Chapter Twenty #2
Her gaze moves over my face like she is reading old handwriting on a torn page.
“Mike’s trouble,” she adds.
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
I do neither.
Her eyes drop briefly to my clenched hands. “Your own damn fear.”
My throat tightens.
Then she smiles.
“We’ll work on that.”
Lottie laughs under her breath. “That’s Hot Mama for welcome.”
Hot Mama pulls Lottie into a hug that is half affection, half inspection. “You look tired.”
“Drove from Kentucky with a guilty woman and a kid who believes dinosaurs practice law,” Lottie says.
Hot Mama kisses Lottie’s cheek. “So a quiet trip.”
“Quiet as church mice with warrants.”
A woman near the garage lets out a sharp laugh. “Julip always did know how to make an entrance.”
I look at Lottie.
“Julip?”
Lottie’s mouth curves, and for the first time since we crossed under the Queens sign, she looks a little younger. A little wilder. Like Kentucky Lottie is only one layer over someone with louder stories.
“Old name,” she says.
Hot Mama snorts. “True name.”
“Don’t start.”
“Baby, I named you. I’ll start if I feel like it.”
I blink. “You named her Julip?”
Hot Mama looks at me. “Bourbon, sugar, mint, and a bite that sneaks up after a man decides sweet means harmless.”
Lottie rolls her eyes. “It’s spelled Julip because Hot Mama was drunk and contrary.”
“It’s spelled Julip because I said so,” Hot Mama says.
The woman by the garage grins. “And because she cracked a man’s tooth with a julep cup once.”
Lottie points at her. “He had it coming.”
“They always do,” Hot Mama says.
I stare at Lottie, trying to reconcile the woman who packed August’s snacks with the woman these patched Queens are looking at like family.
“You were one of them,” I say.
Lottie’s face softens by one guarded inch.
“Still am, honey. Some crowns travel.”
Then her eyes come back to me.
I stand straighter without meaning to.
Her gaze sharpens, and something like approval flickers across her face.
“You look like your mama when she was trying not to shake.”
I hate how badly I want more.
I hate how desperately I want this woman to tell me who Caroline was before fear, whiskey, bad men, and Kentucky swallowed the better parts of her.
“You knew her,” I say.
“Yeah.”
“When she was with Mike?”
Hot Mama looks toward the trees for a second. “Among other disasters.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means stories got order, and yours ain’t ready for that one.”
I bristle. “I have had enough people deciding what I’m ready for.”
Her smile vanishes.
Not in anger.
In respect.
“Well, there she is.” She points one red nail at me. “Good. Keep that. But learn the difference between a woman hiding truth to control you and a woman placing knives on the table one at a time so you don’t cut yourself grabbing all of them.”
I don’t have an answer.
Lottie smirks. “Told you she does that.”
“Does what?” I ask.
“Sounds like a fortune cookie got into a bar fight and won.”
Hot Mama throws back her head and laughs.
The sound rolls across the campground, and several women look over, smiling like thunder just told a joke.
“Come on,” Hot Mama says. “Let me show you where you’ll sleep before Sagebrush gets her hands on you and tries to steam your trauma out your pores.”
“Steam my what?”
“Exactly.”
She turns and walks toward the main building, expecting us to follow.
We do.
As we cross the yard, I take in the place piece by piece because looking keeps me from falling apart.
A bulletin board near the kitchen lists chores, meal times, group meetings, court dates, doctor appointments, and motorcycle maintenance classes.
Next to it is a hand-lettered flyer for something called Rage Yoga and Release Screaming.
Another advertises Intro to Self Defense: Knees, Keys, and Creative Swearing.
Under the pavilion, two women sort donations into bins.
Clothes. Shoes. Diapers. Toys. One of them has a healing black eye and a baby in a sling.
The other has a scar down her forearm and a Queens cut over a sundress.
They talk softly until we pass, then the woman with the baby looks at me and nods.
No pity.
Just recognition.
The main building is warm inside and smells like chili, coffee, wood smoke, and lemon cleaner.
The floor is scuffed but swept. The walls are covered in photos.
Women on motorcycles. Kids at campfires.
A group standing under the Queens sign, arms around each other, middle fingers up.
A Polaroid of Hot Mama wearing a crown made of beer tabs.
Another of Lottie years younger, laughing beside a woman I don’t know.
I stop at that one.
Lottie notices.
“Don’t,” she says.
“Is that my mother?”
The room goes quiet around the question.
The photograph is old, faded at the edges. A young woman stands beside Hot Mama, hair wild, smile sharp, eyes painfully familiar. She has one hand on her hip and a cigarette in the other. She looks like she is about to either kiss someone or steal their truck.
Caroline.
My mother.
Not tired.
Not bitter.
Not dying.
