Chapter Thirteen
Another Family Dysfunction
Sammy
If there was one thing, I loved about being home, it was drowning my sorrows in a hot shower. There was no rush. I could wash and scrub to the point of compulsion, or until I felt better about things. My skin was always pinker than necessary when I came out and swiped a hand across the mirror, but no one was looking at it besides me anyway.
I ran the comb through my dark-brown hair and stared at my reflection in the mirror. I had dark circles under my eyes, and my normal tan complexion was a bit paler than usual. I’d been a welterweight when I competed in the ring, but I could tell from a glance, I wasn’t anywhere near that now.
“Shit.” I huffed, unsure what was stress and what was illness. “Get it together, Sammy.”
I shook my head and picked the towel up off the counter. I was looking down at the laundry basket where I dropped it when I stepped out, so I didn’t realize my entire local family was sitting around my kitchen table until I rounded the corner.
I let out a scream and jumped back, pinning myself to the hallway wall as I stared wide-eyed from my father to my mother. My gaze narrowed when it landed on Sauce.
That little snitch!
He couldn’t look at me, and for some peculiar reason, I laughed.
It was an odd sound that I didn’t recognize at first and I couldn’t stop it once it began.
“This is fuckin’ rich. You’re prospecting and dry snitching without shame. What the fuck have the Dirty Savages come to?”
“Samantha,” my mother hissed.
“Jolene,” I returned, with just as much shame and disappointment in my tone.
She shrank back in her chair, and I stalked forward, ready to pounce.
“Did you really fraternize with a married man?” she whispered, her head canting downward like she was too humiliated by such a concept to even be seen uttering the question.
“Oh.” Dad snorted, “No one gives a fuck about that, Jo. Jesus!”
He shot out of his chair and rounded on me, his hands coming to my shoulders and redirecting my attention in the process. “Honey, wh…? Are you gonna be okay? That’s all that really matters. Sauce mentioned a diagno–”
“What the hell do you mean, no one cares? She’s ruined her military career, Wyatt. She shit on her honor–”
Dad groaned and turned as he swiped the air to bat her back. His whole face contorted at her ignorance, “What the hell do you know about fucking honor, or the marines for that matter?”
He didn’t wait for her to answer before he barked, and brought his hand up to cup his ear “Huh? Yeah. That’s what I thought. Don’t ever talk to my daughter like that again.”
“Oh, fuck you, Wyatt!” Mom shrieked, “You think because you got a – a fucking–”
“That’s right. I got a fuckin’ purple heart. A purple heart, a dead daughter, and an ex-wife with no goddamned common sense.” He scoffed and tried to turn back to me.
“Uh–” Sauce stammered, looking as uncomfortable as one could be. “This has, uhm– Derailed.”
“No common sense?” Mom’s voice somehow continued to climb, “You refer to your own son by his criminal moniker rather than the God-given name we placed on his birth certificate, and I’m fucking ignorant?”
She made a wet sound with her lips and shook her head.
“Fuck me,” I managed, before the laughter started again. “Derailed? What did you think was going to happen? You really thought you could hold an intervention with these two sharing space and oxygen? Truly? Every time they’re together it’s like a rabid dog chasing its own tail, Sauce. All they do is snarl and snap for no logical reason.”
I folded my arms and pointedly stared at our parents, “Go ahead, we’ll wait.”
I smiled like I had all day for them to finish performing.
“It’s always the same, a race to see which of you will weaponize it first. Come on, don’t drag it out, be merciful, one of you…” I wiggled my fingers in the air encouraging one of them to come forth with it already.
“What are you talking about?” my mother venomously spat, her face pinching up as she addressed me.
My brother stared awkwardly at the floor, while my father glared at his ex-wife and pleaded through gritted teeth, “Sit down, Jo. Just— Sit down and hush a minute, will you?”
“I will not. Her brothers are still in the service, I’ll remind you. What happens when they go about the same base having to live with the shame of their sister? The shame she brought to the family! She does all of this and then sneaks home and accuses us of weaponizing things. What is it, Samantha? Speak plainly. What are you waiting for us to weaponize? I’ll wait to hear how you’re somehow the victim in all of this.”
“You should leave.” I sniffed and turned to head back to the bathroom.
“No.” She rushed toward me as she said it.
My father caught her, but she still gripped my shoulder enough to turn me.
“You should grow up!” she yelled. “Your sister didn’t have the chance to grow up, but you do.”
“She’s waiting on one of you to hurl it out there. Two years, three weeks.” Sauce cut her off, only for her to fly toward the table, plant one hand on the surface and slap his face with the other.
“You’re no better than he is with violence.” I sniffed, unable to hide my amusement.
She was forever talking about my father's impulsiveness and violent lifestyle; I couldn’t help it.
The kitchen door swung open, and Maelyn stepped inside, her eyes glued on the oblong object in her hands, “Who is Lennox Za—?”
Her eyes snapped up, realizing there was an audience just a breath too late. My father snatched the letter out of her hand and the oxygen straight out of my lungs.
Oh shit!
I panicked like some high school girl, which pissed me off almost as much as the original invasion of my privacy.
“Are you kidding me right now? You didn’t tell me you were home, but you fuckin’ told my Road Captain?” Dad roared, his brows spiking with disbelief as he hurled the question.
“Unbelievable,” Mom scoffed, stepping around Maelyn.
She stormed off leaving us to sort ourselves.
“I– I actually told him she was home,” Sauce admitted from behind us.
“Yeah.” I snorted, staring at my father, with no less rage, “He tells everything, apparently.”
“Well, what the fuck was I supposed to do? Do you want me to just sit around while you get sicker? You wouldn’t go to the doctor, Sammy!” Sauce protested.
“I fucking did, okay? They did a thing called a LEEP procedure. It’s over. It’s probably done now,” I snapped back, having had my fill of it all. “Happy? Good. Now, get out, all of you!”
I whipped back around, shoving a finger toward the door, only to find my dad fully invested in the now opened letter. His jaw slowly dropping while his eyes rapidly scanned the contents of my mail. He made a sound that was somewhere between a scoff and a laugh and shoved the letter at me before storming out, much the same way my mother had.