The Bandit

by B. B. Reid

  Anna’s eyes were clouded, and as someone who shared her pain, I knew all too well the dark place she was headed. “Where is Brandi, anyway?”

  She rolled her eyes, and my shoulders relaxed. Anger was sometimes less dangerous than sadness. “Off with her latest boyfriend.” She huffed. “She is so selfish! She was the reason I was late to babysit Caylen, you know?”

  “It’s okay, Anna. That job wasn’t going anywhere anyway.”

  She frowned. “What are you going to do for money?”

  I shrugged as if I wasn’t breaking into tiny irreparable pieces. “I’ll do what I’ve always done. I’ll find another one.”

  She appeared thoughtful. “Until then, don’t worry about paying me. I’ll still babysit for you when you need to look for work.”

  I sighed and felt at least one of my burdens disappear. “You’re an angel, you know that? I promise to pay you as soon as I can.”

  “It’s no problem. I love Caylen.” I nodded. “And he loves you, Mian.” I nodded again. “It will get better.” I didn’t react that time. She’d said the same thing each time I lost a gig or the lights were turned off. I just wasn’t sure I believed her anymore.

  The sudden intrusion of Caylen’s cries filtered from the only bedroom in the apartment, which we shared. “I have to get that.”

  We laughed and ignored the heaviness in the room. After seeing Anna out, I made my way to the bedroom. Across the room, in the crib I had found for a bargain, was the reason I even still tried.

  I smiled when I saw that he had managed to kick off his blanket and continue to throw a tantrum fit for an eight-month-old. I scooped him up and cradled his warm body against my chest. He no longer screamed, but his fussing went on as he tried to eat his fist.

  “I’ll guess you’re hungry, huh, little guy?” I left our bedroom and entered the kitchen. I hadn’t had the chance to prep his bottles before leaving for work, so I made quick work of it one-handed while attempting to soothe him. After popping the bottle in the microwave, I took stock of what we had and calculated we had enough food and diapers to survive another week. Whatever I did, I had to move fast. Time moved fast when you didn’t want it to.

  Tomorrow, I’d search the papers and every square inch of the city by foot if I had to.

  There were thousands of restaurants in the city.

  One of them had to be hiring.

  * * *

  I was still jobless after a week of scouring as many places as I could, as often as I could. I even took Caylen with me on the cooler days to search for work. I was now down to the last of our food with no money and no solutions.

  “Mian?”

  I recognized the voice and groaned. Joseph ‘Joey’ Jones was my second-floor neighbor. He lived here with his mom since he was seventeen and still in high school. He also had an unfailing crush on Anna and begged me to talk him up to her every time we ran into each other. The one time I asked, Anna had made it clear she wasn’t interested. “Not my type and never will be,” is what she said. I pushed through the fronts doors and quickened my pace when the sound of his footsteps grew closer.

  “Hey, wait up!”

  I could hear him breathing now so I turned and forced a smile. “Hey, Joey. What’s up?”

  “Damn, girl. I had to run after you. Did you not hear me?”

  “Nope.”

  “Oh, that’s cool. So where are you headed?”

  I shrugged. “Nowhere special.” I attempted casual but his bushy eyebrows bunched together under his backward red cap. I could even see the riots of dark curls peeking out from under it.

  “Why so secretive?” He chuckled and stuffed his hands in the pockets of his cargo shorts. I’ve known Joey since the first day I moved in, and he had offered to help me unload my meager belongings. He’s always been nice and helpful and even chauffeured Caylen and me around in his beat up old Chevrolet when the weather was too bad to trek it. I had no real reason not to trust him.

  It’s just that trusting people with your secrets made you vulnerable, and I’d had enough of that already.

  “I lost my job,” I offered. “I’m hunting for a new one.” I left out the part about me being destitute and almost out of food.

  “With Caylen?” He nodded to him strapped to my chest. The carrier had been a godsend in the form of a hand-me-down I graciously accepted from Tara who lived on the first floor. She had seen me struggling to carry Caylen and two handfuls of groceries one day and had helped me carry them. After thanking her for the help, she’d reappeared at my door with the carrier. Turns out, she had a two-year-old son who’d outgrown it. I turned it down, feeling wrong for taking from a stranger until she patted her arm where her birth control was planted and reassured me she had no plans of having another one.

  “Anna’s working today.”

  “Right.” He looked from me to the baby and then met my gaze again. “I could watch him if you want.”

  I hesitated because I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. Joey’s maturity level wasn’t quite there for me to trust him with my baby. “That’s okay. I’m just filling out applications today.”

  It was a lie I was hoping he didn’t see through. I was actually heading to one of the only payphones that probably still existed. I had scraped up change in a few junk drawers and planned to use it to call the last two people I ever wanted to ask for help.

  “Oh, okay then.” I nodded and turned away. “Before you go…”

  Damn it.

  “Yes?” I really wanted to get this phone call over with before I backed out altogether. Joey was threatening that.

