Splintered (15 page)

Maddy had had enough of conflict for the day. She took a deep breath and forced a smile. “That might be good. Thanks, Mom.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Lily cupped Maddy’s cheeks with her hands. “Good. I’ll start making calls tomorrow. As for school—”

Maddy sighed and her whole body deflated.

“Well, we don’t have to decide anything right now,” Lily said. “It’s Friday, so we have a couple of days to figure it out.” Lily kissed Maddy on the head. “Don’t stay up too late. A good night’s sleep will help everything look better in the morning. Don’t forget, tomorrow’s my day off. We’ll go to the nail salon. I’ll even splurge for your fingernails this time. How’s that sound?”

Maddy nodded, afraid her voice would betray her. She walked silently back to her room, her fists shaking at her sides. She felt like she might explode, like if she didn’t release all the stress building up inside she would spontaneously combust. Her mom hadn’t even noticed that Maddy had come home from school in different clothes. She looked down at her mismatched outfit.

Who in the hell wears sweatpants in September?

Once in her room, Maddy yanked the shirt over her head. Then she stomped her legs to kick off the sweats until she was standing in only her bra and underwear. Thinking back on her day at school, she wanted to scream. It had only gotten worse as each hour dragged on.

There’s no way I’m ever stepping inside that place again.

Maddy wanted to holler until she had no voice left, but that was out of the question because it would only bring her mom back.

The woman already wants to send me to a shrink. If I totally wig out, she’ll probably commit me.

Maddy looked around wildly, scanning the room for anything that might help ease the tension. She eyed a fork sitting on a plate on top of her dresser. She grabbed hold of it with her fist and raked it down her calf muscle. Angry red marks appeared next to healing pink lines. Her mind blissfully emptied as she watched with quiet fascination scratches appear with every swipe. Tiny droplets of blood appeared—and then the pain hit. She savored it, letting it completely wash over her. In that moment, the emotional pain receded to make way for the physical pain. A numbness filled her mind. She sat on her bed, blissfully unaware.

Moving on autopilot, Maddy slipped on a pair of lightweight pajamas—short sleeves but long pants. She winced when the garment brushed against her legs. After a few minutes of standing indecisively in the middle of her room, she opted to check her e-mail in hopes that maybe her dad had responded to one of her messages.

She sat down at her desk and waited for the computer to boot up. Every time she turned it on, it took longer and longer to load. The piece of junk was on its last leg. One day soon, she would push the power button and nothing would happen.

Then I’ll really be screwed. No TV or electronics in my room.

Maddy made herself quiet the inner dialogue. She refused to let go of the numbing high just yet.

Junk mail was the only thing littering her e-mail inbox. Since she wasn’t in the market for penis-enhancing crème or weight loss supplements, she exited the mail program. She logged onto Facebook and was surprised to see twelve notifications. Her blossoming smile quickly disappeared when she saw the names of the posters. The first notification took her to Sabrina’s wall. The post said: EVERY WORD OUT OF MADDY EASTIN’S MOUTH IS A LIE. SHE’S NOT TO BE TRUSTED. HAVE YOU SEEN THE PAPER, THE NEWS STORIES? SHE’S THE GIRL WHO LIED ABOUT THE TWO GUYS TRYING TO ABDUCT HER. SHE’S A PATHETIC EXCUSE FOR A HUMAN BEING. I TRUSTED HER. I TOOK HER INTO MY INNER CIRCLE AND SHE PLAYED ON MY SYMPATHIES. SHE HAS A SERIOUSLY PATHETIC NEED FOR ATTENTION!

Sabrina had intentionally tagged Maddy, to ensure she’d see the message. The post had twenty-eight comments already. Kids from school were chiming in, telling Sabrina not to be too hard on herself. That she was only trying to be a good friend, and Maddy had taken advantage of her. They were cheering Sabrina on while at the same time shredding Maddy to pieces. Words like “lying bitch” and “scamming whore” were just a couple of the many insults posted about her.

Maddy understood now that Sabrina had never truly been her friend. The girl had only “forgiven” her in the hopes of uncovering some juicy ammunition that could be fired back at her later. Sabrina was a manipulator, and she’d played Maddy like a fine-tuned instrument. In the end, Sabrina had turned this whole thing around to make it look like
she
was the victim—and in return got all the attention.

