She’d been on my side of the bed, snuggled in to my pillow. I wondered if the only reason she stayed cuddled up against me at night instead of rolling away was because I was on her preferred side of the bed. But seeing her in my shirt just hit me hard. I had to stop myself from climbing on top of her. I got a quick shower and had left before she woke up. I was about to call back and then Sarah called again,
“Excuse me,” I said to Dare and to the three men I was sitting with, brokering a deal for a very lucrative upcoming construction project. I answered and stepped away, “What is it?”
“That girl just spent twenty five minutes crying on my shoulder like her life was over. She won’t talk, just keeps crying. What are you doing to her?”
The fuck?
I ended the call without a word. For fuck sakes. Few people in the world dared talk to me that way. Unfortunately, Sarah was one of them.
My head was barely in the rest of the meeting. Thankfully, Dare picked up the slack. By the time it was over I knew that Sarah and Tia would be out shopping. I called Earl to check in and make sure everything was okay.
Tia
Grocery shopping with a 6 foot 6 mean-looking black man and a sweet Latino woman who never shut her mouth for more than five seconds was interesting. It broke up the boredom of lying in my torture chamber (AKA his room), at least.
I was quiet, just pushed the cart while Sarah filled it and talked about recipes, about prices, about what was in season, while she asked me questions about whether or not I preferred crunchy or smooth peanut butter, about whether I liked fruit bottom or stirred yogurt. She told me what Tommy liked to eat, like I cared. But this was a diversion
, at least, from the pit of despair I’d been in.
Earl was on the phone, “Yes, Sir. No, no problems, Sir. Yes, Sir. Right, Sir. Fine, Sir. Bye, Sir.”
Fuck off and die, Sir, I thought to myself, or so I thought but I guessed I had actually muttered it aloud and Earl was staring at me with a funny little smileon his face.I tried to smile back, I definitely blushed. I was grateful I wasn’t being babysat by burly number one or burly number two or Tommy’s very intense angry brother. I guess I kind of liked Earl so far. He seemed nice. He had kind eyes. As kind and nice, I guess, as a guy can be who’s helping another guy hold me prisoner.
As my neck was coming around to face forward after smiling at him I saw my foster mother push an empty shopping cart past me. Rose! She made eye contact briefly, and then kept going. This wasn’t her neighborhood. She glanced back at me and subtly made the sign language sign for toilet.
I knew a bit of sign language because last year we’d had a deaf 16 year old girl named Shelly live with us for four months. They were four hellish months because she was a nasty piece of work that made all our lives drama-filled and me and the other girls threw a little “Ding Dong the witch is dead” party with chanting and everything when she was relocated.
Rose wasn’t happy about our celebration at the time, giving us a lecture about being patient and trying to be helpful and turning the other cheek, yada yada, but that girl had stolen something or another (clothes, money, books) from every one of us, had spread lies about Bethany at school and online, and she was just really unpleasant. Anyway, I knew a few signs because of that. I waited until we turned another corner and then tried to be nonchalant, “Is there a public washroom in this store?” I asked Sarah, careful not to look at Earl.
She pointed behind us, “Yeah, back by the customer service desk.”
“Okay, I’ll meet you in ice cream in 5?”
She smiled at me, “You want ice cream?”
I smiled back and nodded. “Be right back.”
Earl said something to her and she took the cart from me. He followed me to the bathroom. I felt my face get hot. I didn’t make eye contact with him. Thankfully, he at least waited outside the door.
The washroom had two regular stalls and one wheelchair washroom. I saw Rose’s feet in the wheelchair washroom. I pulled the handle and stepped in and she grabbed me and clutched me tight against her.
I tried not to make a sound but wanted to fall apart.
“Let’s go. Quick!” she said.
I put my finger to my lips and pointed out the door, “bodyguard,” I whispered.
She gasped and covered her mouth, then said, “I’ve been so worried. Are you okay?” her voice was barely above a whisper, “You don’t look well.”
I nodded and dashed the tears off my face.
“I don’t know much but I know when something is fishy. A man came to see me to tell me you were in protective custody temporarily, that your father was in trouble but the police were keeping you safe. He gave some cockamamie story with too many holes in it so I called the police. I had written down the license plate and gave it to them.”
My hand came up to cover my mouth. Oh fuck. Oh no. Oh fuck.
“They transferred me to a cop and he took down the information and said he’d call me back. Someone else called and it didn’t feel right. They were giving us the total brush off, like you’d just run off with a boyfriend or something. Something wasn’t right. This wasn’t you. I called Susie. She started poking around and then I got another visit, from a man who said you were now engaged to a powerful man and that you had moved on with your life. When I balked because, hey, I know you…he said we’d all be in danger if we continued to try to interfere. He said if we stayed out of it we might get invited to the wedding and get to have a relationship with you. If we didn’t, we might need to find a new house to live in because old houses like ours often had electrical fires. Can you imagine? Cal was close to the house as he left with your things so I had him follow. This morning I decided to wait at that house for them to leave and then follow. Susie thinks you’re in trouble with the mob because of your father. Is it true? She said he’s been associated with the mafia over the years according to her contacts in the police department.”
“Oh Rose, this is too dangerous!” I was trying to keep my voice low. I didn’t have much time, “Listen,” I said, “I can’t talk about this but these are dangerous people. I don’t want you and Cal getting mixed up in this. I’m okay. I’m fine. Please don’t do anything else, please just ---”