  “Have you talked to Anna lately?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “About me.”

  “Joey…”

  “I know what you’re going to say, but maybe she’s changed her mind!”

  “Why don’t you just talk to her yourself?”

  “Because…”

  “Because what?”

  “Because she’s beautiful,” he answered softly. His eyes shone with admiration, making me wonder just how deep his crush actually went.

  “And you have trouble talking to beautiful girls?”

  I wondered what that meant for me since he talked to me just fine. I wasn’t conceited, but I never considered myself unattractive either. Feeling self-conscious, I ran my fingers through my hair in a subtle attempt to improve my appearance. I suppose it’s what I got for letting stress make me not care what I looked like.

  His laugh broke through my self-loathing, and I cut him with my glare. “Of course not or else I wouldn’t be able to talk to you either.” I actually blushed, but then remembered this wasn’t about me. “It’s just that I see her as someone I want to…” He blushed.

  “Have sex with?”

  He flinched at the bite in my tone. “No! More than that. I just don’t know how to explain what Anna means to me.”

  Oh, jeez. He was in love with her!

  It was sweet yet incredibly tragic since I knew without a doubt that Anna would never feel the same.

  “Joey?”

  “Yeah?”

  “If it’s meant to be, it will be.” Jeez, that was lame but what else could I say?

  He nodded and studied his feet. I expected him to argue or to launch into one of his many crazy schemes he came up with to make Anna love him, but instead, he turned with shoulders low and walked back into the building.

  I stared at the door and considered going after him but what good would it do? Lying to him wouldn’t help him either.

  “And the award for World’s Biggest Asshole goes to Mian Ross,” I mumbled.

  * * *

  “ This is the Ross residence.” Hearing my aunt’s nasal voice made me consider hanging up, but then, my baby boy cooed and wriggled against me with his adoring and trusting eyes staring up at me. He didn’t deserve t
o suffer because of my pride, so I took a deep breath.

  “Aunt Gretchen, how are you?”

  “Who is speaking?” The temperature drop in her tone told me she knew exactly who was speaking.

  “It’s Mian.”

  “Mian. Hmmm. I hope you’re well,” she answered. I could almost hear her derisive snort. “Why are you calling?”

  “I—we… need your help.”

  “Mian, really—”

  “Please, Aunt Gretchen. I lost my job, and I’m out of money. If not for me then could you consider your great nephew?”

  “I’m sorry, Mian. We gave you a chance but you chose to be just like your father. You chose to sin over God, so now you have to pay your penance. Please don’t call us again.” The line died. The only family I had left and the only way for my son or me to eat tonight had tossed me away like trash for the second time.

  When I discovered I was pregnant, I was devastated and afraid. I managed to hide my pregnancy for five months. Despite my aunt’s religious beliefs and how far along I was, she demanded that I get an abortion.

  “You’re to get an abortion and do it quietly.”

  “Aunt Gretchen, I can’t. How could you ask me to? I thought—”

  “You are not going to shame me in front of the church. Cleanse yourself of this sin or get out of my house.”

  I’d been on my own ever since.

  Counting out the change I had left, I realized I had enough to make one more phone call. I had to make it count.

  I picked up the receiver and hoped my memory didn’t fail me now. I’d dialed it so many times in the past only to hang up that I knew it wouldn’t.

  “Hello?”

  “It’s Mian.” I decided to cut to the chase. My own aunt didn’t offer me the courtesy of recognition. I had no reason to believe he would.

  He exhaled heavily into the phone while I held my own breath. “What do you want?”

  “I’m sure you know what I want, or I wouldn’t be calling. Believe me when I say, I want nothing else from you.”

  “So you think you’d just pin a baby on me to get paid?”

  “You and I both know that’s not what this is about. I lost everything because of you.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “You raped me. Or don’t you remember? You should. I was the one drugged out of my mind while you had all the fun.”

  “What are you going on about?” He’d snapped. Indifference was replaced with anger, and for the first time since I told him about Caylen, he reacted. “You know what? It doesn’t matter. Because no one would believe you.”

  “Are you sure about that? Caylen—that’s his name by the way–is your son. Whether you want to believe that or not, all it will take is a simple DNA test to prove.”

  “Yeah? And how do you think you could get me to do that? Tell the police? My father will bury you.”

  “You underestimate the way the justice system works these days. It’s no longer politicians who rule the world. It’s social media. It’s drama. It’s scandal. All I have to do is point, and you lose.”

  “You’re out of your mind.”

  “That’s where you’ve got it twisted. I’m a mother trying to feed her child—a child that you wronged the moment you stuck your dick in me without my permission .”

  “You’re bluffing.”

  “Am I?”

  “Even if you aren’t, you’d have a tough time proving the son of a senator raped you.” I imagined his face twisting with disgust as if I were the one drugging and raping.

  “Maybe not. And it may be that the age of consent in Illinois is seventeen… but we both know the twenty-one-year-old son of a senator impregnating an underage nobody, whose father is in prison for murder, and who also accuses him of rape, will destroy your father’s career when this goes public. And it will go public, Aaron.”

