by Terina Adams
Those black eyes did not leave mine. Who would back down first? The predator or the prey? Ticking seconds turned into snail-crawling hours, our only distraction the nervous throat clearing of the kid behind the checkout.
Jax dropped his eyes, not to signal defeat but to claim his victory with a languid walk of his eyes up my body, the sort a guy gives a girl to put her in her place. There was nothing on his face to indicate he took pleasure in what he saw any more than in the conquest of an enemy.
“I was disappointed with our first meet.” He jerked his head in the direction of the aisle. “I’m happy to say things have changed.”
Two steps and I closed the distance between us. “The only thing that’s changed is how close I am to leaving you behind.”
He rolled his tongue along his inner left cheek, relaxing farther onto the counter. “This will be an interesting game.”
I threw my backpack on the counter, pinning the fuzzy-haired kid with my glare. “You want to check my bag?”
“Umm…well…I don’t know.”
Jax swiped the bag across to him and yanked the zip undone with a violent tear. “Delve deep,” he said as he shoved it across to the kid. His black eyes drifted to me, a challenge.
There was nothing left in me, the collapse when faced with the inevitable. I closed my eyes, the only way to escape this mess, escape him.
Chapter 2
The only other time I’d traveled in a car down this road was in the back of a taxi another lifetime ago—two months to be exact. Unfortunately the scenery had yet to change from the wastelands of desolation to the architecture of the privileged few, who’d been us in that other life, the one that came before the destruction of everything I knew, including my trust, faith, and love.
The view was worse this time because it came from the back of a police car. They had rung home, but I never expected Mum to answer. And she didn’t. They couldn’t have had much else to do with their day because I was bundled into the back of their car and escorted home. All of this for a tube of toothpaste and toothbrush. But I missed my chocolate-coated licorice bar. Asshole, I wouldn’t forgive him for that, along with all the other weird, creepy things he’d said. At least riding away with the cops got me away from him.
With the windows up, their colognes mixed, clashed, and filled the small space. Oceanic wilds, salt spray, lashing winds, that’s what my dad’s cologne made me think about, the only one he ever wore, an expensive brand. Nothing like the cloying smell of fake citrus and lavender filling the car right now.
We turned onto my street, and I pressed back into the seat as I watched the houses flick by, seeing it from the cops’ perspective, the way I’d seen it when we first arrived. Unkept gardens, broken fences, car bodies, and scrawny dogs with rib cages protruding like piano keys. In the rearview mirror, they would see a young woman with no future, possibly popping pills, perhaps a jailed boyfriend and a hooker for a mum. They would never know about the private school, the driver, the mansion, the yacht, the clothes, the parties, the belief life would always hold, and family wouldn’t change or betray or kill.
“Fifty-five?” The cop looked in the mirror as he asked, so I nodded.
“Good-looking neighborhood,” said the cop in the passenger seat.
I stared at the back of his neck, the only thing visible from the small gap between the headrest and the seat. No surprise to hear the derision in his voice. Circumstances had forced me into that shop, and my aspirations were pathetic, but I was still the girl chauffeured to school another lifetime ago, still the girl who tried to be the best in whatever she did to please her dad, and who failed every time. That girl remained inside of me, trapped with no hope of ever being free.
The cop swung into my driveway, pulling up to the house because there was no car of our own to fill the space. Once the engine was off, I climbed out and dodged the cracked paving to our door while listening to the sounds of the cops’ boots smacking along behind me. They weren’t going to drop me and go, like a stupid part of me had hoped.
On entering, I saw the cushion foam sticking out of the hole in the cover, the frayed upholstery on the armrest, the deep grooves running tracks across the wood coffee table, and the stain in the worn carpet. We didn’t even have a TV and the built-in shelving on the far wall was empty. Cleaning made no difference to the appearance of the place. I shouldn’t even bother.
I forced myself to leave the door open for them to enter and swept my eyes to the corners of the wall, where the wallpaper peeled back in thin sheets, and the linoleum floor at the entrance to the kitchen, which was worn down to form brown smears.
The two cops stood in the middle of the living room, the shorter one looking at me. The other, whose belt was stretched tight across his wide waistline, cast a look around the room. I saw what he saw and more, caught the smallest lip curl and the thoughts churning in his mind, the judgments already formed.
“You said your mother was home,” said the short cop with the flat nose.
“She’ll be in her room.”
Without waiting for the prompt, I headed down the narrow hall, seeing yet more wallpaper peeling, more stains on old carpet, more of everything that had not been in my life before but was part of the real me now.
Stale air wafted out to greet me when I opened the door to Mum’s bedroom. The drapes were thick and heavy, creating a blackout, which helped her fall into herself and disappear. I shut the door in case one of those cops got nosey and made my way across the bedroom in the dark.
“Mum.” I moved my way up the bed, patting the edges as I went. “Mum.”
She stirred when I found her hip and gave it a gentle shake. “Mum, some people are here to see you.”
She made soft sleepy sounds, murmurs, then grunts.
“You need to get up.”
“Sweetheart.” Her voice was croaky and rough.
