“What do you think I’m supposed to do?”
“Nothing yet, baby girl. There’s a lot you need to learn first. I want you to be able to protect yourself when I’m not around. There might come a time when you have to do things you don’t like, to stay safe. You may need to at least appear to be working.” He ran a critical eye over me. “For starters, you’ve got this all-natural sweet-and-innocent thing going on. Much as I hate to say it, you probably need to do something edgier with your look. And you’re gonna need to learn your drinking limits. I don’t want you to end up in a situation where you don’t know your boundaries.”
“How am I supposed to learn?”
“You drink. Under my supervision. We’ll figure out how much you can handle in a certain amount of time, and practice controlling it so you can stay coherent and not get drunk.”
My heart jackhammered against my ribs.
“Are we starting tonight?” I asked.
An eerie pause passed before he cleared his throat and said, “No. We’ll start tomorrow.”
He pulled the car onto the road and accelerated. I noticed for the first time that we were headed toward Cartersville. He was taking me home. I had an overwhelming urge to hug him. I shot my vision along the line of trees and the road surrounding us. Nobody was in sight, so I flung my arms around his thick neck and squeezed, resting my head on his shoulder. His body shook with gruff chuckles. He kept one hand on the wheel and used the other to reach up and pat my shoulder.
“Just remember I love you,” he said again, and I wondered what he thought he could ever do to make me doubt it.
That night I peered out of my bedroom window and noticed the absence of moonlight and stars. Massive gray clouds filled the winter night sky. A spooky chill was in the air, making me lock my bedroom door.
I got ready for bed, hoping not to disturb Patti, who’d had a rough day. She was having a hard time dealing with the slight shift in authority ever since I’d met my father. Patti’s word was no longer the final say-so, because there was a greater, more dangerous threat that even she could not protect me from. Now all she could do was just hope that she’d raised me right.
My bed was a comfort as I sat, crossing my legs and clasping my hands together. I closed my eyes.
I don’t know what You’ll have me do, or where You’ll have me go, but I trust You. Please show me when it’s time to act. Help me to recognize the signs. Speak to my heart and let me hear.
I awoke with a start at three a.m. Rain battered the windowpane. I closed my eyes and tried to relax, pushing away the strange foreboding. Just as I began to doze again, I felt a chill of certainty that I was being watched. I wanted to scramble under the covers like a child, but I was too scared to move or open my eyes. I held my breath. Was someone in my room?
An image flitted into my mind of a young man standing in an open-air market surrounded by children and women of all ages doing their shopping. I sensed the man’s anxiety and apprehension as he stood there, surveying the gathered crowd with wide eyes. He looked down at the small detonator in his hand and I realized with horror that he was strapped with bombs. He murmured something under his breath. No, don’t do it! I shouted to him, but he didn’t hear me. With a cry into the air he pressed the button, releasing a blinding flash.
I wanted to sit up, but my chest was heavy. Another scene began to play in my mind.
It was a different place now. A man in an office held a telephone—the image switched to the woman on the other end of the phone, his wife, very pregnant, setting out their dinner plates. Her face fell when he said there was a late meeting, and even as he spoke the lie, his mistress was unbuttoning his slacks. The bright red of his lust overshadowed his fog of guilt. My mind snapped into darkness.
What the heck is going on? I gasped for air and pulled the blanket to my chin.
Another image was focusing: terrified dogs, poked to agitation with sticks and then thrown together to rip at one another’s flesh while the surrounding crowd of people jeered, clapped, pointed, and laughed. Stop! It’s not funny! I was sickened by the panic in the animals’ eyes and the human hunger for violence. I continued to gasp, unable to fill my lungs.
A boy now, no older than me, in some sort of basement or cellar, tying a rope to a beam and the other end around his own neck. I shook my head, trying to dispel his crushing feelings of self-doubt and loneliness that reached out to me like dark, strangling fingers. I held a hand out to him. Let me help you, I pleaded. You’re not alone. But his eyes were empty and he let himself drop.
No! I yelled as he twitched and swung. He disappeared in a haze of thought.