38. Chapter 38
Ididn’t keep my end of the deal.
Well, it wasn’t a deal, necessarily, but an understanding. Knox and I had both cut most of the drugs we were into a few years back. We didn’t really talk about it directly, but at some point we both started … stopping.
Which was why I felt guilty, staring at Knox, staring back at me—pissed. I messed up. I could never understand why I do the things I do.
I ran into an old friend at the gas station, and we caught up for a bit. It was innocent, at first. We stood perched against the brick wall of the side of the building as we chatted about this and that.
“Have you seen so-and-so lately?”
“Did you hear what’s-his-name moved?”
It was familiar. And that’s all it took to bring me years back, so when he pulled out a joint in his car, I accepted. Then a little pot turned into some pills, and I knew before I even saw what he was offering that I was going to accept. Because I’m weak. Or just an idiot. I’m not sure. But I quickly realized I was in over my head in the company of a bunch of guys who were old acquaintances, and I called Knox to come pick me up, instead of Jake, my boyfriend.
Knox got there just in time because Marcus was just starting to get handsy. He was used to the old Jenny, the one who would loan out her body for drugs, so I couldn’t even blame him for thinking things were still the same.
But he was getting pissed at me brushing off his advances. When we ran into each other earlier, I had forgotten what an ass he could be. He was all charm. His short, spiky dark hair still made him look boyish, and his lip ring gave him a punk-rocker vibe. He was cute. How much of a jerk could he be?
How easily I forgot.
With each shot he swallowed, joint he smoked and pill he popped, his eyes drooped and darkened, and his smile turned more evil.
“Come on, Jenny-girl,” he said as he leaned over me on the couch where we were sitting. I could feel his hot breath against my cheek as he nestled his head in the crook of my neck, sucking on the skin left exposed by my tank top. He had one arm draped around me, cupping my far shoulder, and the other hand was creeping up my thigh, over my jeans.
System Of A Down was blasting from the speakers in the dark and dingy basement. There were two guys doing lines off a pool table, and a guy and a girl going at it on another couch adjacent to us.
“Come on, Marcus. I’m not here for that,” I said as I tried to push him away, but he was just too freaking big.
“The Jenny I remember was always up for this,” he said, taking my hand and yanking it toward him, placing it on his crotch.
“I’m serious!” I began as I started to squirm, which only made his hold on me tighten.
I heard loud steps descending the stairs, and then, “There you are,” as Knox’s voice came booming over the music, which sounded like freaking machine guns. Relief washed over me. And guilt, for dragging Knox into this situation. Into my mess.
And that’s why we were staring at each other.
Marcus turned to look at the source of the voice as Knox neared, giving me a little breathing room as he did. “I don’t believe it!” Marcus boomed as he released me and stood up. “Knox? Is that really you? Fuck man, what’s it been? A few years, at least?”
“Definitely more than that, I’d say,” Knox responded in a friendly tone, taking Marcus’ outstretched hand and accepting a bro hug. He locked eyes with me over Marcus’ shoulder and the look he gave me told me he was more than pissed at me.
When the two of them stepped away from one another, Knox nodded his head in my direction. “You ready to get out of here? I’m kind of in a hurry.”
“Yes,” I shot up, standing next to Marcus.
He looked between Knox and I. “Oh, shit, man! I’m sorry. I didn’t know you two were …” he waved a hand between Knox and me.
“Uh, well …” Knox rubbed one hand on the back of his neck, and I hoped he was thinking what I was thinking. Let the guy think whatever the hell he wants and let’s get out of here. “It’s complicated,” he finally said, as he reached his other arm toward me and took my hand. “Anyway, it’s nice to see you, man. Take care.” He turned to leave, giving me a tug behind him.
I was apologizing as he tugged me up the stairs, tripping as I went. The drugs were really kicking in. “I’m sorry, Knox. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“Shut it,” he gritted out through his teeth, without even turning to look at me. “I lied to Lizzie, you know that? I told her some of us were headed out for a drink after work.”
