Page 109 of Creeping Beautiful

And they don’t care anymore. They can’t stand one more second of safety. They need new. They need different. They need anything else but same.

Something has to give.

CHAPTER NINETEEN - DONOVAN

INTERVIEW WITH INDIE – age 19.9

SESSION #178

DONOVAN: OK, Indie. What the actual fuck? You’ve been missing for two weeks and—

INDIE: I already told you. I don’t want to talk about it.

I know you don’t want to talk about it. You’ve made that very clear. But I have been equally as clear that we will not leave this room until you tell me where you’ve been and what you’ve been doing.

…

I’m not fucking around, Indie. I will lock you in this room until you talk.

I’ll find a way out.

I will drug you. And then no, sweetie. You will not find a way out. I will keep you here for as long as I need to. Because you cannot go missing for two weeks with no explanation.

I’m a grown-up, Donovan. I can do whatever the fuck I want.

You have a child, Indie. If you walk away from her, that’s called abandonment. And we won’t put up with it.

Is that a threat?

Yeah. That’s a fuckin’ threat all right. I have serious concerns about your mental state and your ability to take care of Maggie right now.

I’m her mother, Donovan. You’re no one to her. None of you guys can stop me from picking her up, walking away, and taking her with me.

Wanna bet? You wanna try us, Indie? Because we’ve already agreed that you will not leave this house with Maggie. That is one hundred percent truth. And we’re no one to her? Really? I heard her calling Adam ‘Daddy’ last week. That’s no one?

Adam isn’t her daddy. Nathan is.

And Nathan is not here, so—

OK. Let’s start there. Why isn’t Nathan here, Donovan?

I couldn’t really tell you for sure. He was too young to be a father? He wanted to play football instead? He wanted to fuck girls in college and have a good time?

That’s not why and you know it. You can say all those nasty things to try to hurt me, or shock me, or whatever. But that’s not why he left and never came back. We both know one of you did something.

What did we do? Because I know for a fact, I didn’t do anything. I can count the number of times I’ve talked to Nathan St. James on one hand. And all of those conversations happened before you were fifteen. So, no. I didn’t do anything to keep Nathan away from you. He’s just a boy who walked away as far as I’m concerned.

Well. I’m happy to hear you weren’t involved. But aside from the fact that one of you got him arrested—

He was quickly released.

—he also called me once, you know. And he told me different.

When?

A few weeks after Maggie’s first Christmas.

Is that right?