Chapter 3
“Are you sure you don’t want me to help you clean up?”
“Yes, I’m sure. You just go and settle into your new room. We moved all your stuff from your old room. Well, everything that survived the move. We had to replace a lot of stuff.”
“Oh…” I’m not sure what to say. I wasn’t particularly attached to my old furniture, but with all these sudden changes, I was kind of looking forward to my familiar bed. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“We didn’t want your moldy old furniture in our house—”
“Nixon!” James snaps at his son. “Stop being so rude.”
“What? It’s true.” He shrugs, completely unapologetic. “Maybe we can replace some of her clothes too?” He looks down at my shirt in disgust.
“We could go clothes shopping this weekend,” my mom interjects. “Girls’ day?”
“Sure.” I force a smile. Anything to get away from these two assholes.
“Perfect! Do you want me to show you to your room?”
“We’re going up anyway,” Colt offers. “We’ll show you where your room is.”
“I’m sure I can find it myself.” Grabbing my backpack off the floor, I stand up, looking for a way to escape this place.
“It’s upstairs, the last one at the end of the hallway,” James explains.
He has barely finished giving me directions when I start speed walking out of the dining room and up the stairs without looking back.
Only when I’m on the second floor, and I don’t hear anyone coming after me, do I sigh in relief.
“Last one at the end of the hallway…” But he didn’t say which one. The staircase leads into a wall with hallways on either side. I try my luck on the left side.
As I walked down the hall, I count the doors, wondering whose room is behind each one. I pass five before I get to the sixth and last door. If I took the correct turn, this should be my room.
Lifting my hand, I reach for the doorknob. My index finger brushes over the cool brass, the small hairs on the back of my neck lift, and a shiver runs down my spine.
“Wrong room, love bug,” Nix whispers behind me.
I spin around so fast that I lose my footing and stumble backward until my back hits the wall. Nix takes one large step toward me, eating up the distance between us.
“Don’t call me that.” Love bug might seem like a cute pet name but knowing why he calls me that leaves a bitter taste on my tongue for simply hearing it.
After my accident, I had to wear a bulky back brace.
Someone had the bright idea to call me a stink bug since I had an outer shell, and in the summertime, I would smell like sweat, no matter how much I tried to cover it up with perfume.
Nix and Colt turned stink bug into love bug at some point, but they say it with the same kind of disgust still.
“I’ll call you whatever I want. After all, you are in my house, and you’d do well to remember that. Don’t walk around and stay in your room. I don’t want you touching my stuff.”
“You think I want to be here? I didn’t even know about any of this until a few hours ago.” I try to push past him, but he places his hands on either side of me, caging me between him and the wall.
“I don’t care what you know or what you want. All I care about is getting rid of you. You and your gold-digging mom need to find some other guy to leech off.”
He dips his head low, leaning into my face until his nose brushes against my cheek. “You don’t belong here. Go back to your trailer park.”
“Trust me, I’d rather live in a run-down trailer than here with you.” I shove against his chest as hard as I can, taking him by surprise. Ducking under his arm, I take off down the hall, past the stairs to the other side of the floor.
When I get to the last door, I don’t hesitate to open it. I rush inside the room, slamming the door shut behind me. Dropping my backpack on the ground, I reach for the lock, only to find none.
What the hell?
Is this some kind of mistake? Instead of there being a latch on the doorknob I can turn to lock in place, the surface is smooth. I have no way of making sure there’s any privacy in this room.
Then my heart lurches, and I rush for the adjoining bathroom. I don’t even care what it looks like. I only want to examine the door. Sure enough, there’s no lock here, either, not on either side of the doorknob.
An icy chill runs through me, and I shiver, rubbing my arms as goose bumps cover them.
This is wrong. This whole thing is wrong.
Why would I not be allowed to lock my doors while living in a house with all these men?
I would say something to Mom about it, but I’m sure she would laugh it off—if I got lucky.
Otherwise, she’ll demand to know why I’m making her life so difficult.
I don’t know what would be worse, being laughed at or blamed for something I’m not trying to do.
Another thing I’m not trying to do is take a shower without being able to lock the door.
I feel so dirty after spending hours in those bus seats, sometimes falling asleep while my head rested against a window countless other people touched.
The thought of it makes me wrinkle my nose.
How am I supposed to clean up when I can’t trust Colt and Nix to stay out?
One of my new bedroom furnishings is a desk and a matching chair.
It’s about the right size, so I pick the chair up and carry it to the bathroom, where I wedge it under the doorknob.
At least now I can breathe a little easier, even if the idea of having to do this in what’s supposed to be my house disgusts me.
Then again, there isn’t much about this situation that isn’t disgusting. Wrong.
I pull off my clothes and leave them in a pile on the tiled floor before hanging one of the stacked towels on a hook outside the shower door.
My own bathroom. I wish I could be more enthusiastic about this because I've always dreamed of having my own bathroom. One of those Someday, when I’m rich fantasies.
And compared to the tiny little bathroom back at the trailer, this is massive.
I wish I could enjoy it.
Still, the shower is nice, already stocked with all kinds of good-smelling soaps, shampoo, and all kinds of other items I always wanted to buy for myself but never had the money for.
I take advantage of all of them, too, using sugar scrub to rid me of the feeling of being soiled and nasty before soaping up.
Even the shampoo is better than any I’ve ever used, and I never thought it really made that much of a difference how much a person paid for it.
Now I understand. By the time I’m finished rinsing out the thick suds, I think I could get used to living this way.
If only it wasn’t for my fear. Not to mention how strange this all feels and how sudden.
