Package Deal

by Jess Bentley

  I pivot slowly, reaching back to take Brother Owen's hand. He allows himself a mysterious smirk.

  “Thank you, Brother,” I smile. “That was just what I needed.”

  “It was just what we needed, too,” Brother Owen agrees. “You should be getting back to your mother now. Don’t forget to be ready on Friday night.”

  I shrug my agreement. It doesn't seem so bad now. Somehow, I'm sure I will find the strength.

  Angel

  The next few days go by about as slowly as possible. Mama seems even more absent than usual, and I take an extra shift in the reclamation shed just to keep my mind occupied.

  Tulip must feel bad about what she said to me because she seems sort of stiff and tense. And I suppose her ceremony is this week too. It’s a big deal for her but I do not want to ask about it. I’d rather just let that information flow past me without thinking about it, like a leaf on the river.

  When Friday comes, I'm careful to groom myself the way that Brother Owen suggested. I bathe again in the afternoon after work, tying my hair back with a little bit of fabric fashioned into a ribbon. I made myself a dress out of a shower curtain with tiny blue flowers all over it. Hydrangeas, I think they are, little puffs of color like cotton candy.

  It looks all right, I suppose. I watch myself in the mirror, turning from side to side, trying to see what I'll look like to strangers. What are they expecting? Fancy clothes? Makeup? We are not allowed to wear makeup. My freckles are about the only adornment I've got.

  My last chore for today is preparing dinner. I fry up some pork chops in the cast-iron skillet, dropping some green beans to lightly cook in the fat. It's a nice, simple, homey meal. The sort of thing I will be preparing for my family, when I have one.

  Looks like I might be having one sooner rather than later.

  “You all right?” Mama asks me from the kitchen doorway. She leans against the framing with one shoulder, her arms folded, her eyes narrowed with suspicion.

  I turn around in surprise, biting my lips together and trying to rearrange my face into a neutral expression.

  “All right? Of course I am all right.”

  “What's that you're wearing?”

  I glance down. How am I supposed to explain this?

  “Angel? Are you planning on answering me?”

  “Just have a seat. I’ve got your dinner right here,” I say, trying to change the subject.

  But it doesn't work. Though she pulls out a wooden chair, scraping it along the floor before she sits, she keeps her eyes on me. She’s scrutinizing everything I do now, trying to figure out exactly what's going on before I tell her. She considers herself quite shrewd and is a large fan of mystery novels that we sometimes get in the donations. I found that out now. Mary likes the romances. Agatha likes the thrillers and horror stories, my mother prefers mysteries. No wonder she thinks she's so smart.

  Her plate clunks against the table as I push it toward her. She picks up her fork and leans back in her chair while I sit.

  “So?” she persists.

  I shrug. Something tells me if I start to talk about this, I’ll cry. I don't want to do that. I want to be brief.

  “Have you been drinking?” I ask her suddenly. She opens her mouth in shock.

  “How dare you? I am your mother!”

  I nod, taking a knife to cut neat little triangles out of my pork chop. The meat glistens with a sheen of oil and little flecks of black pepper.

  “I know you are,” I say evenly, careful to control my voice. I've been taking my new role seriously, testing the boundaries of what I can and can't say. This might be farther than is really wise.

  “What I do is really none of your business,” she mutters testily. “Honestly. I can’t believe you.”

  She stuffs some pork chop into her mouth, chewing noisily. I detect a faint whiff of alcohol, certain that she's exhaling it through her nose right now.

  “Where would you even get it?”

  She shakes her head and rolls her eyes.

  “Honestly,” she says again.

  “From the reclamation shed? That doesn't seem to make sense. Where would you get the money? How does that happen?”

  She points her fork at me. “I know you think you know everything, but you don't. There's still a lot of things that go on around here you don't know anything about, Angel. A lot of things.”

  We sit in silence for a few minutes, while both of us try to figure out what we’re going to say next. This is not an argument that either one of us can win at this point. All we can do is make things worse.

