“Sit tight, Katie and I’ll be right there.”
“Okay, thanks, man.”
We hung up and I got out, shutting the door behind me, not bothering to lock it. I sort of sprinted for the doors, but the bounce hurt, so I stopped. Please God, please God, please God. Don’t let him see me. It was a small market, but I could hear a group of people in the back right of the store, a small radio playing. He’s probably back there, I thought, which helped ease me a little since the stuff I needed was in the front left.
I grabbed the generic brand butterfly stitches, a bottle of peroxide, some gauze, and medical tape, racing as fast as I could without hurting myself back to the front, but when I rounded the aisle, there he was. He leaned against a display near the only open register talking to Danny Marks.
My stomach dropped to the floor, a frog built up in my throat as I approached.
“Holy shit, Lily, what happened to you?” Danny asked.
As if in slow motion, Salinger stood from his slack position and turned toward me, but I couldn’t meet his eyes, too embarrassed, humiliated in front of him for the second time that day. I tossed everything onto to the belt.
“What’s up, guys?” I attempted at casual.
“Fuck,” Danny sang out. I felt my face heat up to impossible temperatures.
“Lily,” Salinger whispered. As if I couldn’t help myself, my face lifted toward his, but I didn’t answer him. “D-did Sterling do that?”
I tried to shrug it off, but lifting my shoulder made my back and throat burn.
“That guy is such a prick,” Danny chimed in, ringing up my stuff. I faced him, unable to look on Salinger any more.
He stared a hole into the side of my face, though, but I refused, no, couldn’t look at him. I handed Danny a wad of cash from my bag once he’d totaled it all up. Twelve dollars gone. The market doors opened and in walked Katie and Ansen. They made a beeline toward us.
“Let me see,” Ansen said.
I took a deep breath and dropped the rag that was almost soaked through by that point. Judging by everyone’s winces, it definitely looked as bad as I thought it did. I placed the cloth back and grabbed the plastic bag full of my stuff.
“Come on, Ansen,” I whispered. “You’ll have to help me this time.”
“Sorry about that, Lily,” Danny called after me.
I half turned and mumbled a thank you, then caught Salinger staring me down, his face white as a sheet.
“Well, I’ll never see that guy again,” I said out loud when we’d exited the doors.
“Who, Danny?” Ansen asked.
“Are you mental?” I asked him. Katie rolled her eyes. “Salinger.”
“Oh, yeah. I told you, though.”
“Yeah,” I sighed, “you were right.”
When we reached my Scout, Ansen opened my door for me and I sat in the driver’s seat as he played doctor. I can’t count the number of times Ansen had patched me up.
“Uh-oh, mister man himself,” Katie said, facing the store.
“What?” I asked, trying to see over Ansen’s shoulders.
“Stop moving, dumb ass,” he said.
“Sorry,” I said.
Salinger came into view over Ansen’s shoulder and I nearly gasped.
“Did that hurt?” Ansen asked.
“No,” I whispered to Ansen. “Did I forget something?” I asked Salinger.
“No,” he said. “I don’t know why I’m out here, to be honest. Just wanted to see how you were.”
Katie’s mouth opened slightly and she fought a smile. She stood behind him a little and looked at me, before winking, making my cheeks heat up.
“I’m okay,” I began, but he narrowed his brows. “I mean, I-I’ll be okay.”
Ansen stood up, unscrewing the cap to the peroxide. “Batten the hatches, buttercup,” he braced me. I gritted my teeth and prepped for the onslaught over my temple. He poured the liquid and I could feel it running in rivulets down the side of my face. I looked down and saw blood and foundation pooling at my feet.
Salinger brought his hands to his hair.
“Looks bad?” I asked.
Katie’s faced screwed up in mock pain. “It doesn’t look good, babe. Worse than usual. What did you say to him?”
“I just existed, Katie,” I explained away for the hundredth time. It was never Sterling’s fault. Ever. It didn’t matter who asked in my stupid town.
