I return her smile with an equally tight one of my own. She’s not an ally, but she’s also not the enemy. I try not to shoot the messenger more often than I can help it. I just have to survive one more year until I turn eighteen, until I graduate and move the fuck out of here.
“’Late last night and the night before,’” I sing under my breath as I follow her down the stairs, pressing my fingernails into my palms to steady myself before facing Lee.
I step into the living room where my stepdad sits smoking and squinting at the little boxy TV that looks too small for the room. I don’t know how my parents could afford this place, though in all honesty, it’s a dump. Or “fixer upper” as my mom said when she told me we were moving here. It’s not a mansion, though it might as well be after our last place. It’s at least twice as big as our house in Ridgedale, probably more like three times. It’s also probably a hundred years old.
“You know we got a pool out back, or you been too busy holing up in your room with your nose in a book?” Lee asks.
“I didn’t figure you’d want me bringing pies to the neighbors,” I say with my sweetest smile.
“You getting smart with me, girl?” he asks, glowering at me from under grey brows on his protruding forehead. The asshole looks like a caveman elder, but I’m saving that little insult for when I walk out the door for good, flipping him the bird as I go.
“No,” I say. “Just stating facts.”
“Get your ass outside and start cleaning it,” he snaps.
“I don’t know how to clean a pool,” I point out. “Do I just skim it or…?”
Lee grinds his cigarette out in the ashtray sitting on the arm of his worn chair, his eyes boring into me with such intensity I’m pretty sure he’s imagining putting it out on my face. “I don’t pay the bills around here for you to sit on your ass like some pampered princess, reading whatever nonsense is in those books of yours,” he seethes. “You don’t know how to do something? Fucking figure it out, Rae, or I swear to God…”
An involuntary quake goes through me despite my efforts to be brave, and I shake my head, my bravado gone. “I’ll figure it out. Just sit tight while I get my shoes on.”
I race back upstairs and shove my feet into my tennis shoes, my heart pounding. The minute my shoes are on, hugging my feet like a pair of familiar, comforting arms, the craving to run almost overtakes me. I glance up and see the roof empty outside my reading nook. A pang of loneliness goes through me.
If I were a bird, I’d fly away too.
Not really. People who say they want that for a superpower are crazy. Flying sounds terrifying to me—being buffeted by the wind, careening out of control, maybe caught up in storm if you weren’t careful. I prefer my feet on the ground.
Lee is right, anyway. He does pay for everything, since Mom doesn’t have a job and won’t file for disability because then she’d have to explain all the mysterious injuries she never went to the doctor about. I haven’t rushed to get a job, either, looking the way I have for the past few weeks. Not that Lee would have let me. He has to keep up appearances. But maybe I’ll put in some applications now that I can leave the house without people staring.
Mom meets me at the back door, lowering her voice to a whisper. “Make yourself useful for an hour, just to get your father off your back,” she says, giving me an apologetic smile.
“It’s fine, Mom,” I say, pushing her hands away when she starts picking at me again. “I could use the fresh air, like you said. I might even go for a run before I come back.”
“What are you two hens squawking about?” Lee demands.
Mom cowers. “Don’t be out too late,” she whispers to me, darting a glance back to the living room. “Remember, Faulkner has a city curfew.”
“I’ll be in way before ten,” I say, pulling open the door and then pushing the screen door beyond. It creaks on its hinges, the wood old and wobbly, probably rotted through.
I step out onto the porch and take a deep breath of the sweltering May heat, letting the steamy air fill my lungs as I take in my surroundings. Though the grass isn’t uniform like it might be in a fancy neighborhood, the backyard has been mowed in neat stripes. Of course Lee had to take care of his lawn first thing. The man’s obsessed.
Apparently the next door neighbor is, too. I can hear their mower running, though it’s a damn sauna out here even at six in the evening. I catch a glimpse of a tall man through a hole in the privacy fence where three or four of the grey boards have been broken out to let neighborhood kids in. I can tell by the graffiti along the fence, mostly penises, swear words, and gang signs. There’s also a giant bird painted across one whole side of the wooden fence, each feather detailed in black paint. Its impressive wingspan stretches wide, as if to encircle the yard in a hug. I know instantly that someone else has gotten a visit from Poe. Did the person who lived here before us paint this? It’s not like the other graffiti.
I trot down the four steps, noting that the boards on the second step are loose, the nail heads sticking up half an inch. There’s a shed at the far end of the pool that looks like it might collapse in the next gust of wind, and a big old oak at the far end of the yard. But the swimming pool is front and center, unshaded by trees or the shed. That’s the main attraction. I cross the grimy white tiles to the pool.
And groan.
I pictured a scene from90210when Lee said we had a pool. Skim a few leaves and some tree pollen, and it would be a sparkling blue rectangle where I’d lay out and work on my tan while reading, like a rich girl.
This is… Not that.
The urge to run pops back up, wheedling for attention. It’s not like Lee cares if I work or run first. Okay, maybe he’ll care, but he won’t know. He’s off duty, and he’s planted himself for the evening. He won’t budge until dinner. As long as I stay out of the house, he won’t complain.
Probably.
I weigh the risks, then turn and cross the yard to climb through the hole in the fence, only then realizing I’m in the neighbor’s yard. He’s gone around the back of his house with the mower, so I hurry along the fence until it ends and step into our front yard before he sees me. Then I stop to gather my thick, dark waves into a high pony. I stretch for a minute, taking in the other houses in the neighborhood. I’ve seen these from my window, unlike the back yard.
Our house sits on the northwest corner of our block, where Mill ends. The other houses on the street are basic, drab rectangles. Ours sticks out like a sore thumb, the only two-story house within eyesight down any of the streets I can see from the windows. It’s big and white and shabby, with grungy white paint peeling away in places. The wraparound porch surrounds the entire lower level, and latticework hangs from the roof over it. It’s completely out of place among the ranch-style brick boxes in the surrounding area.