“Knox, just tell her the truth. Tell her I’m a fucking idiot—”
“I’m not telling her I came here!” He spun on me when we got to the top of the stairs, and we lingered in the hallway for a minute. I had to use the wall as a support to stand. “Jenny, I’m not doing this again, understand?”
I nodded. “Yes, Knox. I’m never coming back, I swear.” I swayed as my vision started to blur at the edges. My mouth was dry. My eyes were dry. Everything tingled.
“Shit,” Knox said under his breath. “What did you take? How much?”
“Um, I think it was X. I took … It was two pills.”
He huffed in frustration. I couldn’t even look up at him. “Come on,” he said as he gingerly took my elbow and steered me down the hallway.
“No,” I said, and pivoted. “This way.” How I even knew which way was out was beyond me, but Knox followed my direction.
And then he stopped. Because Marcus was standing at the front door, arms crossed over his chest.
Shit.
“Thing is, Knox. I don’t know if your girl here told you, but she accepted a couple pills from us. Smoked some good shit, too. So, she kinda owes us.”
I saw Knox’s head turn slightly, and his eyes darted over our shoulders. I didn’t have to look to know someone came up behind us.
“Yeah. Yeah, no problem,” Knox said, releasing my arm and pulling out his wallet. “What does she owe you?” He started rifling through his wallet and I saw he didn’t have much cash. Or at least it looked that way to me, but I was kinda seeing double.
“Shit,” Knox said, looking back up at Marcus. “I don’t have enough cash.” Then he looked at me. “Jen, when you plan on partying could you give me a heads up? That way I can come prepared.”
I put my hands up and played along. “Hey, I had no intention of partying,” then looked at Marcus and tried to be playful. “You coerced me. All I have on me is my ID and my credit card. I was headed back to Netflix and chill until I was talked into coming here.”
Marcus was unmoving, so Knox spoke again. “You live here? You’ll be here tomorrow? I’ll bring cash tomorrow.”
After a beat, Marcus looked to the side and cracked his neck loudly. “We don’t really take rain checks, do we Vin?” Again, I didn’t have to turn around to know the guy behind us was nodding in agreement. “So, how about Jenny stays here, while you run to the ATM and grab some cash?”
I finally turned around to look at Vin. He was pale and had a shaved head. He was about Knox’s height, but he was just as bulky as Marcus.
“Dude,” Knox said. “No offense. But I’m not gonna leave her here alone with anyone. She’s fucked up. You’re all fucked up. Sorry, but I’m just not comfortable with that. We’ll go to the ATM and come right back.” He took me by the elbow and started to take a step forward, but was pulled back by the neck of his T-shirt. “Seriously?” he let out, still somehow sounding almost playful. “What the hell, Marcus? Come on, man. You know us. We’ll be right back.”
Marcus unfolded his arms and stepped right up to us. “Yeah … Still, I’m gonna need some leverage.” He raised his left hand and trailed the back of his fingers down my right arm, slowly, all the way down to my hand, where he intertwined our fingers, and gave a little pull. In my state, I practically fell into him. “Unless,” he continued, looking down at me, “you wanna pay me back in another way …”
Knox jerked away from Vin and grabbed my upper arm to pull me out of Marcus’ grip, but arms came around Knox’s shoulders as he was pulled back and slammed into the wall.
“Knox!” I yelled, and as I tried to go to him, Marcus grabbed me around the waist and pulled me back into him. “He’s fine, sweetheart,” he said into my ear, as I watched Vin land a punch in Knox’s gut, and he doubled over and fell to his knees. Then he took a right hook to the face.
“OK!” I shouted, and spun around. “Marcus, what do you want. You want me to—”
“No.” Knox grit out, and I looked over to see him spit a bloody gob on the floor. “Let’s all go get the cash. Together.”
Marcus looked down at me, then over to Vin, who shrugged. “Now that’s a plan I can get on board with,” he said. Vin started patting Knox down, then pulled Knox’s wallet from his back pocket and slapped it against his palm a few times as he stepped around us, and Knox rose to his feet.
“You drive,” Marcus said to Knox, and raised his hand before us, gesturing for us to follow Vin out the door.
