24. Bellamy

TWENTY-FOUR

bellamy

I tossed my phone onto my bed, then grabbed the bag of ice from the floor and put it back to my lip. Forget that Bennett was trying to jump us; the second I walked into that Waffle Hut and saw him at the table with her, war drums went off in my head, calling some primitive part of me to battle. Because whether or not she liked it, the very animalistic part of me had claimed her as mine.

That was what I'd surrendered to tonight, and her leaving with me meant she'd inadvertently surrendered to it, too.

My bedroom door cracked open. "Bubba!" Arlo slipped inside, then leaped onto my bed. "I'm hungry. Momma went to work early, and there's no Spaghetti-O's."

I tossed the ice-bag onto the floor. "Dad didn't feed you?"

"No."

It was almost ten at night. Before the incident at Waffle Hut, I'd been over at Hendrix's trying to move a car. When I was taking Drew home, Mom messaged to tell me she'd been called in to work. She said she she'd left a sandwich for Arlo, which, if I had to guess, Dad ate in the ten minutes Arlo was here without me.

My jaw tightened as I pushed off the bed.

The hum of the television in the living room crept down the hallway, and my blood came to a low simmer.

Dad was worthless. I grabbed my shirt from the floor, pulled it on, then took the envelope filled with cash from my dresser drawer and tucked it into my back pocket. "Come on, you wanna go to McDonald's?"

"Yeah!" He tumbled off my bed and flew to the door, stopping before he bolted out. His brow scrunched when his gaze landed on my busted lip.

"Did Daddy do that?"

"No."

"Then who did?"

I followed him into the hallway. "Busted it with the car door." I hated lying more than anything. But some shit, he just didn't need to know. Like that his big brother had gotten into a brawl over the girl he said would poop on him.

The ding of a bell and roar of a crowd blared from the TV before two oiled-up men went at each other in a ring. Dad sat in the recliner, passed out with a burned-down cigarette in one hand, and a whiskey bottle in the other.

My fingers twitched, the urge to knock his unconscious ass right out of that chair. But it would only cause more problems for Mom, and that was the last thing I wanted to do.

On my way to McDonald's, I stopped by the post office and dropped off the envelope addressed to my mother, with almost two-thousand dollars in it before driving off.

The late-afternoon sun streamed through the pine trees surrounding Hendrix's backyard. I finished filing off the Chevy's serial number, swatting at the mosquitoes biting the absolute shit out of me. "Come on, man. There'll be plenty of girls there," I said. I wasn't even sure why I was trying to talk Hendrix into coming to the party—all he'd do would be give me grief about Drew. But he and Wolf were my boys. We did everything together.

Hendrix slammed the hood and shook his head. "I'm not going to The Dump party. The ginger's gonna be there." He rounded the car, snatching a wrench from the tall weeds before pointing it at me. "You go to that party, and you're taking a steamer on Zepp."

"Seriously, man?"

"Seriously, dick."

Hendrix hated Zepp's girlfriend's guts because he was one hundred percent sure she was the reason Zepp had gone to prison. But Zepp himself had told me his arrest was all on him. Of course, Hendrix refused to listen because he was Hendrix. "It's the dump, Hendrix," I said. "That's our territory."

"Was! Was our territory until the ginger devil came along." He chucked the wrench into his toolbox. "And I already told you, we're going to the Methodist revival."

He'd watched some documentary about cults and convinced himself that church girls were freaks. I wiped off my grease-covered hands on a towel, watching as he tossed the toolbox down, then rummaged through a cooler on the back porch.

"I am not going to church, man."

He cracked open a Dr. Pep and gave me a disapproving glare. "You're going to The Dump for her. You weakling."

"I'm going to The Dump because your theory about finding freaks at a revival is messed up."

Hendrix snorted. "Come on, Bell. It's a place full of sweet, virginal girls hungry for a little taste of the devil."

And that—that was something I wouldn't even touch. The second Hendrix and Wolf set foot in the place, it was going to go up in flames.

"You've got issues, man."

