Page 16 of Beneath the Dirt

Araceli: Hope she’s a squirter and blesses you with her holy water =P

My fingers glide across the keyboard to text her back, but before I know it, Tori is fully dressed in the outfit she wore during service.

“Everything okay?” she asks, standing over to my side.

Her hair drapes over the phone screen, blocking my view. Not wanting her to see the text, I hit the lock screen.

“Yep. All good.”

“Okay.” She bites down on her lip. At first, I take it as a flirtatious thing, but the longer she stays with her lip trapped and kneaded under her tooth, I see the guilt on her face.

“Are you okay?”

She stops chewing on her lip to answer. “Yeah, but you’re not going to tell anyone are you?”

“No,” I reassure her.

Satisfied with my deadpanned response, she turns on a smile. “Okay, just wanted to make sure.”

I nod, looking around the inventory room. I don’t know why Dad told me to come down here. Everything was in order by the time I met Tori here.

“Yep,” I drag, an awkward energy filling the room. My mind drifts off to Araceli, wondering what she thinks about what she saw me do. Hoping it turned her on as much as I hope it pissedher off. “Well, it looks like everything is taken care of down here, so I’m going to head home.” I move to the doorway, ready to sneak into my dad’s office to get Araceli’s pills—and hopefully not get caught this time. Patting my pockets, I realize that I don’t have the key.

Something jingles and distracts me.

Tori, now dressed, walks past me with the keys to my dad’s office. “Thank you,” she blushes, placing her hand with the keys on my cheek. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Are those the keys to my dad’s office?” I ask, already knowing the answer but confused as to why she has them.

A laugh erupts from her. “Yeah, silly. Since my mom had surgery, I’ve been filling in for her as secretary. Well, just on the days or nights that I can since I have to juggle my own job and commuting to campus.”

“Right.” I offer her a short response while I’m trying to brainstorm how the fuck I’m going to get into the office now with her having the keys. “Are you locking up or do you have work to do?”

“With the Holy Harvest tomorrow, there’s so much work to be done.” She begins to move through the doorway. “So I’ll be here for a little bit still.”

Great.

I follow after her. “Need help?”

She pauses her stride, looking back at me over her shoulder. My gaze falls to her lips and the smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. She says something, but I can’t focus on what she’s saying. Like a pin dropping in the dead of night, something crashes, faint yet loud enough to be heard, behind me. The acoustics linger in my eardrum, causing a ringing to occur. The noise is unbearable. In desperation, I throw my hands up, covering my ears, but it only makes it louder. I look around to see where the noise is coming from, but I see nothing.

Tori walks over to me, fear ripe within her hazel stare.

“Harlan.” My name is muffled, but it cuts through the ear-piercing ricochet that is attacking my hearing.

With a yank at my wrist, she breaks the seal I created with my hands around my ears. To my surprise and much to my relief, the sound is gone.

“I was just telling you I don’t need any help.”

“You didn’t hear that?” I blurt, baffled by how nonchalant she just spoke to me.

Dumbfounded, she widens her eyes at me. “Umm, my voice echoed a bit. I, uh…” She fumbles her words, and it’s clear she didn’t hear what I did.

“You seriously didn’t hear that sound? It was so…” Now I’m the one fumbling my words. “It was so…” I don’t know how to finish my sentence. Even if I wanted to. I’m too distracted by one of the many core memories embedded in my psyche taking this opportunity to remind me how fucked I am.

My body remains where it is. Where I know it ought to be. In the church basement next to Tori but mentally I’m back home. Younger than I am now by about fifteen years, back to my five-year-old self, curled up in a ball, crying. Begging for the sting to go away on my back from my father’s belt.

“It’s in your head! You were never there! It doesn’t exist.”

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