Charity's Secrets

by Maya James

  "I hope so," I whisper with a hint of life in my voice.

  "It will happen," Lena says comfortably, pushing her chair back away from the table. "I'm going to head back to the city now and make it happen." She thanks my parents for breakfast and their hospitality, and says her goodbyes to everyone ending with a long, tight hug for me.

  "Melissa, can I talk to you alone for a minute?" Lena asks, motioning her head toward the front door. I knew she was planning something since the start of breakfast. Melissa looks confused. "I just wanna talk about Charity behind her back for a second." She follows her joke with an innocent smile.

  Innocent enough, except that isn't the truth, not with Lena.

  MELISSA AND LENA WORK their way around the few tables before the door, putting their coats on as they walk. They disappear out to the front while the rest of them wait for Charity's father to finish with the bill.

  As soon as they are outside, Lena gets voraciously serious, her breath pumping out of her mouth in thick white clouds. "There's only a minute or two, so I'm going to cut right to it—for Charity's sake, please do the same!"

  Melissa's smile melts quickly. "Okay?"

  "When we first sat down in there, you saw something. It totally freaked you out, scarred the shit out of you, but you didn't tell anyone. You hid it from them, so I'm thinking whatever it was it somehow involves them?" Lena asks.

  Melissa nods and nervously checks the door to make sure they're not coming yet. "Someone is stalking Charity, at least I'm pretty sure they are. I keep seeing the same guy whenever she's around. The first time was when I was in New York helping Charity with your surprise. I saw him again here when Justin brought her home for a few days. I thought she saw him too, but she didn't seem to recognize him. When we sat down today, he was across the street. I'm sure it was him—and I'm sure he was watching us."

  The cold is already biting at Lena's hands, so she stuffs them into her coat pockets. "How do you know he's not following you?"

  "I don't, not for sure. But I never saw him before New York, and I only see him now if Charity is around," Melissa answers convincingly.

  "Keep an eye on her," Lena says after thinking about it quickly. "Don't tell her, but keep her safe until help comes."

  Melissa is scared again. "What help? What are you going to do?"

  There is a sparkle of something wickedly sinister in Lena's eyes. "I'm going to fix things, all of it—including her stalker."

  "JUSTIN, OPEN THE FUCKING door! I know you're in there and you know I won't go away until you let me in." Her voice carries in through his door easily. Lena waits in the silence of the hallway with an unbreakable resolve.

  She pounds on the bell and beats her knuckles on the face of the door again, growing more impatient with him. The door starts shaking on its hinges.

  Less than an hour ago, she had used their systems at Panther to break into the apartment building's account records and locate which apartment he was staying in. There were several possibilities, and it was easy to figure out which one has current, active utility use. When she came here; it wasn't to knock and give up, she is prepared to break in if she has too, but that would seriously piss her the fuck off if Justin lets it come to that.

  He isn't ready to see anyone yet, she knows that. His heart is broken into a million pieces, and that's exactly what he spent most of his life avoiding. Justin will have no idea how to deal with his pain and get past it like most of us would, he has no practical experience with the emotions of betrayal. Whether he likes it or not, he needs help, her help.

  "Dammit, Justin, I've been your friend way too long for you to not trust me. I love you. You're my family, and I would never steer you wrong," she tells him softly.

  Inside the room, Justin is sitting on the couch with his shoulders slumping over toward the ground. He knows she's right, but he hasn't been able to move for hours. Even now, the ache in his chest takes his breath away and leaves him unable to stand. There is no going forward, but he can't go back either. He's stuck on the couch, stuck in life.

  Since he's been with Charity, she has become his life. Without her there is a debilitating emptiness that slowly expands and consumes everything around him. He cannot find a future to head toward now.

  Nothing to eat or drink has passed his lips in the two days since Sunday when he discovered what Charity had done. His head is pounding from the dehydration and stress.

  "Justin, please," she pleads through the door.

