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I could hear my father playing a Jimi Hendrix song on one of his Fender Strats in the living room. The music stopped just before he shouted in agreement, “Looks good, Scooter!” He must have seen me walk by.
“Thanks, Dad!” I yelled back, dropping my purse on the kitchen island, which was really just a wobbly white particleboard nightmare my mom had purchased from Kmart. With wobbly stools to match.
“Ooh, these are pretty,” I said, admiring a fresh vase of Stargazer lilies on the island. “When did you get—”
“They’re from Hans.” My mom’s tone dropped, just like my face when I heard his name.
Giving her a look that could sear the chrome off a bumper, I picked up the entire crystal vase, walked over to the trash can, and stepped on the pedal to open the lid.
“No!” she shouted, snatching the vase out of my hands at the last second. “They’re so pretty. At least let me take them to school. Maybe I’ll use them for a still-life lesson before they die. The kids will love them.”
I sighed and let the lid fall shut. “Fine.”
“Baby…”
Doodle-oodle-oodle-oo, my cell phone sang from my purse.
My heart skipped a beat as I snatched my purse back off the table and began rummaging through it for my glittery little Nokia.
Doodle-oodle-oodle-oo!
Grasping the device, I pulled it out and read the name on the screen. For the second time in as many minutes, my face fell.
I silenced the ringer and shoved it back into my bag. Flowers from Hans, never-ending phone calls from Knight…all I needed was for Harley to get out of jail, and the Terrible Trio would be complete.
Looking up at my mom with an expression that I hoped said, That was absolutely not Ronald McKnight who I just sent to voicemail, I tried to remember what we’d been talking about.
“That was him, wasn’t it?”
“Who?” I smiled innocently.
“You know who.” She wouldn’t even say his name. It was as if Knight was so evil that my mom was afraid he could be conjured, like a demon or a ghost. “When are you going to change your number?”
“Mom…” I scoffed. “It’s fine. I don’t even answer.”
Anymore.
“It’s not fine. I saw him parked in the cul-de-sac on his motorcycle just last week, staring at the house!” She threw her hand in the direction of the front door and street beyond. “You know, your father and I watched a Dateline episode about guys like this. They called them lurkers. No…stalkers. They called them stalkers, and they said that they are dangerous and have no boundaries and will stop at nothing to get what they want.”
I wanted to laugh so bad. If she only fucking knew. Knight had been terrorizing me for a quarter of my life. At fifteen, he’d isolated me from my friends, threatened anyone who so much as spoke to me, introduced me to a world of bondage and bloodplay, intimidated and humiliated me at every turn, then shattered my heart when he left for the Marines. I had gotten a brief reprieve during his two tours of Iraq, but both times, he’d come back more aggressive and volatile than ever.
Knight’s new favorite pastime was leaving irrationally angry, obscenity-filled voicemails on my phone, but no matter how bad it got, I couldn’t change my number. I just…couldn’t.
Knight wasn’t a stalker.
He was worse.
He was my first love.
My mom opened the kitchen junk drawer and pulled something out. “Here,” she said, turning and presenting me with a small black pouch on a key ring.
I accepted the canister, my fingers grazing the word Mace embossed on the side of the leather carrying case.
“Your father wanted to give you one of his guns, but I think you have to be twenty-one to carry a concealed weapon. So…maybe for your birthday.”
“Mom”—I rolled my eyes, dropping the poison dispenser into my bag—“I am not carrying a gun.”
“Well, I’d feel a lot better if you did. Look at you. You couldn’t fight your way out of a wet paper bag.”
Here we go again.
“Welp, thanks for the mace. I’m going upstairs now.” I stood up and grabbed my purse, trying to make an exit before the issue of my weight, or lack thereof, came up. That was how these conversations went. No matter how they started, they always ended with a—
“Have you eaten today?”
“Uh-huh,” I lied, backing out of the kitchen.
“Good,” she called after me as I turned and practically sprinted up the stairs. “And be sure to take that pepper spray to school. You know, fourteen people get mugged downtown every day!”
