Page 6 of Vicious Sentiments

At this point, all I can see is Julian’s back and his elbow repeatedly piercing theair behind him.

Suddenly, I can breathe. A deep breath fills my lungs and I sag. Kyles down. He’s down and he can’t hurt me. Tears spill onto my cheeks in relief. I hope he kills him, I think, but then take it back. Kyle doesn’t deserve Death’s sweet cradle.

When Julian finally gets back into the car his breath is measured but his chest is puffed. His knuckles are covered in blood and there are little splatters of it on his shirt, dulling the shiny buttons.

He grips the wheel, tensing and flexing over and again until he calms.

“Do you want to stay here?” he asks but doesn’t look at me.

I shake my head.

“Do you want to get anything?”

I shake my head again.

“Good. Don’t change your mind.” He puts the car into reverse. “Because we’re never coming back here.”

Chapter Five

Ithink there’s a multitude of times in everyone’s life when a moment happens that changes their course forever. Most are probably not aware when it does, but I am. I’m floating outside of my body, watching my first life-changing moment in real-time, disconnected from myself but not afraid to be.

There have been times—not life-changing times—when I’ve disconnected from myself, and it was frightening. I would be so far away from my body that I couldn’t save myself if I needed to. But I couldn’t stay connected, it hurt too much. I would watch in horror as my dad snapped back both of my pinkies in punishment, or when Mr. Canes pushed himself, painfully, into where he shouldn’t be. I would slip away from my body when Kyle used his pocket knife to carve his name into my skin, or anytime things seemed unreal.

Because they couldn’t be real. They couldn’t be happening to me. If they were, then I wouldn’t be able to come back from it. I wouldn’t be able to get dressed or eat or breathe.

But now, as I float above my body, I’m not scared. Yes, what’s happening seems unbelievable, but I don’t have to worry about what’s going to happen to my abandoned body. I’m curled up in the sleek and buttery leather passenger seat of Julian’s McLaren. The seat isheated. He had pressed a button near my thigh and took great care to not accidentally brush against my skin when he did so. The radio is so soft that I can’t make out if a song is playing or a commercial, but the buzz is nice. Orange street lamps continuously pulse into the interior of the car as we travel farther and farther away from Bridgerock and it’s soothing.

I’m not worried about dad. He probably won’t even notice I’m gone and when he does, I can’t see him caring. He’s never cared about me before. A little pang threatens to pull me back into myself and I push the dirty image of my dad out of my mind.

The car glides on the pavement so benevolently, that if I didn’t know better, I would think we were flying. I’m drifting to sleep, unable to stay up any longer, but I didn’t stay up because I felt like I needed to be on alert. It was because I was excited. I didn’t show it but I felt it. To be honest, I didn’t know how to show it. I can’t think of any time in my life when I felt excited. I never had a moment where I thought my mom was coming home. I knew no woman would ever return to my dad. I never had a moment to look forward to. Mr. Canes wasn’t old, he wasn’t due to retire and graduating wasn’t going to get me any farther away from him. And Kyle would never leave Bridgerock. There was nothing to look forward to.

But I was looking forward to wherever Julian was taking me. A part of me knows I should be worried. He could leave me at a women’s shelter or take me to child services. He could be worse than any man I’ve ever come across, a wolf in sheep’s clothing, but I don’t think so. There is something in his eyes, in the tone of his voice, when he said we were never coming back to Bridgerock. He said ‘we’. He also told me to get comfy because ‘we’ weren’t making any stops. He was late for something but he didn’t seem stressed. After a while, he said we still had about a thousand miles to go and asked if I was hungry.

I told him no even though I was but I didn’t want to slow him down.

He stopped at a drive-through anyway. I ordered just a burger, which produced a sigh from him and he added a large fry and achocolate milkshake to go with it. For himself, he ordered a black coffee.

I ate everything, down to the last crunchy fry and had to stop myself from taking the lid off the milkshake to get the melted drops at the end. I was careful in the car that cost almost a million dollars, but Julian didn’t seem to bat an eye as the new car smell was replaced with the scent of grease and salt.

I ease back into my body, forcing myself to believe that this life-changing and exciting moment is real, and fall asleep.

Chapter Six

Julian’s calm demeanor is replaced with a stoic chisel once we’d traveled the thousand miles. He has both hands on the wheel, gripping it so tightly that the cuts on his knuckles break open and little beads of blood appear.

I saw a beautiful sign for Cape Canaveral, lit up by ground lights in the night, and I sat up straighter to see what Florida was like. I’ve never seen anywhere besides Bridgerock and part of me is disappointed I slept so much on the drive, or else I would have been able to see the other places we traveled through.

I still don’t know what Julian is late for but I can’t fathom what it would be at three a.m.. He had been texting from his new phone frantically, with one hand on the wheel, an hour before, and while it didn’t seem like he was hiding the texts, I didn’t ask.

“We’ll get some food after this,” he says, as we finally cross a small bridge.

“It’s okay,” I whisper, my face glued to my window.

It’s not lake or dam water beneath the bridge but ocean water. I’ve never seen the ocean, and it’s too dark to make out much, but I’m taking in what I can.

“We’ll get food after this,” he repeats, and I turn to nod.

When I do, I see a massive cruise ship and my eyes widen. There are three of them, and we whip past signs that say cruise parking.Julian is driving fast despite the small roads, and the ships are soon out of sight as we curve along and pass more signs.

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