by Ellie Parker
When he slipped his fingers between the strap of my backpack and my shoulder, I knew just how wrong I was. I didn’t even try to stop it from dropping. Didn’t even try to stop him as he hurled my backpack across the cafeteria. It felt a whole fucking lot like it was my heart he had launched across the room.
Leaning in, he caught the top of my ear with his teeth. “Fetch, bitch,” he whispered and pulled away.
As if on cue, the entire cafeteria burst into an echo of barking and howling and laughter.
“Fuck you, Sven?” The words came out shaky, weak, mimicking the way I felt. But as close to a whisper as my words were, they managed to render the entire cafeteria silent.
The corners of Sven’s mouth ticked up and when he caught my gaze, the darkness I saw was something only the devil himself could put there.
“Been there, done that,” he said. “You don’t have the kind of pussy that makes me want to come back for seconds, Jessa.” That one didn’t only sting. It punctured. I didn’t fucking lose my virginity to Sven. There was no blood on my panties in the morning, no ache between my thighs. I wanted to slap a comeback at him. Make him feel as small as I felt. But I couldn’t. My mouth felt like I’d swallowed an entire sheep. There wasn’t just cotton in my mouth, but cotton in my entire throat.
“And to think she held out for that long,” someone from the crowd laughed. I didn’t try to pin a face to the voice. What the fuck was the point.
“Miss Renshaw.” This time it was a voice of authority that called me and not one of the assholes who were trying to take my life for a spin.
I pulled my shoulders up and spun around. Principal Lenley was standing at the door to the cafeteria, hands crossed over her chest. She was a stern lady, an angry lady. The kind of woman who acted like she’d never had one good thing happen to her in her life. As I strolled toward her, I couldn’t help but think that I knew exactly what that felt like.
Arm extended to the right, she pointed in the direction she wished for me to follow. “In my office now,” she added.
Bending down, I picked up my backpack from the floor, flung it over my shoulder and followed her step for step away from the cafeteria.
A part of me thought that maybe she caught wind of the whole bullying situation. It had only been a day, sure. But these kinds of things spread like goddamn wildfire. I mean, it only took a matter of a morning for everybody to agree that I was enemy number one, two and three. Somehow, I knew better than to believe whatever it was that ran through my head. Of course, just like every other school, we had a non-bullying policy. The difference was, ours was hardly – if ever – implemented.
Principal Lenley grabbed a bundle of keys from her pocket and unlocked the doors to her office.
“Take a seat, Miss Renshaw,” she said. Without much hesitance, I did as I was told.
A few seconds later, she was tucked behind her desk, pulling a drawer open. A stack of business cards in her hand, she placed them on the table in front of me.
“Care to explain?”
I looked down at the pile, my chest tightening as I saw my name. Telephone number. Address. And…offer. Twenty dollar blowjobs.
“I…”
“I don’t think I need to explain to you that prostitution is illegal. I also don’t think I need to explain to you just how much you’re shredding your reputation, your decency, your self worth, your chance of graduating.”
“This isn’t me,” I stuttered, shaking my head. Instead of tears forming in my eyes, anger took their place. This was taking a step too fucking far.
“A few of the students have already confirmed that you were the one to hand the cards to them.”
I pushed the pile across the table, so that it was no longer possible for me to read the words displayed upon them. No way to see just how professionally the Starks had tried to ruin my reputation.
“They’re lying,” I said.
“They better be lying. Because if I find out that you’re not telling the truth, you’ll be looking at expulsion, rather than suspension. And so close to graduation-” She left the rest of her statement empty, allowing me to fill in the blanks on my own.
“We’ve reached out to your parents,” Principal Lenley continued. “Something like this simply cannot be ignored. If you’re hiding something Jessa, if these really belong to you, now is the time to fess up. Because for now, the police are not involved.”
