Page 136 of A Whole New Play

This is almost over.

The stranger whips her head back, taking advantage of my distraction.

Stars shoot across my vision when her skull hits my jaw. I reel back in pain, unintentionally releasing her as I fall to the ground. I land on my butt, sending another jolt of pain through my body.

But one of the women intercepts her before she can get ahold of Abby again. The other rushes the little girl back, keeping her out of Sara’s reach.

The person whirls back around. “You bitch!”

I know that voice…

Sure enough, when my vision recovers from the head butt, I focus on the face of none other than the woman who’d cornered me and the twins at the science fair.

Sara.

I scooch back until I hit a stall door.

Sara has a crazed look in her eye that fills me with dread.

“What are you doing here?” She sneers. “Carter wants nothing to do with you. Why are you harassing his kid?” She spews the words at me. It takes me a moment to process what she’s said.

This woman is delusional.

“You’re the one he wants nothing to do with,” I counter, using the stall behind me to help me get to my feet. “And I’m not the one who just tried to kidnap his daughter!”

“Carter belongs to me. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll stay away.” Logic holds no sway with this woman. She’s incapable of thinking clearly.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

Her already flushed face turns a dark, angry red. “I should have run you over with my car when I had the chance!”

What the actual hell?!

“Valerie,” Abby whimpers. She cowers between the two remaining women. They’ve stayed to make sure I’m okay.

“It’s alright,” I reassure her gently. “Everything is going to be all right.”

I look at the women. “Get her out of here, please.”

They nod.

“No, Valerie. Come with me!”

I tune out Abby’s heart-wrenching protests as the women usher her toward the exit and focus on the lunatic in front of me. I won’t let Sara out of my sight until I know Abby is safe.

“You need to leave,” I tell her with a deceptively calm voice, keeping her attention on me.

She adjusts the baseball cap on her head with a scowl. “I’m not going anywhere until I talk to Carter.”

“Carter doesn’t want anything to do with you.”

“I’ve loved him for years,” she hisses. “And he broke up with you. It’s you who needs to leave.”

I sense that Abby is almost at the door.

With her safety nearly secured, I let the anger I feel for this woman and the danger she’s put me, Abby, Andy, and Carter in fuel the vitriol of my next words.

“Listen, you psycho. Carter and I may be over, but at least I was his girlfriend. Whereas you are nothing more than a delusional, pick-me girl who pathetically tries to force herself into his life with the idiotic hope that it will make him like you. News flash, it won’t. Carter will never like you. Ever.”

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