Page 41 of Maid in America

He wasn’t certain where he’d gone wrong, what he’d done to warrant a phony number, what he’d said to make her so aloof at Maggie’s when he said he wanted to see her again.

That night that he’d brought her to his home, the look in her eyes was intense, filled with desire, withwant.

So… what had changed?

Where did he go wrong?

Were there red flags that scared her off? Another woman’s balled-up panties among the piles, perhaps? Aside from a filthy apartment, he couldn’t see any other items that warranted such a cold brush-off.

Smoky climbed up into Barrett’s lap and curled into a ball. He stroked her head softly, and within a minute or two, she was purring. He thought it best to put his thoughts of Aphrodite… ofChastity… aside for the night.

After all, looking down at Smoky, tired from her adventures out in the world, he could appreciate that some things were best left wild and untamed.

15

The muffled cackling ofold crones made Chastity’s eyes flit open. She stretched and mumbled, “This place is like a geriatric denture convention.”

She threw her legs over the side of the bed, snatched her phone from the nightstand, and did a double-take.

Three p.m.

Are you fucking kidding me?

She wondered how that could possibly be accurate.

She fell asleep bingeing the prior season ofSummer Love, a cleverly edited elimination-style reality TV show filmed every summer where half-naked hotties hooked up in will-they-won’t-they show-mances followed by a whirlwind of drama and sex.

She thought she might have dozed off somewhere around midnight, just before Tawny, a double-D-silicone-breastedbitch, was finally voted out of the beach house. But… if that was the case,why had she slept in so late?

After weeks of piss-poor sleep, that had to be… what?Fifteen hoursof snoozing? Surely, that couldn’t be right.

Bible study was in full swing in the living area just a little beyond her door. Every word felt like sandpaper in her ear, grating on her sanity, grinding her paper-thin patience to a pulp.

Chastity trudged to the dresser and snatched out a clean black bra and green panties, quickly changing into them before throwing on a tight pair of leggings and a cherry-red, low-cut V-neck that said, ‘Don’t be a prick’ with a small waving cactus printed on the right breast. She scrounged two socks at random and sat to put them on.

One woman’s words trickled in through the gap beneath her door. “So… she gotkicked outof the university?”

“No! Didn’t you listen? Sheflunkedout,” another old biddy said.

“Why? Why wouldn’t she just take the semester over?” asked yet another voice, one belonging to a woman old enough to have signed Jesus’s birth certificate herself.

“Well, I guess it’s not that much of a stretch. I heard the poor girl wasalreadyon academic probation.”

Another gasped. “Oh my! Forwhat?”

“My sister-in-law’s daughter is on the board down there. She said that Chastity was caught with a half-naked boy in the women’s dormitory—”

“No!”

“—And they were smokingreefer.”

Chastity almost snorted at the outdated term. She threw on her boots and grabbed the doorknob, hesitating to open it.

“That’s a shame. She had so much potential.” She heard the woman make atisksound.

“Weed is a gateway drug,” another voice chimed in.

“I can’t believe she’s onthe pot. Such a shame. You know, I knew she’d seemed off since she’s been home.”

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