Page 145 of The Spider & the Storm

My lungs deflated, and my heart ached, but I looked up at Stormy's mother and offered a genuine smile. “I love cookies.”

***

Dinner was a couple of delivered pizzas. I was surprisingly grateful for that. It had been way too long since I'd eaten Connecticut pizza, which was arguably better than that in the Salem area. Or maybe it was just that it tasted like home and things I missed, but could never have again.

“So, Stormy, how're things at the office?” Chris asked, wiping his fingers on a paper napkin after polishing off another slice. “Poke any interesting holes in anyone lately?”

The woman at my side grinned around a bite of pepperoni pizza and swallowed. “Things are good. Can't say any holes are interesting at this point, but …” Then, she sat higher in her seat, excitedly raising her brows. “Actually, there was this guy who came in, wanting a set of dermals in the shape of Cassiopeia. You know, the constellation? Apparently, that's the name of his daughter. And I thought it was really sweet.”

I cocked my head, envisioning the design done in sparkling jewels against someone's skin. “Thatisni—”

“What are dermals?” Barbara asked.

Stormy seemed eager to explain as she leaned forward in her chair, planting her elbows on the table. “I'll spare you the gory details. But basically, it's a piercing that's implanted beneath the surface of the skin. It's anchored in by a piece of metal that looks like a foot, and—”

Barbara looked absolutely disgusted, her nose scrunching and her mouth frowning. “Anchored in?”

“Well, what I do is punch a little hole into the skin and slip the foot under the skin. The skin then heals around it, growing through the little holes in the metal to—”

“Oh God.” Barbara waved her hands frantically. “Nope. I don't want to know any more.”

Stormy wilted at my side, her shoulders slumping. Her parents might not have noticed the subtle changes in her demeanor, but I did. “I mean, you asked …”

“I don't know how you can do that for a living,” her mother went on, shaking her head and pushing her plate away. “I'll never understand how you can inflict pain on someone in exchange for money. I mean, it's messed up enough to wantthat done to yourself, but to be the one to do it? I'll never understand.”

Stormy pressed her lips shut, clamming up instead of defending herself. My gaze swept from her—now picking at a slice of pepperoni, peeling its edges off the cheese with the tip of her black fingernail—to her mother, who was lifting her glass of water to her lips with a shake of her head.

I understood that it was a common thing for parents to disapprove of the choices their kids made, and I understood that Barbara’s chastising had come from her heart, only wanting what was best for her daughter—even if the execution had been brash and uncalled for.

But Stormy had also told me the reasons why she’d left Connecticut. That not only had her youth been misguided, but her parents hadn’t given her the acceptance she needed to thrive in their environment. It lit a match beneath my skin’s surface to watch her—a strong, confident, and outspoken woman—transform into an ashamed and withered version of herself in the presence of her parents. Like she’d never stopped being that girl, wishing for their approval—and why shouldn’t she have it? She’d made a name for herself. She’d crawled out of the filthy hole of addiction and God knew what else and found the light of day, and her mother had the gall to criticize?

Without another thought, I opened my mouth. “When I was eight years old, my brother’s best friend cornered me in the school bathroom. He threw my backpack into the urinal and then proceeded to piss all over it. He was eleven years old, old enough to know better, and it wasn’t even the first time he’d done something like that. Even though my mom never knew it was he who did all this messed-up shit to me, she knew I washorribly bullied for simply being myself. It was around that point when she pulled me out of school and taught me herself.”

I took a moment to breathe, offering a pause to my story to find that every pair of eyes around the table was now on me. The realization that I was center stage and speaking my mind to an audience of people I barely knew—with the exception of Stormy—sent my heart off at a gallop. But I wasn’t going to back down now, not when I was proving a point for her, so I trudged onward.

“My mom always encouraged me to be who I was, no matter what that might be. Even if it wasn’t what she envisioned, which I’m sure it never was. Now, my parents have both been dead for a long time, but I’d like to think that, if they were still alive, they’d be proud of me for whatever the hell it was I was doing with my life. Because at least I’m doingsomethingto make an honest living.”

From the corner of my eye, I spotted Stormy’s sidelong glance and the gentle lift to one side of her mouth. Her palm slid over my thigh, where she found my hand and her fingers interlocked with mine.

“And what is it that you do?” Chris asked in a monotone.

“I’m the caretaker at a cemetery just outside of Salem,” I replied, holding my head high.

“Do you think that’s what your parents would’ve wanted for you?” he asked without malice, only genuine curiosity.

I lifted and dropped one shoulder in a shrug. “Frankly, sir, I don’t think it matters either way. A parent’s job is only to make sure that kid becomes a good person, not to dictate every one of their life’s decisions.”

Chris folded his hands on the table and tipped his head with intrigue. “Do you think you’re a good person?”

“Dad! Seriously?”

“What?” Her father shrugged. “It's an honest question.”

Stormy's hand tightened around mine, her nails piercing my flesh. I didn't flinch at the sharp dose of pain. Her father was challenging me, sizing me up. He wanted to know if his daughter's taste in men had truly changed all that much in the past fifteen years. Could I blame him? Wouldn't I have done the same thing if I had a daughter with a history of self-destruction? It didn't matter that she was in her mid-thirties. It didn't matter that she had been on her own for over a decade. They wouldalwaysbe her parents, she wouldalwaysbe their child, and they wouldalwaysbe concerned for her well-being. I couldn't fault them for that any more than I could honestly say I was a good person.

“I don't know,” I replied, holding his firm gaze.

His brow lowered with suspicion. “You don't know?”

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