Beyond the Pale

by Jennifer Millikin

  “Well,” my mom says, cutting into her chicken. “Are you feeling excited, Lennon?”

  I nod, spearing a cauliflower floret with my fork.

  “Pretty soon you’ll be in Texas without anybody to tell you where to go and what to do.”

  Is that... wistfulness I see on her face? It stuns me, causing me to pause my fork in mid-air. I watch and listen as she opens her mouth again.

  “Hopefully Ted and I have done a good job instilling in you the values of our home. Just because you’re in another state doesn’t mean you no longer represent our family and our morals.” She picks up another bite of chicken. “I think you’ll do just fine.”

  For some kids my age, this talk would be obnoxious. They’d roll their eyes, either outwardly or inwardly. But not me. My mother so rarely shows this level of concern or care, and instead of being annoyed, I feel like I’m being showered with praise. My belly feels warm and happy, my heart swells.

  “You don’t need to worry about me,” I manage to say around the tightness in my throat.

  Mom nods, reaching across the table and patting my hand. It’s all I can do not to fall from my seat.

  What is going on tonight? Could it be that my graduation is making my usually stoic mother sentimental?

  After dinner I head home, even though I thought I’d be doing something different tonight. I didn’t talk about it with Finn and Brady, but I assumed I’d be with them.

  Going up to my room feels anticlimactic given the excitement of the evening, but that’s what I do. I change out of my pretty dress and into pajamas and flop down on my bed. The air conditioning blows directly on me, so I grab a sweatshirt and tuck my phone into the front pocket, in case I get a text. I want to call the guys and ask them what they’re up to, but that makes me feel pathetic, and that’s the last thing I want to be. Yesterday I checked a book out from the library, so I grab that from my desk and lie back down. I’m hooked within minutes of starting it, and suddenly it’s eleven o’clock and I can’t put it down.

  I tell myself I’ll finish this chapter, but then I keep turning pages and now I’m starting the next chapter and I can’t close the book now. That’s sacrilege.

  Another hour goes by. I’m so into the book that I barely notice my door open. It’s the faint creak of the metal hinges that catches my attention. I peer over the top of the book and watch Ted peek in. He locks eyes with me and steps around the open door, closing it behind himself.

  “What’s going on?” I ask. He’s never come to my room like this. “Is there something wrong with my mom?”

  Ted ignores me. Or, if he’s going to answer, he’s taking his sweet time.

  He turns, and I can’t see what he’s doing, but I hear it. An ominous click. The lock on my door sliding into place. A sick feelings drops into my stomach.

  “Ted? What are you doing?” My voice drips with the apprehension coursing through every cell in my body.

  He shakes his head at me, lifting one finger to his lips and making a soft shushing sound, as if he’s soothing a wailing infant.

  I set my book down and draw my knees into myself. Adrenaline courses through my limbs, every inch of me on high alert.

  Fight?

  Run?

  Maybe there’s nothing happening here. I’m probably reading into it. Ted would never do anything bad to me. He’s been my stepdad for ten years. Everything is fine.

  He walks closer to me, and I feel it deep down in my gut. Everything is not fine.

  Quickly I stand up from the bed. Ted smiles. He smiles. I’ve never seen anything so evil.

  “Don’t worry, Lennon. I’ll be gentle.”

  Shock keeps me frozen in place, even though beneath the ice my pulse races.

  Ted stops a few feet away from me, watching me carefully. He’s enjoying his role as powerful predator, watching his frightened prey. “Unless you don’t need me to be gentle. Maybe you like it rough.” His voice is soft, like he’s trying to soothe me. “I could ask Finn how you like it? Or Brady? Or maybe both? At the same time?” His tongue darts out to lick his lips, and I realize the sick fuck is excited by the idea.

  Adrenaline overcomes shock, and I scream. I scream until the scream dries out my throat and fades out. Ted simply watches me, amusement turning up the corners of his lips.

  “Your mom took a sleeping pill. A fire alarm couldn’t wake her up.”

