Never smile at strangers

After a moment, she turned and shot him a dirty look. But she didn’t bother to stop what she was doing. She continued to rock and just gazed at him.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he shouted from the doorway, not sure which one he was talking to. He took a step forward and saw that the boy wasn’t a boy at all. He was a man. A husky man much older than he was.

He had a flashback of all of the disheveled-looking men who would stay with their mother for a few hours at night and during some late afternoons when he had been younger. Of the young, pretty, dark-haired woman who came around all the time that one year, only to retreat in his mother’s bedroom for an hour or two.

He began having trouble breathing. His breaths came shallow and uneven and he began to feel weak. The onset of a panic attack.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing!” he repeated. “She’s just a kid, asshole!”

Alarmed, the man shoved Allie to the floor and bent to pick up his pants.

Trying to contain his rage, he flipped on the overhead light and went up to the man. He shoved him, and the man floundered, tumbling back into bed, his pants around his hairy calves.

“I didn’t know,” he screamed. “She told me she was eighteen!”

“Eighteen? Christ, does she look eighteen?”

“Leave him alone!” Allie shrieked, scrambling from her place on the floor. “He’s a client!”

It felt as though bugs were squirming beneath his flesh. He scratched at his arms until he tore the skin, then stepped forward and struck the man in the side. The man shouted something he couldn’t make out because Allie was screaming again.

He noticed three wrinkled twenty-dollar bills on Allie’s nightstand. Now even more beside himself, he kicked the man repeatedly. Each time harder than the last.

Allie’s hands were around his waist now. “Stop! Please stop!”

“What’s the money for, Allie?” he shouted, tears stinging his eyes.

She was a whore. An evil, vicious whore.

She held onto him tighter, her naked flesh burning his. Their eyes met for a quick moment and he could tell that she was enjoying this.

Her slow kill.

“What’s the money for?” he screamed again, out of breath. “What’s it for, huh?”

He had to get away from this place. This house, from her, or they would kill him.

Trembling, his eyes out of focus and filled with tears, he watched the man rise and fumble with his pants again. He snatched up a cowboy hat and a set of car keys from the floor, then staggered out of the room.

A few seconds later, the front door slammed.

Chapter 31

AN HOUR LATER, as he sat on the narrow seat of a swing set studying the Anderson house, a boy walked up. The kid tiptoed through the yard until he reached the daughter’s bedroom window. Then, seconds later, the girl poked her head out and the boy helped her down. The two laughed quietly, then dashed across the yard and into the night.

After they’d disappeared, he studied the girl’s bedroom window. He breathed in the cool rain-cleansed air and tried to decide if it was too risky, if he’d be taking it too far to do the thing he wanted to do.

He thought for a few minutes, the polished stone tumbling violently in his palm, then decided it was worth the risk. He’d witnessed the girl sneaking out before, and she had always disappeared for hours. The rest of the house was dark, so the family was sound asleep.

Yes, he’d be safe going inside.

He lifted the window a little wider and pulled himself into the house. Once inside, his heart pounded as he stepped slowly around the room, taking in the dim surroundings. There was a bureau with a ceramic ballerina and a jewelry box sitting on its surface. A dresser, untidy with small brushes, makeup, and a large can of hairspray. He picked up the brush, his hand grazing the strands of hair caught in the bristles. He pulled several out and rubbed them between his fingertips.

The strands were coarse. Probably dyed, not the natural, untainted hair her mother had. But the closest he’d ever gotten to his angel, so he pocketed them and placed the brush back on the bureau.

He walked over to the unmade bed. In the murky light, he tried to guess the color of the comforter. A big pillow lay at the foot of the bed. Embroidered within the shape of a heart was the word Kelsey.

“Kelsey,” he mouthed, and felt the word roll off his tongue. A word his angel probably said several times a day.

He said it again, and bent to smell her sheets. They smelled girlish, like Allie’s. Perfumed.

He lay on the bed and gripped the pillow. This is where her daughter slept. These are the things she sees just before falling asleep, the things she hears.

He glared in the darkness and his shoulders stiffened. Blood surged through his veins, and suddenly he wanted to grab the girl by the shoulders and shake her. Shake her until all that could be seen were the dingy whites of her eyes.

Didn't she know her mother would worry if she caught her sneaking out? This girl was no good, just like Allie. Just like the young girls he saw every day. The girls who looked at him, whispered, and sometimes went as far as to wink, their eyes evil slits, their lips the shade of blood.

These girls were dirty, dangerous. And he was sure they were no different outside of Grand Trespass. He’d seen the same girls on the television. They were everywhere, a fucking pandemic.

He ran his fingers over the comforter. It was soft. Softer than Allie’s, the sheer opposite of the government-issue wool blanket he’d slept with since he was a child. He wondered how soft the mother’s comforter would be. Suddenly he knew he’d have to find out. He’d have to know or else the thought would muddle his already crowded mind. He closed his eyes and reveled in the thought. Then, he let himself silently enjoy a delicious memory.

Tiffany had been angry when he stopped to pick her up from the side of the road. Hopping in the truck, she asked him to take her away. Anywhere, but here, she’d said. So he threw the truck into gear and they moved up Main Street toward his mother’s house.

Soon, her hand was on his shoulder, then her fingers in his hair. Long, red fingernails, the tips perfect crescents.

“We’re through,” she a

“Through?”

“Yeah, we’re done for good this time. He thinks he owns me, and I hate it.”

“Does he?”

She watched him in the darkness, fingering her necklace. Then she seemed to decide he was kidding. “He-ell no,” she said, and a grin spread across her small face. Her fingers again found his hair.

He jammed his boot against the pedal.

At the house, she draped her slim, ta

After a while, her eyes began to droop, but she was still babbling. She slipped off the recliner, and wavering, walked to where he sat, her warm breath tickling his ear. He tried to stay calm.

The closer she got, the more torment he felt. His breath quickened and he clenched his fists. He hoped Allie wouldn’t come home. He imagined her walking through the door, seeing the girl in the house—then saying something smart, or stupid. But he knew he couldn’t stop himself. Not now.

She pressed her lips to his, and his body filled with rage. He wanted to grab her by the throat and shake her, but instead he leaned back, out of her reach.

“What’s wrong?” she whispered, alcohol wafting from her warm mouth.