When we got to the truck, Knox got in the driver’s seat, I got in the passenger side and then Marcus scooted me toward the middle so he could climb in next to me. Vin jumped in the back. “We pass a cop, and we’re getting pulled over for that,” Knox said as he hooked his thumb behind him, toward Vin.
“We’ll be fine,” Marcus replied. “We’re just headed to the mini-mart up the street.”
Knox pulled away from the curb and drove quickly to our destination, and while I was glad he was trying to make this quick, the potholes he was driving over made me feel like I was on an amusement park ride, and combined with the high, I felt like I was gonna puke.
I closed my eyes and breathed through my nose as I braced a hand on the dashboard to steady myself. Knox side-eyed me. “You OK?” he asked.
“Yep. Just keep driving.”
“You need a little distraction, baby?” Marcus piped up from beside me, and I felt his hand on my knee.
I immediately pulled away and bit out, “Get the fuck off of me, you disgusting prick.” I heard him chuckle in response, and I felt the puke rising.
Knox spotted the mini-mart and pulled a hard left, cutting someone off, and a horn blared obnoxiously. He slid into a parking spot and slammed on the brakes so hard we all flew forward, including Vin in the back.
“The fuck, man!” I heard him yell.
“You, stay here,” Marcus said to me, then looked past me to Knox. “I’m coming in with you.”
Both men opened their doors and exited the vehicle, and as Knox went to shut his door I began to scoot out. “Jenny, just stay—” but he didn’t get to finish his sentence because just as I got out of the door I leaned over and vomited.
“Shit,” he said, but I just waved him away.
“I’m fine,” I said. “Just dizzy. Just, go get him his damn money.”
Knox paused a beat and then turned on his heel and followed Marcus into the building. I spat and wiped my mouth, then turned and saw Vin staring at me. We glared at each other, and I got back in the truck.
I could only imagine Marcus was in there trying to drain Knox’s bank account. It was likely that his savings account was attached to his debit card, and I hoped Marcus was too stupid to think of that, but was sure we wouldn’t be that lucky.
I swore to God I would pay Knox back every cent.
After what seemed like an eternity, they came back outside and got back in the truck. I looked at Knox, but he wouldn’t return my gaze. He threw the truck into reverse, backed up, switched gears without even coming to a complete stop—causing the transmission to grind—and then he peeled back onto the street. We were all silent on the quick ride back to Marcus’ place.
Knox pulled up in a rush, with the passenger side tires climbing up onto the curb, then came to another jarring stop. “Get the fuck out,” he grit out through his teeth.
Marcus laughed as he slowly opened the door and hopped out, and Vin jumped over the side of the truck bed. “Pleasure doing business with you,” Marcus said, then made a kiss sound at me before shutting the door.
Knox waited zero seconds before peeling away. He didn’t even look to see if there were any cars coming up behind him. He just got the fuck out of there.
We were quiet as he made a few turns, then suddenly he pulled over on a side street and shut off the car. He ran his hands through his hair and clasped them behind his head as he leaned it against the steering wheel. He was shaking.
“Are you OK?” he asked in a ragged voice.
“I’m fine,” I said quickly. “I’m so sorry, Knox. I’m going to pay you back. How much did he take?”
He let out an insincere laugh and then ran his hands down his face.
“Knox, how much?”
He blew a breath out through his nose, long and slow. “Three grand. Each. He took three grand out of my checking account and three grand out of my savings. No, ours. Mine and Lizzie’s. He took three grand out of our checking and our savings. Thank God for withdrawal limits or he would have drained our savings.” He huffed. “We never keep that much in our checking account, but I just finished a side job and had a big check deposited.”
“Knox, I’ll have money wired tomorrow. I—”
“FUCK!” he bellowed and punched the steering wheel, then he turned at me, murderous rage in his eyes. “What the fuck, Jenny? What were you doing?” I was full-on ugly crying. “How did you even end up there? I thought you gave all that up?”
“I did!” I yelled. “I swear I haven’t touched anything other than alcohol and pot in over a year. I don’t know what happened. I just ran into him, and we were chatting and—shit, I don’t know, Knox. I just … I always fuck everything up.”
“That you do,” he spit through his teeth, and damn did it hurt, but I deserved it.
