“Spiderlicious punch,” Brooke explained.
Evy tipped her head back and nodded. “Ah, that’ll do it. Member the first time I drank that?”
Brooke snorted. “You ended up licking a railing at Burger King.”
Evy shuddered at the thought. “Lucky I didn’t get TB.”
“Am I ugly?”
Their heads snapped back to Tasha.
“What?” Brooke said, taking her friend’s hand. “No, of course you’re not ugly, sweetie. You’re beautiful.”
“Then how come every penis I touch turns to Jell-O?”
Evy folded her arms across her white v-neck. “Well, when you handle a million penises, you’re bound to come across a few bad ones.”
Brooke shot Evy a heated glower and turned back to Tasha. “Why would you go back to Craig’s in the first place? Do you not remember the hell he put you through?”
Tasha wiped at her eyes, smearing fake blood and grime across her cheeks. “Because I’m stupid. Is that what you want to hear, Brooke?”
Brooke shrugged. “It’s a start.”
“I’m cursed is what I am!”
“You’re not cursed,” Brooke replied softly. “You’re just picking the wrong guys.”
Tasha paused. “I heard about Roger, or whatever-his-name-is,” she said faintly. A wistful sigh escaped her. “Thank God I wasn’t the one who ended up in a closet with him last night.”
“Wait, who’s Roger?” Evy asked.
The front door burst open. They all jumped as a man stumbled down the hall in a torn suit and tie, reaching for them with bloody hands.
Tasha screamed so loud Brooke nearly fell off her stool.
“Dad!” Evy laughed.
“Braaaaaains,” he moaned, staggering closer.
“If you want brains, you came to the wrong house, buddy,” a lady with short brown hair said, shutting the front door.
The zombie stopped lurching and straightened up. “Well, dang it. I’m starving.” He nodded at Tasha. “Hi Tasha.”
“Mr. Burnett?”
“Call me Will,” he said, sinking his blood stained teeth into a Waffle Dog. “Mr. Burnett was my dad.”
“Hi mom.”
“Hi Brooke.” Her mom’s high heels clicked into the kitchen, her face pinched with as much confusion as her tone. “You girls having a slumber party?”
“Just doing some laundry,” Evy smiled innocently, hands clasped behind her back.
“Well, this is a lovely little Halloween surprise!” Will’s gaze hopped from Evy to Brooke to Tasha as he chewed. He swallowed, eyeballing Tasha. “And bless your heart, you even dressed up.” He turned to his wife and gestured with the meat on a stick. “See, honey, people do dress up on Halloween.”
“Not at church, they don’t - especially not as a member of the living dead.”
Will ran a hand through his disheveled salt and pepper hair. “I told you, Jesus came back from the dead and so did I.” He turned back to Tasha and his two daughters, palms out. “Why doesn’t anyone get that?”
“Because it’s blasphemy and now we have to find a new church.”
“You’re over thinking things again, Laura.”
Laura leaned against the counter and crossed her arms, ignoring her husband’s evil eye. “Why is there a box of your junk on the sofa table?”
Brooke’s insides twisted into knots. “It’s not junk.”
“It’s all of her precious belongings,” Evy said, unable to contain a shit-eating grin.
“Belongings?” Laura took her shades off to examine Brooke closer. “What happened?”
“Hey, what is this?” Will held the Waffle Dog up to the light coming in one window. “It’s really good.”
“What happened?” Laura repeated, her tone implying she didn’t want to know.
Brooke looked over the faces staring back at her, wanting to flee. Flee so fast she wouldn’t even have time to grab her stuff. She glanced at Evy. “Can we talk about this later? I really need a nap.”
Laura and Will exchanged glances as Tasha backpedalled toward the front door.
Chapter Five
The peephole darkened. Ben cleared his throat and tried to act cool as the door cracked open two inches. A single bloodshot eye stared back at him, puffy and stained with eyeliner.
“What’re you doing here?”
“I just wanted to apologize…for last night. I’m sorry that happened. I really am.”
