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“— another video?” he repeats. “Kita, are these public videos? Like on YouTube?”
I nod, pressing my lips together to keep from crying again. This is all so humiliating.
He reaches out, taking the phone from my hands and laying it face down on the sofa. Then he leans forward, gazing at me seriously.
“Kita, I want you to listen to me. I know you don't have any reason to trust me, but I want you to trust me anyway. You can't go back there. But you can stay here. I promise you will be safe here. Do you believe me?”
I nod, biting my lips together and holding my hands firmly between my knees. I don't know why, but I do want to trust him. There’s something so sincere in his eyes, and just being around him makes me feel safe. Safe as I can feel right now, anyway.
“And you agree to stay in school?”
“But —”
“Say you will.”
“But, Dad,” I say, then stop. My mouth falls open and goes dry. He looks shocked, but not in an entirely horrified way. “I mean… um, Daniel—”
He holds up a hand, stop. “That's the condition. Free room and board, but you have to stay in school, is that clear?”
Slowly, I nod. Apparently he’s not going to mention my weird slip-up just now. But I have to admit, he’s acting awfully parental. Some weird part of me kind of likes it.
“That's a good girl,” he tells me and breaks into a smile. I warm under his praise.“Just let me help.”
“But why?” I have to ask.
He purses his lips, scowling as he thinks this through. I find myself breathless, waiting to see what he will say.
“I see potential in you, frankly,” he says in a low voice. I lean in closer to hear better and his hazel eyes catch my off guard again. They bore into me intensely.
“You do?” I hear my voice squeak.
“Absolutely,” he nods. “I think you got a
little thrown off track, but I see… something. Something good. Let me help you.”
I’m close enough to him that I can smell his woody, earthy scent. I breathe it in, suddenly hungry again. He really does seem sincere in everything he says. And I have to admit, I’m drawn to his strength in a weirdly eager way. Like, there’s a little kid inside me who just wants the big strong adult to take her hand and tell her which way to go.
“All right,” I say, finally letting myself smile back, just a little.
He smiles too, lines creasing around his handsome mouth. “Excellent.”
In a few hours, Freddie returns with neatly labeled cardboard boxes. Kita, top dresser drawer. Kita, sundries. Kita, closet shelf.
One by one, he brings the boxes into the guest room as I stand in the middle of the floor, helpless and unsure if I should help. I don't know how I would help, since he's carrying the boxes two and three at a time. I would probably just be in the way.
I'm trying not to imagine it. As soon as Daniel left the room, I heard the garage door going up. By my guess, Freddie must have taken one of the cars out of the huge attached garage and went to buy boxes, then to the sorority house. How did he get in? What did Lizzie say to him? Daniel made it sound like an operation that I didn't need to know all the details of, but it must have been something else.
It sort of plays out in my mind like a scene from a movie. Freddie is tall, over six feet. He has broad shoulders but he's thin and wiry. Like slender man, but not evil. When he brings the boxes into the room he doesn't look at me directly and he hunches his shoulders over just a little bit, as though protecting himself. He seems like one of those extremely polite southern boys, who have been raised with a very long list of rules about how they are supposed to act around women. And how they are supposed to act when in the presence of a big dog, which is what Daniel definitely is.
What have I gotten myself into? Am I insane?
Freddie brings up another box and slides it onto the top of the stack. It is labeled Kita, locker. That means that he was not just in my room, he was in the storage closet down the hall, where I also had a locker for valuables. Did he use bolt cutters to cut the lock? Wow. It's like they thought of everything.
I'm uncomfortable thinking about what Lizzie is doing right now. If Freddie knocked on the front door and politely asked to come in, she would have simply told him to go away. So he must have insisted. And then, what, asked for directions? Just walked around until he found of my door, which had my name in sparkly bubble letters?
What did the girls do when he brought in the boxes? Did anybody help?
Every drawer's contents was put in its own box. I guess all he did was go, assemble boxes, and then dump the contents. Efficient. Very military.