  “Well, anyway, I like your dress,” she finally says.

  And I can't help it, I start to cry. As softly as I can at first, trying to choke it back by keeping my head down, holding my breath. But when the tears start dropping onto the rim of my plate and flowing into my nose, I have to sniffle. She hears it. She knows.

  “Geez, Angel. What's the matter with you?”

  I look up at her, trying to see through the bleary puddle of tears in my bottom eyelashes. Her expression teeters between annoyance and actual sympathy.

  “Tonight… they’re taking me…”

  “What are you talking about?” she asks irritably. “Who's taking you? Where could you possibly be going?”

  I start crying in earnest, my shoulders heaving up and down, threatening the new seams of my shift. I try to explain, but I can only talk in phrases between hiccuping coughs.

  “I don't know… Father Daddy… we’re gonna… for the Family… sell me…”

  She squints at me, calculating. Then her eyes open wider.

  “You're going to Dustin’s?”

  I nod miserably.

  “Well, that does make sense. I was wondering why they didn’t give you Master yet. Makes a lot of sense.”

  Her cold, distant tone slashes at me. I feel lonely, like a kitten left out the snow.

  “Mama,” I bawl. “But I'll be… I'll never see you again. Will I? I don't even know… Tulip said…”

  She leans forward, resting her elbows on the table and clasping her hands under her chin.

  “Listen, kid,” she starts, “everybody has a job to do. You should consider yourself lucky. You're probably very important to us. They probably picked you specifically, you know.”

  “I was picked to settle your debt,” I hiss, suddenly full of venom. “It doesn't really have anything to do with me, at all. It's you, Mama. Your debt. Why didn't they sell you to settle your debt?”

  She shrugs, raising her eyebrows imperiously. “What do you think they would get for an old lady like me anyway? My work is here. My service was raising you, and they must think I did a good turn on that or they wouldn’t have picked you. It all works out, somehow, it always does. It's all part of God’s plan.”

  I don't want to say anything. She looks so satisfied, so smug. Then I realize, she's always been well aware of her debt. Apparently, so are a lot of other people. With me gone, nobody will be able to hang that over her head anymore. Her last shred of humility will just vaporize, just like that.

  “So you will clear the last of our family obligation, Angel,” she continues reasonably. “Doesn’t that seem balanced? Fair? Everybody carries a debt, anyway. Don’t you think that both of us living here these last sixteen years has cost the Family something? Eating isn’t free, you know. And Silas coming in, being the father you never had? Don’t you think you owe him for that?”

  I gasp a little, trying to understand what she's saying. It never occurred to me that I would owe Father Daddy for what he does, not really. Not for me specifically. He does it for everyone.

  But that is sort of true, isn't it? I never had another father in my life. He's just about the only man I've ever looked up to with that kind of gravity or respect.

  Then I remember our time in his office, murmuring word Daddy against his chest. The vision of his face buried between my legs flashes through my mind and I feel my cheeks getting hot as I blush fiercely.

  �
�You all right?” Mama asks me, her eyes narrow. “You getting feverish or something? You think that'll get you out of it? Want to go take a nap or something?”

  “I don't need a nap,” I spit right back at her. I stand and gather the plates off the table, even though she's got a couple bites left.

  She doesn't even realize, this might be last night we ever see each other. Those might be the last words she ever says to me. And now she is going to have to make her own dinner. Clean her own house. Tend her own garden.

  She'll miss me. She will.

  That gives me only the slightest glimmer of satisfaction as I trudge out of the kitchen, swallowing back yet another wave of humiliating tears.

  Silas

  I come out of my office to greet her right at dusk. She's wearing the new dress that Brother Owen suggested and a pair of short, white boots that she must have picked out especially for the occasion.

  “You look beautiful,” I tell her, and I mean it.

  She looks up at me with those big eyes, her lips set in a grim, brave little smile. She's such a good soldier. She’s willing to do anything for us. Anything for me, I suddenly realize.

  Remorse slices through me like a dart. Am I doing the right thing?

