Chapter 2 – ELLIE
ELLIE
Age Twelve
"We're gonna be rich."
Kade's declaration echoes through the RV as he paces back and forth, his hands moving like he's already counting money that doesn't exist yet.
Four years in this dump and he still talks like we're one brilliant scheme away from ruling the world. Or at least Creekside Estates, which is basically the same thing when you're a kid and your entire universe consists of dreams too big for your neighborhood.
"Think about it," Kade continues as I sit cross-legged on our worn couch, trying not to laugh as he outlines his latest master plan.
His gray eyes are bright and intense, which means we're about to do something spectacularly stupid.
"These assholes keep vandalizing shit around here.
Mrs. Cove's garden gnomes? Smashed. Mr. Baldwin's truck tires?
Slashed. Someone needs to protect this place. "
"That's called a protection racket," Cyrus says dryly without looking up from whatever he's doing on his ancient laptop.
The one he "found" behind the electronics store last month.
His glasses reflect the screen's glow like a supervillain.
"The mob does it all the time. Pay us or bad things happen to your property. "
"Exactly!" Kade snaps his fingers and points at Cyrus, who just heaves a tired sigh. "We'll be the mob of Creekside Estates!”
I snort. “The mob of a trailer park. I’m so intimidated.”
“Shut up, Princess,” he says, but there's no heat in it.
There never is anymore. Not for me, at least. It took Kade a while to warm up to the idea of having a girl in his "kingdom," but I'm pretty sure if I stopped hanging out with them, he'd be the first to beg me to come back.
Or drag me back. "We charge everyone a few bucks a week, we keep an eye on their shit, everyone's happy. "
"And if they don't pay?" I ask, even though I already know where this is going.
Kade's grin turns sharp. "Then maybe we can't guarantee their garden gnomes stay intact."
"You want to become the vandals to stop the vandals." I shake my head, laughing. "Brilliant."
"It's called creating demand," he shoots back. "Business 101."
Jinx's fingers work through my hair, braiding it while he listens in slightly amused silence to Kade's grand plans.
He's gotten good at this over the years, says it relaxes him.
I don't tell him that having someone play with my hair makes me feel safe.
Some things are better left unsaid, even between us.
My mom used to braid my hair, but she's working so much at the diner lately, I barely ever see her anymore. She leaves before I walk to school, and she comes home most nights after I've given up on trying to keep my eyes open.
"So what, that makes you the Don?" Cyrus asks Kade, sounding bored as usual. Deliberately bored, probably in a vain attempt to suck some of the wind out of Kade’s sails.
"Obviously." Kade puffs out his chest like a rooster, jabbing a thumb at it. "I'm the one with the vision."
"Who's Don?" Jinx's hands pause in my hair. "And why would you want to be him?"
Cyrus actually looks up from his laptop to stare at Jinx. "Are you serious right now?"
"What?"
"It's not a name, dumbass," Kade says, exasperated. “Are you even paying attention? It's a job title. Like, the boss of bosses. The guy who runs everything.”
"Don't call him a dumbass," I say automatically.
"Yeah, don't call me a dumbass," Jinx echoes, tugging my braid-in-progress playfully.
Kade's jaw tightens the way it does when he wants to argue but knows better. Four years and he still hasn't figured out that I don't make requests, I issue verdicts. "Fine. Whatever. The intellectually average individual doesn't know what a Don is."
"Better," I mutter, though we all know Jinx is far from stupid. He just doesn't give a shit about mob movies the way Kade does. Kade steals them from the video store and watches them over and over until he can quote every line.
He got really pissed when I said he couldn’t bitch about ruining the day of his daughter’s wedding because he’s twelve.
A metallic clang from outside makes me jump a little.
I peek out through the curtain that only partially softens the blinding sun coming in through the cracked window.
Tank's over by the rusted car remnants that have been slowly decomposing beside our RV since before we claimed this place.
He's crouched down, completely absorbed in whatever he's doing, his massive frame folded in on itself.
"What's he doing?" Kade asks, following my gaze.
I untangle my hair from Jinx's hands and hop out of the RV, my curiosity getting the better of me. The gravel crunches under my feet, and I have to step around a broken bottle someone threw here last night. Probably Kyle and his asshole friends.
