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“We don’t leave empty dorm rooms sitting around. Usually, we end up having to turn people down if they take too long to fill out their paperwork. There’s not some endless supply.”
“Okay. Thanks.” Wren’s head hangs low when she turns away from the desk. Instead of doubling back and passing me, she walks to the other end of the room and leaves through that door. So now she thinks she’s slick.
All she’s doing is pissing me off. Obviously, the girl is either too stupid or too stubborn to know I’m not fucking around. I follow her out to the hall, then outside, with a million questions banging around in my head. Why would she decide after classes have already started that she wants to live in a dorm room? I guess she doesn’t know any better—it’s pretty obvious you don’t decide out of nowhere to rent a room like it’s a hotel. I doubt her whore of a mother would teach her about shit like that.
“What happened?” I ask as we cross the quad. “Did the shack you were living in burn down or something? Maybe the homeless shelter ran out of beds? Do you think you can just walk into the admin office and rent a room?”
“Please, stop.” I can barely hear her, she’s whispering so softly. “Stop yelling about stuff you don’t understand.”
“Make me understand. I’m curious. What makes you think anybody around here would share a room with you, anyway? Do you know how much money the school would have to spend on disinfectant to clean it up after you left? They probably couldn’t afford it.”
I’ve had enough of her bullshit. Acting like she has the right to ignore me. “Little bird, I’m talking to you.” All it takes is a hand on her shoulder to stop her and turn her around. When she tries to break away, I grab a hold of her arm to pull her in close. It’s time to remind her who she’s fucking with.
“Ow!” She hisses and flinches and squeezes her eyes shut, all because I touched her arm.
“Since when are you such a fucking baby?” Except when I grabbed her, I pushed her sleeve up a little, and now the dark purple bruises are clear.
Something strange happens to me. Something I sure as hell couldn’t have predicted. The sight of those bruises on her thin arm turns my stomach. Suddenly, I’m hot inside, boiling hot, ready to tear somebody’s fucking head off. “What happened to you?” I growl, staring down at that ugly purple stain on her creamy skin.
“Could you please let me go? It hurts.” I hear the pain in her voice, and it would normally make me happy. I would consider it a good day if I could make her sound like that.
But I’m not the one making her sound like that. Somebody else decided to take the pleasure away from me. I need to know who it was.
I loosen my grip but don’t let go, since I know she’ll just try to run away if I do. “Who did it?” I ask again.
“Nobody.” Her long hair falls across her face when she hangs her head. “I just fell.”
My ass. “You just fell?”
“That’s what I said. I fell.”
“Where did you fall?”
“I don’t even remember.” She’s breathing pretty fucking fast for somebody who doesn’t remember, and she sounds upset in a way even I can’t normally make her sound. Like she’s really, deeply afraid.
“Wherever you fell, they left fucking finger marks on you,” I mutter, dropping her arm. I’m insulted that she would bother lying, especially since it’s such a pathetic lie.
Somebody wrapped a hand around her arm tight enough to leave finger marks, and now she’s trying to get a dorm room. Is somebody at home hurting her? As far as I know, she doesn’t have a dad in the picture—how could she? No self-respecting man would stick around a woman like her whore of a mother, even if there was a baby involved. Maybe especially if there was a baby involved, since that’s at least eighteen years of association. It would take a man with a death wish to subject himself to that kind of torture.
What the hell is wrong with me? I should be glad somebody is out there when I can’t be, putting her in her place, making sure she remembers she’s nothing.
But damn it, I’m supposed to be the one doing that. If somebody is going to leave marks on her, it’s going to be me. I’m the one who lost my mother. It would’ve been bad enough if she’d just died, but that’s not what happened. She would be alive now if it wasn’t for the fucking affair with that filthy bitch, who could never be even half the woman Mom was. Just some wet hole for Dad to stick his dick into, that’s all. He probably doesn’t even remember what she looks like.
But I do, just as clearly as I remember Mom. I won’t let her be forgotten. I won’t let her death end up meaning nothing.
If I have to remember my dead mother—and the reason she died—every goddamn time I set eyes on Wren. I’m going to make sure Wren pays for that. I’m not leaving her punishment up to some random asshole.
“Are you finished asking for details of my personal life that are none of your business?” Somehow, she still has the nerve to say shit like that to me.
She shakes her head and turns around. Only instead of going to the Liberal Arts building, she walks to the parking lot instead. “Calling it an early day?” I ask. I’m parked a few spots away from her car, where a big, ugly patch of ruined paint running the entire driver’s side is a reminder of whoever spray painted it. I should find out who did it. I would like to buy them a beer.
“I just want to go home, okay?” The problem is, she doesn’t look like she actually wants to go. Not with her head hanging the way it is. Not when she sounds so defeated.
“You know I could follow you, right?” I ask as she gets behind the wheel of the piece of shit that somehow still gets her around town. I can’t imagine how it does, but it got here. “I could also have this trash towed out of here. It’s a fucking insult, having to see a car this ugly sitting around.”
She slams the door, shaking her head, then jabs the key into the ignition.
And nothing happens when she turns it, beyond a flat clicking noise.