I denied it. Of course I denied it. But I could see in her eyes that she didn’t believe a goddamn words that came out of my mouth. Adults aren’t unlike high schoolers when it comes to gossip. These teachers sit in their staff room during their break, cackling about one student or the other. The fact that I’d been the girl who was claimed by the Stark boys was something I was sure came up in their discussions more than once. And if you’re looking at someone to pin the whore card on, it’s easy to pin it on the girl who was usually surrounded by not one, or two, but three boys. Brothers. Triplets. The kind of thing that kinks and fantasies are made of.
“You are excused,” Principal Lanely said, gesturing for me to leave the room.
I’d made it as far as the hall before I spotted Stone with Marilyn’s hand tightly held in his grasp. It was kind of cheap, if you thought about it. Of all the girls in the school, he chose her. And for what? To torture me, to tease me, to taunt me. And again, why?
I slipped into the girl’s bathroom and locked myself into a stall, waiting for the bell to chime in announcement for the next class. When it did ring, I decided that facing them again just wasn’t worth it. How much worse could things really get? How much trouble could I really get in if skipping class was weighed against prostitution? Possibly a lot. Two strikes in one day wasn’t exactly something that would work to my benefit.
20
Jessa
Convincing my parents that I wasn’t a prostitute was relatively easy. Still, it did nothing to dull how pissed off they were. They wanted to know who was responsible. They wanted the school sued for allowing things to get this far. I knew who the culprits were, but revealing this to my parents felt even closer to the end of the world than all the meteorites the Starks were throwing at me and so I kept my mouth shut. Told them I was fine. Strolled off to school like I didn’t know what waited for me there.
Thing were pretty calm, for the most part. At least in the early portion of the day. I’d gotten somewhat decent at avoiding the Stark boys. That kind of thing wasn’t rocket science. Not when it was done by someone who knew their schedules better than the back of her own hand.
Lunch, however, that’s when things took a turn for the worse. Honestly, I don’t even know why I showed up to the cafeteria. Eating beside a goddamn toilet bowl filled with rotten shit would have been a lot easier to stomach than the way the Starks looked at me.
Chase was the one who made the move this time. Strolling up to my table with a tray of his own in his hands, he kept his eyes on mine. A part of me hoped he’d say something; anything that would at least give me a hint of what was going on. I was so focused on the look in his eyes that I couldn’t have worked up the situation that would play out before it happened.
One foot hiked up on the bench, Chase looked down at me, then dumped the contents of his tray all over mine.
“Why are you doing this, Chase?”
His eyebrows furrowed and his scowl contorted his entire face into something inhumanely cruel. “What’s the matter? Garbage for the garbage girl isn’t good enough?”
I think I came close to passing out. The world fell away and turned gray. No one had ever treated me like that before and so I’d never had to defend myself before now. The Stark boys had always done if for me. Now it was they who were leading the attack, and I had absolutely, no fucking idea why. I felt like I was in an episode of The Twilight Zone.
I dumped the contents of the tray in the trash and left the cafeteria, staggering down the hall and trying to remember which class I was supposed to be in next.
21
>
Walden Stark
I was dragging ass. The next time Marjorie wants an island vacation, I’m sending her butt down to Cuba for a year. I’ll stay here with my other entertainments.
I was a shame she wasn’t into the things I was into. But then again, if she were, that would mean I’d be stuck with her alone. Wouldn’t be the same. In fact, the fact that she didn’t know what was going on right under her nose made it all the better.
I stepped inside the house and noticed that the place was unusually clean after leaving three, healthy young males in charge of themselves. In fact, too clean. I’d bet my ass they had a helluva party and then hired somebody to do the dirty work. I don’t think they even knew what a broom was, much less how to use one. That was okay. I was their age once, too. I never could pass up getting into trouble whenever I had the chance.
