Total pages in book: 51
Estimated words: 50311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 252(@200wpm)___ 201(@250wpm)___ 168(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 50311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 252(@200wpm)___ 201(@250wpm)___ 168(@300wpm)
She didn’t come back until dawn, barefoot and shaking, clothes torn at the seam, face bruised. I didn’t ask what happened. I already knew. She collapsed on the bed and hasn’t moved since.
I hate this place. This dusty town with its broken sidewalks and flickering motel signs. I hate the looks the gas station clerk gives me when I walk across the street in my baggy jeans and oversized hoodie. Like I’m one bad decision away from becoming my mother.
Maybe I am.
Maybe this is all life has to offer me.
Maybe this is my own personal purgatory.
I pocket the change and head back inside, blinking against the dimness of the room. The air conditioner wheezes from the window, doing more rattling than cooling. The room smells like sweat and sadness. Momma’s curled in a ball, lips dry, mumbling something incoherent under her breath.
I kneel beside her. “You need water, Ma.”
She shakes her head. “Don’t want it. Just need Frankie. He’ll come. He always does.”
Frankie.
What a fucking joke! She thinks he’s her savior.
He’s the devil walking.
Her pimp. Her nightmare. The man who made her this way.
“He ain’t coming,” I whisper.
But I know better. He always comes. No matter how much I wish he wouldn’t come back, I never have that luck. No matter how much I pray for his overdose, it doesn’t come.
I sit back on my legs, wiping my palms on my jeans. There’s a rip in the knee that wasn’t there yesterday. I found them in the dumpster, took them back and washed them in the hotel laundry room. They don’t fit quite right, but I didn’t spend money on them. I picked because they didn’t have holes like a lot of jeans come with already. Probably got this one from crouching behind the motel dumpster, digging for discarded bottles to cash in. I used to dream about leaving.
About college.
Modeling maybe.
Singing on a stage in Nashville.
Momma always tells me I have a pretty face and a sweet voice. She tells me to get us out of here. I used to think I could do it. Make something of my life and hers too.
But dreams don’t last long when hunger lives in my stomach and bruises live on my mother’s skin and sometimes my own. Any dream of having a life out of Collins, Arkansas crashed around me two years ago.
I go to the mini fridge—empty, no surprise there. I grab the half loaf of bread we swiped from the convenience store dumpster and tear off a piece. No butter, no jam. Just dry bread and water from the tap. Gourmet.
I hear a knock on the door and freeze.
My heart jumps into my throat.
Another knock. Slower. Heavier.
I grab the baseball bat I keep next to the dresser and tiptoe to the door. “Who is it?”
No answer.
Frankie doesn’t knock. He has his own key to the room. He always gets a key. My key actually. Some nights we sleep under the steps if I don’t come up with enough money for the hotel. No matter how much we switch rooms, Frankie always gets my room key. Momma says he needs it more than me. Which means sometimes after one of my shifts at work, I have to sit outside until my mother comes to and can let me in.
My fingers tighten on the bat. I crack the door an inch and peek out. Just a man. A very attractive man.
Tall. Broad shoulders. Jeans, tight black t-shirt, and a leather vest.
My heart skips again, but not in fear this time. He’s smoking a cigarette and watching me like he’s been waiting his whole life for me. Or maybe it’s my young girl fantasy for someone, anyone to rescue me from this life.
“You dropped this,” he says, holding up a crumpled dollar bill.
I don’t reply. I just stare blankly at him.
He smiles, slow and easy. “I’m not here to hurt you.”
I open the door a little wider. Anxiety fills me. I don’t like strangers and I don’t trust anyone.
“Name’s Little Foot.”
I snort somehow relaxing which surprises even me. “That supposed to be cute?” I remember a movie when I was a kid that came on the free public channel. It had dinosaurs.
He laughs. “I guess it is.”
I stare at him wide-eyed, “Your mom named you after a cartoon dinosaur.” Like who names their kid Little Foot?
“Road-name babe. Little Foot because I used to wear my big brother’s shoes every day even when my mom would say not to, I would always get them and my foot was so little in them. When Axel, that’s my brother, brought me into the Hellions, he tagged me Little Foot. It stuck.”
I step outside, let the door close behind me. No need to let him see my mother in her condition.
“Why you talkin’ to me? Why not keep the dollar?” I ask because seriously who tracks someone to a room over a single dollar.