Not that my mother is notorious for making the best choices, but this is over the top even for her.
Is she this desperate to escape our old life?
I guess so, and that’s my fault, too. I’m sure if I ever complained, she would throw that in my face.
If it wasn’t for you getting hurt and everything that came afterward… I don’t even want to think about it.
Stepping out of the shower, I catch sight of myself in the mirror.
My long reddish hair is caked to my neck and shoulder.
My green eyes are framed with pale lashes that can barely be seen unless I put mascara on.
Just as I reach for a towel, the reflection in the shower stall catches my eye.
The way I’m standing lets me get a good look at my back.
I rarely look at the ugly scar I’m left with, mostly because I don’t need the reminder of it all.
“Come on, Leni, one more time.” Coach has been pushing me hard this week. “I know you can do this. You have to nail that landing.”
“You got this, babe!” my mom yells from the sideline.
Drowning out everything around me, I run toward the high bars.
My mind is laser-focused, every muscle in my body taut as I use the small trampoline to jump up and grab the lower bar.
Using my momentum, I swing around the low bar.
I let go at just the right moment, launching into a full twist before catching the high bar.
I continue my routine perfectly. Then go for the dismount.
Knowing I have to let go at the perfect time to make a backflip with a one-and-a-half twist work.
I spin around one last time, not knowing it would be my indefinite last time.
I let go of the bar half a second too early, maybe even less than that, but it’s enough to mess up the trajectory. My body twists in the air, and I know I’m going to hit the mat before I do. What I didn’t know was how hard I would hit it.
For a moment, everything goes black. When I come to, I’m in the most excruciating pain of my life.
It feels like someone has cut my back open and is digging through it with claws.
The pain is so severe I can’t breathe. My vision is blurry, and all I can hear is my mom’s sobbing voice telling me everything is going to be okay.
She lied. After my accident, nothing was okay.
By the time I’m wrapped in a fluffy robe and returning to the bedroom, I’ve almost resigned myself to this.
At least James seems like a decent guy, even if he’s a little much.
He wants to impress me and make me feel at home, which is a lot better than how he could treat me.
Like a burden, he would rather not deal with.
This bedroom is no joke. I see now that my paltry furniture would look entirely out of place—the room is so large, my bed and cheap Goodwill dresser would have been swallowed up, looking more like furniture from a dollhouse than anything else.
Now, I have a bed twice the size, heavy and sturdy looking, and a mattress so soft I want to sink into it and pull the blankets over my head on contact.
Maybe this won’t be so bad. So long as I can find a way to secure the door, so I feel safe, I might be able to make it through this ordeal. I’m sure Colt and Nix have their own busy lives. All I have to do is stay out of their way.
But I’d feel a lot better about this if I knew I could lock my door. I need privacy. Everybody does, right? I don’t think it’s too unusual to ask for a means of keeping the world out.
Maybe if I put it that way, that all I’m looking for is the guarantee of privacy, my mother will be a little more understanding.
I want to try, at least. Otherwise, all I have in front of me is an endless string of nights spent worrying whether one, if not both, of my stepbrothers will come barging through the door.
If only she wanted to understand how they treated me back in school. How they’re still treating me. Yet those stories would fall on deaf ears, so I’m not going to waste my time.
My own clothes are in the dresser, and they don’t take up much space. But they’re mine, so I put on clean jeans and a tee, preparing to sweet-talk my mother into finding a way through this. A new bedroom door can’t cost that much, can it? I’m sure James could afford it.
I go to the door, prepared to put on my happiest face—but when I try to turn the knob, I get nowhere. It’s stuck in place.
Somebody locked it from the other side.
“Are you kidding?” I call out, my heart pounding so hard I’m afraid it will burst out of my chest. “You’re going to lock me in here like this?
” Which one of them did it? It could be either of them.
The odds are equally in both their favor.
When no one answers—I don’t even hear so much as a snicker from out in the hall—I touch my forehead to the wood and try desperately not to cry.
I didn’t do anything to deserve this. When is it going to stop?
No. I am not going to let them break me down like this.
I’m not going to stand here and cry like a baby because of a locked door.
Instead of giving in, I fish my phone out of my backpack.
Mom probably won’t be happy that I’m bothering her over something I know she’s going to think is trivial, but maybe I can make it sound like a big misunderstanding, something we can laugh off together. I have to hope.
As it turns out, I have a text message from a number not stored in my contacts.
Unknown Number: If you know what’s good for you, you’ll stay in that room and not complain. Otherwise, you’re going to regret it.
Are they that determined to avoid the sight of me? Is my presence in this house that much of a problem for them? I can’t understand why. I have never done a single thing to either of them, ever. I wasn’t even here when our parents supposedly fell in love. I had nothing to do with it.
I guess with people like them, there doesn’t need to be a reason. They decided from day one that they hated me, and nothing is going to change their minds. The harder I try, the worse it’s going to get. So why bother?
I don’t bother responding to the text, instead throwing my phone onto the bed and dropping down beside it. I hate this sense of letting them win, even in this little way. But I have no doubt they meant what they said. They’ll find a way to make me regret it if I make a big deal about this.
So instead of marching downstairs, like I’d intended, I change into pajamas.
Then inspiration strikes, and I go to the bathroom to retrieve the chair, which I wedge under the doorknob in here.
Just because I’m locked in doesn’t mean somebody couldn’t decide to unlock the door and do whatever they felt like.
I’m not going to make it that easy for them.
Once I’m sure there’s no getting in from out in the hall, I go to bed. The events of the day have left me drained, physically and emotionally. I might be able to handle things better if I get a good night’s sleep.