At first I was in complete shock, paralyzed, not so much out of fear but my brain couldn’t process what was happening fast enough. It feels like you’re having an out-of-body experience, disconnected from this horrible event you have no control over. Then my underwear came off, and something kicked into gear, some stored-up reserve of energy.
I started screaming, trying to push him off. But I was twelve and he was an old man. He was fumbling around with his pants when all of a sudden his body disappeared. One minute an oppressive, crushing weight was on top of me, nearly suffocating me to death, and the next it was gone.
I scrambled to my feet and snatched my shorts off the ground, turned my back to whatever was going on around me, and there was definitely something going on. If you’ve ever heard the sound of flesh meeting flesh, bone being crushed under unrelenting force, you know it’s a sound you will never forget.
Shaking, I stepped back into my shorts and turned around to find fifteen-year-old Tommy Marsden straddling Stills’s prone body, pummeling his bloodied face into something unrecognizable, something inhuman. Tommy was in another world, beating Stills like he was making up for lost time, getting payback for every injustice ever done in the world. I can still see the old man’s body jerking every time Tommy’s fist connected with his face in crystal clarity.
All I knew about Tommy back then was that he lived two doors down from us and his father liked to use him as a punching bag when he drank. I rarely saw him around the neighborhood without a black eye.
Tommy must have sensed me watching because he stopped beating Stills and looked up at me, his anger barely leashed. He looked like a wild animal.
“Go home. Don’t tell no one what happened,” he said. It was the first he’d every spoken to me. When I didn’t move, he added, “You’re okay, right?”
It was less a question and more a statement. Now I realize it’s how he survived the hell that was his childhood––convincing himself he was okay. That everything was copacetic. But back then I took it as an order and it was probably for the best. I wasn’t ready to understand and process what had happened.
I nodded, an understanding passed between us, and I left, wiping away the tears and dirt––the evidence––off my face. I never saw Stills again. The next day his car was gone, and so were the bunnies. Tommy and I never discussed what happened that day. But that day changed everything.
“When is he expecting it?”
There’s a pause. “Soon…now, I guess.”
“Let me think about it. I’ll come up with something.” When he doesn’t acknowledge my command, it sets off another round of alarm bells. “Tommy do not do anything stupid. Nothing. You hear me? I’ll figure something out.”
He nods, and we climb back into the Jeep. The rest of the car ride home is conducted in silence. Not even Bruce can make this better.
Detective Dominic Vega was on his way home from a late shift at the local precinct when he decided to stop at the 7-Eleven three blocks from his home for a cup of coffee. He walked in and observed a teenage girl––sixteen to be precise––stuffing a bag of powdered mini doughnuts in her puffy black jacket. Then he watched her stride over to the wall of refrigerated drinks where she appropriated a can of Dr. Pepper and slid it in the opposite pocket. Detective Vega walked to the cashier and promptly paid for the items. He then followed the juvenile delinquent out into the parking lot and read her her rights.
After scaring the crap out of me, he gave me a choice: show up at his home the next night for a family dinner or get booked for petty theft. I showed up at his house.
“Hold still,” my best friend demands while taking a fistful of my hair and yanking my head back. Veronica’s the sister I never had, both fiercely protective and mildly abusive at the same time––albeit in the most loving way possible.
“Ouuuch,” I wail around a mouthful of popcorn. There’s a Euphoria marathon on TV, enough junk food to survive a zombie apocalypse, and Vern is doing my makeup. It’s a typical Sunday night for us. Except there’s nothing typical about this Sunday night.
It’s been five days since Tommy blew up my life and I’ve finally come to a decision, devised a plan of sorts. Or rather, the decision has been made for me––the plan is the by-product of me alternating between beating my head against the wall and curling into a fetal position. But I’ve decided not to dwell on the devastation wrought on my life, or I may start to cry and never stop.