Chapter 16
CHAPTER
SIXTEEN
Sabrina took a huge cleansing breath of the crisp morning air and let it out slowly.
The house she faced differed greatly from Cam’s.
It looked like the others in this cluttered row: regimented boxes on a thin strip of land with little to no space between them and their neighbors.
This one had the luxury of a narrow drive leading to whatever space sat behind it.
The place gave off an air of forgotten neglect.
No yard to mow, no plants or anything to make the sparse structure appealing in the least. Her bike had a flat tire this morning, so she’d Ubered to this address.
One look at the place and she was ready to go back to her van.
This was where Scrap lived—if it could be called that.
More like this is where Scrap exists.
She inhaled again and marched up to the front door.
Peeling gray paint flaked off as she knocked on the wood.
The man had gone MIA since his episode at the hospital, and she wasn’t going to make any more futile efforts to corner him at the bar.
After Scrap’s collapse, she’d left him alone for a time.
Even though she wanted answers, she wouldn’t kick a man when he was down.
Whatever happens, I’m gonna keep my dignity and my integrity, she thought as a gruff “Yeah” came from the house’s interior. One more big breath and she opened the door.
The inside wasn’t much better than the outside. The first floor was an open living area with the kitchen in the back. Beyond that was a bathroom. Narrow stairs led to the upper floor, but by the looks of things, Scrap didn’t go up there much.
He was lying back in a beat-up recliner with several afghans tucked around him. The sallow skin on his face wrinkled as he frowned at her. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
Sabrina raised her chin and squared her shoulders, as Ernie taught her to do when she faced an opponent. She looked down at the old man in front of her and had a hard time feeling anything but pity for him.
“I came to get answers. I’m not running away from this, and neither are you.
” She broke the stare to take the few steps over the scratched hardwood floor and plop herself onto the ugly plaid sofa.
She had to move a pile of mismatched throw pillows and crumpled bedsheets.
“When did you get this thing? When Jesus was a child?”
“Get the fuck out of my house.”
“Not until you agree to take the DNA test. I can get one of those mail-order ones from and have it delivered.”
“That’s not gonna happen.”
“We’ll see about that.”
Sabrina glanced around at the ancient furnishings.
A floor lamp with a shade yellowed with age, a braided rug with colors so faded they’d gone gray, a set of bookshelves stuffed with stacks of old magazines and a few hardbacks.
The only modern piece was the flat-screen Vizio mounted above the bricked-over fireplace.
Otherwise, the whole house looked like time stopped circa 1975. “Nice place you have here.”
Scrap just grunted as he picked up the remote and clicked on the TV.
He scrolled through several channels in rapid succession, pausing to view one for a few seconds before moving on to the next.
The effect was dizzying. He finally landed on a network that broadcast old game show reruns.
Long-dead people competed for prizes already used, broken, and consigned to landfills.
She figured he was trying to intimidate her or annoy her so much that she left. Too bad for him, she had the day off. She crossed her arms and settled herself in for the long haul. “You got any coffee?”
Scrap grunted again.
Sabrina got off the sofa and wandered into the kitchen area.
Avocado-green appliances sat next to gold-flake Formica counters, and a chrome-legged kitchen table with the most uncomfortable-looking chairs ever made stood on the opposite side.
“Seriously, have you ever thought about joining the twenty-first century and modernizing?”
He jabbed a finger at the entrance. “You don’t like my house? There’s the fucking door!”
She made her own grunting sound and started rummaging through the cabinets. A cheap four-cup coffee maker sat back against the tiled backsplash. She pulled it forward and dumped the old grounds into a plastic-lined trash can.
“Don’t get shit all over my counters!”
The yell almost made her smile.
She found the coffee and the filters in a cabinet, along with several mugs. “You want me to go? There’s one guaranteed way.”
“I’m not taking a gawddamn test!”
That roar definitely had the corners of her mouth turning up.
“Suit yourself. I kinda like it here in Pittsburgh. I think I’ll stick around for a while.”
She didn’t hear his grumbling reply, but amusement still danced through her head.
The new battle plan she’d come up with included letting the man fuss and bluster while she hung around and did the passive-aggressive thing.
Whenever she went toe-to-toe with him, he locked down tight.
So far, when she didn’t pay attention to him, his blowups petered out pretty quickly.