  Silence.

  It stretched on for so long that I thought maybe I had finally won.

  But I was wrong.

  The line had died and with it, my last lifeline.

  Did I have the strength to withstand such scandal? He was right when he threatened that his father would bury me. And what about my father? Did he even know about Caylen? Only Anna knew of how he came to be. I couldn’t even trust Erin with the truth. Did I want my father to find out from behind prison walls that his daughter had been raped?

  I stared down at Caylen lying still against my chest. His eyes were closed and his breathing deep. It was trust that I’d take care of him and protect him while he slept. My shoulders shook as I mentally collapsed, but when he shifted and scrunched his face at being disturbed, I remembered he still needed me to fight.

  Back at our apartment, I laid Caylen down for his nap and only when I put a safe distance between us did I allow myself to cry. All the normal feelings of despair and desperation that usually followed loss of hope spilled from me as I sunk to the floor.

  How could I fool myself into thinking I could do this? I couldn’t take care of myself. It was selfish of me to bring such an innocent life into my fucked up world. Despite his conception, Caylen had become the light in my world—the one thing I had to hold onto since my mother died and my father’s incarceration.

  I loved him more than I thought loving someone could be possible.

  What if that meant setting him free?

  I cried until I had nothing left. I cried for my parents. I cried for my innocence. And then I cried for my son, who would undoubtedly suffer unless I did the only thing that was left for me to do.

  When the last tear fell, I rose up.

  I only ever allowed a certain amount of time to feel sorry for myself before I let it go. Sorrow and tears wouldn’t feed my son. I made a bottle for Caylen to have when he woke and then sat down on my lumpy sofa in my box-sized living room and studied the fading paint. The only thing I had to decorate the wall was a family portrait of my father, mother, and me in front of our house. It was one of the few things I had salvaged from our home before it was seized by the bank.

  I was still staring at the portrait when a single thump startled me followed by the wall vibrating from the force. The thump quickly became a hard rhythm and then the unmistakable sound of a male groan in the throes of passion filtered through the thin wall. If Brandi’s latest boy toy woke up my son, I’d scratch her fucking eyes out.

  The sound of their fucking increased to the point of obscenity. I surged to my feet, intent on putting a stop to their good time, when the frame suddenly plummeted to the floor. I stared at the spot on the wall where the frame had been. Brandi and her guest never stopped fucking on the other side of the wall but I no longer cared.

  The answer to my problem had revealed itself.

  It meant a promise had to be broken.

  Chapter Three

  …always a Daddy’s girl.

  MIAN

  “Who are you here to visit?”

  “My father.”

  “I need a name, miss.”

  “Oh, right. Theodore Ross.” The lobby officer started tapping at her keyboard.

  Please be on there.

  Two and half years ago, my father forbade me to return. I assumed that meant he’d take my name from his list of approved visitors, so I was here solely on the chance that he hadn’t.

  “Ok, Miss Ross. I need a valid form of identification…” I hid my relief and handed over my driver’s license. “…and for you to fill this out.” I took the form she handed me and studied it. At the top of the form read, “Notification to Visitor.” I swallowed down bile when I recalled filling out a similar form before his trial. Even though he’d left me on his list after all this time, he could still deny my visit.

  I quickly filled out the form and returned it to the officer. She then returned my ID and in
structed me to wait. Thirty minutes later, I was shown to security, and my relief returned full force, but on its heel was anxiety. I hadn’t seen him in almost three years.

  Would he look the same?

  Sound the same?

  Would he even be happy to see me?

  He accepted my visit so maybe there was a chance he missed me as much as I missed him. I floated through security and rode with an elevator full of visitors and two security guards to the eighth floor.

  My hands were sweating so I ran them down my jeans and gave myself a pep talk. He was my father. Despite what he’d done and how far he’d pushed me away since Mom died, he would always be my father. Neither of us could change that.

  Finding a seat was easy since the visiting room was mostly empty. Today was the start of the Fourth of July weekend. Incarcerated loved ones were forgotten about for summer beach fun.

  I took a seat furthest away from the ears of the guards and waited with my gaze fixed on the table. The volume in the room rose as the inmates were released. I could hear tearful greetings and kisses being exchanged. I held my breath through it all.

  “Hey, baby girl.”

  I worried for nothing. His voice hadn’t changed a bit. I felt him standing by my side. I wanted to jump into his arms and beg him to come home, but I was too afraid of the answer.

  “Hi, Daddy,” I whispered my greeting to the table.

  “I’d believe that if you actually looked at me.”

  Shit.

  Here goes.

  I tore my gaze from the table. The first thing I noticed was his chest. It was bigger than I remembered. The next were his shoulders. They were broader than I remembered. It was obvious he spent his time packing on muscle.

  My gaze continued their journey until I was staring into eyes so identical to mine.

  They were greener than I remember.