I wasn’t afraid of Geordie. He was the bigger of the two other contenders, but he only really had his size to use to try and win. He wasn’t bright, or cunning, he didn’t know how to blend in, or take someone by surprise. He didn’t have the skills required to seduce someone into taking a drink without sniffing it first, or to get out of handcuffs or an exemplary sailor’s knot. He didn’t know how to survive in the underground criminal world.
Xavier did. He only looked at me when he absolutely had, to but when he did, I felt the piercing slice of his eyes on every inch of my soul. If I lost to him, he would take pleasure in what he did to me. Every cut his blade made would be savored, every ounce of blood would be intentional.
I know exactly what it means to look into the soul of a killer.
When I arrive at Hannaford Prep’s chapel, the grin on Joey’s face chills me to my core.
He’s not pretending to be a decent person anymore. There’s no fake civility. All I see is the evil that lives under his skin. An echo of Xavier rings out in my mind and the inventory of what it took to disable him. I can’t believe I’d thought he looked like Ash and Avery. The differences in the siblings is so clear to me now that I struggle to see their similarities. I am no longer blinded by the good looks.
The girl I had put away to come to this school, the one that lived inside a box in my mind—her job wasn’t quite done yet.
“Thank you for joining us, Mounty.” His tone is conversational and jovial. I want to hit him so badly, I clench my fists to stop myself from lunging at him. “I thought we should all get to know you a little better. I took the liberty of looking into your records so we could get a better idea of who Eclipse Andersonreallyis.”
My records,fuck. I manage to keep my breathing even. They can’t know about Matteo or the Wolf. There’s no written evidence of my position within the Club, or as one of the Twelve. I’d never been caught or implicated in any of my jobs. There’s nothing he could have that would break me.
I wasn’t wrong.
He doesn’t break me.
But fuck it if I don’t bend a little.
Chapter 11
I’m the only kid in my class who walks to and from school without a parent or older sibling. The area I live in isn’t safe, not by a long shot, but my mom doesn’t care if I make it home alive. She would probably rather I disappeared, so she didn’t have to feed me.
The holes in my jeans aren’t artfully placed or fashionable. The shirt I’m wearing has bloodstains from the last time my mom’s boyfriend smacked me so hard my nose shattered. I still have the lump to remind me not to breathe too loudly around a guy so high on meth, he thinks his skin is crawling with insects and the walls are bleeding. My mom had told me it was my own fault as she threw a dirty rag at me to wipe up. I didn’t have any respect for her left to lose.
My teacher had pulled me to the front of the class to sing happy birthday to me. I was embarrassed, and I didn’t want to admit it was the first time I’d ever been sung to. What kid wants to admit their mom never remembers the day they were born? I only knew when my birthday was because of my enrollment at school and the teachers adding my name to the class birthday tree each year.
I hear sirens in the distance as I approach the front steps of our house. It’s barely a step up from sleeping on the streets. It's ancient and decrepit and it belongs to my mom’s dealer. He arrives twice a week to take his payment from her, and she makes me sit outside while she gives it to him. I can still hear them.
The door is locked, but I don’t need a key. I jiggle the door handle until the lock springs free and the door opens. The room is dark as I enter, but that’s nothing out of the ordinary. I kick my shoes off and sling my bag to the floor, wincing as I feel the straps pull. It's threadbare and ratty, like everything else I own. I've had to use duct tape to fill in a hole, and I know I'm a few short weeks away from having to find a replacement. I have no money and no way of making money. Well, there are ways I could make money, but the thought of getting down onto my knees in the bathroom of the gas station on the corner and doing… that stuff is inconceivable to me. I know girls my age who are doing it to eat at night. I'd rather starve.
I do starve.
I start toward the kitchen, and as soon as the door cracks open, the smell hits me. I gag and step back. It smells like vomit and shit and rotting meat. There had been a heatwave happening in Cali for weeks, and the temperature had gone over a hundred degrees every day that week. We didn't have air conditioning or even a fan. I'd learned to just sweat it out. It helped that I was skin and bone.
I know now that the heat had accelerated my mother’s decomposition.
She had overdosed. Vomited and shat herself while she fitted on the dirty kitchen floor. I might have even been home that morning when it happened and not noticed. Her eyes are bloodshot and milky. Her hands are rigid and twisted like claws, and one of her fingernails is ripped out at the nail bed from where she clawed at the floor in her dying moments. Her hair is lank and matted. Her lips are blue and stretched over what is left of her rotting teeth. I can see the burn scars that cover her arms and belly, the gray hue of her skin distorting the look until I'm sure she's made of wax and this is all a nightmare.
It takes me a while to realize I'm screaming.
The smell has crawled up through my nose and down into my lungs and I think I'll never be able to get it out of my body again. I'm rooted to the ground. I can't move my arms or my legs, every fiber of my being has turned to stone. I just stand and stare and bear witness to the demise my mother had been crawling toward my entire life.
I'm only nine years old.
Eventually, long after the sun has set and the traffic has picked up on the road out front, I shake myself out of the trance I'm in. I need help. I need to call someone to get her and take her away. I just want someone to take her away.
There's no landline. I don't have a cell phone, but my mom has one. I do a quick check of the house with shaking knees. There's only really three rooms to check, so I'm quick about it. Then I realize, with a stuttering heart that just won't pump the way it's supposed to, that I can see the outline of the cell in her pocket.
I have to touch her to get it out.
I sit and hug my knees. I let myself cry for the first time, but I hate the feel of the fat, hot tears sliding down my cheeks. I think the smell has dissipated, but really, I've just grown accustomed to it. My body has absorbed the unthinkable stench of death, and now I'm immune.
The feel of my mother's skin slipping from her bones as I wiggle the cell out of her pocket will stay with me forever. If I ever need to vomit on command, that is the memory I recall. I open the back door to vomit on the rickety wooden steps.
My hands shake as I dial 911.
