Page 5 of The Spider & the Storm

“I’ll see you soon, okay?” He wiped his fingers the rest of the way on my shirt. “Better go wipe your face off, you little baby. Don’t let your mommy see the mess you made.”

Then, as he went back to the kitchen and I felt the first of my tears begin to slide down my cheeks, I started to wonder if I could ever truly be lucky at all.

CHAPTER TWO

MASSACHUSETTS, PRESENT DAY

A crisp but silent breeze rustled my T-shirt as the leaf blower removed the dead leaves from the plot. Ellen H. Mills might have died in 1971 at the baffling age of one hundred three, but I liked to think she appreciated my diligence in keeping her burial site tidy.

A gaggle of teenagers meandered down the path I’d just cleared of debris from last night’s gale, the remnants of twigs and dried leaves still in the blower’s bag. They were all dressed in a uniform of typical so-called mall goth attire. Black tops and black jeans, worn tight and hanging low on the hips of two girls and the singular boy. The other two girls wore skirts to reveal the torn fishnet tights and pasty-white legs underneath. Their faces were all caked in white while their eyes were lined with deep black, and their hair was choppy and dyed a flat black any self-respecting hairstylist would’ve turned their nose up at.

I only knew this because I had dated one once years ago, long before I had no choice but to run away from the only home I’d ever known.

The group of kids strolled past me, carrying with them an air of arrogance I found nearly infuriating. I might’ve been well into my thirties now, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t remember being a teenager myself. Not unlike them in my choice of clothing, but lacking the ambition to dye my hair or lips a color to match. But what had really set me apart was the lack of companionship. Other kids—Luke’s friends or others in ourneighborhood—saw me as the freak, the weirdo, the outcast too messed up to fit in.

Sure, I guessed having the occasional panic attack over nothing and everything hadn’t helped my case much, but neither had my choice in favorite color or my fascination with the macabre.

But anyway, my point was, these kidstriedto be this weird. And other people—their peers—likedthem for it. Which, in turn, didn’t make them all that weird at all. They didn’t know what it was like to be cast aside, to be teased and tormented for being truly strange and unusual, and I didn’t like them for it.

Then, somewhere beneath my distaste, I found my envy. OhGod, how nice it must be to easily find acceptance. How truly wonderful to have friends without needing to change who you are.

One of the teenagers—the girl in the shortest skirt—caught my eye for one second longer than the others. Not for any reason. It was simply a stutter of the eyes, but in that second, she held my gaze, and she sneered in response, curling her black lips.

“What the hell are you looking at, you fuckin’ perv?” she asked, accusation heavy in her tone.

I quickly looked away and maintained my usual silence, focusing on making sure Ellen’s plot of neatly trimmed grass was clear of weeds or anything else one might find unsightly.

“Freak,” another girl said to my back.

A rush of heat rose from my collar. A frown tugged at my lips.

The fact that a girl who modeled herself after the freaks of the world could turn around and use the word as an insult nearly made me chuckle. The irony nearly made me shake my head. I was tempted to scold her. To tell her to respect her elders—I must’ve been at least twenty years her senior. But I never did well in situations of confrontation, so I kept my mouth shut and my eyes on the headstone before me while wishing they would just walk away, as I usually did in times of being bullied and tormented.

All but one.

But alas, they didn’t.

It could never be so easy. It never was.

I heard the boy say, “Watch this.”

I listened as he walked with determination from the path and onto the grass, coming to stand beside me. He was inches shorter, the top of his head barely reaching my nose, but confidence emanated from beneath his black trench coat. More than I possessed in my pinkie finger.

I kept my eyes down, aimed at Ellen H. Mills's name, and used all my brainpower to will this little shit to get back to his stroll.

But of course, he remained beside me.

He pulled a tissue from his pocket and blew his nose loudly, the snot emptying from his nostrils in two strong huffs. Then, he threw it on the ground, right beneath Ellen’s etched epitaph.

My eyes slowly lifted from the crumpled wad of white to pin him with my withered glare.

“Keep your goddamn eyes off my girlfriend,” he warned, the big, grown-up words passing through his painted boy lips. “Now, clean that shit up, creep.”

“You gotta say something, Charlie,”I could hear Luke telling me as the nasty little fuck walked away with his arm around the girl in the short skirt, boasting and laughing.“What the hell are you gonna do if I’m not around to fight for you?”

“Nothing,” I replied in a mutter, turning from the path to stare once again at the decades-old stone marker. “Apparently, nothing.”

Then, I bent over and snatched the used tissue off the ground.

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