Maddy’s hand hovered over the mouse as she realized her own Facebook wall would probably be plastered with similar rants. Her heart shouted at her, trying to shield itself from more piercing blows, but her hand refused to cooperate. She clicked on her name and saw message after message, one hateful word after another slamming her character. She got ready to shut off the computer when she noticed a recurring link showing up in the comments. Unable to stop herself, she clicked on the blue text.

The Channel 3 News website popped up on Maddy’s screen. That was the station with the hunky anchorman she liked, Karl Hurly. The site showed an article about Maddy’s attempted abduction and how it had all been a hoax. She was stunned that the story had been posted on the first page, but when she saw that it had attracted a hundred and two comments, she freaked. She scanned them but didn’t see her name anywhere. Instead, hash signs replaced the letters of her name.

That’s right . . . that idiot detective said news organizations can’t legally print my name because I’m underage.

She scrolled to the bottom of the page to start reading the comments from the beginning. Even though they weren’t full of the ugly words posted on Facebook, they hurt just as much. Things like: WHO DOES SHE THINK SHE IS? . . . IF THAT WAS MY DAUGHTER, I’D . . . WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS GENERATION?

A longer comment caught Maddy’s eye. WHO MAKES UP A STORY ABOUT BEING KIDNAPPED? THIS GIRL MUST BE COMPLETELY SELF-ABSORBED TO MAKE UP SUCH A LIE. SHE PUT HER FAMILY THROUGH HELL. I FEEL SO SORRY FOR HER MOTHER.

The comments went on and on. With every new remark, Maddy felt like another weight had been added to her shoulders. The pressure became too much. Something inside her snapped. The idea that complete strangers were idly commenting about her suddenly infuriated her.

Who the hell are they to make assumptions about my life? They don’t know me. They don’t know what I’ve been through.

Maddy’s internal dialogue went into overdrive. Nothing she could do would turn off the bickering chatter inside her head.

What are you going to do about this, Maddy? Are you just gonna take it? . . . Why bother, no one cares what I have to say . . . Stand up for yourself, girl. Tell them to go screw themselves . . . What does it matter anyway? Who would listen to my side of the story? . . . Go on, tell them. Write down everything you’ve been so afraid to say out loud.

Before Maddy lost her courage, she completed the website’s registration form and created a username and password so she could add a comment. Once she started writing, the words seemed to gush out. Her fingers could barely type fast enough to keep up. She told her story from the beginning, explaining what had compelled her to lie and how it had ended—with all the bullying she’d endured both in the classroom and online. When she hit the

“Submit” button, her inner voice finally fell silent.

“Get your head outta your ass, Hank.”

“What? Oh, shit! Sorry, Bill.” Under bright floodlights, Hank had been using a demo saw to cut steel rebar while his coworker Bill held the metal in place. They were sitting on the bridge expansion with nothing but a line of concrete barriers separating them from the cars speeding down the interstate. Hank’s mind had been wandering again, and he’d nearly taken Bill’s finger off when he skipped the saw off the rebar.

“I’m takin’ a break,” Bill said, exasperated. “Get whatever’s in that head of yours straightened out by the time I’m back. This is the second time you’ve almost lopped off a body part.” Bill took off his work gloves and slapped them against his thighs. The air filled with dust. Then he turned and stalked off down the hill, shooting Hank a dirty look over his shoulder.

Hank shook his head, wondering why it was so hard to push away the thoughts that had taken over his mind. They seemed to not only have invaded his dreams, but also his every waking moment. For years, he’d fought against his most primal urges. What was different now? Hank had lost track of how many times in the last week one of his buddies at the job site had caught him staring off into the distance. He knew accidents wouldn’t be tolerated. Hank’s boss was always on the lookout for guys screwing around.

If I don’t get my shit together, the guy will can my ass.

The combination of a wandering mind and cars racing by at seventy miles an hour was a dangerous mixture. Add that to the night shifts Hank would be working through Saturday, and the possibility of an accident increased tenfold. Everyone knew working nights were more dangerous. The later the hour, the drunker the drivers. So far, they’d gone fifty-two days accident-free, but one slip up and the whole job would be shut down during the investigation that was sure to follow. No work meant no paycheck. There wasn’t a guy on the line who could afford to be without steady income, and woe to the one who screwed it up for all of them.