  He needs her to help him make sense of this, why Charity would hurt him this way. Justin finally pulls himself off the couch and heads for the door, feeling an absolute weakness fighting him. When he reaches the door, he grabs the deadbolt and turns it out.

  From outside she hears the clicking and gets herself prepared, but she was not prepared at all for what was inside the open door, this hollow shell that resembles her best friend.

  "Christ, Justin!" Lena rushes into the apartment on a mission.

  "What?" he scoffs.

  "Don't be an ass! You look like shit. You're so dehydrated your lips are shriveled." Her arm locks around one of his and she drags him deeper inside, sitting him down on the couch. She starts him off with a glass of water while she checks the refrigerator for something better. It's completely empty. "Are you fucking kidding me here?"

  Justin finishes gulping the water. "I wasn't planning on being here," he growls defensively.

  Lena fills the glass again and hands it back to him. As he drinks, she studies him while shaking her head.

  "Say it," he orders, feeling better already.

  "Why don't you?" Lena snaps. Justin's expression is confused. "You want to ask how she is. Sure, you're trying like hell not to, like you don't give a shit, but it isn't working. You're mad as hell, no doubt, but that doesn't mean you don't still love her and you aren't very worried about her."

  "So then just tell me," Justin growls. "How is she?"

  "Terrible! Worse than you. Do you know that she can't stop crying? Tough bitch like her and she's broken."

  She sees the tears that comes to his eyes. He can't stand that she’s hurt that it's him hurting her.

  He slowly runs both hands into his hair, combing his fingers through its thickness. Then he stops and grabs fistfuls, yanking it hard in self-punishment. "Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!" His injured eyes catch her. "Why, Lena? Why the hell would she do that? What the fuck was she thinking? The only reason to go to my mother is to hurt me."

  "That's not true, Justin," she chirps quickly. "Has she ever done anything to hurt you, do you really think she's capable of that?"

  "There's always a first time!" he shouts angrily.

  Lena is quickly pissed off. "Do you love her? Before all this, wasn't your heart all in and she was everything to you?" He nods. "And wouldn't you have done anything for her, anything at all—even destroy yourself if it would make her happy?"

  "Of course! I was living for her. I would have done anything!"

  "Well, she might even love you more than that, Justin. Just like you, she was willing to hurt herself for you, if it was something to make you happier, more complete. And she proved it!"

  He looks stunned. "What do you mean?"

  Lena softens her voice. "You learned something new about your father last year, after all that time. What if you're wrong about your mother? What if things happened the way they did for reasons, Justin?"

  He doesn't have any words.

  Lena continues, "You would never go and find out on your own. You're too stubborn and way too angry, but she could find out for you. She could find her and talk to her and if you were right all along, nothing had to change. If you were wrong though, if there was something you didn't know all this time, she was willing to risk losing you and damn near killing herself with sadness—if it would lead to your happiness. You are worth more to her than she is to herself."

  Justin is trembling all over.

  "I'm going to tell you something else, something she made me promise not to, but I
think you should know." Lena has a quiver in her voice rising up from her chest. "It's me you can blame for this."

  His eyes grab her tightly.

  "I found her name a long time ago. I had it and was too afraid to do anything with it," she says. "When Charity came into your life, when I was sure she was the one and you had finally understood that, I gave her the name. I couldn't bear it anymore, and I told her she could do what she wanted with it I would respect her decision if she wanted to let you just live as you were or if she wanted to seek your truth for you."

  "She had the strength to finish what you couldn't," he whispered.

  "She didn't want me to tell you that, so that I would be able to get to you and give you the message, tell you what she found out from your mother."

  His trembling got worse. "You know—you know what it is?"

  "I do, but I won't tell you. It's too big, and you have to hear it from Charity and your mother with your own ears. Justin, it changes everything you know, and when you hear it, you are not going to be mad at Charity anymore. You're going to love her more than you ever did."