  Yes. I'm doing the right thing. I can't let my attachment to this one person overshadow my duty to everyone.

  “I’ve got a surprise for you,” I tell her.

  “Surprise for me?” she echoes faintly.

  “Yes,” I nod. “I'll bet you've never been on a motorcycle before.”

  She is stunned, and I like that. Her pink lips form a perfect little O. I'm excited to show it to her. I reach out to take her by the hand and tug her toward one of the pole barns at the back of the compound. It's where we keep the tractors we use for the big field on the south end.

  “I’ve never been here before,” she breathes as I slide open the big door. It's not like the barns we gather in. This one is just for work. It's filthy in here, stinking of diesel and dry rot.

  “Course you haven’t,” I answer. “This is men's work. You would never have had reason to be in here. But look at this.”

  I go into the back corner, to a tarp thrown loosely over something beneath it. I reach out to grab a corner, but look back so that I can see her face when I pull the tarp down.

  She doesn't disappoint. Her eyes get wider, her smile creeps into her cheeks and dimples them two, three times.

  “Wow,” she breathes, slowly letting her breath fill the air. I catch a whiff of soap, that sweet, innocent smell.

  “You like it?” I ask her, looking over the 1982 Indian with fondness. My dad’s bike. Well, it was his, and then it just sort of fell to me eventually. It's almost like a family member.

  “Is beautiful,” she sighs. “And the other one?”

  “That's mine,” Owen says, coming up behind us. He hands her a helmet.

  “Put this on. It will feel kind of weird, but it's worth it. Keep you safe.”

  She does it and stands there looking awkward and alien for a few seconds, grinning broadly. She seems to be just enjoying herself, like maybe she's forgotten what's about to happen.

  I roll the Indian out of the barn, and she follows behind.

  “Okay, I am going to get it started. And when I tell you to, you to put your left foot on this peg here, then swing your other leg around behind, you got that?”

  She nods, the helmet bobbling up and down. I get the bike started and she gathers her dress up over her thighs, almost to the edge of her panties. My cock jumps in my pants, and I briefly wonder if I've got enough time to just spend one more minute with her. Just once more.

  But there's no time.

  After I nod to her, she climbs on the bike just like I told her, like she’s done it a hundred times.

  “Okay,” I say loudly, over the noise of the muffler. “You just wrap your arms around me and hang on, okay? You just do what I do. Don't lean away from me when we turn, either. Just trust me and do what I do, okay?”

  “Okay!” she yells.

  “It's going to be scary. You’re gonna love it!”

  Owen rides ahead of us on the dark roads, his headlight cutting out a triangular swath of the dusty, country roads. It's almost pitch black out here. Every once in a while I see movement along the ditches as raccoons and other things scurry away from all the noise we’re making.

  All too soon, I can see the lights of the roadhouse up ahead. We roll in, swinging around to the back side and parking the bikes near the service door. When I cut off the engine, she climbs down, still smiling broadly. She pulls the helmet off and her hair flies up and covers her face.

  “That was wonderful!” she exclaims. “My legs are still all shaky!”

  Owen glances at me knowingly and jerks his chin toward the parking lot.

  “There's an awful lot of cars here,” I suggest to him. “Did you have something to do with this?”

  He shrugs. “I just made a few phone calls. Nothing unusual. Word gets around. You know.”

  Word gets around. I turn the phrase over in my mind.

  It must have gotten around quite a bit. We enter discreetly through the back door, taking the measure of the situation inside. Brother Owen goes first, with Angel discreetly sandwiched between us. I don’t want this all landing on her all at once. She's never been in a bar. She's never experienced this kind of outrageous music. She's never seen people drunk and smoking and grabbing each other's asses and all the other crap these people get down to.

  And here I am, leading her right into the middle of it.

  The room is large, lit in all different colors of light bulbs that try to get through the fog of cigarette smoke in vain. The music is something stupid, some angry hard rock that makes people want to move their hips and do shots of Tequila.

