Chapter 7

Confrontations

For "Sarge", who has much faith in me, deep and profound insight, and the patience and heart to help guide an occasionally high strung woman through rocky shoals. Aliquam mi omnia ad utilitatem et provocationem

For casual or accidental readers, this chapter has no sex, and it requires reading the previous 6 or it will make no sense. This one is truly from my heart.

Send lawyers, guns, and money

The shit has hit the fan.

Warren Zevon

I see the bad moon arising.
I see trouble on the way.
I see earthquakes and lightnin'.
I see bad times today.
Don't go around tonight,
Well, it's bound to take your life,
There's a bad moon on the rise.

Creedence Clearwater Revival

Karen sighed deeply. She turned to look at Laci in the dim light of the dashboard instruments. "Laci, darling. What is it that's so important that you have to go back there to get it?"

Laci shrugged. "Just something I need. Please Karen? Please? It'll only take a minute, and it's not like I'm going someplace strange. I only lived there with her for, like ever. It's no worse than it was a few weeks ago when I was there every day."

Karen sighed again. Her intuition was screaming at her that a bad moon was on the rise. However, Laci's eyes were pleading, and she couldn't resist that look. "Laci, I just have a bad feeling."

Laci rolled her eyes in the way only teenage girls can. "It'll only take a minute. Drop me off, and I'll run up and run back. Don't be such a worry wart."

Karen let out one more sigh. "OK. If you promise not to screw around, get in, get out." Karen shifted the car into drive and pulled out.

It was much easier to drive and park on the downtown streets now. The city cleared away the high banks with graders and tractors, and an enormous snow blower came along and chewed up the filthy snow, spitting into the back of dump trucks. Karen wheeled down the seedy street until she was directly across from the decrepit 4-story tenement where Laci once lived.

"Now hurry up," Karen said. "I'm going to go turn around and wait for you right in front, OK?"

"'Kay," Laci said. She leaned over and kissed Karen before grabbing her new satchel bag and stepping out. "Be right back ... promise!" And she darted across the street.

Laci scurried up the steps and into the first floor entryway. It was quiet and cold. She mentally went over what she needed to grab. Not much, really, mostly the Teddy bear. The thought of leaving the Teddy bear Karen gave her, Karen's own childhood Teddy bear, in that cesspool was unthinkable. Karen probably wouldn't understand, so it was best to be vague. Besides, why was Karen so afraid?

Laci hurried up the stairs to the second floor landing, tracing her fingers along the banister railing. She stopped in front of the door to the old apartment and listened. It was quiet. She put her hand on the knob, turned it and stepped inside.

Her stomach immediately dropped. The familiar cat-urine smell of meth filled the air. The only lights in the house came from the over-stove fluorescent and a small table lamp in the living room. Her mother and the boyfriend Gerry (or was it Gary?) were sharing a meth pipe in the dim light, beer cans littering the floor. "Well well well," her mother cackled. "Look what just came through the fucking door."

Laci froze like a deer caught in a truck's headlights. High on meth and drunk. Not good.

"Miss High and Fucking Mighty. Where the fuck have you been the last goddamned week, you worthless fucking whore?"

"None of your business," Laci hollered, unable to think of anything better.

"The fuck it ain't." Sandra jumped up and came at Laci, her body as tense as an over-wound watch. Even in the dim light, Laci could see her eyes were like two burnt holes in a blanket. "Where the fuck you been, slut!" Sandra yelled.

Laci's mouth went dry, and she began to shake. Everything began to appear fuzzy and muddled. Her mother was spoiling for a real fight, and she had Boyfriend to back her up. "What do you care," Laci said, trying to sound defiant but failing miserably. She quickly skittered to her old room and reached into her closet for the Teddy bear.

Her mother was in no mood to respect the door on this night. Laci stuffed the bear in her bag, and her mother yelled, "What the fuck are you stealing this time, you thieving little cunt whore?"

"Nothing," Laci cried.

"Lemme see, you fucking thief! Lemme see!"

"No! Leave me alone!"

Laci instinctively tried barging passed her mother, but it didn't work. Snarling, Sandra grabbed Laci by the hair and swung her open hand, connecting with Laci's face with a sharp crack. Laci screamed, only dimly hearing her mother say, "I'll teach you, you no good cocksucking thief! You think you can push me around and get away with it, missy bitch!"