An eighteen-wheeler rushed past. Hank tried to turn from the draft slapping his face, but a small pebble shot across his cheek with the force of a bullet exiting a gun. Hank brushed the side of his face. A thin line of blood spread across his work glove. He stared at the red color soaking into the brown material.

A vision of the gloves he wore as a kid working on the farm came back to him. He remembered how well they had absorbed blood. How, when it dried, you couldn’t even tell what the substance had originally been.

“Son, make sure you take good care of your tools,” Hank could still hear his dad telling him. “Always clean them after running them through a hard day’s work. You be good to them, and they’ll last a lifetime.”

One time when Hank had forgotten to wash his gloves, his dad had smacked him across the face with them. One of the metal embellishments on the glove was bent, and its sharp edge had left a line off blood across Hank’s cheek.

To hammer home the point that “a man’s work gloves were his most basic but important tool,” his dad had made him dig a hole in the backyard until sundown without the benefit of those gloves. For weeks afterward, it was painful to hold anything due to the infected, split blisters on Hank’s palms. A hard lesson to learn, but one he never forgot. Not only were a good pair of rugged gloves a necessity in work and life but so was a keen intellect. Not book smarts though. His dad never put much value in those. But smarts that would serve a man well in life.

Hank had become a student of human behavior. He quickly discovered watching and listening to those around him was a much more useful tool than talking. Learn enough about a person, and you could work that to your advantage well before the time you needed to talk your way out of a situation. That was how he’d survived the Fry household—by adapting to every situation.

Bill climbed the steep embankment and headed back toward him. With an arched eyebrow he asked, “What’s going on in that head of yours, Hank?”

Bill’s face morphed into Earl Fry’s before Hank’s very eyes.

“What’s going on in that head of yours, son?” Earl Fry asked, towering over Hank. The rushing cars disappeared. Hank was back in the barn. He looked down at his hands, expecting to see his work gloves. Instead they were bare and gripping the lock of a cage. He was crouched on the dirt floor.

“Answer me, boy.”

Hank was confused. He felt himself say in a younger voice, “I just wanted a look-see.”

“You sure about that? You wasn’t sneaking in here to let that girl go, were you?”

Hank turned away from his dad and looked into the frightened eyes of a girl hunkered up against the far wall of the type of wire cage meant to hold a large dog. Dad had snatched her right out of a strawberry field in Plant City. With one punch, he’d knocked her out and carried her back to his truck. He’d gloated to his son that no one had seen a thing. He knew her illegal-immigrant parents would never go to the cops for fear of deportation.

The girl’s name was Rosalina, but Hank couldn’t understand anything else of the rapid Spanish that flew out of her mouth. He figured she was pleading with him to set her free, but he had other things in mind. This girl was older than the one he’d seen strapped down on top of his dad’s table weeks earlier. This one actually had breasts instead of just nubs that barely poked out on the other girl. Hank figured she was around fifteen—only a year younger than he was.

“No, sir. I would never let her go. Promise.”

Earl stared hard at Hank. “Well then, you must have been coming in here hoping to have a little fun of your own. That it, boy?”

Hank looked down, embarrassed by the thoughts swirling around in a mind he felt certain his dad could read.

“If you wanna have your own fun, find your own girl. Mine’s off-limits.”

“Hank? Hank?” Bill stood in front of Hank, his arms crossed in front of his barrel chest.

Hank shook his head to clear the memories playing out in front of him like a movie.

Bill clapped his hands together. “Snap out of it, man. What the hell’s wrong with you?”

He stared at Bill, wanting to wipe the look of disdain off the man’s face. Hank took four steps forward, until he was directly in front of the other man. The strong aroma of cigarette smoke was wafting off Bill in waves of stink.

With a low, menacing voice, Hank said, “I think you’ve got it all wrong, Bill. It’s you that’ll have the problem if you don’t get off my ass.”

Bill broke eye contact first. He looked down and shuffled his feet. “Come on, now. You know I was just razzing you. Don’t take offense. I didn’t mean nothing by it.”

“I didn’t think so. Now grab that damn saw. We’ve lost enough time ’cause of your cigs. Next time you need a smoke, don’t make up some bullshit story about me almost cuttin’ off your finger just so you can take a break. You hear me?”