Alive.
My hand lifts, but I stop before touching the photo.
Hot Mama comes back to stand beside me.
“She hated that picture,” she says.
“Why?”
“Said her hair looked like a raccoon got electrocuted in it.”
A laugh breaks out of me.
Then a sob.
I cover my mouth.
Hot Mama doesn’t touch me.
Nobody does.
Crying is allowed.
Whining is taxed.
So I cry quietly in front of a wall full of women who understand enough not to make me explain.
After a moment, I ask, “Was she a Queen?”
Hot Mama’s gaze stays on the photo.
“We weren’t Queens yet. Not official. Not then.”
“But she had a crown?”
Hot Mama looks at me. “Some women patch in. Some women leave blood on the floor and get remembered anyway.”
Lottie said the same thing.
The words feel like a door I’m not allowed through yet.
“What blood?” I ask.
“Later.”
“Hot Mama.”
She turns to me fully. “You want all Caroline’s ghosts before supper?”
“Yes.”
“No, you don’t.”
I want to argue.
But August’s laugh comes through the open window then, bright and wild, and every sharp thing in me bends toward it.
He is in the sandbox with three other kids, holding Blue Rex up like a judge passing sentence. The girl with purple boots is dramatically pretending to be a criminal dinosaur. August is laughing so hard his whole body shakes.
I haven’t heard him laugh like that since before Jeremy started watching every joy in the house like it had to justify itself.
My argument dies.
Hot Mama sees it happen.
“Kids eat first,” she says softly. “Truth can wait until after chili.”
The bunkhouse is behind the main building, painted pale green with white trim and a porch full of muddy shoes.
Inside, it looks like a summer camp cabin if summer camp had trauma-informed rules and a weapons policy.
Bunk beds line the walls, each with a small shelf, a trunk, and curtains that can be pulled for privacy.
There are quilts in bright colors, lamps clipped to bed frames, and a row of hooks by the door.
A basket near the entrance holds stuffed animals, flashlights, and what appears to be three rubber chickens.
“Why rubber chickens?” I ask.
Lottie says, “You ask too many questions for a woman at a place called Queens of Anarchy.”
Hot Mama points. “Upper bunk or lower?”
“Lower,” I say immediately.
“Good. Mothers always pick lower until they remember kids can fall out of anything, including good intentions.”
There are two women inside when we enter. One is folding clothes on a bunk while a baby sleeps in a portable crib beside her. She looks up and offers a small smile. The other sits cross-legged on a bed, writing in a notebook. Her hair is shaved on one side, and a bruise blooms along her jaw.
“New?” the one with the notebook asks.
I nod.
“Welcome to the circus.”
Hot Mama says, “That’s Tansy. She bites emotionally.”
Tansy shrugs. “I’m in recovery.”
“From what?” I ask before I can stop myself.
“Bad taste and vodka.”
The woman with the baby laughs softly. “I’m Maribel. The baby is Joey. If he screams, it’s not personal. He hates air.”
I almost smile. “I’m Amelia.”
“We know,” Tansy says.
I stiffen.
Hot Mama gives her a look.
Tansy grimaces. “Sorry. Not creepy. Lottie told us. Also your kid has already announced Blue Rex presides over court and doesn’t accept bribes unless they are fruit snacks.”
Despite everything, I laugh.
Hot Mama gestures to a lower bunk near the back. “You and August can use this one tonight. Tomorrow we’ll see if you need a cabin.”
“A cabin?”
“If you stay.”
If.
The word lands softly and still manages to hurt.
Because I have no idea what staying means anymore.
Kentucky feels a lifetime away and also still hooked into my ribs by Derby’s sleeping breath.
Lottie sets our bags on the bed. “I’ll help you settle.”
Hot Mama looks at her. “You leaving tonight or morning?”
Lottie’s face changes.
Mine does too.
“You’re leaving?” I ask.
“I got to get back.”
“Already?”
“Honey, I kidnapped a woman and a child across state lines before breakfast. My husband is probably explaining my personality to men with guns.”
“You’re leaving me here?”
The question sounds small.
I hate it.
Lottie’s face softens just enough to make me want to cry again. “Yes.”
I look toward the window, toward August’s laughter, toward the women outside. “I don’t know these people.”
“You didn’t know me once either.”
“That isn’t comforting.”
Hot Mama crosses her arms. “You ain’t alone out here. You’re just not surrounded by men who think roaring is a plan.”
I almost laugh.
Almost.
“Derby roars,” I whisper.
“Most men with big feelings and little vocabulary do,” Hot Mama says.
Lottie snorts. “Derby’s vocabulary is mostly profanity and engine sounds.”
“He’ll come after me,” I say.
The room stills because I say it like a confession.
“He will,” Lottie says.
“I told him not to.”