Mandy’s single eye thinned into a razor sharp slit. “You are such an asshole.”
Ben shifted in his red Asics, his black jeans feeling too tight, his bladder suddenly on full. The cool breeze offered little comfort.
“Come on in,” she grumbled, opening the door all the way.
Ben furrowed his brow and watched Mandy lumber into the living room and slump down onto the couch with a heavy bounce. He carefully stepped inside, on the sharp lookout for bear traps and spring-loaded knives lying in wait. His eyes scanned the nest of wadded tissues and Dove Bar wrappers on the couch as he shut the door, heart jack hammering in his chest. “You’re right, I am an asshole.” He craned his neck to see into the dining room. “You didn’t deserve that.”
She laughed a little and blew her nose before looking him in the eye. “How could you do that to me, Ben? Why?”
Her tears made her sad eyes look bigger, wrenching his heart.
His Adam’s apple bobbed one time. “I – uh – had too much of that damn punch and wasn’t thinking clearly. Somebody may have drugged my drink or something, I don’t know.” His eyes flicked down the hallway to the bedrooms.
“That was one of my best friends!”
His gaze jerked back to her, wondering how long Brooke and Mandy had known each other and praying it wasn’t one of those relationships that stretched all the way back to their grade school days. “I didn’t know. I barely remember anything.” He swallowed dryly. “I know that’s no excuse and I’m sorry, Mandy. You didn’t deserve that.”
She twisted on the couch to face him, examining him through a set of harsh eyes.
“That’s not who I am,” he added, cringing as soon as he did. When it came to words, less was more in a situation like this and he knew it. He shifted from foot to foot and glanced back down the hallway.
She drew in a deep breath that made her chest rise beneath a Drake University hoodie with a chocolate stain on its front. Her silence made his legs feel heavy and he just wanted to sit down. “I just want you to know, that if you ever do that again, I will cut your dick off.”
The comment made his face fold with his spirits. He unzipped his black leather jacket, already missing that cool breeze. “I wish I could take it back.”
She stared hard at him but it felt like she was staring through him, reading his mind. “Promise me you will never do something like that again.”
He swallowed against the lump in his throat, shovel in hand, ready to dig even deeper. “I promise.”
She started saying something else – one kind of ultimatum or another - and his eyes nonchalantly gravitated back down the hallway. The closed door at the end called to him like a light house on a stormy night at sea. She might be in there. His brain scrambled for an excuse to get closer, anything to get him closer to her. Then it hit him. The bathroom. He had to go anyway. It was perfect.
Mandy’s voice trailed off into silence. Her eyes followed his gaze down the hall. She sprang from the couch like a spider had just waltzed across her lap. “Oh, hell no!”
“What’s wrong?”
She planted her hands on her hips and abruptly shifted into an accusatory tone. “You didn’t come here to get back together with me, did you?”
He cleared his throat and tried not to stammer, subconsciously backpedalling toward the front door. “I wanted to apologize to both of you,” he said, raising his voice just in case Brooke was in her room. “I feel horrible! And don’t want either of you thinking that’s who I am! Because it’s not!”
Mandy
tightened her glare. “Why are you yelling?”
He shook his head, feigning disgust. “I’m just upset with myself. I didn’t sleep a wink last night thinking about it!”
Mandy glanced down the hallway where he kept looking and lowered her voice to a soft whisper. “Maybe you’d like to tell her yourself?”
“What? No, I just…”
“Go ahead,” she said, nodding to Brooke’s room. “Go tell her how sorry you are for fucking her brains out in my closet!”
Ben looked from Mandy to Brooke’s bedroom door. He cleared his throat and tried to sound sincere. “Maybe I’ll just apologize real quick and then go.”
She crossed her arms. “Maybe you wanna fuck her again real quick while you’re here.”
Ben’s jaw came unhinged.
“Maybe you wanna fuck her in my bed this time!”
“I just want to apologize and that’s it.”
Mandy’s incredulous smile morphed into a heavy scowl. “Well, good-fuckin-luck, dick-face! She doesn’t live here anymore!”
