Chapter 3 #2
Allen couldn’t sleep. Thinking about how he’d been less than a block from one of his daughters made him anxious.
He was fearful of what she might never want a thing to do with him, and that bothered him more than anything.
He wasn’t thinking she was going to just help them out, no, he knew better than to even think of that, but he did want— He rolled to his side to think about what he did want.
A place to stay would be nice, but he knew in his heart that they didn’t deserve that.
Maybe they did deserve it; they’d done their time, but perhaps it was too much to ask of her.
Especially for all the times they’d hurt them and been cruel to them both.
He did wonder what Justine was up to, and since he’d found out that Sammy was close, Justine would be as well.
At least that’s what he was hoping for. To be able to see both his girls would be a thrill for him.
Just to see that they’d made a good life for themselves would be more than he could hope for.
“You’re talking in your sleep again.” He told Belinda that he wasn’t asleep but mumbling about the hardness of the floor. “Well, maybe someone is throwing out an old mattress or one of them blow-up kinds, and we can get it out of the trash. That’d be nice, don’t you think?”
He didn’t want to sleep on anyone’s tossed-out mattress, he started to tell her, but changed his mind. She was more than likely asleep already anyway. He thought about all the things that he thought that he’d like, and he kept coming back to his daughters and how they were doing right now.
Allen wanted a job where he could feel like a person again.
He’d had one in prison, but it didn’t pay all that much.
However, it did give him a sense of being a man, something that he’d realized that he’d never felt until then.
Their mode of having money back when they’d been raising the girls was when they could sucker some guy out of his wallet and take the cash.
It was the way they did everything back then, take-take-take.
Wondering why he didn’t tell Belinda what he’d been thinking gave him pause.
There were times when he thought that she enjoyed being without anything to hold them down.
That’s what she’d said too, too many things would hold a person down, and he didn’t believe that.
He thought that while having a lot of useless things was terrible, not having anything to their name was worse.
He decided that he wanted a roof over his head that didn’t leak and a soft bed.
And some time with his daughters. He didn’t think that was too much to want in this life.
He figured that if he had money from a job, he could have food in his belly if he was smart enough to hold onto it.
And Allen thought that he’d been so long without that he’d know the best way to hang onto a few dollars for some food.
That was all he wanted. He didn’t care about a television, lots of clothing, or even a nice chair that he could rest his bottom in.
Just those three things would go a long way in making him feel like a man who had something to look forward to.
The sun was shining in the building when he realized that he’d not gotten one bit of sleep.
Getting up when he heard the crunch of gravel, he watched as Sammy got out of the car she’d gotten in last night.
Then, when another car pulled up, he felt his eyes fill with tears when he realized that the other woman could have been Justine, but he just wasn’t sure.
When they hugged one another, he looked harder at the two of them, just knowing that it was his daughters.
There they were, standing not a fifty feet from him, and he couldn’t do a damned thing about it.
Watching them as they got back into Sammy’s car, he had it in his head that they did this all the time.
Meet here to go to lunch together someplace.
Or in this case, breakfast. His belly rumbled in protest, but he didn’t look away.
This was a treat that he never expected and would cherish for the rest of his days.
He’d gotten to see both his little girls, and they looked just great to him.
Lying next to Belinda, he let the tears fall.
He thought that he should have awakened her, but there really wasn’t time.
Even to turn his back on the scene below him for a few seconds felt like he’d miss something wonderful.
Now he had a moment in time that he’d look on as a gift he’d never thought he’d have, and he was somewhat glad that he’d not had to share it with Belinda.
It was selfish, he knew, but he just couldn’t count on her to see what he’d seen.
He wanted it to be both his daughters there below him.
He decided that he was going to get their plate numbers so that he’d be able to see their cars when they were out and about.
Just so he could catch a glimpse of them going about their daily routine like their father wasn’t right there with them.
Getting up when he realized that he wanted to know more about them and couldn’t get it lying there, he made his way down the stairs to the parking lot and got Justine’s license plate number.
And when she returned, he’d get the same from Sammy’s car.
~*~
Melbourne listened to the faerie as she told him where the Taylors were hiding.
He remembered the look on Sammy’s face when she thought that they were outside her door and knew that if she understood where they were right now, she’d be freaked out.
Not to mention Justine, who he’d only met one time so far.
They were both terrified of their parents, and with good reason, too.
He’d been able to read the report on their parents and how they’d been put in prison for child neglect as well as child endangerment.
Justine had been an adult then and had been given custody of her younger sister.
However, he couldn’t see where she’d ever taken care of her little sister at all.
She’d been so traumatized by their parents that it took her almost six years before she would leave the house that she grew up in.
Terrified, he supposed of them coming back and taking up where they had left off.
His mom had been able to get him the paperwork from their time in prison.
After the first year, they changed so dramatically that even the warden didn’t believe their new personality.
But they became model prisoners, never causing any trouble, and had gotten into a healthy program that had made them healthier than they’d been in their entire lives.
Their one goal in life, they told the warden, was to be someone that their daughters could be proud of.
Yet they never used their time in prison to contact either one of them, even though they might have had help from the system.
Neither one of them wanted to bother their daughters for fear of what they still might think of them.
“I have a faerie on the two of them. The mister is a lot different than the missus. Not that she’s outwardly mean, but I see some of her meanness coming out when she’s frustrated about not having the things that she wishes for.
She wishes for a good home with food in the cabinets as well as a car to get around in.
The mister only wants a roof over his head as well as some time with his children.
The missus never mentions the girls when she is upset.
” He asked Juice if either one of them had looked for a job.
“The mister has looked, but since he has no address nor a working phone, he cannot get one. The misses has not. I don’t know why, but I can find out for you. ”
“That’s all right. Tell me what they’ve been doing since they found a place they can sleep at night.
I want to make sure that they’re not plotting to harm the sisters.
” Juice told him that they seemed to be keeping up with walking as much distance as they can a day and getting themselves something to eat.
“The building has water, doesn’t it? I mean, I had you make sure that they could have at least that. ”
“They bathe daily, even though they complain about the water being very cold.” That was good, he thought. At least they were trying. “Have you had any luck with talking to the man? I know you said that he watches Sammy nightly.”
“I believe that he holds the place where his daughter works close to his heart. The misses doesn’t seem to understand that he knows both their cars when he sees them.
She seems to complain a great deal, but nothing ever comes from it.
I believe that she simply likes to complain about things.
” It said that in the report from the prison.
That Belinda was a nagger and complainer, but she never did anything to change the way that she could get to the things that she wanted.
“Mr. Allen washes out their clothing nightly and hangs them up to dry. I have been making sure that they’re stain-free and dry before morning. I hope that’s all right.”
“It is, and thank you.” He thought of the other things that he had in mind for Allen.
He seemed to be the one he could talk to.
He’d not had any kind of contact with either of them, but he had a feeling that Belinda would demand things while Allen would be appreciative of anything that he got.
“Contact me if he looks like he’s going to approach either one of the women.
He doesn’t seem dangerous right now, but that doesn’t mean that he’s got a plot in his head that would harm them. ”