Chapter 16
Pat kicks at the gravel as we make our way back toward my trailer, the last stack of names tucked under his arm. The summer air has an almost unbearable quality to it, but the swarms of bugs have started to die down.
“Fuuuuck,” he complains, dragging the word out. “I hate to say it, but this would’ve gone a hell of a lot faster if Diana had been with us.”
“I thought you hated her.”
“I do, it’s just—” he throws both hands up in frustration. “We knock, some grumpy old guy answers, and Jesus, Lil, they talk our ears off, and we still don’t get a signature. But if it’s her at the door? Boom. Signature. And snacks too. Snacks. I haven’t eaten since breakfast!”
“To be fair, you had breakfast at noon,” I remind him, dancing around the subject of Diana. Everything about her feels different these days. Too much to think about. A sore spot in my heart and my friendship with Pat.
Pat doesn’t have the same problem. “Point is, she’s a bitch, but she’s an efficient bitch.”
“You are so lucky she never hears you talk like that.”
“Oh, please,” he scoffs. “She’d tell me I have no class and give me some kind of look that’d probably scare me enough to watch my mouth for a week.”
We both laugh at that because it’s totally true. Diana could scare anyone with a single look.
“She gets that from her mom,” I respond with a not-so-fake shiver of fear.
The porch light flickers as we climb the steps to my old trailer, sitting in a sea of other ones that look exactly the same. “Well, it’s safe to say we’ve got more than enough signatures to take that strip mall down.”
“Yeah,” I say softly, flipping through the sheets of our final signatures. “I can’t believe we did it.”
I look back up at him with an expression I know is way too sappy. “Thank you for helping. We couldn’t have done it without you.”
He shrugs like it’s no big deal. “Hey, I said I’d help you save your little fairy garden. I keep my promises. No matter how hot it is and how many doors get slammed in my face and how starv—”
“Okay, okay. I get it. I’ll buy you lunch tomorrow, deal?”
Pat doesn’t get a chance to say anything before headlights sweep up the road and Gary’s beat-up Ford rolls to a stop in front of us, crunching gravel loud under the tires.
As soon as the engine shuts off, Gary climbs out, stumbling a little, clearly drunk, scowling like the sight of us offends him. “Oh, great,” he starts, loud enough for the neighbors across from us to look up. “Don’t you have somewhere better to be?”
I feel the flare in my chest immediately. I don’t know where all this animosity toward Pat is coming from, but it’s really starting to piss me off. “Fuck off, Gary, he’s helping me—”
“I didn’t ask what he’s doing,” Gary snaps, jabbing a finger in Pat’s direction. “Get lost, boy.”
Pat starts down the steps, hands raised. “Relax, man. I was leaving anyway.”
“No.” I step forward to grab him by the shirt. “He doesn’t have to leave because you’re a drunk asshole.”
Gary’s eyes narrow at me, the whiskey he must’ve had before coming here turning his already shitty personality mean. “Watch your mouth.”
“You don’t get to dictate who my friends are.”
The trailer door swings open behind me, revealing Mom, already in a nightgown she thinks is sexy, leaning on the frame like it’s the only thing holding her up.
It probably is.
“What’s going on?” she slurs, rubbing her forehead like we’re already giving her a migraine.
“Your girl’s got company,” Gary says, jerking his thumb toward Pat. “Caught them out here about to get rowdy.”
“Rowdy?” Pat repeats, so confused.
It would be funny if this wasn’t my life.
Mom’s eyes find Pat, and she tries to glare, but she’s too drunk. “Oh. Him,” she says, agreeing far too quickly for someone who was just defending our friendship. “Honey, tonight’s not a good night for visitors.”
My jaw drops. “Are you serious? Mom, he helped me all afternoon, and we’re tired—”
“I said it’s not a good night,” she interrupts, firm enough that it almost convinces me she cares.
“I’m eighteen!” I face her with clenched fists, not even thinking about the neighbors who are definitely staring now. “You don’t get to tell me who I can—”
Pat steps between us, palms out. “Hey. Lil.” His calm voice cuts through my rage. “It’s fine.”
“It’s not fine,” I seethe, shaking my head. “They’re being assholes.”
“That’s new?” he jokes, giving me a tired smile. “Come on. It’s okay. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Pat—”
He shakes his head, giving me that look that says It’s not worth it.
“Later, Lil.” He tucks his hand into his pocket casually as he starts back down the gravel road for a twenty-minute walk, even though I know his feet hurt too.
I storm into the trailer, the screen door slamming behind me with a crack that echoes through the entire space. I don’t make it two steps into the cramped living room before I hear them, Gary first, then Mom, following behind closely.
“What the hell is your problem?” I shout. “Seriously. What the fuck was that?”
“Lily, honey, calm down—” Mom says, trying to be soothing, but the booze scent wafting off of her pisses me off more.
“No,” I bite out. “I’m not calming down. I’m asking you why you let that asshole talk to Pat like that.”
Gary scoffs, “I was doing you a favor.”
“A favor?” I laugh, a sharp, ugly imitation. “You’re doing me a favor by fucking with one of the only good people in my life?”
Mom has that fake-concerned expression she always uses when she’s about to try to emotionally manipulate me. “Lily… you know what happened to Diana,” she says, shaking her head like she’s disappointed. “We don’t want the same thing happening to you.”
I stare at her. For a second, I don’t even have words. “What are you talking about?”
Gary crosses his arms like he’s about to deliver some wise advice, coming from a man who’s never acted like anything but a drunk piece of shit. “A girl gets too friendly, trouble happens. Diana’s proof of that.”
My mouth hangs open. “You have got to be kidding me. You don’t even know Pat. You don’t know me. Me and Pat aren’t—”
“I know enough,” he cuts in.
