Page 42 of Rock and a Hard Place

Peter looked around the cluttered desk and dresser. “Have you seen my phone? I thought it was in my coat, but I can’t find it and I need to call Libby.”

“It’s probably on the bus.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Something about Garrett seemed odd, but Peter brushed it off.

Libby huddled against the barn, huge gulping breaths racking her body. Locked in her private misery,she didn’t hear Aunt Marge approach.

“What are you doing out here?” Aunt Marge held a shotgun in the crook of her arm.

Libby looked up from the frozen ground. Her lower lip shook as her tear-filled eyes rested on the weapon. What was Aunt Marge doing with a shotgun?

“Speak up.” Her aunt’s piercing words brought Libby back around. “You should be on the bus to school, not lurking around my barn. What are you looking for?” Aunt Marge’s eyes narrowed. “What did you see?”

“Peter broke up with me,” she uttered, her voice breaking. A new onslaught of tears and hiccups erupted.

“Good. Now maybe you’ll pay attention when I tell you something. He was a snooping rich boy nosing around where he didn’t belong. I knew this would happen. You’re too damned stubborn to listen to me. You think you know everything. Well, I’ll tell you, little Miss Know-It-All, you haven’t got a clue about life.”

Libby barely listened as her angry aunt ranted. The woman’s words meant nothing. Without Peter, her world was empty. Tears overflowed anew.

“Now move your lazy ass up off the ground and get to school. I have work to do and you’re interfering.” She waved the gun in the direction of the road.

Libby fumbled with her book bag and rose, her body trembling with emotion. “I missed the bus.”

Aunt Marge looked her up and down. “That was stupid.Looks like you’ll have a long walk to think about how to avoid that mistake again.”

Libby’s eyes widened. “It’s five miles.”

Aunt Marge shrugged. “Then you better get started.” Aunt Marge stood steadfast like the vacant farm buildings, ugly after years of neglect. Would Libby turn out the same way?

This confrontation was more than she could handle. Libby gulped. No option but to go. Resigned, she walked around the dilapidated barn; the wide door hung open on rusted hinges. She automatically glanced inside.

Libby shouldn’t have been surprised at what she saw.

She couldn’t turn away from dozens of small plastic bags that sat in tidy rows. She stepped into the barn. Lab equipment with beakers and funnels were set up on one side. Piles of clear bags containing crystals filled a table. There were scales, rubber tubing, and all sorts of paraphernalia littered about.

Was Aunt Marge making crystal meth?

She turned to face her aunt and laughed at the irony. The woman who restricted Libby’s every move in the guise of good behavior was cooking meth!

Rage etched Aunt Marge’s haggard face. “You think you’re so smart. Well, you’re an ignorant, self-absorbed child.” She stalked closer. “How long ago did your weak, spineless father dump you here? A year? More? And you finally get curious? You’re as brainless as your idiot mother.”

“Don’t talk about my mother like that! She was amazing!” Anger replaced her sorrow.

“Your mother was a fool. She never accomplished adamned thing in her life. She spent years raising you and your bratty sister, and for what? To get splattered on the highway like a bug? Not much of a life.”

The cruel words horrified Libby. “How dare you.

You . . . you bitch!”

“Watch your mouth, little girl. I’m all you’ve got left in this world, and you’d be ill advised to screw this up, too.”

Libby bit back her words. Things were happening too fast. She needed to tread carefully and sort things out. She stepped back, away from her aunt, away from the drugs. Without another word, she turned toward the road.

“That’s more like it. Get yourself to school, and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll keep your mouth shut.”

Libby started her long trek down the country road, glad to escape her aunt’s insanity. The pea gravel crunched under each step like the touch of sandpaper rubbing her raw nerves.

After a while, the sound became a soothing anthem, lulling her distraught mind into a murky haze, where she could rehash the happenings of this morning in a distant, detached way.

---