I fumbled for the lamp on the bedside table, which had already been in the house when we arrived. The shade hung on a slant to the left like it had been knocked off too many times, but the thing still worked.
“Cover your eyes. I’m switching the light on.”
The gentle yellow glow was too much for her eyes and she rolled away, her forearm over her face.
“Mum, you have to get up.”
“What time is it? Is Ajay ready for school?” she mumbled.
“Ajay’s at school already. It’s going on ten.”
“So late. I should be up.” Her warm hand found mine. “Sorry, hon, you got him to the bus. Has he got lunch?”
She slowly inched herself up to sitting. Unveiling herself from the covers brought out the sour smell of her unwashed body. “How was he?”
“Better each day.” I brushed the hair that had loosened from her braid out of her face. “Everything will get better each day.”
Mum clasped my hand in hers and drew it onto her lap. “My beautiful girl.” Her warm hand soothed my cheek. “You’re the only one holding us together.” The last words wobbled under the strain.
“And I will.”
She sucked in her bottom lip as she shook her head. With more light in the room, I’d see her tears.
“It’s okay, Mum.”
No, it wasn’t okay. There were two cops in the living room waiting to speak to her about her thieving daughter.
“There are some people here to see you.”
Mum brushed her hair from her face, her expression stunned silence. “What? Who?”
“Some cops.”
She palmed her mouth. “Sweet Jesus, will it never end?”
“They’re here because of me.” I shifted closer to her. “It’s all right. It’s nothing.”
“You? Why?”
“I was caught stealing some toothpaste.”
“Stealing? I don’t understand, Sable.” Then suddenly, as if reality caught up with her, “Why aren’t you at school?”
“Just come out, please. Let’s deal with the cops. It’s a formality. That’s all.”
>
Less than an hour ago, I’d been nailed by a different kind of stare. Mum’s kind hurt worse, broken and defeated, oozing the misery of our combined pain.
“You should be in school. I don’t understand why—”
“Please, Mum, let’s get rid of the cops first.”
I stood, willing her to get out of bed. In two months, she’d withered away, her once curvy figure now hard angles and juts. With no hips, the pajamas slipped low on her waist, forcing her to tighten the thread.
I turned away to spare us both and headed for the cupboard. All her dresses lined the small cupboard, packed in with no room to spare. This far from the lamp, I couldn’t see whether my hands found an evening gown or a light summer cocktail dress.
With the soft pads of her bare feet crossing the room, I turned to find her robed and leaving the bedroom.
“Mum.”
“Hmm.” She turned to me, her shoulders slumped, curving her into a C.
“I thought…” I looked at the dress in my hand, a soft blue with fitted bodice, which perhaps wouldn’t fit her now, cinched waist and loose flowing skirt, something styled from the fifties Dad had adorned her in. “Never mind.”
I knifed my hand through the throng of dresses and rehung what I’d taken out, then followed her out the door. In the light from the living room, funneling down the hall, I couldn’t help but look at her bare feet. Gone were the manicured toenails. If the dress called for open-toe sandals, she painted her toenails the color of her dress for that special occasion or muted colors on every other occasion to match anything she wore.
The cops hadn’t moved while we were away, perhaps scared they’d catch something. They both turned in our direction as we entered, eyes settling on Mum, words delayed, making me see things I normally paid little attention to now, like the deepening of the shadows below her eyes, the regrowth line down the center of her scalp like a runway covered in dirty snow. The scrutiny in their eyes became my own.
“Mrs. Wellcrest.”
“Yes.”
She was smaller than me and grew smaller still in this room filled with the living when she had one foot in with the dead. When had her face become so lined, her cheeks hollowed, her complexion ashen?
I should’ve offered to do her hair, at least, to spare her the embarrassment of her scraggly mess, which had worked loose from the braid, something I’d done for her one week ago. But she didn’t look embarrassed. I’m sure she didn’t even realize how she looked. Two months and she existed, nothing more.
“Mrs. Wellcrest, this is about your daughter.”
“My daughter is a good girl.”
The two cops shared a look, and I caught it too, the cynicism, the joke. A withered old woman in a desolate house. Two couches, one coffee table. In the kitchen, they’d find a table, three chairs, kettle, and little else.
“Mrs. Wellcrest, your daughter was caught stealing.”
She bit her bottom lip as she sank to the couch, me sinking beside her. “I am so sorry. We can pay for the items.” For the first time, she brushed a strand of hair flat as if, for a moment, she remembered she’d once been different to this.
“That won’t be necessary as they have been returned to the shop. No charges have been laid at this point since the total of items was less than ten dollars. But it is imperative your daughter is made aware of the consequences of her actions. Had the amount been greater, we would have no choice but to take further action.”
“I understand, yes,” she said in a small voice. Mum had withdrawn into herself, concaving forward.
I stared at my hands in my lap, then to Mum’s robe and the brown stain above her left pocket, then farther to the gaping V where the two halves of the robe crossed at her chest. In the gap, I saw the missing button on her pajama shirt, saw down to the jutting bones of her clavicle. She barely ate, no matter what I bought her.