Knox ran his hands through his hair again. “I’m gonna have to come up with a lie to tell Lizzie. She sees the bank account activity. She’s going to wonder why the fuck I took out six thousand dollars. And money from both our checking and our savings account. Our savings, Jenny! We’ve been saving up to put money into the house.”
A few silent seconds passed before I whispered, “Don’t lie to her, Knox. Tell her the truth. Tell her it’s all my fault. Tell her you won’t even be friends with me anymore. I deserve that.”
“I can’t tell her,” he said, shaking his head. “This was all supposed to be in the past, and it’ll break her fucking heart. She doesn’t deserve it.” Some more silence passed between us before Knox asked, “Where did you leave your car?”
I told him, and he started the truck up again, then pulled out into the street. He was deep in thought, and all I could think about was what a selfish bitch I was and how I ruin everything. I didn’t deserve his friendship, and I didn’t deserve Lizzie’s, either.
We came to a stop sign, and Knox looked both ways, then headed right. I kept looking at Knox, whose gaze was straight ahead, but I could tell he was elsewhere. Then occasionally I looked at our surroundings, sometimes seeing a random person or couple walking down the sidewalk, or a car passing. I saw lights on inside some of the houses and apartments, and I wondered what the occupants were doing. Maybe they were watching Wheel of Fortune.
Actually, it was probably way too late for that. I had no idea what time it was.
“I’ll tell her I needed it for supplies for a side job. That’s why I took the money out.”
I turned and looked at Knox, who was driving with his right hand, with his left elbow resting against the window and his head propped up on his fist. Blood was drying on his bottom lip and a bruise was already forming above his eye. “What are you going to tell her about your face?”
He sighed, “I’ll tell her me and Gino got into it at the jobsite.”
I turned back and looked forward when I spoke again. “I’m not going to ask you not to hate me, but I hope one day you can forgive me. And, I swear to God, Knox—I mean this—I will never be in this situation again … Knox?”
He wouldn’t look at me.
“Knox, please. Tell me you hate me if you have to, but please just look at me.” He sighed, and I yelled at him. “Knox! Look at me!”
He did. He looked at me, and then back at the road, and then back at me as he spoke. “Jenny, I don’t hate you. I hate that this is your life. And I’m sad for you. But I’m also just over it. And what happened tonight … It’s just so fucked up.”
I started sobbing and dropped my head in my hands as the reality of all of it all set in. He was right. I was such a fuckup.
“Jenny, it’s … Just, take a breath, OK? None of this is all right.” I felt his hand rubbing my back as the truck made another turn, then I heard his voice again. “Jenny? Jenny, look at me. Come on, look at me.” I raised my head and wiped away my tears to look at Knox through swollen eyes. “I don’t hate you,” he said, and before I could thank him, something caught my eye—a flash of red hair—and I turned my head to look out the windshield and saw a figure.
“Knox!” I shouted. “Stop!” But before the word was even out, I heard and felt the impact as the front of the truck struck something, which slid up the hood and was thrown into the air and off to the side. The truck came to a screeching halt in the road.
“Oh God! Fuck!” Knox shouted as he struggled with his seatbelt before he got it off and threw the door open. It took me longer to undo my seatbelt but as soon as I was able, I jumped out and went around the truck. Knox was kneeling over a young woman.
“Call 9-1-1!” he barked as he moved his hands over her like he wanted to help her, but he was afraid to touch her. “Jenny! JENNY!”
Finally, I snapped to and saw him staring at me. “Jenny,” he began again, calmly. “Get your phone out of your pocket. Call 9-1-1. Tell them someone has been hit by a car. Tell them to come quickly.”
I nodded as I patted down my pockets and pulled my phone out. It took me a few tries with shaky hands to unlock the screen, and the numbers were blurry thanks to my high, but I eventually made the call.
“What street are we on?” I asked Knox, as an operator answered. He and I were both craning our necks looking for a street sign. I spotted one at the corner, only a house down, so I jogged over there as I was telling the operator what happened, the world tilting this way and that, and then gave the operator the street address.
It wasn’t long before we heard sirens.