Page 2 of Lethal Weakness

“Mommy.”

I left everything behind that I couldn’t lift, or afford to fight for if it comes to it. That includes everything that was locked away in my ex’s wall safe without my consent.

“Mommy.”

“Yes?” My head tips towards her, but she’s looking distractedly across the chain-link fence that separates our driveway from the neighbor’s, so I resume my hoisting of bags out of the trunk.

This is a desolate, dead-end road. Not purposefully. The pavement simply stops about 200 feet down the way, with nothing but a grassy field in front of it like one day the workers went home, and no one bothered to show up the next day.

The three houses across from me are in even worse shape. One is probably vacant based on the broken windows in the attic and the knee-length grass. The other two belong to elderly women, and I only know that because my new landlord owns those properties too.

The house next to me on this side of the street has a different owner, and the rest of the town is a mile in the non-deserted direction. But even they aren’t doing great.

There isn’t even a dollar store here in Twinflower. Just a bar, a general store that doubles as a gas station, and… Well, I’m not sure. Whatever else there is isn’t very significant.

“Mommy, is he your friend?”

“What?” My head swings in her direction this time, and I see what she is looking at. Or, rather, who.

The neighbor, a man standing rigidly behind the raised hood of a worn-down GMC truck, is looking directly at us.

The top half of his face is hidden under a baseball cap, but even so, I can tell he’s glowering. Or at least, watching us without a lick of friendly curiosity.

The hairs on the back of my neck tingle, and it is the only sign I need to wrap my arm around Avery’s little shoulders and tug her towards our new front door.

“Mommy, my stuff!”

“I’ll come back out. Let’s get you a snack, now.”

Even without looking back, I can sense his stare on my back like daggers.

Sweat moistens my neck as I struggle with the door because I’m not used to the lock and which way to turn the key, but once we’re inside, I finally breathe.

I wasn’t exactly expecting a warm, neighborly welcome, but I also hadn’t heavily considered who we were moving next to.

I didn’t have time to weigh any other options.

This is all I could afford, and I barely convinced the landlord to give me the keys. This has to work, because we can’t be chased out of another home. We have nowhere left to go.

I take my time getting Avery settled at the kitchen table with an emergency pack of fruit snacks from my purse.

Luckily, one of the only perks of this rental home is that it is partially furnished, if you consider a kitchen table, plastic patio furniture, and a couch from the 70s furnished.

Doesn’t matter because I’ll take what I can get.

“I’ll be right back, honey. Make sure you’re chewing good,” I remind her, unnecessarily. She’s always been a cautious eater. I’m the one usually forcing her to eat more.

My head stays tipped towards the ground once I’m outside, and I hustle to my car. As far as I’m concerned, our new home is an island, and the chain link between the glowering neighbor and us is the Great Wall of China.

I don’t want to invite any unwelcome hostility into our new domain. I need positive vibes only.

But with only two of our suitcases rolled to the porch and three boxes still in the depths of my old Pontiac, the air shifts in a way that any woman who has lived through hell understands.

That inexplicable feeling you get when storm clouds snuff out the light of the sun, or when you start holding your breath around a man that was supposed to be a protector, but was really an antagonizer.

The type of man who throws eggshells at your feet and then smacks you around for stepping on them.

“Moving in?” A deep voice comes from over my left shoulder, near the fence, making me flinch so hard I smack my head on the inside of the trunk.