stick around. He was in a motorcycle gang, for Christ’s sake. And he ran drugs for a notorious crew. What had made her think she could trust him?
No, she knew exactly where to place the blame. Squarely on her own shoulders. She had no one else to blame but herself. She should have known better. She did know better. She knew better than most that people couldn’t be trusted, that they always betrayed you in the end.
Lori was standing in the middle of the tiny living room, thinking about what to do. Over the last few weeks, Gears had grown even more unstable. She hadn’t thought that was possible, but it just went to show that she didn’t know people at all.
Now, he stopped in at random times of the day and night, ringing her doorbell, pounding on her door until she opened it. Just ‘checking in on’ her, he would say. But she knew it was more than that. The few times she’d been gone when he stopped by, he’d freaked out, shouting at her from the sidewalk.
She’d become more and more of a shut-in, rarely leaving her house. She couldn’t now. Her car, the same car that Gears had leant her, was gone. One morning she’d woken up and it had just disappeared.
She’d asked Gears about it and he said it had been recalled. He was just worried about her safety. When she’d asked him how she was going to get to work every day, he’d answered her by cutting her hours at the club. Then he’d ‘raised her rent’. So, by the time she got her paycheck at the end of the week, it was barely enough to pay for groceries, let alone anything else.
For the hundredth time in the past few weeks, she contemplated calling Tex or Carrie or the god-damned police. But what could she say? Hi, yes, the man who helped get me off the streets and gave me a job and home to stay in is cutting my hours at work?
Lori knew how these things worked. The cops couldn’t do a damn thing unless Gears did. And then it would be too late for her anyway. A single desperate tear slid down her cheek and she wiped it away angrily. She had no use for tears. No use for tears, or cowboys.
The doorbell rang again, more insistently, and Lori knew she had to answer it. He wouldn’t go away. She’d tried ignoring him before and it only made things worse. The only thing she had going for her was that she could normally talk him down enough to leave her alone for a day or two, before his jealousy overwhelmed him again.
Lori drew in a deep breath, throwing back her shoulders as she walked through the living room. There was no use resisting.
She grabbed the doorknob with a trembling hand and pulled the door open in one movement.
She nearly died from relief. It wasn’t Gears standing on her front porch, like she’d so come to dread. It was Carrie.
With a shaky laugh, Lori stepped back, waving Carrie inside. In the next instant, Lori was engulfed in a big hug and the scent of Carrie’s cheap perfume. It smelled like heaven to her.
“Hey, Carrie. It’s so good to see you,” Lori said with a big grin.
Suddenly she was fighting back those pesky tears again, but they stayed away this time. Carrie pulled back, looking Lori up and down as her dark eyes grew wide with concern.
“Oh, honey. You look awful.”
Carrie gave her another quick hug.
Lori just shrugged.
“It’s this bug.”
She tried to sound as casual as she could. She didn’t need another thing to worry about.
“You’re still getting sick in the mornings?” Carrie asked, taking a small step back.
Lori let out a small chuckle.
“It’s not contagious. I’m not running a fever or anything.”
Lori shrugged again, hoping she sounded a little more convincing to Carrie than she did to herself.
“It’s just all this stress. And it goes away after a few hours. It’s not a big deal.”
Carrie was still giving her that wide-eyed look.
“Maybe you should go to the doctor, honey. I’m worried about you.”
“I’m worried about me too,” Lori said on another chuckle, but this time there was no humor in it. “I’m worried about how the hell I’m going to get out of here. Gears has been getting… worse.”
“What do you mean?” Carrie snorted derisively. “How could that maniac possibly get any worse.”
Lori shrugged at first, wondering how much she should reveal. But, as soon as she opened her mouth, she found it all tumbling out. Not just the things that Gears had done, the obsessiveness, the strange visitations that happened more and more frequently; she also told Carrie about her hours being cut and the car being taken.
“Why don’t you get a different job, hun,” Carrie suggested gently.
Lori threw her hands up in despair.
“I brought it up to Gears, in a sort of roundabout way.” Lori practically sobbed the words, “He said the house is just for rent to employees of the club. He would kick me out and I’d be no better off than I was a year ago, homeless and doing everything I could to get a meal. I was hoping Tex would…”
Lori cut off her own sentence. She hadn’t wanted to say anything about
it to Carrie, but it was too late. She’d already picked up on it.
“You were hoping Tex would what?”
“He said he was going to help, Carrie.” Lori looked up at her friend hopelessly. “He left weeks ago with the rest of the pills. He promised he would be back, but it’s been almost a month and I haven’t even heard from him. Not even a text. It was so stupid. I should never have relied on him.”
The anger that was deep inside her started to rise to the surface.
“I should have known better than to trust him. I should have known he would abandon me. Just like everyone else.”
Carrie was back, wrapping one arm around her shoulder.
“I’m not abandoning you, Lori,” she said fiercely. “Something tells me that you weren’t stupid for trusting him.”
Lori rolled her eyes. She was done trusting, relying on others to solve her problems. She would just deal with it on her own. She would find a way. She had to.
A sudden knock at the door had her jumping and Lori shot a frightened glance towards the front. The pounding came again, harder and louder this time and Lori started again.
“Shit, it’s Gears,” she whispered.
Carrie’s brows drew down in a hard expression.
“I’ll deal with this,” she said and started towards the door.
But Lori stopped her.
“No, Carrie. It’s not your problem. It’s mine. I’ll take of it. No one else will take care of it for me.”
She muttered those last words more to herself than to anyone else, but it didn’t make her feel any more reassured as she forced her own legs to move.
The door rattled on its hinges the next time the knocking came, but Lori threw the door open, making sure to fill the doorway with her body so that Gears wouldn’t try and sneak through.