This way, she could wear him down until he gave up and gave in.
The coffee maker spit out its goodness, and she sniffed the aroma. Whatever faults Scrap had, bad coffee wasn’t one of them.
“Pour me a cup of that.”
Sabrina smiled at the gruff demand. She pulled two mugs down from the cabinet and checked them for dust. This machine didn’t have an automatic stop, so she deftly transferred one mug under the streaming liquid while filling the other from the pot, then switched them.
“Cream and sugar?”
“Do I look like a cream and sugar kind of man?”
She handed him a full mug. He grunted his thanks while Bob Barker wowed his audience with a new car. The coffee finished bubbling, and she filled her own mug. “I prefer cream and sugar, but I like it black too.”
“I don’t give a shit.”
“Ernie drank his coffee black.”
“I don’t give a shit about that either.”
“Fine. I’m still not leaving.”
Scrap opened his mouth to yell at her, but three sharp raps on the front door stopped him.
“Yoo-hoo! Walter, are you decent?” A short, rotund woman somewhere in her seventies bustled in with several brown-paper bags of groceries and a ginormous purse on her arm. When she spotted Sabrina, she stopped and her mouth formed a perfect O.
“Oh, for Pete’s sake, I bet you’re Raquel’s daughter. The one Titus keeps telling me about.”
Sabrina smiled as Scrap cursed under his breath. “Yes, I am.”
The woman grinned broadly. “So good to finally meet you. I heard you’ve made quite the splash.
I’m Mary, Titus’s wife. You’ll know him as Baghouse in their little club.
” She started putting away the groceries while keeping up a steady stream of conversation.
“You look so much like your mother, but I can see Walter there too. You have his eyes and his build. Your mother wasn’t curvy at all.
No breasts until Walter got her the boob job she wanted.
Land sakes, that was a time. Walter took care of her every day until she healed. ”
“I never knew she had that done.”
Mary took out a carton of eggs and put them in the fridge. “It was a long time ago, before you were born. How’s your mother doing these days?”
“I don’t know. I hardly ever see her.” Confession time, Sabrina thought as she noticed Scrap was quietly sipping his coffee and listening.
That was odd, as she expected him to rage at both her and Mary, but he was keeping to himself, at least for now.
“She birthed me and took off. She wasn’t around much while I was growing up, just popped in whenever she saw fit. ”
“I’m sorry to hear that. We were club wives at the same time, but we didn’t have much to do with the club or each other, so’s I can’t tell you much about her from back in the day.”
“It’s okay.” Sabrina lifted her own cup while the woman continued to chatter.
“We got six kids, Titus and me. All boys. Two of ’em are close by, and three others are scattered around the country. One is in the cemetery over in Washington.”
Sabrina didn’t have to see the woman to hear the sorrow in her voice. “Um… my condolences.”
“It happened a few years ago. He was shot while makin’ a delivery.
Worked for UPS, you see. He wasn’t doing anything special, ya know?
No cause for the greater good. Just dropping off a big box of T-shirts and got caught in some gang war thing.
Shot in the neck. Here one day and gone the next.
” Mary kept bustling around the kitchen, putting boxes in cupboards and wiping the counter.
Sabrina had no clue what to say to that. “I’m really sorry for your loss.”
Mary wiped a finger under one eye and dipped her head.
“I appreciate you saying that. I really do. I still miss him, but he left behind a piece of himself with our daughter-in-law and our cute little grandson. Portia and Grayson are such a comfort to us. I don’t know what we’d do without family around, especially when times get tough. ”
Sabrina had the notion that Mary’s conversation just dropped a lot of hints, but she wasn’t sure if the message was actually meant for her.
Scrap evidently thought the same thing. “Woman, if you’re trying to fucking say something, just spit it out and be done with it.”
Mary jerked open a cabinet door, making it smack loudly into its neighbor and causing Sabrina to jump. “You haven’t moved from that chair since I got here and I bet not since she got here either. Wanna tell us why?”
“Do not fucking go there.”
The words were supposed to be a threat, but Sabrina heard a note of desperation in his growling tone.
Mary ignored it. She shoved several canned goods into the cabinet and slammed it shut. “I lost my son years ago, and I feel that pain every damn day. You have a living, breathing daughter right here, and you’re wasting time you don’t have.”
“I’m warning you, Mary. Shut the fuck up.”