  Justin drops his face into his hands. It makes him look devastated, but maybe also relieved.

  "I'm so sorry I caused this. I hate seeing you both this way. You need to go to her Justin; go to her, fix this and put any anger you have on me instead of her."

  "Is she upstairs? Is she home?" he asks in a quiet, reserved voice.

  "No. I took her to her parents. I didn't want her alone, not in her condition. I've never seen so much hurt in someone’s eyes." Lena begins to cry at the memory of Charity's pain.

  Justin nods. "That's good. Better she has their support right now."

  "There's something else you need to know," Lena begins through her gentle tears. "Melissa told me she saw someone when you had Charity home a few weeks ago, someone she thought had followed them from New York."

  Justin perks up. "Yeah, I remember when that happened," he says nervously, anticipating bad news about to be told.

  "Melissa saw him again, this morning. She's sure this guy is after Charity," Lena tells him. "It scared the shit out of her and I'm afraid this has to do with our work with Senator Lewis."

  Justin suddenly stands, towering over Lena ominously. Smoke pours from his nostrils under weighted breaths while his massive chest heaves. His hands flex into hammers.

  Without warning he bends and grabs the coffee table in front of them and lifts it over his head. Justin throws it in one single motion and it sails twisting through the air in the room until it collides with the sheetrock wall about ten feet away, embedding into the hole it makes. Pictures come flying off the wall, crashing and shattering on the floor as the building seems to rumble.

  His chest is still cranking and his breath still smoking.

  "What are you going to do?" Lena asks, calm and unaffected from having seen him furious before.

  Justin's deep voice growls. "I'm going to her. She's mine! Nobody touches her—I'll fucking kill them where they stand!"

  Suddenly he grabs Lena by the shoulders and stands her up so their eyes are even. "You don't tell her I'm coming, understood?" Lena nods. "I don't want her acting different and tipping this guy off. I wanna kill him myself!"

  NOTHING HAPPENED LAST NIGHT after he’d arrived in PA. Justin had stayed in his car down the street where he had a view of Charity's parent's house. Melissa was there, sticking to her side as Lena had told her to do, her car parked right in the front.

  A move is going to be made soon. Justin was surprised it wasn't last night, since Melissa had seen the stalker now for the third time. He couldn’t afford to drag this out much longer. It wasn't a very professional job and that had Justin wondering why, if it's supposed to be this way. Maybe it was just to draw him out, make him vulnerable to an attempt. Or maybe it was a message that they could take her any time if he doesn't back off.

  Either way, they've gone too far, crossed a line that should not have been crossed. Charity is off limits and it's time to show them that.

  The sun came up into a clear sky this morning and the air is crisp. His window is down a crack to keep the windows from fogging up and he's ice cold because of it.

  Nothing has moved for quite a while in the house. It seemed to be holding its breath waiting for its occupants to wake up, being careful not to disturb them. Now there are people moving around, heading to the kitchen at the back of the house. Justin can almost smell the coffee he knows they are making and he's desperate to wrap his hands around a hot cup of his own.

  Charity appears in the front window unexpectedly and Justin's heart pangs for her. She touches her face, and he realizes there's a tissue in her hand.

  She's still crying.

  That breaks him. One of his hands grips his chest right over his heart and he's not even aware that he's doing it.

  Melissa appears next to her, wrapping an arm around her like a good friend. Charity drops her head to Melissa's shoulder, spent. She's in agony and it's agony to watch her and not be able to stop it, at least not yet.

  That was it for an hour, until the front door opens and the two girls come spilling out, still fixing their coats and gloves. They jump into Melissa's car and it rumbles to life coughing out white from its tailpipe.

  He waits.

  Their car begins to roll away, but he does nothing, even when they reach the end of the street and turn. There's no fear of losing them. As soon as he arrived last night he snapped a GPS locator on her car. They aren't going anywhere he can't find. It was better to wait, not just so they don't see him, but to see if anyone else follows them first.