He slurped back more of his drink on his way to the back door. "Whatever. Like you wouldn't."

"I wouldn't."

He shook his head. "Drew's done gone and fucked you up. Passing up virgins and Jesus..." The screen door slammed closed behind him.

Oh, the girl had fucked me up all right...

I left Hendrix's and swung by the house to grab Arlo and take him to a friend's for a sleepover. And when I got back to the house, Dad was already shitfaced. He stood at the open fridge, swaying on his feet as he grabbed another beer.

Mom shuffled into the kitchen, pinning her dark hair away from her face before taking a can of peas from the pantry.

"I don't want no damn peas with my dinner, woman. I want hamburger steak and mashed potatoes."

She froze, then placed the can back on the shelf. "We don't have any fresh potatoes, Dan."

"Well, better go get some."

"I don't have time. I have to be at the Dollar Ser—"

"I don't care what you've gotta do. I want a decent damn dinner."

"Don't fucking talk to her that way!" My heart thumped against my ribs, the sensation hitting the back of my throat. I took the can of peas from the shelf and slammed it down on the worn counter. She worked her ass off, and she loved him when he didn't deserve it. There was no way in hell I could stand by and let him disrespect her. "She's not going to the store."

"Bellamy…" Mom whispered.

Dad was already shoving up his sleeves. "She will go to the goddamn store." He staggered toward me. "You think you're a big bad man now, son?"

I thought about all the times I'd seen him hit her, all the times he'd left me with a black eye as a kid. Then I thought about him not feeding Arlo the other night.

"Dan, please," Mom whispered, then he reared back like he was going to smack her, and I just snapped.

Dishes shattered. Sheetrock splintered. After I'd busted his nose and his lip and he'd taken a beer bottle to my head, I grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and shoved him through the screen door. "Get the hell out."

He staggered to his feet, swiping at his bloody nose.

"I swear to God," I said, fighting through my ragged breaths. "You come back in here before you're sober and I'll kill you."

He froze, dragging in deep breaths before he stumbled around the side of the house. The engine to his truck sputtered, tires gripped the gravel, and then silence fell over the house.

Mom stood at the kitchen counter, hands bracing the sink while her chin hung to her chest. I hated it upset her, but I wouldn't let him hit her. On a hard sigh, I grabbed the broom from the pantry and began sweeping up the shards of glass and Wal-E-Mart china.

"You don't have to clean that up, Bellamy…"

I picked up a few more broken pieces, biting my tongue until I couldn't. When I turned to throw it into the trash, I looked at her. "Leave him, Mom. Leave his ass before I have to kill him."

Sighing, she kneeled beside me, grabbing pieces and tossing them into the bag. "I..."

"You can."

And then her chin dropped to her chest. "I love him."

"He's an asshole."

"But he didn't use to be..."

Annoyance lapped at my veins, and I hated it. She was the last person on earth I ever wanted to be annoyed at, but it was so damn hard sometimes. Because she deserved better, and she just wouldn't let herself see it. Mom was still stuck on this idea of who he used to be. The man who used to buy her flowers and hold down a job. She clung to that like it was a life raft in this shitty storm, and that notion of love was what I was afraid would either end up as her demise or mine. Because every time he got rough with her, it was harder and harder for me to stop throwing punches at him when I got him down.

Shaking my head, I dropped to my knees to collect more pieces of glass. We went through the motions of cleaning up the destruction. Then she grabbed the meat from the fridge and pushed up on her toes to kiss my cheek before she moved to the stove. "I love you, Bellamy."

"And I love you, too." What else was I supposed to say to her?

I helped her with dinner, then sat down beside her to eat. After I'd washed up the dishes, I sent Drew a text: Can't make it. Sorry. Because like hell would I leave Mom here alone. And when she went in for her shift at eleven, I grabbed Dad's bottle of half-drunk whiskey from the coffee table, and I went outside to look at the stars because, at times, those little white dots were the only thing that reminded me that some things are born from destruction.

And sometimes, that was the only damn hope I had to cling to.