  I try to barrel past him, but all it does is close the distance between us. He grabs me and hauls me into his side. His breath is musty and hot, streaming against my cheek.

  “Lennon, don’t fight it,” he croons. “It will be so much better for us both if you don’t fight.” His finger runs the length of my face and my dinner feels like it might come up.

  My whole life I’ve felt pushed down. Unloved and unwanted by the person who is supposed to love me most. My existence is a nuisance to my mother. I have a lifetime of therapy ahead of me when I can afford it, but this will not be something I talk about in therapy, because there’s no way I’m allowing this to happen to me. Ted will not do this to me.

  No fucking way. No fucking way. No fucking way no fucking way no fucking way.

  I scream it in my head, until I hear my voice screaming it out loud.

  I become a tornado, flinging limbs and stomping feet. I catch him with something, I’m not sure what. Maybe it’s my elbow that does it, or my foot crashing down on his.

  He grunts, stumbling back and letting go of me. I run for the door, unlocking it and thundering down the stairs. Blood pounds in my ear as I race to the front door, slamming back the lock and throwing it open.

  I run into the night. In my bare feet I run, until my throat and my legs burn and I’m dripping sweat. Before I slow, I look behind me, and when I don’t see anybody, I come to a stop. I’m hot, so freaking hot, so I pull my sweatshirt over my head and something tumbles to the concrete.

  My phone. Oh thank god. I look up to the dark sky and mouth the words to someone I’m not sure I believed in until now.

  Brady doesn’t answer. My next call is to Finn.

  He answers immediately, and the sound of his voice is more than I can take.

  “Finn,” I sob his name.

  “Where are you?” he demands, not bothering to ask me what has happened.

  I walk closer to the corner until I can read the street signs. “Stagecoach and Jackson. A little way from my house.”

  “Give me a house number. I’ll put it in my GPS.”

  I look to the house closest to me, reciting the numbers I see on a gold metal sign above the garage.

  “I’m coming for you,” he growls, then he hangs up.

  I sit down where I am. The concrete is still warm from a day of unyielding sunshine.

  And I cry. I cry tears of sadness, for what almost happened. Tears of anger. Tears of relief and pride. I fought, and I won.

  Until this moment, I’ve never realized that it wasn’t only my mother who’d been denying me love this entire time. It was me too.

  I’ve never loved myself.

  Starting tonight, that’s going to change.

  Finn

  I learned my lesson the hard way, of course. It seems that’s the only way I learn.

  Never get Brady high again.

  “Are the police following us?” He turns around, looking through the back window of my crappy single-cab truck. His eyes are wide. Paranoid. “I think I see them, Finn!” He said this three minutes ago too.

  Sighing, I glance in the rearview mirror just to be certain he’s not right. And he’s not. There’s nobody behind us, not even a headlight in the far-off distance. “Nobody’s there, Brady.”

  Brady faces forward again. If he wasn’t so annoying, I’d record the guy just so he can see himself. But honestly, I don’t want any lasting reminders of tonight. Having this in my memory is bad enough.

  Brady leans his forehead against his window, and I focus on the drive. I’m high too. I can’t afford to get pulled over. If I wasn’t
afraid Brady would kill us, I would’ve had him drive. He’s the one who would get away with murder in this town. His dad would cruise into the station and wave his magic wand. Brady’s problems would disappear, if they’d even arise at all. Someone might recognize him before it could come to that.

  But not me. If I’m caught right now, I’ll be toast.

  I don’t know what happened to Lennon, but it’s not good. The second she sobbed my name I was up out of my chair and heading for the door.

  My GPS barks out directions to the address Lennon gave me. It’s about a mile from her house. I make turn after turn, getting closer, and it makes me wonder why she came this way, of all ways. She obviously wasn’t going in a straight line.

  I make one more turn, and up ahead I spot her, sitting on the sidewalk with her knees pulled into her chest. She looks up, and my headlights shine on her face. She blinks away the light, climbing to her feet. She’s wearing her pajama shorts, the ones with the penguins on them, and a white tank top.

