Chapter 39 Haven
Haven
The underpass looms ahead—a gaping maw of concrete teeth and shadows swallowing the road.
“Here,” Lenny rasps, scratching at his neck as he points to the trash-littered sidewalk up ahead.
I ease Dad’s junker to a stop, my hands numb from how I’m gripping the steering wheel. The weak, amber headlights illuminate a narrow strip of cracked tar, a handful of dilapidated tents, and a rusted shopping cart leaning drunkenly over the lip of the sidewalk.
My stomach drops when I spot the dark shape of a man leaning against one of the concrete pillars under the bridge.
He must be the dealer, or one of his runners.
“Stay, bitch.” Lenny chuckles as he fumbles with his seatbelt, as if him telling me to stay like a dog is the funniest thing he’s ever come up with.
He doesn’t look at me. He’s too focused on the desperate need crawling under his skin.
I call them meth-roaches. Tiny, invisible insects chewing through their brains, forcing them to twitch and scratch and do terrible things to hold them at bay.
I watch Lenny amble toward the dealer. My uncle looks even shiftier than the fucking dealer—clothes filthier, movements awkward.
Dear God, let this be quick.
It looks like we’re all alone out here, but for how long? My dad’s car is a piece of crap, but I’ve seen what desperate junkies will do for cash. If one of them happens on us while we’re out here, who knows what will happen?
I tug my hoodie up over my face and wish I’d parked a little further up the road where I’d be in shadow.
The dealer recognizes Lenny, but he doesn’t exactly look like he wants to shake his hand. If anything, his posture gets stiffer—shoulders bunching, chin lifting—like he’s expecting a fight.
“Come on, come on,” I mutter, the cracked imitation-leather on my dad’s steering wheel squeaking in protest as I tighten my grip. “Just get it fucking over with.”
The sooner he gets his fix, the sooner I can drive us home. Two more months living in Lenny’s shithole apartment with my junkie father, then I’m off to Agony Hollow. College.
A new life.
I can do anything for two more months.
They’re too far away for me to hear what they’re saying, but it’s obvious that things aren’t going well. From the way he’s gesturing, it looks like Lenny’s trying to get the dealer to drop the price.
I risk winding down the window, wincing when a mechanism inside the door squeaks loudly.
Lenny’s voice carries up the empty street to where I’m parked. “—Told you I’d have it next week!”
“Fuck off, Lenny.”
Lenny throws his hands up. “Jesus, man. You know I’m good for it.”
More head-shaking from the dealer, who lights himself a cigarette like Lenny being upset isn’t a big deal. Maybe he doesn’t know my uncle that well, because I’d do fucking anything to avoid my uncle getting pissed off.
Dread pools in my stomach when Lenny shifts his weight and glances back at me over his shoulder.
It’s not a casual ‘is she still there or did she take off with the car’ kind of look. It’s that roach-driven calculated glare he gets when life’s handed him lemons and he’s trying to figure out how to sell them for drugs.
My entire body jerks when he snaps his fingers at me.
“Hey, princess!” he calls out. “Get over here!”
My entire body locks up in terror. “No, no, no,” I mumble.
“Get the fuck out of the car, bitch!”
Every instinct screams at me to floor the gas, drive out of town, and never look back.
But where the fuck would I go? I can’t live on the street for two months, can I? I mean, I could try, but Lenny would find me. He always finds me. And the punishment will be so much worse than whatever he’s planning now.
He probably just wants me to act as a character witness. To tell the dealer he’s good for the money. Maybe he wants to check if I’ve got money.
I do.
I have ten dollars. If that’ll make this whole thing end so I can go home and get back to pretending, then I’ll pay it gladly.
Except…that means getting out of the safety of the car and showing my face to a fucking drug dealer.
It’s okay.
I won’t be in Ashwood Crossing that much longer.
Lenny turns until he’s fully facing the car. He’s wearing a slack-jawed scowl that sends a shudder through my body, breaking me out of my paralysis.
I know that look…and what comes next if I don’t do what he says.
My hands shake as I open the door, and my legs nearly give in before taking my weight. I huddle into my hoodie, tugging it further up my face, digging in my pocket for the money that’ll make this nightmare end.
I sidestep a puddle of what looks like rain but smells more like sewerage, and make the idiotic mistake of getting within arm’s reach of my uncle.
“Stubborn bitch.” Lenny slings an arm around my shoulders, pulling me against his side. He reeks of sour sweat and cigarettes. “But pretty, yeah?”
The dealer’s eyes rake over me, sizing me up. He’s younger than I first thought—mid-twenties, maybe. I ignore Lenny as much as physically possible, holding out the crumpled bills I pulled from my pocket.