The cops’ eyes drilled Mum down. I read the insinuations, trailer trash, junky, discarded prostitute, unfit mother. What they didn’t see, buried deep in the depression, was beauty. She’d always been beautiful, with a lush mane of hair, light brown when it had been natural, then a glorious, glossy dark brown after it came from a bottle.
I dropped my eyes and slumped forward. If only the couch would swallow me.
“I can assure you this won’t happen again.”
The cops shared a look, unconvinced because her voice lacked conviction. The robe and pajamas would not have helped, neither her wild tangles and obvious still-in-bed look at ten in the morning.
“Your daughter is forbidden to enter Dram Truckers convenience store for the next six months.”
“Of course.” Mum patted my knee. “She won’t be needing to go back. We don’t shop there.”
“If she is caught shoplifting again, charges will be laid.”
She nodded, clutching her robe closed with one hand, squeezing my knee with her other.
“Her name is recorded. We will be keeping an eye out for any further misdemeanors.”
Like birds diving in to pick at the scraps, the cops would not relent. They’d made themselves clear after the first sentence but still they hovered around, diving in, withdrawing, diving in again, pick, pick, pick. The highlight of their day, demeaning and degrading because it made them feel better that others were so low.
“I suggest you keep a close eye on that one,” the short cop said, pointing his finger at me. “Any mark against her name will affect her college admission.” One side of his mouth quirked back in a smug smile as he glanced to his partner, who mirrored his expression. Said because they knew damn well I wouldn’t be going to college.
Final judgment pronounced, taut silence snapped, they left us alone. When the door closed, Mum collapsed back onto the couch. I copied her and stared ahead at the surface of the table. Snuffles beside me and I looked across to see Mum had covered her face with her hands, her shoulders bouncing in rhythm to her sobs.
I took one of her hands and kissed it. “Come on, Mum, please. It’s all right. We’re going to be all right.”
She palmed her mouth, the tears rolling over her fingers. “Your daddy wanted you to go to college.”
“A job’s more useful.”
“Is that why you’re not at school?”
I looked away, relaxed our joined hands between us on the couch. “There’s no point. I’m old enough to help financially.”
When she didn’t respond, I looked over to see her silently crying again. “My baby,” she said, snuffling her sobs back into her mouth. “You shouldn’t have to do that. I’ve found it hard.”
“I know, Mum. And it’s fine. I don’t blame you at all. Neither does Ajay.”
“I’ve let you down.”
“No, you haven’t, not you.”
“Please, honey, don’t punish him like this.”
“Who else can I punish? We’re not the ones who did all those things. It wasn’t us who killed someone.”
She shook her head. “No, they are lying. All of them. Your father never did those things.” She clasped my cheeks between her hands, her face turning red with the tears. “He loves you, Sable.”
I couldn’t do this, couldn’t express my fury at the man I had loved for seventeen years, not in front of Mum. No matter what the evidence showed, she stuck by him. Even when they ripped us from our home, stripped us of all our possessions, reclaimed the proceeds of crime, his supposed innocence stayed in her heart.
“How about I make you a cup of coffee?”
She nodded, unable to talk.
At the edge of the couch, I looked down on her. She looked like a child, small, fragile, and alone.
Halfway across the living room, my cell rung from inside my backpack. Frozen, I stared down at the bag. In two months, that cell had never rung. My old life was left behind. Old friends shunned us and we weren’t about to make new friends in a place like this. Who would be calling me?
The chimes stopped but still I stared down at it like the thing ticked. C
uriosity won out, and I scooped my backpack off the floor and headed for the kitchen. I threw it on the table and stared at the pocket where I always placed my phone. A wrong number or sleazy sales call?
The number I didn’t recognize. Whoever it was had left no message. Cell still in my hands, it chimed as the text appeared across the home screen.
Soon
J
I threw the cell down onto my backpack. It landed faceup, the message staring up at me. J? Who the hell did I know with the initial J? I backed away from the table as the cell screen turned black. Unless it was… No, that was impossible. This will be an interesting game. He’d said those words. Not possible. A stranger could not have my number.
Chapter 3
“Why are you dressed like that?” Ajay stood in the bathroom doorway.
I stared at him through the mirror. “I have a job interview.”
He came in and slouched down on the side of the bathtub. “What’s it for?”
“It’s a clothes shop.”
He rolled his eyes.
“Once I’m working, I can buy you a chocolate-coated licorice bar every day as a surprise.”
“It’s not much of a surprise if you’ve already told me.”
“Treat then.”
“When do you start?”
“I haven’t got the job yet. But I’m confident.” I spun to face him. “What do you think?”
Ajay flicked his eyes over me without much enthusiasm. “You’re all right, I guess.”
I headed over and ruffled his hair. “You’ve had breakfast?”
“Hmm.”
I crouched down in front of him. “Best stay out of Mum’s room. When I get back, we’ll go shopping, okay? If I get the job, maybe I’ll buy you something small as a celebration.”
He nodded.
“Done your homework?”
“It’s Saturday morning.”
“You could play in your room, or read. Just try and keep the noise down. Promise when I get back we can go to the park on the way to the shops.”