  As he was about to give up, a car drove up the crossroad following in their direction. Maybe it's nothing, but Justin isn't taking chances, not with Charity's safety. He turns his key and carefully follows behind. Some of the roads are still empty this early in the morning, so he drops back as far as he can, using the GPS to track, instead of his eyes. It makes his nerves hum and his knuckles turn white from his angry grip on the steering wheel, but it's the only way to do it.

  He closes in and finds Melissa's car empty on the street with no idea which storefront they've gone into. The other car, a silver Honda Legacy with rental tags, is parked here as well.

  And it's empty!

  It laughs at him the moment he sees it, taunting him for being too late, for being useless. Justin's chest bounces from the pressure of his beating heart. There's almost nothing for him to do, no way to know where they are, if her stalker is hurting her or waiting for Justin to show up.

  He takes a deep breath to stop the panic. If he's going to help them, his head has to be clear. Suddenly he's sure they are fine, that this one stalker would not have been able to handle the two women alone, and definitely not in town. He's doing what he does—he's stalking. Every time Melissa has seen this man, he's been watching them from a distance, usually outside wherever they are.

  There's no one outside at the moment; the street has a quiet hush about it, like a one-street town in an old western before the gunfight breaks out.

  There's a bagel shop near Melissa's car and it's suddenly obvious where the girls are. He's not as late as he had feared. Directly across from the bagel shop there is a Laundromat with an all glass front, and that's where Justin would watch from if it were him.

  He gets out of his car, stretching his stiff and frozen legs, and hikes his collar up around his neck and face as high as it will go. It's more to hide himself than to keep warm. If he's going in, he'll have to pass in front of several windows before reaching the door. Fast and sure, that's the only plan. Hopefully it's done before the girls come back out.

  Fuck it!

  He's off and moving.

  In the very first window, Justin sees the stalker's face. He's leaning against the glass with both hands, not even hiding himself.

  A damn moron!

  That only makes him angrier.

  Justin keeps moving, hoping to reach the door before the stalker bothers to notic
e him. His blood is pumping now, fueled by the certainty that this guy is after Charity.

  That fucker! That dirty fucker! She's mine!

  Justin is seething by the time the door handle presses into his fleshy palm. The door swings open easily.

  Only now does the stalker pay any attention to him, startled by his forceful charge into the laundry. There's no one else in here this early, and that's just better than perfect.

  Justin's gun is out before the door shuts behind him. It's aimed at the stalkers forehead, which has turned into a patch of dense wrinkles as his eyes widen in absolute terror. He stumbles backward against the wall at the edge of the last window.

  "Why are you watching her? Who the fuck sent you?" Justin demands, still marching forward. His voice explodes in the bare space.

  "Who the hell are you?" the stalker squeals as he reacts.

  His saucer-sized eyes are transfixed on the gun. He doesn't see the shift in Justin's body; the twist in his weight, the powerful effort, and the huge, rock hard fist flying at his chin.

  There are two intense thuds, the first was surely a bullet exploding through his face. The second is his head breaking through the plaster wall behind him. His head is filled with searing, white noise that instantly controls all sight and sound.

  The laundry melts into the whiteness.

  Justin grabs him by the collar as his limp body drops to his knees. He pushes him back against the wall and tries to shake him conscious.

  They're not done—not hardly!

  Justin sees the life seeping back into his loose eyes, and he presses his gun deep into the flesh under his chin, right where he'd punched him and the pain helps wake him up.

  Charity's stalker slowly realizes he's not dead, not yet, and that might not be a good thing. The room is still churning in dizzy swirls that make him want to throw up, and this guy that has him looks crazy enough to make him choke to death on his vomit.

  Justin draws his face close until their breath is mixing between them. He pushes the barrel of the gun deeper, crushing in his flesh. "I'm not going to play with you. She's mine, so tell me who the hell sent you!" His voice is an evil hiss.