When Ansen was done, he taped some gauze over it to keep it clean, using the bottom of his shirt to clean off my face. I bit my tongue to keep from crying out when he brushed over a bruise.
“You can stay at my house for a few days until he cools off,” Ansen offered, but I could tell that made Katie uneasy.
Ansen and I had been best friends since we were three years old, creek-water babies. He was a brother to me. Not literally, but it felt like it. I didn’t want to disrespect Katie, though, so I said no.
“I’ve got a couch,” Salinger put out there.
“No, it’s okay,” I said quickly just as Ansen spoke up.
“Yes, that’s awesome.”
“I couldn’t impose, Salinger,” I said.
Ansen looked at me like I’d grown two heads. “Why not?”
I stared daggers into him. “Because I’d feel like a burden.”
“That’s nonsense,” Salinger insisted.
“I’ll be okay, seriously. Thank you, though.”
His brows knitted together. “It’s no problem.”
But I knew that was a lie. The market was a new job to him, leaving it, even if for one night, was risky, and I wasn’t about to be party to that. Plus, he didn’t know me.
“Lily—” he began again when I didn’t respond. I interrupted him.
“Thank you so much for the offer, but I’ll be okay. I promise.”
“A-are you sure?” he asked me.
“I’m sure.” I tried to appease with a smile.
“Salinger!” we heard someone yell from the front of the store.
We all looked and saw Danny signaling for Salinger.
“I’ve gotta go. I’m so sorry. If you change your mind, text me?”
“Sure,” I said, but I knew I was never going to see that guy again, let alone text him. “Thanks.”
He stared at me for a second. I didn’t know if it was my imagination or wishful thinking, but it looked like he didn’t want to leave. He hesitantly turned toward the store and jogged back to work.
“That boy’s sweet on you,” Katie carelessly spoke. It was like a pang to the heart, that statement, because I really liked Salinger. At least what I’d grown to know of him during the day. He seemed like he would make a really good friend, a good boyfriend.
“No,” I explained, “he’s just a really nice guy. Too good for us. Too good for me.”
“Come on,” Ansen said. “Let’s go to Court’s, get you high, get you distracted, and keep you away from Sterling for a few hours.”
“Good idea,” I answered.
I watched Salinger reach the doors and get lost in the shelves.
Way too good for me.
CHAPTER FIVE
ANSEN ROLLED A FAT BLUNT, took a hit, then passed it my way. I breathed it in deep, letting it calm me down, allowing it to erase what I felt. The anxiety, the physical and emotional pain? They buried themselves away. I settled into Court’s couch.
A baby in a dirty diaper crawled into the living room with us.
“Who the hell’s baby is that?” Ansen asked.
“That’s my cousin’s baby,” Court explained.
I sat up a little. “What’s it doing here?” I asked.
“I’m babysitting while she goes out with some friends.”
“What the hell, Court? That baby needs some attention. And why is it up? It’s like, freaking five in the morning,” I told her.
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” she explained.
I stood and picked it up, smelled its head. “Oh my God, this poor kid.
What the hell is wrong with your cousin?”
I didn’t wait for her answer or even ask permission when I took it back to Court’s bathroom. I set the baby down, cleaned and rinsed the tub, then ran warm water, filling it a little. I took the baby’s diaper off and discovered it was a boy.
“Hey, little one,” I cooed.
I covered him in shampoo because that’s all Courtney seemed to have in her tub, washed his little body, though it hurt to make the effort, washed his hair, then rinsed him clean. I searched under Court’s sink for a clean towel and found a small one. It had a ton of holes in in it, but it was clean. I wrapped him in it and brought him out to the living room.
“Where’s his stuff?” I asked Court.
“In that grocery bag on the counter in the kitchen,” she explained.
Inside the bag was an oversized T-shirt and five diapers. “You poor kid,” I said, shaking my head. “Where’s his bottles and stuff?” I yelled toward the living room.
“He has a bottle, but that’s it.”
“Seriously, what the hell is wrong with your cousin?”