Laci twisted frantically, and managed to slip away before her mother could hit her again. Nothing registered very clearly in her mind. Raw panic took over. She screamed and turned to run away, and ran smack into the boyfriend Gerry. "You little fucking punk!" He sneered, grabbing her by the jacket. "Think you can wiggle your ass and get away with it? Steal my money?" He pushed her back against the trash-laden table sending piles of assorted junk crashing to the floor.

The boyfriend grabbed her by the hair and backhanded her across the side of the head. Laci screamed as loud as she could, but she was sure she might as well be mute for all the good it did.

Her mother came charging at Laci, her fists pin-wheeling wildly as she attacked Laci while Gerry held the girl. "I'll teach you to steal from me you no good ass-sucking little cunt!" Her fists connected several times. Gasping as though she'd run up the stairs, her eyes blazing, Sandra screamed, "I'll show you, you nasty fucking cunt!"

Laci was sure she was about to be raped and murdered. High on meth, drunk, bitterly angry, bad combination. "I shoulda fucking killed you years ago! You think you're such a tough bitch, ain't so fucking tough now, are you?"

"You hold your fucking piss," the boyfriend Gerry snapped at Sandra. "This little fucking slut whore is mine first, then you can do whatever the fuck you want!"

"Hurry the fuck up! I'm gonna teach this rotten cunt a lesson she shoulda had years ago!"

Laci struggled to free herself, but Gerry the boyfriend grabbed her arm and wrenched it back. In her terror, all she could manage were the piercing cries, "Karen! Karen! Karennnnn! Help me Karen! Oh God, Help Meeeeeeee!"

Karen drove the car around the block so she could park on the right side of the street. She was nervous without really knowing why. Laci was right – wasn't she? She'd been in that apartment nearly every day until a week ago. Why should it be any different now?

Karen pulled the car up to the curb in front of the house. That's when it hit her, like a bolt from above. What the fuck are you THINKING! What in God's name is wrong with you? Letting that child go up there ALONE? Are you high? "Oh God!" she said aloud. Her stomach did a freefall, her heart exploded and ran like an out of control jackhammer. Hands suddenly fumbling, she turned off the car and instinctively pawed at the keys. She yanked them free and burst from the car. The one rational part of her mind still functioning chuckled and said, About to meet the infamous Laci's mother. If all's quiet up there, you're gonna have some 'splainin' to do.

Karen ran up the steps of the stoop, ignoring the ice under her heeled boots. She threw the door to the dilapidated tenement open, and instantly understood her fear was well justified.

Laci's piercing screeches rained down on Karen like arrows. Oddly, no one else in the tenement seemed to care about the commotion. "Karen! Karen! Help me Karen! Please help me!"

For an instant, Karen thought she might vomit. Everything took on a fuzzy quality, and when she ran to the stairs, it seemed she moved with leaden feet as she might in a dream. Was this a dream? It hardly felt real. She climbed the stairs, which seemed to stretch toward eternity. She held her keys clenched in one fist, the end protruding between her middle and index fingers. Losing the keys now would not be good.

The door to the apartment was slightly ajar. Karen ran at it and it burst open with a bang. She might as well have been stepping through the gates of hell. The filth and the smell were appalling. Even worse was the sickening sight of Laci being held by the boyfriend while the mother swung her fists at the child. Karen instinctively screeched in a piercing voice, "Let her go!"

Amazingly, it worked. Perhaps it was shock of her entrance and the force of her voice, but the boyfriend lost his grip and the mother looked at Karen momentarily dumbfounded. Laci skittered free, sobbing.

"Laci! Get out!" Karen hollered. When the child began to protest leaving without her, Karen cut her like a knife. "Get out of here! Now!" Laci obeyed.

"Who the fuck are you?" the boyfriend snarled, regaining his wits.

"I'm not a fucking thirteen year old girl, prick!" Karen roared. "You take me on motherfucker, you better kill me fast, 'cause I'll ram your balls down your throat!"

"Who the fuck are you?" Laci's mother echoed. She grabbed a knife from the filthy sink, and it wasn't a butter knife.

