“Open it you fucking moron,” Johnny said.
I opened the bread and saw a little needle. I gritted my teeth and looked at Johnny. They always fucked with me. Johnny and another guard they called Tater. They would bring me needles all the time, tempting me to do myself in. I never knew what was actually in the needles though. But they wanted me to do myself in. I didn’t want to give them the satisfaction. I knew they were betting on me to do it.
I tossed the sandwich aside and cracked my knuckles.
“You’re really fucking stupid,” Johnny said.
“No,” I said. “I just like a good fight.”
“I’m going to really enjoy this,” Johnny said.
I grinned. “You know, I said the same damn thing to your daughter right before I shoved my huge cock in her tiny little ass.”
“Get him,” Johnny said.
The four big guys came charging at me.
I was going to take one hell of a beating, but I would put up a fight though.
And for some reason, in that moment of death coming at me, I thought about… her.
3
(Lindsey) *THEN*
I HUGGED my favorite bear and was huddled in the corner of the bed. The bedroom was massive. Freshly painted. Fresh carpeting. A mansion compared to what I used to live in with Aunt Jane. But I hated him. I hated Jim. He was a complete and total asshole. Even if he said he loved me, it didn’t matter. I didn’t like the way he looked at me. I didn’t like the way his hands touched my hair, my back, or even those couple times he accidentally touched my butt.
It was all weird and gross to me.
Yet he was the one who married Aunt Jane and bought her this house.
Aunt Jane had always done her best to keep a roof over my head. Something she didn’t have to do. I could have been floated around anywhere after my mother was killed in a car accident. And that included being shipped over to Ohio to live with my deadbeat of a father who left when my mother was pregnant. But Aunt Jane stepped up and raised me. My part in the entire thing? To somehow find a way to accept Jim.
But he took Kingston away from me.
It was insane. And not just taking Kingston away… but taking my heart away. Because now Kingston liked to be called King. And he was getting bigger, stronger, and he was getting into a lot more trouble. Nothing was the same between us after what happened that one summer when we were ripped apart. We wrote letters. We tried to sneak phone calls. But none of it worked.
I heard a rumor that he had kissed another girl over that summer but King never admitted to it.
There was a knock at the door and Aunt Jane poked her head in. “Hey, what are you doing? It’s beautiful outside.”
“I hate fall.”
“You do not hate fall,” she said.
“Yes I do.”
Aunt Jane came into the room. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
“Nothing.”
“Liar.”
“Everyone is going to the football game tonight,” I said. “I’m not.”
“Well, why not?”
“Because I have nobody to go with.”
“So you need a date to go to the football game?”
“What do you think they do there?” I asked. “They all hold hands, kiss, sneak cigarettes, whatever. I don’t want any of that.”
Aunt Jane sat on the edge of the bed. “What happened to Danny? I thought you were going out with him.”
“He’s an asshole.”
“Watch your mouth, Lindsey,” Aunt Jane said.
“Well, that’s what he is.”
“What did he do?”
“Slept with someone else.”
Aunt Jane sucked in a breath. “Else? Does that mean you and he…”
“No.”
“If you are… or curious…”
“Stop,” I said. “I don’t want that conversation again.”
“Okay,” Aunt Jane said. “So you’re going to sit here all night and be upset?”
“There’s nothing else to do,” I said. “I can’t go do what I want.”
“Which is what?”
I looked at Aunt Jane. “I’m going to be an adult next year. What’s Jim going to do then to me? This thing about Kingston…”
“Oh, not this again,” Aunt Jane said. “I thought that was last summer.”
“No. I love him.”
“You can’t say that,” Aunt Jane said. “You don’t know what love is.”
I could argue her. I could fight back hard, like I usually did. I knew what love felt like and I loved King. But I wasn’t in the mood for it.
“You know, I tried to help you with that,” Aunt Jane said. “I snuck all those letters from the mailbox to you. Jim would have flipped his lid. I thought you two would have figured things out and moved on. I regret that now.”
“No. That was amazing, what you did. It’s just that Jim is…”
The door opened and Jim appeared.
My heart climbed into my throat.
“You ready, babe?” he asked Aunt Jane.
“Yeah,” she said and stood up. “We’re going out to dinner. I’ll leave a twenty on the counter. Get something to eat. If you go out let me know. You know the rules.”
Aunt Jane kissed the top of my head.
She walked out of the room as Jim came into the room.
I was alone with him.
It made me shiver.
He touched my shoulder and squeezed. Then he leaned down and kissed my cheek. Then he put his nose to my hair and smelled.