“Get the hell out!” she screeches, her voice ragged and raw. “Get out of my house!”
I stand there, chest heaving, fists clenched so tight my nails bite into my palms.
“Gladly,” I rasp, my throat tight as hell, but my pride harder. I grab the nearest bag of my things, slinging it over my shoulder. My eyes burn, but I refuse to let them see me cry.
She slumps into Bud’s lap like it’s some twisted throne, glaring at me like I’m the villain in this story. Maybe I am. Nothing in my life feels like a happily ever after. I feel like I am only fit to destroy, might as well lean into it.
“Hope he keeps you warm at night,” I snap, my voice like ice. “Because he’ll never pay the fucking bills.”
And with that, I turn, stomping through the hallway and out the front door, slamming the door behind me so hard the frame shudders.
I haul the garbage bag higher on my shoulder, its plastic digging into my skin, my cheek still burning from where her nails carved a warning into me. My chest is tight, throat raw from holding back the scream crawling up my windpipe. I swallow it down, bitter and jagged as glass.
My legs move on autopilot, carrying me out of Mason Park without even thinking. Past the pit bull barking its head off. Past the porch with the haunted silverware wind chimes clattering in the muggy breeze. I don’t know where I’m going until my feet know for me.
Hot tears spill over my lashes, blurring my vision as I walk. My mind rushing with the spiral hate talk of how far I have fallen in life.
I used to have dreams.
Big ones. Stupid ones. Ones that used to keep me up at night in the best way. I wanted to be an author—wanted to write stories that made people feel less alone. Words that wrapped around someone’s ribs and held them tight like they mattered.
Now I’m eighteen with a garbage bag full of my life, walking the streets like a ghost, like every dream I ever had is just another thing my mother stuffed in a bag and threw to the curb.
My shoulders shake as a sob rips out of me, raw and ugly. I wipe at my face, but the tears keep coming, spilling down my cheeks in hot streaks.
God, what am I supposed to do now?
I drag myself up the walkway, my breath hitching as I reach Willow’s front door. My knuckles curl tight, and before I even think about it I am knocking on the door shakily.
“Tommy!” I choke out, my voice splintering as the harsh scratch of unshed tears building in the back of my throat. “It’s me Jasmine.”
I wait a minute before knocking again, my knuckles burning at how hard my fist is pounding into the door. “Tommy, open the door!Please!”
No one answers, but I don’t stop. I slam my fists against the wood until my skin stings, until my bones rattle from the impact. Tears blur my vision, drip hot off my chin, but I don’t care. I can’t care. I need somewhere to be. Tommy once told me I could call him Dad. Once told me I was like a daughter to him, and now when I need him, he’s not here.
“Tommy! Dad,please!” I cry again, hitting the door harder. “I don’t have anywhere else to go!”
The silence is deafening, and the ball of dread in my chest grows like a budding hurricane, but I refuse to stop. I keep banging until the entire door frame shakes, until my shoulders ache, until the wild, desperate sob crawling out of my throat sounds more like an animal than a girl.
The porch light above me flickers, casting me in flashes of sickly yellow, and it feels like the whole universe is mocking me. I squeeze my eyes shut, slamming my fists against the door again and again, each hit dulling the pain in my chest for a second, but not enough.
“Please!” My voice breaks. Tears flood my cheeks as I drag in shallow, shaky breaths.
This was my last shot. My final hope.
This house, this man, this family that once felt like my second home.
I press my forehead to the door, my chest heaving, the tears falling freely now. “Please,” I whisper, hoarse and broken. “Don’t leave me too.”
I slide down to my knees on the porch, tears streaking my cheeks, my chest hollow and aching like there’s a hole carved clean through me.
“Willow?” a voice smooth with an accent that curls off his tongue like smoke. Italian, unmistakably, startles me, and I turn around to see a man.
He’s in a pressed black jacket, dark slacks, like he doesn’t belong on this side of town, and I know if you hear an Italian accent in this town, it could only mean danger. His gaze sweeps me slowly, like he’s checking a list in his mind and I tick too many boxes.
Willow.
The name scrapes across my raw throat.