Marjorie trailed behind me, a small giggle slipping past her lips. She was, no doubt, astonished with just how great of condition the house was in. Naïve little Marjorie. I wasn’t going to be the one to burst her bubble, however and so I kept my lips tight. Things were usually better that way – with none of us exchanging words. A vacation in the Caribbean doesn’t seem like the kind of thing for a couple with less connection than a broken phoneline. But most times, just because something seems a certain way, doesn’t mean it is so. The thing with the Caribbean is the lack of having to watch your back and count your movements. Girls, tanned under the warmth of the sun’s kisses, eager, active – they were just the right kind of thing for a guy like me. And the cops. Well, let’s just say, the exchange rates worked in my favor. Not that I’d ever gotten into a predicament where I had to slip a few bills into their pockets to have them look the other way. Marjorie, of course, hadn’t a clue what was going on. Soaking in the sun, facials, massages, sleeping in – those things were all she needed to look the other way.
Just the thought of those girls made my heart pound a little faster. I was a greedy man. You don’t get to where I am without taking more than your portion of the pie. The itch to get to my room came fast and hard.
I coughed into my hand and rubbed the back of my neck. “Marjorie, would you mind running to town and getting me some cold medicine? I think I picked up a bug on that damned plane.”
We probably had a dozen bottles already in the house, but she was afraid to argue with me. It never paid off. When you’re rich, you get away with the biggest loads of bullshit. Sparkling water with only ten bubbles. Steak, over easily, rarely well done. Dessert with just a sprinkling of Gold. In my case, never trust the expiration dates on anything if you want a quick way to have your wife out the door.
“Of course, darling. I’ll get a few groceries while I’m at it. Be back in a couple of hours?”
She seemed excited. Not that that surprised me much. When I was home, I made her miserable enough to find excuses so she could get out of the house until I was gone. It worked well for the both of us.
Sure, there were many times when we talked about divorce. If there was one stupid mistake I made in my life, other than marrying Marjorie, it was putting my investments in both our names. The lame ass lawyer I had at the time told me there were tax advantages. I believed him and every new acquisition went into title with her name also on it. Oh and no prenup. A young boy in that wicked thing they call love…plain and utter stupidity.
I found out some years later, after the boys were born, that she’d been sleeping with that lawyer. That was okay, I fucked him over good. Ten to twenty in the Federal pen for possession of child pornography. I crammed his computer with it and then asked a friend of mine to do an IRS audit on him. Naturally, it all showed up. Easy as pie.
Marjorie didn’t mess around after that. She knew he’d been a warning. But he’d screwed me at the same time. I couldn’t make a move without her signature. She had the thumbscrews on me alright. I wasn’t even sure she remembered, or understood it, but if I ever attempted to redraft the ownership or screw her out of anything in a divorce, I was sure she’d find another lawyer to help her sort it all out.
The whole thing got to me every once in a while. Sometimes, I just had to find somebody to talk to—a confidante, so to speak. It couldn’t be anybody who would hold it against me, for obvious reasons. So, one day when I was driving by the school after dropping off the boys, there was a girl a couple blocks away, sitting on the sidewalk. I pulled over and went to help. Turned out she was walking to school, arms full of books, when the heel of one of her shoes snapped off and she did a nosedive with everything she owned. Her ankle was hurting, and she was sitting there, miserable. I’d found my new confidante.
I offered to help and before too long, she was stretched over my tantra chair, naked with her butt cheeks spread with her own fingers. I used some new brush whips I’d picked up in Tijuana and she discovered she liked my style of intiJessa. Who knew?
She was new and exciting and willing to do anything to please me. I bought her a few bracelets with sparklies just to keep her loyal. I told her my troubles and she came up with solutions. She was the one who suggested setting up a new dummy corp and buying anything that was mutually owned. I started overwhelming Marjorie with paperwork to sign – blamed it on the lousy economy and the need to invest overseas. She never said a word, especially when I put a cheesecake or box of doughnuts in the center of the table. I put yellow stickies on the papers and Marjorie signed where they pointed without reading. Lucy had suggested adding dozens of worthless pages to the agreements, knowing Marjorie would just want to get over with it. I had to credit Lucy for trying to save my economic stability. Marjorie could only credit Lucy with probably an extra 20 pounds. Needless to say, some of the paperwork didn’t get signed. Some of them were taking an eternity to process. So here we were, Marjorie and me, still stuck in this loveless relationshit.
