Page 41 of Twisted Empire

“I’ve never actually been to Fairwick. It’s weird, because I’ve always been so close to the area,” I said. “What was it like for you growing up there?”

Tatum shrugged. “It was okay.”

“Just okay?”

I knew I was prying, but I wanted to hear about her experiences. Her childhood was a world away from my own, despite the geographical proximity, and that made me curious.

“Well, it wasn’t easy growing up around so many people who seemed to have everything when we could barely pay our bills most months, but we still had more than a lot of people in this world, so I can hardly complain,” she said softly.

“Hey, it’s not a competition. Just because other people have really shitty lives doesn’t mean yours wasn’t shitty at all. You’re allowed to say you had a rough time.”

Her cheeks turned pink. “Hm. I guess.”

“So tell me about it.”

Another shrug. “It really wasn’t that bad. My parents never hit me or screamed at me, I had clothes and an education, and we almost always had food.”

I raised a brow. “Almost always?”

She looked down at her lap. “Sometimes I’d have to skip breakfast or go eat dinner at a school friend’s house because my parents were totally broke and couldn’t afford to buy anything. But that only happened a few times.”

I winced as she spoke. I knew her story wasn’t unique, and like she said before, a lot of families out there were even more impoverished than hers. Still, the thought of someone in this country being forced to skip meals because they simply couldn’t afford it utterly blew my mind. I felt like an over-privileged asshole for feeling that way for even one second, but I couldn’t help it. The concept just seemed so alien to me.

“I’m sorry things were like that for you,” I said. “It’s fucking unfair.”

“Like I said, it wasn’t that bad. I always got food eventually. The worst part was when my parents fought about money. They’d yell at each other for hours about the same stuff over and over, always trying to figure out how and where their lives went so wrong.”

“That must’ve been shitty to hear as a kid.”

“Yeah. A few times they even said they shouldn’t have had me. Trust me, that sucked way worse than skipping a meal.”

“What the fuck? They said that to your face?”

“Oh, no. Never to my face. I overheard,” she murmured. “It upset me, but I understood after a while. It made sense.”

My brows twisted into an incredulous frown. “You actually thought it was normal that your own parents said they shouldn’t have had you?”

“Not exactly normal. It just made sense to me at the time. I was a burden on them.”

“Jesus, Tatum, they chose to have you. It was their responsibility to take care of you, not make you feel like a fucking burden.”

She looked out the window, hands folded on her lap. I pressed my lips together and gripped the steering wheel so hard my knuckles turned white.

Until now, I never realized how much of a number Tatum’s parents had done on her. Obviously, they were terrible enough to sell her to my father like she was nothing more than an object, but to force her to spend her entire childhood feeling like a drain on them made it even worse. The thought of her hearing her own mother and father discuss how they wished she didn’t even exist on occasion made me hot with rage. I wanted to beat them both over the fucking head with a tire iron.

“You don’t get it,” Tatum finally said, turning back to me. “Having no money can really mess with people’s minds. It eats you up inside because you can never stop thinking about it and wondering when you’re finally gonna lose it all. So I never blamed my parents for thinking of me that way.”

I grunted. “I still think they’re pieces of shit.”

She pursed her lips. “Well, I agree with you now that I know they sold me to the society, but back then, I really thought I understood their point of view. I even tried to help them out so I’d be less of a drain. I worked a lot. Babysitting, waitressing, stuff like that.”

“Did that make things easier?”

She nodded. “Yeah. Most of what I earned went to my parents for bills and rent, but sometimes I’d be able to squirrel a bit away for nice things for myself. Like a dress for prom, or new shoes.”

“At least you learned the real value of a dollar, I suppose,” I said, trying to find the silver lining. “I never had to. I could just buy shit whenever. When I was a kid it never even occurred to me that something like a new phone was the equivalent of a hundred hours work for someone like you.”

Tatum snorted at that. I raised a brow. “Did I say something stupid? I didn’t mean to make you feel bad or anything.”

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