“You all right, hon?” a man asks. His face is leather, and his brown eyes are kind.
I nod, then I start to walk in the direction of my caravan. It’s a long walk and my shoes start to chafe and hurt. I take them off and walk in my bare feet. It gets dark and I stumble along blindly. My body feels hollow. I cannot accept she is gone. I refuse to. I keep thinking of how she looked at the weekend. The way she had laughed when I clowned around at the hotel spa. She had been so happy, so excited about the future.
The caravan site comes into view. As I walk past Joe’s caravan, I see him sitting on the step drinking a beer.
“Howdy neighbor,” he calls out.
I completely ignore him and walk on. When I get home, I get my bottle of Vodka out of the cupboard, and go sit outside. I swig a mouthful straight from the bottle. Then I lean my head back against the cold metal of the caravan and close my eyes.
“Oh Sam,” I whisper brokenly.
“Hey, you all right?” Joe’s voice asks.
My eyes snap open and I frown at him. “Get lost, Joe.”
In the darkness his eyes glitter dangerously. “Why are you being like that? I’m just trying to be friendly-like.”
“Go back home, Joe. I’m really not in the mood to chit chat.” I stand with the intention of going back inside, but he moves fast, and suddenly he is standing in front of me. I’m trapped between him and the chair.
“I’m a good listener, Autumn,” he says softly.
“Then you should have fucked off by now, because I’ve already asked you to leave three times,” I snarl.
“Woah,” he says, widening his eyes in mock fear, “watch it Joe, this cat has claws.”
“For the last time, move,” I mutter between gritted teeth.
He grins, his teeth flashing like a Cheshire cat. “Why? I like where I am. Let’s go inside your caravan. I promise I’ll make you feel real good.”
I take a deep breath, then I knee the moron as hard as I can right in the balls. His mouth opens in shock, and a guttural, choking, almost inhuman sound comes out it. Then his knees give away and he drops to the ground. He curls himself in to a fetal position at my feet while clutching his groin. I step over him, go into the caravan and lock my door.
“Oh Sam,” I whisper in the dark.
Chapter 48
Rocco
His hands are still cupping his groin, his mouth is muttering curses, and his curled body is rocking gently to dull the pain when I step next to him. His eyes widen with astonishment when he sees the shiny leather of my shoes come out of nowhere and appear so close to his face. His gaze flies upwards to my face.
“Who the fuck are you?” he blurts out incredulously, fearfully. My noiseless approach has, naturally, freaked him out.
I say nothing, just stare down curiously at the pitiful creature that he is. Never in my life have I ever seen fit to mingle with or expend any energy on a creature such as him. A useless eater. I knew, of course, men such as him existed, and existed in vast numbers, but I’d never before come so close to one.
Suddenly, he understands. He knows what I am here for. His eyes bulge with terror. He opens his mouth as if to scream, but to his shock no sound comes out of it. I continue to look at him. Tears fill his eyes and run down the sides of his face. Thinking I am the angel of death his eyes beg me silently for compassion. He makes silent promises to be better, to do better. Mutely, he apologizes feverishly for his past misdeeds. He pleads for forgiveness. Then he begins to call to God, the very God he had spurned in his miserable life.
I bend down and grasp his neck. It snaps like a twig, and the annoying, begging light goes out of his lying eyes. I lift him easily and haul him over my shoulder. Dry twigs crunch under my feet as I carry him and his bottle of beer towards the fence surrounding the trailer park. At an appropriate part of the fence I hook one of his legs between the wooden slats, and let his body fall on the ground.
Tomorrow someone will find him.
They will assume he fell and broke his neck. I toss the beer bottle next to him and I look around. The hour is early, but it’s Monday night, so there seems to be no one around. Without taking another look at the vermin, I sprint back to the edge of the forest directly opposite Autumn’s caravan. I slide behind a tree and from the shadows I return to my task of guarding her.