Demi
Six weeks later…
Ispit minty bubbles into the cracked sink of my childhood home before rinsing my toothbrush and placing it into the holder at the side. While staring at my reflection, I act as if I can’t hear my painkiller prescription beckoning me to it.
I only take a minor dose when absolutely necessary.
Regretfully, today is one of those days.
I recruited a father this morning—a single dad of two. He approached me with a story you hear far too often around these parts. His wife had died when his youngest was six months old, and the factory he was working at closed down not long after that. He needed money, and he was desperate enough to admit that to a stranger.
I gave him everything I had on me. Notes, coins, even the coupons I had clipped out of a newspaper earlier this month, but it wasn’t close to what he needed.
Some of the fighters at his gym bragged about the contracts I had offered them. It frustrated him to no end because he wasn’t being cocky when he said he was a far better fighter than the men I had signed in front of him. I tried to explain that the fighting circuit I recruited for was different than a standard fight ring and in no form whatsoever was it suitable for a single parent, but nothing I said made any difference. If I didn’t give him a contract, he would soon approach my uncle. That would have seen his entire family placed onto my uncle’s radar, so once again, I had no choice. The decision was taken out of my hands. I had to sign him.
I’ve felt sick to my stomach all day, and I don’t see the painful twists ending with a minor dose of oxycodone, so I swallow down two tablets instead. It gives me an instant buzz. Even the dreariness of my family home doesn’t seem as bad.
I’ve lived here a couple of months now, yet it still feels foreign. The carpet smells musty, every room has water damage of some kind, and a lack of floor space hasn’t hidden the fact I have hardly any furniture. Mr. and Mrs. Walsh helped me as much as they could, but with them selling their antiques to fund Maddox’s ‘legal fees,’ they didn’t have much left for themselves.
They’re living in a rental house a similar size to my family home. That’s why I moved out—much to their dismay. They went from an eight-bedroom mansion to a three-bedroom home with only one bathroom. We were practically living on top of each other, and Max wasn’t making the tight confines any less noticeable. He scratched at the door every night, begging to come in, but since the den I was using as a bedroom didn’t have a door, I couldn’t let him in. Justine had heard the story of the time he broke the bathroom door in her family cabin, and she was petrified he’d do the same to her bedroom door.
I held off for as long as I could, but eventually, the tight confines became too much to bear. I had to move out. Of course, the entire Walsh family tried to talk me out of it, but despite their multiple confirmations that I wasn’t intruding, I could see the weariness in their eyes. Landon has yet to forgive me for Maddox’s incarceration, Justine is still a recluse, and one night I heard Mrs. Walsh express concerns to her husband about my ‘constant need to work out.’ She has no clue my multiple trips to the gym are to help her son, and in all honesty, I want to keep it that way. The fewer people aware of my murderous ways, the better.
One of the good things about moving out on my own is that there is less chance of anyone finding out my secrets. I can come and go as I please. My only watch dog without fur is the same man who knows almost all my deepest darkest secrets—Caidyn. He’s asleep on my couch at the moment. I did offer him to camp in my parents’ room during his almost nightly sleepovers, but he declined my offer with a shiver, acting as if their corpses were in their bed.
I freeze partway into my bedroom when a disturbing notion enters my thoughts. I always talk about my mother as if she is dead, where, in reality, I have no clue if that is true. No matter how often I begged my uncle in the months following my father’s death for an update on my mother, he never succumbed to my tears.
Within a year, I stopped asking about her. It hurt more wondering if she was alive than it did pretending she was dead, so I did the latter. I feel guilty about it, but those first couple of months when I was shipped from foster home to foster home were really tough for me. There’s only one time that comes close to competing with it—the past couple of months.
You can only surround yourself with darkness for so long before you eventually forget the colors of a rainbow. Maddox is learning that the hard way, and if the bundles of cash Saint is entering my room with is anything to go by, he isn’t far off discovering the same thing.
“Saint, where did you get this money?”
He answers me by lifting his head high enough the 69ers cap he’s wearing unshadows his right eye. It’s bruised in an obvious manner. Ungloved fists mark the same way.
“Please tell me you’re not fighting for my uncle?” Sloane will never speak to me again if she finds out. Things were super awkward between us last week when she drove with me to visit Maddox. I doubt she would have come with me if Caidyn hadn’t begged her.
With the Walshs’ reputation in the crapper, thanks to Maddox’s incarceration for murder and Caidyn being investigated for a failed arson insurance claim, jobs in the local area soon dwindled to nothing, leaving a majority of the Walshs scrambling for work in other states. It’s been a ghost town around here lately, and the gaping vacancy in my chest is the most obvious.
I tried my best to fake happiness during my one-on-one visit with Maddox, but he saw through it in under a second. I broke down when he reiterated his comment about how I could have a life without him and that he wouldn’t hate me for putting myself first. He truly has no clue those very short minutes we have each month are theonlythings keeping me going. They’re the equivalent of a person counting down to a long-awaited vacation. I circle them on the calendar tacked next to my bed and shed a tear for every day I cross off. I truly don’t know how I would cope if I didn’t have them to look forward to. It would be one dreary day after another.
That isn’t a life I want to live.
I’d rather die than face that day in and day out.
Mistaking my horrified expression as disappointment, Saint shakes his head. “I’m working the circuit independently. This one is separate from the Petretti route.”
I shouldn’t sigh in relief, but I do. Even though I’d rather he not fight at all, it would be so much worse if he were doing it under my uncle.
“Will that help?”
I drop my eyes to the bundle of cash he nudged his head at during his question. There must be at least twelve thousand sitting on the end of my bed. “Yeah, it could… if I had any plans to accept it.”
“Why wouldn’t you accept it?”
I raise my eyes to his, which are glaring at me like I’m gum stuck under his school desk. “Because Maddox will never forgive me if he finds out I took your money, not to mention how you earned it.”
My back molars smash together when Saint replies, “Then don’t tell him.” An expression crosses his face. It shows he’s been struggling as badly as me the past couple of months. “What’s one more item on the laundry list of things you and Caidyn are keeping from him? It will take you recruiting twenty fighters to get that much money. I earned it in one weekend.”
