Page 53 of Driftwood Daffodil
I choked and struggled to suck in a breath while reaching back to claw at his arm. Just when blackness was starting to seep into my vision, another voice hit my ears.
“What’s going on in here.”
Gio let go, dropping me on the floor where I greedily coughed oxygen back into my lungs. When my vision cleared I could see that Sister Mary of the hallway was standing by the doors with her arms crossed.
“Did he hurt you?”
I looked at her then back at Gio and shook my head. “No.”
She cocked a brow, “Don’t lie to me child, I know what I saw.”
The muscle in Gio’s jaw was tensing. It would be so easy to turn him in. He might even end up doing some time for assault. But there was a sad spark on his face that I recognized. My family wasn’t the only one that had been destroyed. He lost someone too and I could understand that.
“I tripped and fell, Gio caught me before I landed on the floor.” I looked back at Sister Mary of the hallway. “He didn’t hurt me, he was helping.”
GIOVANNI
When this day started I did not see it ending with me parked in a batch of cypress trees across from a trailer park. Yet here I was, staring at the trailer Nova’s truck was parked in front of.
I spent my entire life in this city and not once had I heard the name Sault Saint Marie Estates. And now, it was permanently ingrained in the back of my head. Like a big neon sign pointing to a bullseye.
This shitty yellow trailer was where she lived.
Various questions flowed through my mind as I stared at the white screen door Nova disappeared into. What was she doing in there? Was her room one of the windows I could see, or was itaround back? And most importantly, was Nova as nonchalant in private?
At school she acted like she gave no fucks, but everyone cared about something. I just had to find that pressure point. Her brother maybe?
“Sister Anne did not appreciate me toting around her little pet project.” Atlee leaned back and kicked his feet up on the dash.
An act that normally would result in my fist meeting his face – I kept my shit clean – but today the dirt on Atlee’s black Adidas was the least of my worries.
“Fucking Sutton Barlow.” He shook his head. “Someone needs to give that girl a good dicking, or slap some sense into her. Could always do both. I can’t imagine she’d be that much fun to fuck unless you made her scream a little.”
That was comical.
“That girl isn’t fucking anyone.” If there was a picture beside virgin in the dictionary, it would be of Sutton Barlow.
“You can say that again.” Atlee huffed out a snort. “I wouldn’t touch her with your dick.”
“Stay away from my dick.” I leaned in closer to the windshield and eyed the lush green grass in Nova’s front yard.
The place appeared well taken care of. It was clean and orderly, but way too colorful in my opinion. Who had that many gnomes? Was it some kind of fucked up collection? There were way too many for a yard that small. Unless they served another purpose? I didn’t trust anything the Fords’ did.
“She’s constantly walking around saying, Jesus this and God that…”
There wasn’t anything special or out of the ordinary about the trailer, other than the yard decorations that is. Then again, there was something off with the fence? The white pointed sticks were too shiny to be wood, but not shiny enough for metal.
Plastic maybe?
“Yip, yip, yip,” Atlee continued. “Shut the fuck up, bitch. Oh! Then Sister Anne came around the corner…”
It was plastic! Who the fuck would put something like that up? It didn’t cost much for wood, nor was it hard to build. Just stick some pegs in the ground and paint that shit. And why the smiling sun flag? What was the point of that? Were they trying to announce some bullshit like ‘here lives the happiest people on the fucking planet’?
That was some fucked up deceiving crap right there. They were responsible for my brother’s death. Why the fuck should they be happy?
“And I was like,” Atlee grabbed his crotch and cupped his balls through his pants. “Suck it, bitch.”
“No, you weren’t.”