  “Why is Lennon here?” Brady asks, peering through the windshield.

  “I don’t know.” I throw my truck into park and hop out.

  I haven’t made it two feet before Lennon is in my arms. “What’s going on?” I pull back to look at her. Her eyes are red-rimmed and her nose runs.

  “I…” She exhales, a hard and heavy sound. Her eyes wander down the street, searching. For what? Or who?

  “Lennon, what happened?” Brady walks around the front of the truck. His speech is slower than usual, but he’s walking normally. His face is a different story.

  Red, squinty eyes and slower reactions.

  Lennon looks back at me, her mouth hanging open. “Is he high?”

  I nod.

  “Noooo,” sings Brady. His hands go inside the pockets of his shorts and he tips his head slowly from side to side.

  Lennon steps out of my arms and doubles over, her long hair brushing the sidewalk. She’s laughing, but judging by the strangled sound I think she might also be crying. After a moment she straightens, and in the light of the street lamp I see her tears. Her face doesn’t look joyful; it looks broken and disbelieving.

  “What’s funny?” I ask. I’m so fucking confused.

  She swipes at her face and pushes a short breath through her nose. “Two things I never thought would happen, just happened in the same night.”

  I look back at Brady. “He called me earlier this week and asked me to get him high, and I—”

  Brady snorts. “I did not.” He looks at Lennon with all the seriousness he can manage and points to me. “He’s lying.”

  I roll my eyes and continue. “He never did it with any of his preppy private school asshat friends, because he didn’t trust that they would keep their mouths shut about it. He was afraid they would take pictures of him.” Saying this makes me realize I definitely can’t record him, even if the footage is only for him to see. He trusted me with this.

  “Nice friends.” Lennon’s tone is acerbic.

  “He told me he didn’t want to go to college being a marijuana virgin. It’s been a couple hours since his last hit. He should be coming down soon.” I lift my hands in the air and shrug. “So, here we are. Now, it’s your turn. What else happened tonight that you thought would never happen?”

  Lennon’s face falls. Horror creeps into her eyes. “Ted... he…he…” She shakes her head back-and-forth quickly, as if she’s trying to shake the memory from her head.

  “What did he do?” Please do not say what I think you’re about to say.

  Lennon grimaces. “He came to my room. It was late.” Her voice drops to a whisper. “I...I yelled. He said my mom took a sleeping pill and I could yell all I wanted.” Her eyes fill with tears.

  Anger fills me. No, not anger. Rage. Pulsing, white-hot rage. Ted the family man. Ted the pastor.

  I want to take her in my arms again, brush away her tears and these memories, but I’m afraid she won’t want my touch right now. Not while she’s remembering him.

  My hands fist at my sides, my fingernails biting into my palms. “And then?” I cringe, waiting for her to finish. As much as I want to know everything, a part of me wants to know nothing. How can this have happened to my Lennon? Please god, tell me she got away.

  “He told me not to worry. That he would be gentle.” Her voice breaks and her cheeks flame. “He asked if he should ask you or Brady how I like it.”

  Fuck.

  My lower lip quakes as the rage rolls through me. This situation is better suited for Brady, the voice of reason. I fly off the handle, and Brady stays calm and deals with the problem. These are our roles. But right now, I have to be the calm one. I have to think of Lennon first.

  I place my hand on her arm, preparing to steer her to my truck. “Let’s get you to a hospital. They have rape kits.” I choke on that word. Rape.

  She shakes her head. “Finn, no. No.” She shudders violently, enough that my hand falls off her arm. “I fought. I was throwing my elbows and stomping and I probably looked like an angry giraffe”—a small, tortured smile breaks through—“but he let me go and I ran. Out of my room. Out of my house. I ran, without looking to see where I was going, until I couldn’t breathe anymore. Then I stopped and called you.” She glances at Brady, who has been completely silent with his hands still tucked into his pockets. His lips are pursed together tightly, his eyes reflecting the rage inside my body.

