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The other woman moved so fast and struck her so hard that Cricket stumbled and tripped over the coffee table, falling and hitting her head against the side of the couch.
The world tilted, and stars swam before her eyes. She lay on the floor, stunned, pain radiating from her jaw down her neck. She’d never, in her life, been hit—by anyone. Her parents had never even spanked her. Her whole system reeled from the shock, from the pain. She felt herself curl up into a ball, the wood floor gritty and dusty.
The woman came at her again, yanking the coffee table out of the way with the squeal of wood on wood. Joshua moved to get between them.
“Heyheyhey! What the fuck?” He blocked the other woman’s path. “You said she wouldn’t get hurt.”
“No,” said the woman, standing and jutting her chin out at Joshua. He was a full head taller but it was clear that he was afraid of her. He lifted his palms and backed up as she advanced. “Yousaid she wouldn’t get hurt andIdidn’t correct you.”
He bowed his head. “Just—stop. Let me help her up. You don’t need to do this.”
“How the fuck would you know what I need to do?”
They spoke like intimates, like people who knew each other too well. Cricket tried to piece it together, but everything was just a horrible jumble of every single thing gone wrong. What could this possibly be about?
“Here.” Josh bent down to Cricket. She let him help her onto the couch, confused, in pain.
“What’s happening?” she whispered in his ear when he was close. It was the old Joshua, the one she’d been falling in love with. He looked so worried, so loving.
Cricket felt like a little kid, hurt and afraid. She wasn’t a fighter like Hannah; she wasn’t really a tough girl, though she could talk tough when she needed to. Hannah was the one who got suspended for beating up a girl who was bullying Cricket, while Cricket stood on the edge of the sports court and cried. She was embarrassed then and now, too, but she started to cry. It was the kind of ugly crying that wouldn’t stop, sloppy, sobby. Her face hurt—a lot. Oh god, she was going to be sick. She leaned over and vomited on the floor.
“Oh, Christ,” said the other woman.
“Shh,” said Joshua, pushing the hair back from her eyes, resting a hand on her head. “I’m sorry.”
She looked down to see that blood was gushing onto her white cover-up. She swallowed hard, tried to stop crying but couldn’t. She willed herself not to puke again.Make yourself solid, Hannah had said leaning with her over a hundred toilets.
“You said this wasn’t about her,” said Josh, looking back to the other woman. “That it was about him.”
He grabbed the ice pack that she’d been holding tohishead just minutes ago. She’d been tending to him but he seemed fine now—had it been an act?
“It’s aboutall of them,” she said. “You must see it. How they mollycoddle him, enable him. He’s a monster and they’re like his—his—his—handmaidens.”
She was sour, angry. Cricket knew the type, the wronged woman who got bitter and then lost touch with reality a little.
Obviously, this was one of Mako’s women scorned. They were legion.
She might have had an actual grievance at one point—he harassed her at work, used her, fired her when she didn’t give him what he wanted. There was all sorts of chatter about Red World and about Mako on the chat boards, what a pig he was. No one had ever stepped up to file charges though. And like so many men in power, he just found his way to keep doing what he did. This was the post-#MeToo era. Nothing had changed. Guys just got way better at hiding, more accomplished in their gaslighting, lying, and covering up.
Anyway, whatever the initial wrong was, her anger had turned her into something ugly. Cricket had no idea what the woman was talking about, but she could tell that whatever it was, there was something even uglier, even deeper beneath it. Like the bully on the playground who’s abused at home. Hurt people hurt people.
“What do you want?” she asked through her sobs. “Look. If it’s money. We have it. Mako has it.”
The other woman looked at Cricket like she was something she wanted to scrape off her shoe. “That is literally what every single person says. Like it’s the only thing that motivates people.”
The other woman shook her head in naked disgust.
“Then what?” Cricket asked. She was bolder with Joshua beside her. He wasn’t going to let the woman hurt her again, was he? “You obviously wantsomething.”
The other woman ignored her, turned her attention to Joshua. “Just tie her up and put her somewhere. We’ll deal with her later.”
She felt Joshua stiffen, and she looked up to see him staring at the stranger with something like hatred on his face.
“The other one’s out cold by the generator on the side of the house,” she said into the tense silence. “When you’ve secured this idiot, go get her, too.”
Tie her up? What? Who’s out cold by the generator? Hannah? Oh god.
“Look,” said Joshua, rising. “This isn’t about him anymore. Killing him. Destroying him and his life and the people who enable him. Is it? This is about you. I think this has gone too far.”