I brought my phone out. Salinger works at the store, I thought. My hand hovered over his name, but I couldn’t do it. Instead, I scrolled up to Danny’s name and rang him up.
“Yo!” Danny answered.
“Danny, it’s Lily, can you bring me some, like, formula for a six-month-old baby? Some rice cereal too,” I tagged on, remembering when I helped take care of my little sisters and what they ate at that age.
Danny laughed. “What?”
“Danny, I’m not joking. Go back to work and get that shit for me,” I said, before realizing I’d cursed in front of the baby. I sighed. “Just get it for me.”
“Fine, where are you?”
“Court’s.”
“Fine, see you in twenty.”
“Thanks,” I said, hanging up.
I grabbed the T-shirt and a diaper and went back to Court’s room, laying him on her bed.
“You’re such a good boy,” I told him as I dried his skin with the towel. He smiled at me and I nearly keeled over. “Oh my God, you’re such a charmer, little man.”
Putting on his diaper proved a little difficult, but I managed it, then stuffed the T-shirt over him. The bottom hem reached his ankles and he was drowning in it, but it was clean, at least.
I brought him back out to the living room and handed him to Courtney. “There, he’s clean,” I said, falling into the couch beside Katie. “Danny’s coming by with food and sh—. I mean, stuff.”
“Hey, little dude,” Court greeted him and he laughed, snuggling into her neck.
Everything ached, my back from getting the breath knocked out of me, my bones, my muscles, my throat, my head. “I gotta get out of that house,” I told the room.
Everyone nodded their heads in agreement.
“What are you going to do?” Katie asked me.
I took as deep a breath as my lungs allowed. “I have no idea,” I told her.
“We should all get a house together,” Ansen threw out.
“Yeah,” Katie joined in.
“In, like, a dope city somewhere,” Court added.
“Somewhere really far away,” I said.
“Yeah,” Ansen added, rolling another blunt.
Except no one meant it, did they? This is what we did. We sat around, getting high, and talking about what we were going to do with our lives. We talked about how one day we were going to leave Bottle County, how we were going to make it, become successful. It was bullshit, though. We knew what our fates were going to be.
We were going to sit in Court’s living room, or Ashleigh’s living room, or Ansen’s living room, or whomever’s living room, and we would talk about how we would leave, how we were going to live different lives from our parents, how we weren’t going to get pregnant, or fall further into drugs. We were going to talk about how we wouldn’t do those things. It was a giant lie we all told ourselves and each other so we could feel better about our situations. Complacent is a bad place to be, even I knew that.
We lacked the imagination to self-start.
I knew I would go home in a few hours, sleep with my back to the wall, one foot on the floor, and fully clothed. I would sneak around Sterling, hoping he didn’t beat me, or worse. I would smoke my joints to forget. I would live off my mom until she kicked me out for “tempting” Sterling or causing him to beat me to a bloody pulp. I would bounce off couches until I couldn’t do that, and then I would marry some local boy and have three kids by the time I was twenty-one. No education, so I’d rely on him for everything, and when he would start to beat on me or run around on me, I’d feel trapped and he’d know it. He’d have his cake and he’d eat it too.
No one broke that cycle in my stupid town. No one.
So we talked of bigger lives, yes, of course, but big lives belonged to big people and we’d only ever seen big people pass through our little town full of little people with little imaginations.
People like Salinger, I thought, then promptly fell asleep, worn out by it all. All of it.
Danny came through at five thirty in the morning, tapping my knee to wake me up.
“Lily,” he whispered, “wake up, dork.”
I sat up, my body stiff. “Hey, Danny, did you bring the stuff?”
“Yeah,” he said, dropping a bag on the coffee table.
I stood up, stretched myself out, and grabbed the formula, taking it into the kitchen.
The baby was asleep on Court’s chest, but I knew he’d be up in a few short minutes. Babies can’t stand it when someone around them is awake. They feel like they’re missing out.
