Strict (Part Six) by Hannah Ford

Author:Hannah Ford [Ford, Hannah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-12-13T18:30:00+00:00

But he doesn’t leave.

Instead, he stays in his car, parked outside of my house for the rest of the night. Anytime I dare to peek through the blinds, I catch sight of him through the tinted windows of his car, just the shadow of him, either on the phone or typing away on his laptop.

Other times he’s just sitting there, staring out the window.

He doesn’t seem sleep.

By the second day, when his car is still parked outside and he still hasn’t moved, my mother starts to think she has a right to give her opinion on the situation.

“He must be really uncomfortable out there,” she says thoughtfully as she slips a pod into the Kuerig machine.

“Good,” I say.

“I wonder if he’s eaten.”

“I hope not.”

“Probably doesn’t have coffee.” She sets a steaming mug down in front of me, as if I should feel bad that Gage is out there with none. I take a huge sip as if to prove that I don’t care, but the joke’s on me, because I end up burning my tongue.

“You do realize he’s the reason I got fired, right?” I ask her.

She sighs. “You said he wasn’t the reason.”

“He wasn’t. I mean, he was… I mean, I wanted to be with him, Mom, I just…” I take in a sniffling breath. “I’m so confused. And I’m worried about Grace.”

The police in New York City and Syracuse have both put out missing person bulletins, and Grace’s picture has been plastered all over social media, but so far, no one has heard from her. I can’t help but think that it’s my fault she’s missing, that I’m started to worry that maybe it does have something to do with Brandon McCarthur and my sister after all.

Before I know what’s happening, I’m crying, huge sobs that rack my body and leave me feeling spent.

“Oh, sweetie,” my mom soothes, pushing my hair back from my head and pulling me close to her. “Everything is going to be fine.”

“It’s not,” I say. “Nothing is fine. Cassidy is gone, Grace is missing, Gage is…” I trail off, not sure what Gage is.

“Shhh,” my mom says. “Shhh, it’s all going to be okay.”

But she doesn’t know the truth. She doesn’t know the things that Gage has been doing to me, doesn’t know the way my body craves it. If she did, I doubt she would be as tolerant of the fact that he was sitting outside as she is.

“Why don’t you go back upstairs?” my mom says. “Try to get some sleep.”

“I just woke up,” I protest.

“Did you sleep?” she presses.

“Not really,” I admit.

“Go on,” she says. “I’ll make corn chowder for lunch.”

She knows it’s my favorite.

Up in my room, I toss and turn, just like I did last night, unable to fall asleep. Finally, in the afternoon, I give up trying to sleep and spend the day submitting resumes for internships, this time doing it to local companies in Syracuse, hoping they’ll be more responsive than the ones in New York.

I do add some New York City ones in for good measure, even though I have no money and nowhere to stay.

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