Page 108 of Anarchy at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys 4)
There are footsteps in the hall, the sound of deadbolts and chains being opened. Minutes later, we can both hear the sound of a headboard banging against a wall.
“Jesus,” Hael murmurs as we both stiffen up at the sound. I think of Penelope; Hael is worried about his mom.
“Come back to bed,” I murmur, letting go of Hael’s waist and taking his hand instead. I curl up with his head on my chest and stroke his hair with gentle fingers, soothing away both our nightmares at the same time. After the banging stops, Hael falls asleep and I follow shortly after, holding him and breathing in the sweet smell of coconuts and broken boys with cheerful smiles.Two and a half years earlier …
“Mom, please!” Penelope is screaming, holding the deadbolt in her hand. It’s still wrapped up in plastic, some hard-shell shit that takes a knife to open up. She cut herself doing it, and now there’s blood all over the carpet.
“You’re not putting a hole in that door,” Pam snaps back, snatching the package away from Penelope and holding it aloft. “This place is a rental, Pen.” Our mother tucks the item under her arm as tears stream down Penelope’s face. She looks over at me with this expression I’ll never forget.
Why aren’t you standing up for me? That’s what she’s asking. She needs an ally. I’ve never been all that great at being a sister before but lately … things seem different with Pen. Every time I look at her, I swear, she seems just a little bit smaller than she was the day before.
“Why not just let her have the lock? Have you seen the holes that Neil’s punched into the walls? And neither of you are going to drywall that shit when we move out. You’re not getting your security deposit back either way.”
There’s a sound like thunder in the air, a crack that makes my teeth hurt. I cringe slightly, but it isn’t me who’s been slapped, but Penelope.
“This conversation is over,” Pamela hisses at her oldest daughter. When she grabs Pen’s arm and shakes her, I feel this awful fidgety feeling inside of me. “You don’t need the damn lock. Unless you’re, what, inviting boys over to fuck? Is that why you need this?”
“I need the lock to keep them out,” she whispers, but at the time I don’t quite make the connection. Pamela turns away from her daughter, like she didn’t hear her in the first place. We both watch as she pounds down the stairs and out the front door, shoving the deadbolt into the trash at the edge of the curb.
I turn back to look at Penelope, but she doesn’t return my stare. I’ve disappointed her.
Pamela comes storming back into the house, heading straight up the stairs and shoving me with her shoulder. I end up stumbling, losing my balance and pinwheeling backward; my ears ring as my head hits the wall on the way down, my back screaming in agony as I find myself dizzy and disoriented at the bottom of the stairs.
I fell, that’s what happened. It takes me several seconds to make the connection.
I groan as I sit up and Pen yells, sprinting down the stairs after me.
She helps me up, but I can never forget the look on her face, the one that says that what I’ve always secretly hoped for—a change of heart from our mother—is never going to happen. Pamela has the power to get us away from here, away from her abusive husband, out of poverty. She could even keep stealing credit cards and robbing her rich friends. If she spent half of that money on housing and clothing and food for her kids, we’d be set.
That never happens.
I always intended to make up for that moment, when I should’ve stood up to my mother for Pen. After Pam slapped her, I should’ve shoved that bitch down the stairs. I should’ve killed Kali.
What if I get a third chance to make things right, and I fuck that up, too?
“You’re out of your element,” Kali says, smiling at me as she leans over the bed and looks down at me. “You have no idea what you’ve gotten yourself into.”
And then she kisses me, and I wake up.
I have the dream again on both Saturday and Sunday night, waking up the next morning with an emotional hangover.
Fuck I hate Monday morning nightmares with a passion.
A serious fucking passion.Sara Young surprises me on Monday with a map that leads right to Tom’s forested property. I’m so fucking tired that I can barely keep my eyes open as I lift my head up to see what she’s just laid out on the desk. As soon as I register what it is, the blood drains from my face and the room spins.