I heaped more gifts on Lucy and she finally agreed to just live in the red room. It was soundproof and I could lock the door from the outside as well as the inside. I kept her fed from a little kitchenette and when I was home, we played. Marjorie laid right in the bed next to me with Lucy on the other side of the wall and never suspected a thing.
Lucy grew bored and wanted to get out. She wanted to travel and tried to convince me that we should visit Zurich and Malaysia to look for opportunities. I knew what she was after, and that was a ring. She’d helped me rid myself financially of Marjorie, knowing that I’d be more inclined to get a divorce and then she could become the next Mrs. Walden Stark, along with all the benefits.
I gave her one last night of unbridled sexual ecstasy. She moaned my name and never hesitated to follow any order I gave her. Not any of them—including drinking the tall glass of champagne I’d doctored. She simply got drunk and fell asleep, for good.
When Marjorie left for the hairdresser’s the next morning, I wrapped Lucy’s body inside a roll of carpet that I’d covered with a black plastic tarp and strapping tape. She was like one giant wrapped gift. I hired a couple guys to take the carpet roll to a dump down the coast and that was the last anyone heard of Lucy. I was careful to keep the jewelry—it would work for the next girl, too. I thought of it as recycling.
I needed a fix so I watched as Marjorie drove down the drive toward town, and then I went in.
As soon as I flipped the light, I knew something was wrong. I could feel it. Knowing where everything lay in total darkness was a skill I had to develop and now it made me feel raped. Someone had been viewing the DVDs; I could tell by the way one of them was backwards on the shelf. There was a body imprint in the leather of the chair; a much thinner body.
I couldn’t miss the opened curtain or the poster printouts that had been removed. Some still lay on the floor, but one, in particular, was missing. The one I’d taken of Lucy before I rolled her into the carpet.
I felt a rage unlike anything I had ever felt. As they say, this was why some species eat their young. If they’d walked through the door at that moment, they would have gone the way of Lucy. That’s how
angry I was.
I straightened things up and put it all away, including removing the posters from the wall and locking them into a drawer. It would take a long time before I could come into that room again. I felt such a sense of violation.
I went downstairs, shaking. The doorbell was ringing and I opened it to find Jessa. She was looking for the boys, particularly Sven.
I invited her in and we talked. Told me about how it felt like they’d been avoiding her. Told me that she missed seeing me around; that it seemed like forever since we’d seen each other. That wasn’t a lie. After that last time, I tried to keep my distance. I didn’t hate my sons and my sons loved her. Sometimes the little angel on my shoulder was louder than the devil. So I stopped things before it could really get any further.
“I don’t know,” she said, shaking her head at me. Her eyes looked so sad and I itched to reach down and run a finger against her cheek just like I’d done the first time it was just me and her alone in a room. “I think maybe I did something to piss them off. The only problem is, I haven’t got a clue what that could be.”
Now why would they do that? Not too long ago, they were like ticks on that poor girl’s back.
I reached out and touched her hand, massaging the back of it with my thumb. She didn’t pull away. Instead, her breaths came in more evenly. Good girl.
“They’ll come around,” I said, knowing my boys better than to think that they were likely to take up an old toy and start playing with it again. Pity they didn’t know just how much juice this one had left in her.
Jessa smiled that bright smile I knew so well. “You’re always so optimistic,” she said, before thanking me and getting to her feet. She was almost out the door before she spun back on her heel and threw her arms around me, her body pressed so tight that I could feel the outline of her chest.