Page 3 of Saints & Sailors

I sped up. “Fuck yeah!”

“SAYLOR NO!” Jack screamed beside me.

I couldn’t believe he didn’t want to win the race. We were so coming in first.

The finish line was getting closer and closer, and I could vaguely feel Jack’s fingernails digging into my skin as he began grabbing my arm.

Turning my head to face him, I began to question his motives. “What?”

He pointed ahead of us. “Dumpster!”

Facing forward, my vision became clear. It was not a finish line I was about to cross, but a dumpster I was about to collide into.

I slammed my foot on the brake as Jack’s heavy boot smashed into my shoe.

We’d only begun to slow down just a little before we crashed loudly into the rude awakening before us.

When I came to, I found a shiny new bracelet on my wrist.

It took a moment for me to adjust and realize it was a handcuff.

Waking up in the hospital, hearing the sounds of beeping machines, chatter, and footsteps, I was grateful that I was actually alive and in one piece.

I would never be that reckless again.

While it was imminent that my mother was going to have a heart attack and lecture me, there was one thing to look forward to: her husband, Richard.

Richard was a big-time lawyer, and he was damn good at his job. If you were pulled over for speeding and got caught with a dead body in the trunk of your car, he could get you off. If you were tasered by security after getting caught running around naked in the middle of a shopping mall high as a kite, he could get you off. If the police stormed into your house, catching you eating human flesh and mumbling about the devil, he could get you off. Lucky for me, he was in my pocket. He had all the money and knew all the right people.

I never really cared for Richard. He was some uptight hard-ass that didn’t know a thing about fun or personality. In truth, he was a fucking snob. His approach to me at first had been saccharine and soft, but I saw through his veneer instantly, and soon he dropped the act and mostly paid me attention only when it was necessary.

I honestly wasn’t sure what my mother saw in him. They were total opposites.

When Richard married her when I was fourteen, he understood that I was a packaged deal. Whenever I messed up, it was his job to get me off.

This was no different.

I lay in a hospital bed, cocooned by a rack of blue curtains. Around me, I could hear heated voices, one mentioning “felony” and another insisting “misdemeanor.” I was certain the upset voice, the broken one—no doubt strained from crying—belonged to my mother. And the annoyed voice, the tired one, was Richard.

An ache in my head caused me to groan, eliciting attention at once.

The curtain was pulled back, welcoming me into the presence of my mother and stepdaddy dearest.

As I suspected, my mother was a wreck of worry and a tear-drenched face. Richard, he glowered at me as he soon came and hovered over me.

I sat up as best as I could, tugging on my handcuff as I struggled to become acclimated with it.

“You’re really in a lot of shit this time,” Richard whispered vehemently.

My mother covered her mouth. She stepped out of the area and looked around frantically. “Nurse! Nurse!”

In seconds, some middle-aged woman dressed in foam-green scrubs was stepping into my makeshift room. She greeted me with a gentle smile, cooling my nerves as she approached me. With her warm hand, she felt my forehead and offered me a look of understanding. “She has a slight concussion due to the airbag, and I’m assuming a massive headache due to the alcohol and…err, marijuana.”

My mother squeezed her eyes shut. “Oh my God.”

“Other than that, she should be fine.” The nurse, whose nametag read Kirsten, came and adjusted my pillow a little. “You’re very lucky, Saylor. I wish I could say the same for your friend.”

Vomit rose in my throat. “Oh my God, is he…?”