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“It’s everything,” Jude replied. “I can see us sitting out here on this porch, watching while you mow the grass—”
Gale cackled when I turned to smack Jude’s ass. “Shut that smart mouth, bish!”
Laughing, we all headed indoors to get the celebration started.
∞∞∞
It was much later that same night when Jude and Baron drove me back to Rick’s. Reluctance was thick in the car.
“I wish she could just stay at the house,” Jude said, looking across to Baron. “It’s not like Rick would care.”
“You’re going to have the attention of social workers on you right now. You can’t do that,” Baron said.
“I know, but it sucks.”
“It’ll be all right, Jude,” I told her. “I have everything I need.”
I hated returning to Rick’s, but it was true. I had my bat, which I removed from its hiding space and tucked beside my bed every night. I had my chair, which I propped beneath the doorknob once I’d shut myself in for the evening. I’d be okay.
Even if I didn’t care for the increasingly predatorial vibe I’d been getting from Rick lately. He was always there, ‘accidentally’ brushing up against me in the kitchen. Waiting outside the bathroom door because he ‘was in a hurry.’ I shivered at the memory of how his eyes had crawled over me this morning when I’d emerged from the bathroom, fully dressed in the swingy sundress I was wearing to graduation.
Thankfully I’d waited up to the minute to leave the sanctity of the bathroom, and it wasn’t seconds before the honk of Baron’s parents’ car horn broke the creep of his gaze over my skin.
There were a couple of extra vehicles parked outside of Rick’s trailer when we pulled up. Baron cut the engine and opened his door. “I’ll walk you inside.”
I didn’t argue.
Rick was playing poker inside, three other men sitting with him around our glass-topped dining table. Its surface was littered with empties, overflowing ashtrays, and cards. My uncle raised a heavy-lidded gaze when we entered, his mouth sliding over the top of his can of Bud and drinking deeply. I could tell at a glance; he was drunk. The men with him didn’t seem much better. One of them looked at me with an active contempt and I squinted thoughtfully. I knew him. Knew his face, anyway.
“Well, lookit who it is,” my uncle slurred, interrupting my musings. “Wanna come give me some of that luck, niece?”
“No luck here,” I said firmly. “Goodnight, Uncle Rick.”
Baron hovered behind me until I was in my room, and waited outside the door until he heard the scrape of the chair beneath the doorknob. Then I heard his footsteps fade down the hallway, and I went to my dresser with a sigh.
I was alone.
I pulled on a pair of thin sweatpants and a tee shirt to sleep in and laid down on the bed with my phone. The men in the other room were loud and obnoxious, cursing with each bad hand and yelling with every win or loss. There were frequent thumps and bangs and at one point, the sound of shattering glass. The door to the trailer opened, closed, opened again, and I heard one of the men taking a leak in the yard, singing as he did so.
Jesus Pete.
I looked at the time—just past one in the morning.
That one man, who had looked at me so hatefully...who the hell was he and why did he look so familiar?
I desperately wanted to sleep, but I really needed to use the bathroom first. I should have done so when Baron was still there, but in honor of my inner seven year-old, I didn’t need to at the time.
Maybe I could sneak through without anyone paying attention.
I fretted about it for another several minutes, chewing my nails, and then set my jaw. I was going to pee, damnit.
As quietly as I could, I pulled the chair from beneath the doorknob and set it to the side. Then I turned the doorknob and peeked down the hall. No one appeared to be paying any attention to me, so I slid out, closed my door behind me, and slipped swiftly into the bathroom, closing and locking the door behind me.
I did my business quickly and quietly, washing my hands at the sink and deciding to forego flushing the toilet to avoid drawing attention to myself. Wasn’t like Rick would even notice; I was forever cleaning up behind him. Gagging at the thought, I opened the door to return to the bedroom and stopped short. My door was open several inches.
I froze, caught between the bathroom behind me, the group of men around the table down the hall, and whoever was in my bedroom. Trying to control my shaking hands, I pushed the door open wider and saw my uncle sitting in my chair.
“Whatcha doin’ there, niece?” he asked, leaning back in the chair and relaxing his arms out to his sides. His belly paunched obscenely over his jeans and I swallowed. Was it my imagination or was he more sober than I’d thought earlier? His eyes were clear and hard as they fixed on me.