Tank's staring at the ground with an intensity most people reserve for matters of life and death. I crouch beside him, trying to see what's captured his attention.
"Oh," I say, understanding immediately. "It's ants."
A stream of them, hundreds maybe, marching in their perfect little line toward their hill. But there's a puddle in their way from yesterday's rain mixed with shiny motor oil, and they're bunching up at the edge, unable to cross. Some brave ones are trying to go around, but it's too wide.
Tank's already started building something. Tiny pieces of metal, splinters of wood, even bottle caps for stabilization. He's constructing a bridge. His huge hands move carefully, placing each piece just so.
"You're building them a bridge," I say softly.
Tank looks up briefly and nods, his dark eyes crinkling above the skull bandana that always covers the lower half of his face before he goes back to his work.
"Are you fucking kidding me?" Kade groans, leaning out of the RV’s side door. "Tank, we're trying to build an empire here and you're building shit for ants?"
Tank just keeps working, adjusting a piece of wire to make the bridge more stable. One ant ventures onto it, testing, then another. Soon they're streaming across, their crisis averted by a mute giant with scarred hands and infinite patience.
I grab a rusty washer from the ground and add it to the construction, sticking it in the dirt to reinforce one side. "I think it's nice."
"It's ants," Kade protests, but he's already walking over, unable to resist seeing what we're doing.
"So?" I place another piece, a bent nail that creates a perfect ramp. "Maybe he doesn't want them to drown in motor oil. You've got your protection racket, we've got a bridge."
"It's not a—" Kade stops, sighs, then crouches down beside us. "Fine. But this is fucking ridiculous."
He says that, but he's already reaching for a piece of aluminum to add to our bridge. Cyrus and Jinx join us, all five of us focused on saving a bunch of insects like it's the most important thing in the world right now.
"This is actually kind of cool," Jinx admits, watching the ants navigate the bridge. "Look at them go."
Cyrus adjusts a bottle cap one of the more distractible ants got stuck investigating. “One takes a chance on a new path, and the others follow its scent trail. Its pheromones. Sometimes they get caught in a loop. Circular milling—or a death spiral.”
"Dude, it's Saturday and you sound like Mr. Tipton in science class," Kade mutters, but he's smiling now.
We work in comfortable silence, the kind that only comes from years of knowing each other's rhythms. Tank places the major pieces, Kade reinforces the weak spots, Cyrus figures out the angles, and Jinx adds what he calls "aesthetic touches"—a piece of colored glass here, an interesting twig there.
And I fill in the gaps.
"There," I say finally, sitting back on my heels. "The Great Ant Bridge of Creekside Estates."
The ants stream across it steadily now, carrying their tiny burdens to safety.
Tank watches them contentedly. It's hard to tell sometimes with half his face covered, and most of the visible portion so badly scarred he can't fully make certain expressions, but I've learned to read him over the years.
The slight softening around his eyes, the way his shoulders relax just a fraction…
Yeah. He's happy.
I just wish he'd let me see him without his mask. Only Kade ever has. Cyrus says he got a brief glimpse once and saw teeth. I don't know if I believe him, but Cyrus didn’t say it in a mean way—he seemed freaked out and sad, if anything—and Cyrus doesn't usually lie.
Lying is Kade's thing. Sometimes Jinx's, even if his lies are usually the kind so absurd, they're meant to make me laugh.
"We should charge them rent," Kade says. "Two crumbs a week."
"You're such an asshole," I tell him, pushing him hard enough with my shoulder that I almost knock him over, but I'm grinning.
The familiar rumble of an engine cuts through our laughter, and I feel Jinx go rigid beside me.
We all know that sound. Kyle's piece of shit Camaro that he thinks makes him cool but really just makes him loud and obnoxious.
The brand-new aftermarket muffler he probably stole sounds like a giant shitting into a well.
The Camaro pulls up with a spray of gravel, the thumping bass from the stereo making my teeth hurt.
Kyle gets out, and my skin immediately starts to crawl as the smell of cheap pot wafts out with him.
He's eighteen now, with a face full of sharp angles and mean eyes, and short, dirty blond hair that looks like Jinx's if you sucked all the light out of it.
Where Jinx is sunshine, Kyle is a storm cloud.
