White Oleander - Janet Fitch [45]
A minute later, I heard him walking up the riverbed, dry already though it was only April. I knew Davey would read all this tomorrow in our tracks. But the moment I touched Ray, I knew we could never be apart, no matter how much we wanted to, no matter who we hurt. His lips on my neck, his hands under my shirt, pulling my pants open, peeling them down. My thighs craved the naked touch of his hips, we fit together like magnets as we sank into the sand. I didn’t care about scorpions or the western diamondback. I didn’t care about rocks or who might see us.
“Baby, what are you doing to me,” he whispered into my hair.
THE LAST TIME I had heard two adults fight was the night my mother stabbed Barry in the hand. Smashing, crashing. I covered my head with the pillow, but I could still hear every word through the thin walls, Starr’s drunken screeching, Ray’s murmuring rebuttals.
“You used to get it up fine, before you started fucking that lit-tle bitch. Admit it, you bastard, you’ve been fucking her!”
I crouched deeper into my sleeping bag, sweating, pretending it wasn’t me, it was some other girl, I was just a kid, I had nothing to do with this.
“Fuck my sponsor! God, I should have got rid of her when I had the chance!”
I imagined Ray sitting on the edge of the bed, his back slouched, hands dangling between his thighs, not interrupting her, just letting her blow it off, warding off her drunken slaps, wishing she would pass out. I could hear his voice, still calm, soothing, reasonable. “Starr, you’re shitfaced.”
“You perv. You like fucking kids? What’s next, dogs? You really like that skinny twat better than me? That no-tit baby?”
The shame, knowing that the boys were listening, now they knew everything.
“She got a tighter pussy than me? She suck you off like me? Does she take it up the ass? No, really, I want to know what kid fuckers do.”
How long did I think I was going to get away with it? I wished I’d never come here, I wished I’d never been born. Yet I had to admit there was a part of me that was proud, even excited, that Ray couldn’t get it up for Starr. He couldn’t fuck her, no matter how big her tits were, no matter if she let him put it up her ass. It was me he wanted.
“Fuck my sponsor, you call my fucking sponsor. I’m going in there and I’m going to cash her check.”
I heard more crashing, yelling, and then suddenly the door to my room flew open. Starr in her Victoria’s Secret rose negligee all twisted around, both huge tits exposed, was waving the .38. I would see that sight for years in my dreams. She fired without aiming, one arm extended. I rolled onto the floor and the room was full of the smell of gunfire and flying chipboard. I tried to wedge myself under the bed.
“You crazy.” Ray and Starr struggled. I moved out where I could see them. He twisted her arm behind her back and took the gun away. He was naked, and bent her backwards by her arm, so that his cock pressed into her buttocks, her tits pointing at the ceiling, shivering like small scared animals as he pushed her with his hips toward the door.
“Fuck you, Ray, fuck you!”
“Anytime,” he said as he shoved her out.
Maybe they would do it now and forget all about me. There was a hole in the closet wall. I started to get dressed. I wasn’t going to stick around anymore, not with that crazy drunk and a houseful of guns. I was going to call my caseworker tonight. I’d let Ray know where I was, but I couldn’t stay here.
Then I heard fighting in their room, and Starr was back, firing at me as I was struggling into my clothes. Pain bloomed in my shoulder, raced fire across my ribs. I staggered for the dresser, to climb up and out the window, but then she fired again, and my hip exploded. I fell onto the floor.