I made the bottle and set it on the counter. The bar in the kitchen was open to the living room and I looked up to find Salinger staring back at me. I felt my neck go hot. Oh my God, what is he doing here?
“Salinger?”
“Hey, Lily,” he said, lifting a long, slender hand.
“What are you doing here?”
“The shop said they needed a few more hours, so Danny said I could tag along until it was ready.”
“Oh, cool,” I said, feeling anything but. “Excuse me,” I added, heading toward the bathroom.
I peed then washed my hands, glanced at the mirror to see my curls had fallen and my makeup was gone. I looked super worn out. I bent over the sink and carefully washed my face, rinsing out my mouth, and brushed my hair with my fingers. It met my waist and was knotted at the bottom pretty bad, so I rummaged through Court’s drawers for a hairbrush. My heart beat hard in my chest. My bruises were starting to fade, thank God, but the head bandage probably needed to be replaced.
When I came out, everyone was up. Ansen and Danny were playing video games; Katie was in the kitchen looking through the pantry. Court was holding the baby, who was half asleep, half drinking the bottle I’d made for him.
“He probably needs his diaper changed again, Court.”
“Okay,” she said.
I looked at Ansen. “I probably need to change this bandage.”
Ansen sighed. “Fine,” he said, pausing his game.
“I can do it,” Salinger said.
Everyone stopped what they were doing to look at him, including the baby.
“Fine by me,” Ansen said, picking up his controller again.
Salinger was tall and Court’s ceilings were short. He had to duck under the haunch of her kitchen doorway to get to the stuff I’d bought last night. I watched him wash his hands, pick up the stuff, then head toward her front door. The butterflies in my stomach and I followed him outside.
He gestured for me to sit on Court’s porch steps, so I did.
“How are you feeling?” he asked.
“I’m good,” I told him and meant it. “I know how to adapt,” I explained.
He nodded.
Being really gentle, he peeled back the medical tape. “No offense to Ansen, but the butterfly stitches are too loose. Do you mind if I redo them?”
?
??Go for it.”
He carefully peeled the three Ansen had applied the night before and set them on top of the old gauze.
He pinched the skin there and I held up a stitch.
“I want you to sleep on my couch,” he said matter-of-factly.
“You don’t meant that,” I said.
“I mean what I say, Lily.”
“I can’t,” I told him.
“Why?”
“Well, because Sterling would find me, and I don’t want to involve you in this crap.”
“Fuck that guy,” he said, his teeth gritted.
I handed him another stitch. When he took it, his fingers grazed mine. It sent shivers up my arm and settled in my chest. It sobered me and I steadied my breath.
“You got any money?” he asked.
“Not much, why?”
“There’s a blitz tournament about twenty miles from here this Saturday. It’s a fifty-dollar entry fee, but the winner’s pool is twenty-five hundred dollars.”
“Oh man, that’s awesome, but I don’t have that kind of cash.”
“Fine, I’ll pay your entry for you.”
I felt my face heat up. “I don’t think so, Salinger.”
“Don’t you want out of this town?” he asked.
Yes, I thought. “I don’t think I could even if I wanted to,” I said instead.
“You’re scared.”
I leaned away from him, but he followed me, grabbing my face to apply the final stitch. “I’m not,” I whispered, his face inches from mine. The blood in my veins ran hot.
“I think you are. You’re also too comfortable here. You feel like you won’t be able to survive and you’re resolved to this fate. It’s why you hang out with people who are as resolved as you are to this town and why you all smoke your problems away.”
He hit a big, giant nerve. I grabbed his wrist and pulled away. “Excuse me? You don’t know me, don’t know us.”
“I know enough,” he said. “People are consistent, Lily. People favor patterns because it’s what they know. Your life can be changed by simply doing nothing.”
His words sank into my skin, laid there, permeated deep until they reached bone. He pulled his arm from my grasp and reached for the little canister of gauze then cut a bit of medical tape. I let him cover the wound.
He sat below me on the stairs. We faced out into the dark before us.