"Taylor," he barks, not even looking at the rest of us. "Get your ass home. You've got chores."
"I already did them," Jinx says, his voice smaller than it should be. I hate how he shrinks around his brother, like he's trying to disappear. Only Kyle calls him by his real name, and it always makes him cringe.
Or maybe it's just because Kyle is talking to him at all.
"I said get home." Kyle's eyes finally sweep over us, lingering on me in a way that makes me want to claw my own skin off. "Now."
"Do them yourself, asshole," Kade snaps, standing up and conveniently blocking me from Kyle's view. Even at thirteen, he's got a commanding presence that makes people think twice. "Or are you too busy getting shitfaced with your loser friends?"
Kyle's face darkens. "Mind your own fucking business, kid."
"He is my business," Kade says, stepping forward. It's funny that Kade will call Jinx every name in the book and tease him mercilessly, but the second someone else tries it? That's when you see the boy who's been lighting fires since he was seven.
"It's fine," Jinx says quickly to Kade, already moving toward the car. "I'll just—it's fine."
"Jinx—" I start, but he's already giving me that smile. The fake one, the one that never reaches his eyes.
"I'm good, Princess. I'll see you guys tomorrow, yeah?"
He gets in the car before any of us can stop him. Kyle gives us one last look, his eyes lingering on me again. Tank growls low in his throat and Kyle throws himself back into the driver's seat in record time. The Camaro peels out, leaving us in a cloud of dust.
"Hate that fucking asshole," Kade mutters, kicking a rock into the street.
Tank grunts his agreement, the sound rumbling up from his chest like distant thunder. I know he's thinking the same thing we all are. That one day Kyle's going to go too far, and when he does, we'll be ready.
Cyrus hasn't said a word. He’s just staring off into the road after the car. His face looks like a statue’s face, more serious than I've ever seen him, and that's saying something.
"We should do something," I say, even though I know we can't.
What are we going to do? Call the cops? Tell them we think Kyle's mean to his brother? That sometimes he has bruises on his arms and makes up bullshit about where they came from? They'd laugh us out of the station, if they even bothered to show up to the trailer park in the first place.
People don't give a shit about kids like us.
Not even most of the adults in the park care. They all have their own problems, unpaid bills sticking out of their mailboxes, repairs they can't afford for the cars slowly being reclaimed by the earth.
Sometimes I'm not even sure how much Mom cares.
I came alive when we moved here and I met the boys, but it's like this place has been sucking the life out of her ever since we arrived. I wish she could find her own prince. Someone who treats her like a princess, and buys her flowers and dances with her in the living room the way Dad used to.
Once upon a time, I used to dream they'd get back together, but every year that passes, every Instagram notification I get about him and the perfect family we're not a part of, that dream gets hazier.
"Like what?" Kade's voice is bitter, drawing me back to the present. “Kyle’s a man now. He's got a job, and he's friends with that cop. No one would ever believe us over him, and Jinx won't say shit about what goes on in that trailer anyway. He’d probably say we’re making shit up.”
"We could—"
"We could nothing." Kade turns to look at me, setting his jaw. "Trust me, Princess. Some fights you can't win by playing fair."
I want to argue, but something keeps me from it. Maybe the sneaking suspicion that Kade is only telling me the same thing he's told himself too many times.
The ants continue their march across our bridge, oblivious to the darkness that just swept through. I watch them carry their loads, working together, never stopping, and I wish we could be like them. Simple.
"I wish we could all just live here," I say quietly, rubbing at a mosquito bite that's already forming on my arm. Probably got me while I was distracted by Kyle. "In the RV. Just us. No parents, no bullshit. Just our kingdom."
"Yeah," Kade says, his voice softer now. "Me too."
Tank puts his huge hand on my shoulder, gentle as always despite his size. We stand there together, watching the ants use our bridge, and I pretend for just a moment that we really are the mob of Creekside Estates. That we have power. That we can protect each other.
But we're just kids playing at being dangerous, building bridges for ants while the real monsters drive Camaros and share our last names.
The sun sinks lower, painting everything in shades of rust, and I count the ants as they cross.
One. Two. Three. Four. Five.
Five is safe.
Five is us.
Five is home.
And I promise myself it always will be.
But deep down, I know I don't really have any power over that, either.