Page 24 of Neverland

Chapter 6

THEN

“Fifty-one, fifty-two…” My mother quietly counted coins, using her index finger to slide each coin off the table and into her palm. It’d taken us an hour searching the house for any coin we could find, while trying our best not to wake my father. We were hungry, starving even, and a loaf of bread was going to feed us for a couple of days.

“Here,” Mom said. “Ask Mr. Hopkins if he could put milk on our bill.” Without another word, she turned away from me, hooked one frail leg over the other, and placed a tea-towel filled with ice on her bruised cheekbone. While my father spent most of his life in a drunken stupor, my mother spent hers in a comatose daze.

“Ready?” I asked Romeo when I left the kitchen. I found him in the living room standing over my father who lay haphazard on the sofa. Even asleep, he reeked of alcohol, an empty bottle of Jack Daniel’s still within arm’s reach. Romeo’s expression was one of disgust and hate.

“Your mom barely scraped together enough money for bread, and yet…” he kicked at the bottle, “… he wastes his pension on this liquid diet. Miserable sack of shit.”

If anyone understood the life I lived, it was Romeo. I also understood how tempting it was for him to smother my father’s face with the worn pillow. “Come on, let’s go,” I said, taking his hand. Leading him out the front door, I asked about his parents, “Has your dad found work?”

Romeo tore off some leaves from an overhanging branch as we walked down the road. “He can’t even seem to get through the door. As soon as they see him, they say the position has been taken despite people still waiting to be interviewed. And Mom’s had her shifts cut. They argue all the time—”

He stopped short, out of concern, and I wished he hadn’t. His problems were just as relevant and I wanted to be as empathetic to him as he continually was to me. The truth was, we lived in a town that had nothing better to do with its time than to target people for fun. It was a town the governor seemed to have either forgotten about or placed in the too hard basket. And extreme racism was at the forefront of its problems. In the Sanchezes’ case, the locals weren’t going to be happy unless they drove them out of town. The problem was, this was their third move only to face the same discrimination.

“I’m so sorry, Romeo.”

“Don’t be. One day I’ll earn enough money to make sure they never have to be in the position of being treated like that again.”

A bell chimed as we walked into the corner store. Mr. Hopkins glanced over his wire glasses and instead of greeting me with his usual wide smile, he took one look at Romeo and his mouth barely twitched. “Hi, Lucy,” he greeted.

“I thought he was a mute. He’s never once greeted me,” Romeo said under his breath.

“Hi, Mr. Hopkins,” I replied quietly, feeling Romeo’s sensitivity. We wandered to the fourth aisle and looked for the cheapest loaf of bread, my stomach grumbling as I passed the heated food display. Everything smelled amazing when you’re starving.

Romeo returned holding a carton of milk he’d need to take home and pulled a loaf of bread from the shelf. We approached the counter and handed the bread to Mr. Hopkins who just didn’t seem to be his usual self. He’d normally chat up a storm to the point where I’d have to excuse myself because it would be getting dark out. Now, however, his continual clearing of his throat told of his agitation.

“Two dollars,” he said, no sign of animosity toward me. Handing over the last of the money we had, I moved aside and let Romeo pay for his. Mr. Hopkins scanned the milk and bread, placing each item back on the counter with more force than necessary.

“Eight dollars,” he said, holding out his hand.

Huh?

I looked from the Turkish Delight bar I’d been salivating over to a man who was starting to show his true colors. Knowing he was being taken advantage of, Romeo was bristling.

“Eight dollars?” he asked, incredulous.

“That’s right.”

My gaze flicked between the two, the tension palpable.

So this was what Romeo had been talking about. It might seem like a small issue on the surface, but when those small issues tallied up, it was downright hurtful.

“That seems a bit excessive,” Romeo stated flatly.

“I don’t think so.”

“I have the same brand of bread as Lucy. And the milk is two-fifty. That’s four-fifty in total.”

“Not for you it’s not.”

“You realize what you’re doing is discrimination and it’s illegal?”

Mr. Hopkins didn’t flinch. “I don’t care what name you call it. Pay or get out.”

The door chimed and a familiar scent wafted past before I saw who it belonged to. Mr. Hopkins experienced yet another personality shift, his shoulders straightening, eyes resentful, when he saw who’d entered and who was now standing behind me.

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