Ben licked his dry lips and backed into the door, his eyes frantically sweeping the place for clues. “She doesn’t? Where’d she go?”
“Who - fucking - cares?”
Ben held up a finger and braced himself for her response. “What was her last name again? Miller? Or Jessup or something?”
She dropped her arms to her sides and pressed her lips together until they turned white. Her chest heaved, her fingers curling into tight fists. “How dare you.”
“Now listen, Mandy, I think it’s only fair to…” He ducked just before a glass table lamp smashed him in the face. It shattered against the door, raining shards of glass down upon him. “Jesus Christ!”
“Get out!”
He popped the door open she was pointing to without taking his eyes off the large Yankee Candle she was loading into her right hand. “At least tell me where she works.”
“I’m not telling you anything!” She threw the candle with everything she had, missing her mark and smashing it against the wall. Mandy stared slack-jawed at the jagged hole in the chocolate colored wall. “Shit!”
Using the door as a shield, Ben poked his head around the edge. His eyes rummaged a small wooden table, hitching on a stack of envelopes. Mail! His hand reached for the stack before he even knew what was happening. He cried out in pain when a remote control struck him squarely in the back of the hand, hitting bone.
Mandy charged across the room. Lamps (the ones still in one piece) trembled beneath her budding ire. “Get the hell out!” she yelled, slamming the door shut and nearly taking off his fingers.
Ben stumbled backwards on the front porch, examining his hand one second and then watching the peephole darken the next. He checked the mailbox again and sighed. Only an address on the front. No names. Just when he considered taking a quick peek inside Mandy screamed again.
“Get off my porch or I’ll call the police!” The deadbolt clicked. Then the chain.
Shit.
Chapter Six
Silverware clinked against plates in the tension-filled quiet blanketing the dining room. Brooke chewed faster so she could finish and excuse herself but it was no use. She wasn’t hungry and her mom’s famous pot roast tasted more like rubber given the circumstances. Her jaw grinded on the same piece of meat for what seemed like an eternity, getting nowhere fast. She could feel her mother’s eyes on her but refused to make contact. One day she would have to look her in the eye again, but not today.
A knife clattered loudly to a plate. “If I ever see this guy, I’ll kill him.” Will grinded his teeth harder than need be from the head of the table. “No one takes advantage of my baby girl and lives to tell about it!”
“Can we just keep this between us? Please?” Brooke pleaded, dabbing at a tear forming in the corner of her eye. “I really don’t want the whole world knowing about this.”
Will pounded the table with his fist, rattling the dishware. “That tattooed sonofabitch!”
“Stop,” Laura warned, glaring at Will and then turning to Brooke. “All we’re saying, honey, is this isn’t like you.”
“I know it’s not like me, mom!” Brooke threw her napkin onto her plate of barely touched food. “The guy lied to me and said he was single! I was just trying to take care of my sick friend and the next thing I know, I’m…” Her voice turned weak. “I think he drugged me.”
Will balled his napkin into his fist and pounded the table again. The plates and glasses jumped along with everyone else. “He probably did!”
A deep seeded frown stole across Laura’s face. “Will you stop doing that?” She turned to Brooke. “Did you leave your drink unattended?”
“No. Well, I’m not sure, but…”
Laura turned to Will. “We should call the police.”
“No, mom, I just want to forget the whole thing ever happened and move on.” She blinked a tear down her cheek, her eyes blurring everything into fuzzy blocks. “It was such a horrible night and I should’ve never put myself in that position and now Mandy will probably never talk to me again.”
Laura patted Brooke’s leg as Will pulled his cell phone from his jeans.
“What’re you doing, dad?”
“Calling the police to report this piece of shit.”
“No, dad, don’t!” Brooke blurted. “I don’t want to have to relive it again and I don’t know for sure what happened. I just know that he tricked me into doing something I didn’t want to do.”
Will stared at her, thumbs hovering over the cell’s screen, face a burning shade of red.