“I got ten,” I say, having to clear my throat before my voice comes out properly.
Both of them look at me for a beat before bursting out laughing.
I don’t know what scares me more—them laughing, or the way neither of them even looks at the money.
The dealer’s laughter cuts off. “Where’s my three hundred?” he asks, narrowing his eyes at Lenny.
Fuck, he owes three hundred dollars? What’s that, like a month’s supply?
Maybe they’re both so fucking high they didn’t understand what I was offering. At least, that’s all my panicking lizard brain can come up with right now.
“Two-ninety,” I say, wagging the bills in case they hadn’t seen them the first time.
“Aw, look at her, man. Being so fucking adorable.” Lenny’s grip tightens on my shoulder, bruising me when I try to twist out of his grip and away from the pain. “Her pristine, virgin cunt’s worth at least a hundred. And you can fuck her as many times as you want, as long as I’m getting fucked up.”
…What? Fucking what?
My ears start buzzing so loudly, I don’t hear the dealer’s reply.
No.
No, no, no.
This isn’t happening.
This can’t be happening.
“…won’t tell anyone.” His fingers are on the back of my neck now, digging deep. “Will you, princess?”
I can’t breathe.
I can’t think.
I can’t do anything except stand there, frozen, while my uncle tries to trade me to a drug dealer like a piece of fucking meat.
I dropped the ten bucks I was holding. My brain tracks the bill in my peripheral vision, watching it flutter deeper into the shadows until the wind plasters it against the side of the tent where a strip of plastic was duct-taped over a rip to keep it dry.
The dealer takes a step toward me. He gives me another scan, this one slower, more considering—like he’s sizing up my organs for the black market.
“Alright,” he tells Lenny. “You’ll get your fix. But you still owe me two hundred.”
One second I’m frozen, paralyzed by fear and shock and the bone-deep certainty that this is it, this is how I die, violated and discarded under a bridge like trash.
The next second, I’m running to the car.
I left the key in the ignition. All I have to do is get in, start the engine, and get the fuck out of here before anyone’s dick is out.
“Get back here, you fucking bitch!” Lenny shouts.
Fuck that shit.
My feet pound over the road, my lungs burning, my heart slamming against my ribs so hard it feels like it’s trying to escape, just like me.
I reach the car. Yank open the door. Throw myself into the driver’s seat.
Lenny’s footsteps behind me, getting closer. “Stupid bitch! Get out of the fucking car!”
I turn the key.
The engine sputters.
“Come on, you fucking piece of shit!” I yell, turning the key again.
It catches.
Lenny’s glowing like a devil disguised as an angel. What’s left of his wispy hair glowing in the headlamps. Pale skin, demonic eyes, monstrous mouth twisted in a grimace.
I slam my foot down on the gas, yelling because I can already feel Lenny’s hands on me, holding me down as that dealer gets his fucking money’s worth.
I meant to reverse.
I forgot I’m still in first gear.
The car lurches forward. There’s hardly enough time for Lenny’s face to register surprise—a twitch of his eyebrows, a slackening of his jaw—before the car slams into his legs and he’s gone.
The dealer was right behind Lenny.
Behind where Lenny used to be.
He tries to jump out of the way and partially succeeds. But the bumper clips him so hard, he spins once before he hits the road.
The brakes are shoddy. The tires are bald. The car skids as I try to stop.
By the time Dad’s junker responds, I’m inches from one of the concrete pillars supporting the tracks overhead.
I could have died.
If I’d hit that pillar—no seatbelt, no airbags in this prehistoric piece of shit—I’d be fucking dead.
My breath comes in ragged gasps. My hands are shaking so badly I’m struggling to grip the wheel.
In the rearview mirror, I see two shapes on the ground.
One of them pushes himself up, clutching his leg, his face twisted in pain.
“You crazy bitch!” the dealer screams. “You could’ve killed us!”
I look at the other shape. The one that isn’t moving.
My uncle is sprawled on the road, limbs bent at weird angles. I can’t tell if he’s breathing, but the dealer said ‘almost’ and that’s what keeps repeating in my head in a shrill scream.
…almost killed him…
…almost killed him…
Almost?
I’m laughing.
It’s a fucking evil sound in the confines of this piece of shit car. And I can’t stop.
“Almost?” I yell. “Fucking almost?”
I slam the gearshift into reverse.
In a perfect world, it would feel like this was all happening to someone else. Like I’d disassociated, or I couldn’t control my actions.
But that’s fucking bullshit.
I handle that gearshift like a soldier cocking his fucking Ak47 or whatever the hell they use these days. The gearbox grates if you’re not careful how you put it in reverse, but that doesn’t happen.