Page 5 of Shattered
CHAPTER 2
present
Mel
The light through the blinds cast the world in staggered lines. As if only half of what was left survived to shine another day. I stared up at the window, willing it to be night.
My roommate, Colin, poked his head into my bedroom. “It reeks in here,” he groaned.
It had been hard to get out of bed to do anything, especially something like a shower. But don’t worry. I had taken at least one or two showers in the last two weeks, but I hadn’t done much else. The laundry was piled in heaps on the floor. The takeout Colin had given me was still sitting on the desk. There was a hollowness in my chest that made it seem like I was a void of nothingness. Everything and nothing could escape me.
Because it was better to feel nothing. To pretend that I wasn’t okay with killing Aldrich.
“You need to pay rent,” Colin said. He held up a whiteboard calendar and pointed to the first of the month. “You see this? This was days ago. Don’t make me cover your half again.”
I sighed and averted my eyes back to those blinds. How many slats were there? Would Colin still be there, standing in my doorway talking about the rent that I owed, when I finished counting?
“Mel,” he said quietly. “You remember what happened last time.”
About three years ago when we first moved in together, I had been late on rent. Living as a starving artist seems grand, until you realize what people do to survive. At the time, Colin had presented me with two choices: make it up to him the easy way, or the hard way. I hadn’t started working at the Dahlia District at that point, so the easy way—a blow job—wasn’t an option I was willing to take. I had fought him hard on it, until he fought back. The bruise on my eye had lasted for weeks, in lingering shades of pink and dark blue.
“I remember,” I said.
“Well, then,” he said.
Three years had passed, and I had changed from a girl who was desperate to have a family that supported her artistic interests, to a woman who was still desperate to please her chosen family, but now, the thought of sucking dick to pay rent didn’t seem so humiliating. Not in the Dahlia District.
“You’ll get your money,” I said. I rolled over and pulled the covers to my shoulders, suffocating myself in the heat.
“Or we’ll revisit your options.”
His footsteps pattered down the hallway. I know it doesn’t make sense why I was living with Colin, but when my parents excommunicated me, their only child, at eighteen for choosing an art degree over a ‘respectable’ career path, I had been left with nothing. After a year and a half of private student loans, Colin’s offer to share rent on a cheap house seemed like an oasis. His best friend, now one of my best friends too, Jake, had started working on-site security at the Dahlia District. He introduced me to Dahlia herself. She agreed to take care of my loans, and I agreed to pay her back by working for her. I could even sell my art. All I had to do was convince rich businessmen to pay for my time.
Sounds easy, right? Sounds likepure magic. The artist’s dream: selling your art to people who will actually pay for it. But I was, at least, smart enough to continue living with Colin. He may have been an asshole, but the rent was stagnant and he was a reliable asshole. After that one incident, I always knew where I stood with him. Family, be it blood or chosen, didn’t matter to him. I was there to pay rent. And sometimes, he cared enough to make sure I ate, hence the takeout rotting on my dresser.
A knock sounded on the front door to the house. Colin’s heavy footsteps clamored through the walkways, reaching the entrance. I recognized the voice: smooth and hesitant, the detective who had been assigned to Sage City’s newest serial killer. A murderer who went after the customers of prostitutes.
“Mel,” Colin yelled, “It’s for you.”
I ambled to the door. Detective Foreman ran a hand through his shaggy black hair. “Good evening, Ms. Foley,” he said.
Was it evening already? The sun was still out, though it was setting. I shrugged and pointed towards my bedroom. “Privacy,” I said.
I resumed my position in the nest of stale blankets, and eventually, Detective Foreman moved some old textbooks to sit on a stool.
“You’ve been—” he paused, eyeing the mess of empty cans, open mascara tubes, and tangled electronic cords on my dresser, “—working hard?”
“Here and there,” I said. I had been calling out as much as I could afford. I stared at him, waiting for the real questions, and finally, he budged.
“Can you tell me about Haley’s relationship with Aldrich?”
I shook my head. “We weren’t close.” Not really, anyway.
“Some of your fellow servers said you were friends, but one of them hinted that something might have happened right before Aldrich was murdered.”
It was nice that they had kept it vague. Detective Foreman was referring to when Aldrich made false promises about marrying me and saving me from the Dahlia DistrictifI isolated and threatened Haley in front of the club. I had done it only because I knew Haley would understand. It wasn’t personal, and my freedom was on the line. I would have expected her to do the same.
But even now, with Haley long gone, I wouldn’t tell any secrets about our relationship.