The boyfriend came toward Karen. She pushed out with her fists, and the end of the car key jabbed deep and hard into his chest, making him yelp with fury as he staggered back. She knew she had to get out. The tough woman act would only carry her so far against two pissed off, methed-up losers. She backed carefully into the hallway, and the boyfriend charged at her. She side-stepped, and just as he roared through the door frame, she stuck her booted foot out. His leg caught it, and in his rage and drugged state, there was nothing he could do.

It was an image that would play over in Karen's mind again and again, always in slow-motion. The boyfriend pitched forward without putting his hands out to catch himself. Like a gnarled old pine tree under the lumberjack's saw, he ever so slowly toppled with a kind of sick grace. At last, the side of his face connected with the square corner of the banister's newel post. There was a huge, loud, deafening crack, as if the gnarled pine snapped its tether to the stump. Blood splattered out in a spray as his head snapped back, and he crashed to the floor. Two sounds: the boyfriend's cry of outraged pain, and the mother's hysterical, "Gerry!"

Karen turned quickly. She clomped down the stairs and stepped outside. Laci was leaning out of the car window screaming, "Karen! Karen! Get in the car! Get in the CAR!" the last an ear piercing shriek of pure hysteria.

Karen calmly slid behind the wheel. Her voice firm and irresistible, she demanded, "Laci! Sit down! Put your seat belt on! Now!"

Trembling and sobbing, the girl complied meekly.

From a story above, a window flew up. Sandra flung herself out, almost to the point of tumbling to the ground. "You no good rotten cunt! You hurt my boyfriend. Laci, you fucken slut whore cunt, you ever come back to this house, I will KILL! YOU!"

Karen spun the car around and drove off at the speed limit. Laci sobbed and curled up, unable to speak. On the way, Karen pulled over to let two police cars and an ambulance, sirens blaring, go racing by. Karen knew where they were going. And now, was the moment of reckoning at hand?

Laci remained curled up in the passenger's seat, quietly sobbing, her cries stabbing Karen's heart like a dagger. For now, all Karen could do was reach over and squeeze Laci's thigh. Karen herself trembled all over, a nasty taste lingered in her mouth, and her body was covered in a sticky sheen of sweat.

When they got home, Laci's tears had subsided to an occasional sob. Laci let out a low, agonized moan that burned into Karen's soul. Helpless, she reached over and touched Laci's neck. "Come baby, we're home."

Trembling, Laci rose up and slid weakly out of the car. Karen ran around to the other side and slipped her arm around the girl. "Are you okay? Can you walk if I help you?"

"I can walk," Laci nodded. "I'm okay."

Karen reached into the car and grabbed Laci's bag. It amazed Karen that the girl somehow managed to hold on to it while being beaten. The bigger curiosity was why she hung on to it. Why was the bag so important? Karen mentally shrugged. At least the girl was safe. Karen led her into the house.

Karen dropped the bag and helped Laci shed her coat. In the light, Karen was able to get a good look at Laci's face. She looked spent, totally drained. Her eyes were lusterless, a deeply troubling thing to see in Laci, who's eyes normally sparkled with entrancing life. She had ugly bruises on the left side of her face and neck, but it didn't look like any of them would lead to a black eye. Karen bent and kissed her with great tenderness. A mother's kisses made boo-boos better, Karen thought. How many of Amy's boo-boos were made better by Karen's kisses?

"Do you hurt anywhere else, baby girl?"

Laci shook her head. "No, just where they hit me."

Karen gathered Laci into her arms and held her close. Laci let out a long, quivering breath, but she was otherwise quiet. She kept her cheek pressed against Karen's breast. Karen stroked Laci's long hair. Her hair, hair the monstrous, putrid excuse for a human being had grabbed and used to hold her in place. Yet even now, it was as soft as mink. It was one of the things that carried Laci from the merely beautiful to the sublime.

A fresh and horrifying thought arose unbidden in Karen's still churning brain. An image of what would have happened if she hadn't gotten there in time, if she'd decided to go put gas in the tank instead of parking in front of the apartment. Rape, a horrible, agonizing, monstrous violation that would have filled the child with a terror beyond comprehension. Then, death, an agonizing death, strangulation, stabbing, beating, while Laci ... Godammit Karen! Stop this insane bullshit! Karen mentally screamed at herself. It didn't happen, so stop this shit right now!