  “Sleep at my house tonight,” Brady says. “You can’t go back there.”

  “Your mom will die when she wakes up in the morning and sees me.”

  “She won’t see you,” I assure her. “It’ll be my truck parked out front. We’ll sneak you out in the morning.”

  Lennon agrees. She glances down at the sidewalk where she’d been sitting when I pulled up. There’s a sweatshirt balled up there, but nothing else. Bending, I reach down for it and tuck it under my arm.

  “Come on.” With a hand around her elbow, I guide her into my truck. She scoots into the middle, and Brady climbs in the passenger side.

  “Will you go to the police in the morning?” I ask as I turn on my truck and shift into drive.

  She shrugs, and her shoulder rubs against mine. “What will that do for me? It’ll be my word against his. There’s no evidence of a struggle. He barely even touched me.”

  I sigh. She’s right.

  “You have to tell your mom.”

  She nods. “I will.”

  We get her settled at Brady’s. She takes his bed and we throw blankets on the floor. He grabs two pillows from the hall closet and tosses one to me. It doesn’t take long for Lennon to fall asleep. The events of the night have probably exhausted her.

  Brady falls asleep soon after, and I lie there, listening to them both breath.

  My mind races, and it’s not until sometime around three that I finally drift off.

  18

  Now

  “Lennon, what are you doing here? Your mother’s service starts in fifteen minutes.”

  Wilma’s voice comes from behind me in the hallway of the church offices. I turn around partially, my arms loaded down with the weight of the box I’m carrying.

  “I have something for Pastor Thomas. I was just going to set it in his office.” Worry creeps into me. If the contents of this box were seen by anyone but Pastor Thomas, it would raise questions.

  Wilma walks past me as fast as her old legs can carry her. She fishes keys from her oversized brown leather purse and unlocks the door, pushing it open for me to walk through.

  I smile gratefully at her and walk in. Setting the box at Pastor Thomas’ door, I try the handle, expecting this to be locked too. Relief fills me when it turns and clicks.

  “I’ll just be a moment,” I tell Wilma, who’s standing beside her desk, watching me curiously.

  Once I’m in the office, I pull out his desk chair and push the box beneath his desk. There is no note to go with it, nothing to identify what is inside. The second he lifts the lid, he will
know what he’s seeing.

  “Lennon?” Wilma’s voice trickles in. “Everything okay in there?”

  “Yep,” I call, pushing the chair back in as far as it will go.

  I leave the office just in time to see Wilma grab a hat off her desk and slide it into her massive purse.

  “Is that Elliot’s hat? It’s cute. It must be her thing.”

  Wilma gives me a weird look, so I attempt to explain. “Hats, I mean. Hats are her thing. She wears them all the time, doesn’t she?"

  “Ah, yes, she does.” Wilma fishes Elliot’s hat from her bag. “Hats are Ellie’s thing because they cover her halo wig.”

  “Halo wig?”

  “Treatment caused her to lose her hair, so she wears a special kind of wig called a halo.” Wilma uses her thumbs and pointer fingers to form a halo on top of her head. “The hair is real. People send their hair to a company called Crowns of Courage, who take it and make it into these wigs. Once Ellie pops a hat onto her head, nobody can tell a thing. She has real, shiny, bouncy beautiful hair. Like yours.”

  “That’s incredible,” I murmur, my fingers gingerly touching the hair I’ve coaxed back into a bun for today.

  “It is.” Wilma agrees, adjusting her bag onto her shoulder. “You’d better get to the sanctuary. The service will be starting soon.”

  “I’ll escort you,” I tell Wilma, offering her my arm. I’m still thinking about Elliot and her halo wig.

  She frowns at me. “I’m not going to look at whatever is in that box you put in Pastor Thomas’ office.”

  “I’m not worried about that,” I assure her, even though I am. I drop my offered arm and step through the open office door and into the hall.

  Wilma harrumphs and walks out, turning back around to lock the door.

  On the way over, Wilma tells me Elliot asked for my phone number. “She seems to like you.”