“Good morning, Gears,” Lori said as casually as she could manage. On the inside, she was trembling like a leaf.
He sent her a cold smirk, looking past her to try and see inside the living room.
“I saw someone come over.”
“It’s just a friend, Gears. Really.”
Lori let out a deep breath, hoping this would one of the better times. Sometimes he walked away after a few moments. She saw his eyes grow hot with anger and jealousy, and dread sank deeper inside her. She didn’t think anything about this was going to be easy.
“A friend, huh? What kind of friend?” There was an edge to his voice as he spoke. “I just wanted to check in and make sure you were okay.”
“She’d be okay if you let her work a full shift at the club! Or left her alone. Better yet, just stay the hell away from her all together!”
Lori winced at Carrie’s angry words. A part of her loved her friend for standing up for her, but the other part was more than worried about how Gears would react.
She hurried to forestall the explosion she knew was coming.
“It’s just Carrie, see?” Lori pointed behind her. “She came over to hang out and see how I’ve been feeling. You know how I’ve been not feeling so great the past week or so.”
Emotions warred on Gears’ face at Lori’s words. Anger at Carrie and concern for Lori. Jealousy and possessiveness and sympathy. Emotions that shouldn’t go together at all.
Finally, he settled on a sort of possessive pride that he shot in the form of a smirk at Carrie, who was still glaring at him.
“You see? Lori isn’t feeling well. That’s why I cut her hours at the club. She needs to rest, and it’s my responsibility to take care of her.”
“You call this taking care of her?” Carrie snorted,
Lori threw her a warning look.
“More like terrorizing her,” Carrie continued undeterred. “You’re pathetic. You think you could ever be worthy of her? Not in a million years.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about!” Gears railed, the anger suddenly pushing to the forefront, “You’re just a slut. You don’t know anything!”
“Please, Gears. I’m fine. You should go. Really.”
Lori started to shut the door, hoping that would be enough to deter him, but Gears slapped a hard hand against the wood with a loud smack, stopping her.
“You should pick your friends more wisely, Lori,” Gears said, suddenly menacing as he glared murderously at Carrie. “You shouldn’t hang around with whores like her.”
“She’s my best friend,” Lori said, feeling an anger of her own at Gears derogatory words. “And she’s one of the most incredible people I know. I have to go.”
He let her shut the door this time, but she didn’t move until she heard his footsteps leave the front porch and walk back in the direction of his own place.
Nausea hit Lori hard, the stress from the altercation making it even worse, and she dashed past Carrie towards the bathroom.
A few moments later, her friend was there, holding back her hair, as Lori leaned over the toilet. Afterwards, Carrie handed her a wetted towel.
Lori cleaned herself off and then, with a grimace, went to the bathroom cabinet for her toothbrush and toothpaste. Carrie watched while Lori brushed her teeth.
After spitting in the sink and rinsing her mouth out twice, Lori finally felt a little better. When she turned around, Carrie was holding something in her hand.
“What’s that?” Lori asked, her eyes widening as Carrie opened her fingers and she saw the stack of fifty dollar bills in her friend’s hand.
“I know it’s not a lot,” Carrie shrugged, looking away bashfully. “I’ve been saving up, picking up extra shifts for you.”
The tears that Lori had been fighting so hard came rushing back in full force, and she couldn’t stem the flood as she threw her arms around Carrie.
“This means so much to me,” Lori sobbed, swiping at her eyes as she took a step back. “Carrie, this is… It’s…”
“Like I said, it’s not much,” Carrie shrugged and then grinned. “Besides, I know you’d do the same for me if I was in a bad spot.”
Lori just shook her head, speechless, as she looked at the cash.
Carrie’s grin faded after a moment and now she really did look abashed.
“Listen, I brought you something else too. Just in case…”
“In case of what?” Lori asked, confused, as Carrie pulled out a small pink box from her bag.
Lori nearly choked when she saw what it was.
“A pregnancy test? What the hell is that for?”
Carrie shrugged, looking more uncomfortable now. Finally she huffed out a sharp breath.
“It’s for you, Lori.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Honey, I think… I don’t think it’s a regular bug you have. I think you might be… pregnant?”
Lori’s mouth dropped open. Shock filled her. At least it was enough to stop the water works, but she couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
“That’s impossible,” Lori stuttered, holding the bright pink box like it was viper that could strike at any moment.
“Is it?” Carrie asked, giving her a questioning look that made Lori take a step back.
She opened her mouth to say of course it was impossible, but something stopped her. She thought back over the past month and realized that she hadn’t had her period. Not since… Not since that night with Tex.
“I know the signs, Lori,” Carrie said softly. “The nausea. The tears. Oh, just take the damn thing already. Pee on the stick. If it’s negative, then you can tell me I was wrong and you can laugh in my face, alright?”
Carrie didn’t wait for Lori’s response. She just grabbed her bag and left Lori standing there in the bathroom, a stack of cash in one hand and a pregnancy test in the other.
Lori wasn’t sure how long she stayed like that, not moving. But now Carrie had put the idea in her mind, she knew she wouldn’t be able to get it out until she knew for sure. It was ridiculous, the whole thing. Honestly, there was no way she could be actually pregnant.
Then why are you so afraid to
take it? said a little voice in the back of her head, and it sounded just like Carrie.
She took a deep breath before tearing open the package. Five minutes later, she was sitting anxiously on the edge of the tub, watching the time tick by until the timer on her phone went off.
Lori couldn’t move. She couldn’t look at it. It was sitting there, a small plastic stick on the edge of her bathroom counter top, and she couldn’t make herself look at it.