Tears left glistening tracks down Brooke’s face. “Please, dad. I don’t want anyone else to know about any of this. I’m already mortified.”
Laura squeezed her hand. “Everything is going to be okay. Things will get better. They always do.”
“If I ever see this guy I will break his face!”
Laura shot Will an icy glare. “Stop. You are just making things worse.”
He angrily pocketed the phone, picked up his fork and began pushing his food around his plate. “I’m sorry.”
“No, I’m the one who’s sorry, daddy.”
He looked up. “Brooke, you’ve always been wise beyond your years and even you will sometimes get yourself into sticky situations. But this isn’t your fault.”
Brooke grimaced with the analogy and got up from the table. “I should get going.”
Laura looked up. “Where are you going?”
“To meet Tasha,” she replied, sliding her chair in and grabbing her plate and glass. “Have fun with the trick-or-treaters tonight.” Brooke kissed her father on the cheek. “Try not to make anyone pee their pants this year.”
“Won’t do,” he replied, wiping his mouth. “Hey, do you really need to go out so late?”
“It’s not that late.” She dropped her dishes off in the sink and looked to her mom. “Girl talk stuff.”
Laura flashed a knowing smile and then cut into her food.
“That’s what phones are for, Brooke,” Will said.
“It’s not the same.”
He stopped chewing and swallowed, studying her from across the room. “Then at least go downstairs and grab some pepper spray.”
Brooke’s head tilted to one side. “Dad, I’ll be…”
“Do it!”
She sighed and turned for the basement door, knowing it was her only way out. “Fine.”
“And grab a gun!” he yelled after her, shaking his head at Laura and lowering his voice. “That girl is going to give me an ulcer. Am I getting more gray hairs?”
Chapter Seven
Tasha sipped her Jack and Coke as rock music floated down from the recessed speakers above. She swallowed and set the glass down on the glowing turquoise table between them. “I don’t know why you’re taking this so hard. I tried to go after him, too. We didn’t know he was Mandy’s guy.”
“Try telling that to Mandy.” Brooke crossed her legs and took another long dr
ink. She shook her head, replaying the whole thing all over again in her mind. “He said his name was Roger but really it was Ben and Mandy was throwing up all night and Ben and I ended up naked in her walk-in closet and she, not surprisingly, walked-in on us.”
“I remember, Brooke, I was there. You don’t have to convince me. It wasn’t your fault.”
Brooke found Tasha’s wandering gaze, desperate for her understanding. “You should’ve seen this guy naked, Tash. I was powerless! He totally tricked me.” Her eyes drifted to the bar and snapped back to her. “It was the punch!”
“That’s what got Craig.” She leaned back into the tattered leather armchair and stared off into space. “At least, I hope it was the punch.”
Brooke hid behind her hand, like she was shielding her eyes from the sun. “I have ruined everything and will never forgive myself.”
Tasha leaned forward, scrunching her face up. “Are you crying?”
Brooke wiped tears from her eyes. “No, I’m not crying.” She took a wet sounding breath that fluttered her bottom lip, her eyes blurring her drink into a red smudge. “Everyone else is moving on and making something of their lives and I’m going backwards.”
Tasha reached across the table and took her hand. “Hey, quit beating yourself up over it, Brooke. You didn’t know he was her boyfriend. Mandy should be pissed at him, not you!”
Brooke looked up with watery eyes. “Do you think she’ll ever forgive me?”
Tasha stared at her for a second or two. “Of course she will.”
Brooke’s face went blank. “Are you lying to me just to make me feel better?”
“Yes,” Tasha said flatly, her eyes roaming the bar again. “We’re never going to meet any guys if you smear your mascara.”
“God forbid,” Brooke mumbled, taking a long sip of her drink.
Tasha smiled at her. “I can’t believe you’re still drinking those things. You’re so two thousand and late.”
Brooke set the red drink back down, briefly managing to shut off the waterworks. “I like cosmos.”
“Do you, Brooke? Do you really like them?”
Brooke & Ben: Before Fate Interrupted Page 6
