Why didn’t I test it first?
I can’t even die right. And now I’m going to have to call Merry fuckin’ Maids and cancel everything. My plans are ruined.
The room shrinks as I search for a razor blade, finding that it’s harder to locate than a gun on a foggy Saturday night at Kmart. I pull the vanity’s drawers out, find nothing of use, then slam them closed. I slide down onto the floor, grasp the broken gun, point it to the ceiling, and pull the trigger. A loud crack sounds in the air as I fall backward. Plaster falls into my hair, turning the brown to white instantly. A small hole appears in the popcorned ceiling.
How in the hell?
When I fling the gun onto the tile, it echoes through the room like a broken bell. Ten times and the fucker didn’t go off.
Please. Just let me die.
Tears don’t come now. I am not weak. Another plan. I just need another plan. I snatch the gun off the ugly pink rug, get off the floor, and head to my room. It’s so bare, so naked with nothing to show who I am.
I check my phone.
8:32 P.M.
Kmart’s still open and the guy I had buy the gun gave me the receipt. I couldn’t buy the gun myself, since I’m seventeen and you have to be eighteen to buy a shotgun. He didn’t seem to care what I was doing with the gun. I should’ve been more disturbed by that, but honestly I just wanted it.
I think I can fake being eighteen.
My scruddy SUV sounds like it’s about to break down as I travel across town to Kmart. There are exactly four cars in the parking lot; three of them are old and rusted. One is a white Escalade that looks brand new. Light from a lamppost flickers, creating moving shadows onto the gray asphalt. I hop out and grab the bag I’d shoved the broken gun pieces in. I Googled how to take the gun apart so it won’t look like I’m trying to shoot up the place. I use my elbows to open the glass door, careful not to let any part of me touch it. A clear slime of what looks like mucus is dried on the handle.
Gag.
The service desk is opposite where I parked. I walk up slowly and lean the bag against the front of the counter. A thin girl looks down at me with stringy hair and eyes sunk into her skin so far it looks like she had them gouged out with a spork. She’s as tall as Jackson. A twinge of something roils through my stomach when I think of his name. I recognize the guilt, but I ignore it. I have no choice.
Her nametag says Clementine. “What can I do you for?”
“I need to make a return.”
She slides a pad of paper toward me. “Fill this out,” she says in monotone, like she’s bored and thinking of the time she will get off, or maybe when she’s able to quit and dance at the bar full time.
That’s such a bitchy thing to think. I’m going straight to hell.
I fill out the form and reach for the gun parts under me, only realizing after I’d pulled them out what it looks like I’m doing. The gun muzzle barely makes it to the counter when Clementine’s face goes as pale as the wall behind her.
“I’m not going to rob you. I need to return it. It’s broken.”
She stares at me like I have snails crawling out of my ears.
I reach into my pocket and retrieve the receipt. “I have a receipt.”
She continues staring, angling her neck to the side, scrutinizing me.
I’m holding the gun muzzle in one hand and a receipt in the other, and I feel stupid. “Look. It’s obviously broke. I just want to exchange it or get my money back. It’s been a long night.”
She sighs. “Listen here, girl. I’m like, five minutes from closing, and you come in here brandishing a gun?”
Did she just use the word brandishing?
“Yeah, I know all that, but can I get my money back or a new gun?”
She grabs the receipt from my hand. “This is a Walmart receipt.” She tosses it back to me.
Oh, yeah, Walmart, not Kmart. She looks so offended, like I just told her Ted Nugent left the NRA.
“Sorry, got my marts mixed up.”
“I don’t even think we sell guns,” she says.
“My bad.”
I shove the muzzle back in the bag and make my way out of Kmart, set on Walmart and getting my money back, or at least a new gun.
An arm grips me and pulls me backward. “Come with me. Now,” a male voice says from behind me. It sounds authoritative.
“This is about the gun, isn’t it?”
4
The room I’m in is small, and the walls are littered with flyers about safety and worker’s compensation. I didn’t think my evening could get worse, until I find out the security guard is Colter Sawyer from my AP English class. He’s taken my gun and is on the phone in the other room. Nerves snake around my body and I fight to breathe normally. I shove my scarred arms under my legs so he can’t see them, or he’ll know. Maybe he already does. The room’s silent save for the gurgle of the water cooler in the corner.
I’m afraid to touch anything.