  As we turn around the corner, an older woman behind the bar slows the motion of her hand as she's wiping up some spill. She squints at us with poison in her gaze. Maybe that’s the lady I talked to on the phone.

  She looks to be about sixty years old, wearing a halter top that's slung so low that one good shrug will reveal a nipple. She's also wearing teenager jeans with sparkles on the pockets and exposing about five inches of her midriff.

  An older guy in a backwards baseball cap cuts us off, planting his feet about shoulder width apart and crossing his arms. He lowers his chin and glares at Owen.

  “Evening, Dustin,” Owen smirks. “How about a couple of beers? Silas, you want a beer?”

  “No.”

  “Get Silas a beer too,” Owen continues without looking at me.

  “What about her?” Dustin asks, chuckling and jerking his stubbly chin toward my Angel. “She drink too?”

  “Course not,” Owen answers.

  “Better not!” Dustin laughs, tipping his head back and laughing at the ceiling, exposing his blackened molars and the furry inside of his nose.

  He waves toward the bartender with two fingers up, then changes that to three fingers. She rolls her eyes and bends over, exposing the pink line of the top of her thong.

  “Well, now, aren't you pretty little thing?” Dustin drawls as he rakes his eyes over Angel. She presses back, leaning into me like a baby deer or something. “You best get her onstage for people. Folks are gonna want to take a look at what they're throwing their good money at.”

  “Stage?” Owen asks as the bartender shoves a beer bottle in his hand. He takes a long swig and I try to restrain my contempt for that. He shouldn't drink. Our dad was a drunk. It’s in our blood. It’s so easy to fall into that ditch, why would he risk it?

  And I feel it too, that thirst. The smell of whisky and beer brings it all back. I remember what it was like. How good it felt to slake that deep, bottomless thirst. The first few drinks felt great, but only for a few minutes. After that the thirst will return, doubled in strength. You can never quite catch up, not for more than a moment. Chasing it felt like falling down a well.

  “Stage? Yeah, change of plans,” Dus
tin shrugs, downing half the beer in one long series of gulps. “Seems like your little girl here already has some kinda fan club. You are gonna have to auction her off. I'll take 10%. And the bidders’ fees.”

  “Bidders’ fee?” I repeat numbly. I just keep looking around, looking at all the men gazing at Angel with their mouths open like they've never seen anything like her. This is not what I thought was going to happen.

  Dustin leads us through the crowd to the small stage in the corner, the kind where some crappy band could set up and yell out cover tunes for a few hours. A row of tables is clustered protectively in front of the stage, and a few men sit in wobbly stacking chairs. On the middle table is a pile of cash, some in rubber-banded bills, some crumpled and fluttering slightly as though licked by an invisible wind. On the top of the pile is a handgun. Vintage Colt 45, by the looks of it.

  “Yeah, Artie decided to do his bidders’ fee in trade,” Dustin explains. “I don’t mind it. I’ve wanted that piece for a while. And if I’m not gonna get a piece of ass, I might as well get a piece, am I right??” He laughs with a snorting, sniggering sound. He’s pleased with himself.

  “That's all the bidders’ fees? That's what you're keeping for yourself?”

  Dustin shrugs. “Hey, it’s called free enterprise,” he sneers. “It's the goddamn American way. There's no way I'm ending up with any sweet little virgin pussy tonight, so I should get something, don't you think?”

  I want to take her out of here. Rage is getting high in my belly, and I feel a red mist creeping around the edges my vision. More than anything, I'd like to kick Owen's teeth in. I can't believe he would allow things to happen this way.

  “Get your sweet little ass on stage, sweet cheeks,” Dustin says, bending over at the waist and talking to Angel like she's four or something.

  She looks up at me, so trusting, so fearful. Her hair falls around her cheeks in soft waves, lit blue by the light over her head. I hold my breath and nod to her.

  With my permission, she takes a few steps forward, obviously wobbly on her feet now. On her white boots. She mounts the stage and stands in the middle, shading her eyes with one hand, blinking and teary-eyed from all the smoke in the room.