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"We aren't going to talk about it, Meryl," I told him, shaking my head. "I am going to stand here, pissing off customers, breaking egos, and doing the bare minimum of work. You are going to give me shit about it, but let it slide. This has always worked for us. Let's not change it with some touchy-feely bullshit."
The look of relief on him was comical.
I actually felt my lips curling up at that, almost meeting my eyes, which made his brows draw together.
"I've never seen you smile, Len."
I shrugged at that, trying to make light of it, though I knew he wasn't exaggerating.
If I had a dollar for every time someone told me I would be prettier if I smiled, I could quit this hellhole and retire.
"You've never looked so fucking relieved at the idea of not having to comfort me before."
"Well, that's true," he agreed, knowing me well enough to know to let it go as well. "I will go get the cigarette cases," he told me, walking away. "Lord knows your lazy fucking ass won't do it."
I felt my breath move out of me, decompressing the weight in my chest.
Things could go back to normal.
It had started to feel like everything would change, nothing could ever feel as it once did.
But Meryl could still just barely tolerate me.
And I could just be my normal bitch self while inside these walls, even if that side of me would slip off as soon as I walked out the door.
Because Edison wouldn't allow me to keep that mask on.
And, what's more, I didn't want to around him.
Things were changing.
Somehow, I wasn't fighting it. I wasn't terrified of what it could mean.
I guess maybe Edison had a lot to do with that.
The next several hours were just completely, boringly, comfortingly normal. It seemed that Meryl had not shared the reason I had been out of work for so long, as none of the regulars gave me the eyes or the voice I had been dreading. I don't know what he told them about where I was. Probably intensive anger management classes or some shit.
I had never been more grateful to the man.
It wasn't until I was walking down the street toward my car after closing up that shit changed again.
Not necessarily in a good way.
But in a life-altering way.
I saw him.
It had been easy in my despair not to focus on the thing that had been at the forefront of my mind since the day my sister found herself in that hospital bed.
But there he was.
Driving past me, likely on his way home.
Where he used to abuse my sister in every way he could.
And the rage was crippling.
It boiled.
It coursed through my veins like battery acid, burning, eroding, overtaking me completely.
My hands curled into fists until my knuckles ached.
My breath got caught under the weight of my chest until I felt lightheaded.
My heart pounded against the confines of my ribcage.
And I knew.
I couldn't wait.
I had to do it.
Tonight.
Just as I suspected, losing my sister was hard.
The hardest.
This?
This was fucking easy.
I had read thirty pages of her journal detailing every awful, evil thing he had done to her, followed by pages about how he swore it wasn't going to happen again.
Until it did.
Again and again and again.
Until she decided that dying was better than living.
I swallowed back the bile those thoughts sent up my throat, cracking my neck, turning away from my car, and going back toward the building where I stashed it.
The bag that had everything I needed in it. From a change of clothes, hairnet, and wig, to knives and duct tape.
Nothing had been anywhere near my apartment.
Nothing had so much as one of my hairs on it.
Everything was clean.
Paid for in cash a whole county over months before.
Nothing could trace back.
Because they would look.
They would look no matter what because he had been murdered.
But they would especially look because of who this fuckhead was.
I was giving myself every chance possible to walk away from this free.
An hour later, I was in a cab that had picked me up outside Chaz's where I had walked after getting myself changed in a gas station bathroom, tossing my clothes into the garbage, then throwing the bag into their dumpster.
Careful.
I had been planning this for too long to forget the steps now.
My makeup was heavy; the wig was blonde and believable. I had glasses on. And three layers of clothes that made me look much bulkier than I was.
No one could give the cops an accurate description for a sketch.
I felt strange as I watched the meter tick as we made our way across town, dropping me at the train station which was only two blocks away from where I needed to go.
Detached.
I could still feel the rage, but it felt like there was something else there too. A wall. Something that was making me feel almost alarmingly calm considering the situation.