“No, you don’t,” I shoot back. “Mom knows him. She’s known him for years. He’s like family!”
Gary rolls his eyes. “He ain’t hangin’ around you for your good personality, that’s for sure.”
I step closer, my hands clenching into fists as fury burns in my chest. “Could you be any more disgusting?”
Mom touches Gary’s arm like she’s supporting him, over her own daughter. “Lily, Gary is trying to look out for you.”
“Oh, screw you, mom.” I challenge, over all of this fake bullshit. “You’re actually letting him try to dictate who I can be friends with? Are you kidding me? After all I’ve put up with from you, you’re gonna let some disgusting—”
Mom’s face tightens, guilt flashing for a second before she buries it, cutting off my rant. “Don’t talk about him like that.”
“He talks to me like that!” I shout. “You didn’t even blink when he told Pat to get lost. You stood there and agreed.”
Gary smirks like he’s proud. “Someone has to keep you girls in line.”
My skin crawls. My stomach turns. And whatever’s been holding me back, trying to keep the peace, trying to keep a relationship with my mother, it breaks.
I turn away from them and storm down the hall toward my bedroom. I’m done.
I’m done.
I’ve said it a hundred times in my head, screamed it into my pillow, cried myself to sleep over it, but this time I mean it.
I can’t live like this anymore.
I yank my bedroom door open and grab the old duffel bag from my closet that hasn’t been used since Dad left, and we moved here. I throw anything I can grab inside. Clothes, clean or dirty, books, art supplies, my favorite leather jacket. I don’t even care what I’m packing,
I need to get out of this house.
I hesitate over the stack of pictures of Diana I have in my side table, but I grab those too.
Once the bag is filled with everything I own, I go straight for the shoebox I keep hidden under my bed. My emergency stash. My out. My plan for escape from this hellhole.
I haven’t pulled the box out since last winter when I worked holiday hours at the grocery store. It’s been a while, but it hasn’t been so long that I don’t recognize that the box is too light.
My stomach drops.
“No,” I whisper, dread clawing its way up my spine.
The box is empty.
The money I’ve saved since I was thirteen, every dollar I’ve made from babysitting, working summers at the grocery store, every tip, every scrap I could put away, bit by bit, it’s all gone.
All of it.
“No. No, no, where is it?” I throw the empty shoebox down and check under my bed like maybe if I look hard enough, it’ll somehow appear. “Where the fuck is it?!”
Gary’s voice comes from the open door, amused. “Looking for something?”
My blood runs cold.
Mom stands beside him, avoiding my eyes, the way she used to do when Dad would be angry about her spending money we didn’t have. No words come at first. When they do, they sound so angry that I almost scare myself.
“Where. Is. My. Money.”
Gary shrugs. “We borrowed it.”
“No,” I breathe out, shaking my head, like I can make it go away. “No, that was my money. That was everything,” my voice breaks. “Mom. How could you let him take it?”
“We needed it, honey. You live here. You’re part of this family,” she tries to say, but Gary cuts her off.
“This is our house. You bring money in here, it belongs to us.”
And that does it.
Rage so intense comes over me, I whip the empty shoebox at Gary’s chest. “This isn’t your house!” It hits him hard with a thunk. My mother gasps, while his eyes go cold in a way that makes my stomach tighten.
I can’t help but remember that night in the kitchen.
I’m not scared of Gary, he’s a drunk idiot.
But the look on his face has me backing up.
“Watch it,” he warns, moving too fast for me to do anything, and then his hand is on me. His fingers clamp around my upper arm, hard enough to send a shock of pain down my arm.
“Get off,” I jerk against his grip, but he tightens it with a mean smirk. “Let go of me!”
He doesn’t let go.
His face gets harder. Meaner. I can smell the whiskey on his breath. “You don’t talk to me like that in my house,” he growls.
“It’s not your house,” I argue, too angry to back down. “And you stole my money.” He tightens his grip, shoving me into the bookshelf behind me, and I can’t help the sound of pain I let out as his grip crushes my thin arm.
Mom gasps behind us, fully tuning into what’s going on. “Gary, stop, let her go!”
She almost sounds concerned for once, like the sound of her only child in pain actually had some effect on her, but I don’t look at her.
I don’t break eye contact with him.
Luckily, the sound of her voice finally gets him. He releases me with a shove into the shelf, knocking things over.
My arm throbs where his fingers were, but I don’t pay it any attention. I straighten up quickly and sling the half-packed bag over my shoulder, heading for the door, the adrenaline keeping me moving.
If I stop, if I think about what he would have done, if I think about how every bit of my savings went to beer and drugs, I don’t know if I’ll be able to keep going.
Mom rushes after me, her voice sounding a little scared. “Lily! Lily, wait, honey, please—”
I spin around fast, angry, to look her in the eye. “No. We’re done.”
Her mouth opens, closes, opens again like she’s searching for the right thing to say through her drunken haze. Behind her, Gary stands with his arms crossed, smirking like he’s won.
In a way, he has.
But I don’t care about him. He’s a dick, end of story. He doesn’t owe me anything. Mom, on the other hand? She’s the one who was supposed to protect me. She was supposed to comfort me when Dad left us with nothing. She was supposed to take care of me.
Instead, she spent the last five years of my life high or drunk off something, while I had to fend for myself.
So I’m done.
“I hope you’re happy,” I say, and my voice cracks, but I mean it more than I’ve meant anything in my entire life. “I hope he’s worth it. Because I’m never coming back.”
“Lily, sweetheart—”
“No.” I back toward the door. “You’ve been making your choice since Dad left. Now you have to live with it.”
Her face crumples, but I don’t let myself give in, I don’t let her manipulate me. I head toward the door without another word, and I don’t look back.