TRIGGER: A Motorcycle Club Romance Novel (2 page)

Cass

“Cass! Git
down’r
bitch!” My father’s voice roared across the apartment.
First, my heart stopped; then, it doubled its beating, and I offered up a quick
prayer.
Please lord let it be quick,
I
said, my lips moving to match the words although I couldn’t say them aloud. I
turned around; Jennie was looking at me with wide eyes. I gave her my best
attempt at a genuine smile.

“
Whatchu
looking like that for,” I said, trying, unsuccessfully, to keep the tremble
from my voice. “He’s just drunk. Nothing’s
gonna
happen.”

“He’s
gonna
hurt you,” Jennie said, her little cheeks turning bright red, her eyes welling
up, lower lip trembling.

“Cass!” my father yelled
again. I hopped up from the desk where I’d been studying.

“Now, you know that’s not
true,” I said. “He’s never touched a hair on my head, or yours.”

“This time…”

“This time is
gonna
be the same as all the others, little J. He’ll huff
and puff and blow himself to sleep.”

As I walked past her, her
grade school work spread out across the little miniature desk that she loved so
much because it looked just like mine, I tousled her hair and leaned down to
kiss the top of her head, taking an extra moment to breath in the sweet smell
of her shampoo. I gained courage from it, from her innocent smell, from knowing
that later, after Pop passed out, I’d comb out her hair and tell her a story
and she’d sleep like a little angel. I didn’t mind, then, taking the brunt of
Pop’s anger, since it
mean
she was spared.

Still, I had to take an
extra deep breath in before entering the kitchen, where Pop’s presence
announced itself in the discordant clanging of pots being thrown about.

“Pop,” I squeaked out,
turning the corner. The noise of metal clanging didn’t make any more sense when
I noticed the steaming bag on the counter: take-out from the chicken place down
the street. Pop turned on his heel, eyes red and big and wild and watery,
slack-jawed and looking as stupid as a newborn baby. I could smell the whiskey
on him from across the room. It seemed the old man actually
sweat
Jack Daniels. The way he looked at
me then, all moonfaced and dumb, you almost felt sorry for the bastard.

If you weren’t too busy
being scared half to death of what he was
gonna
say
to you
this
time.

“Didn’t you see the dinner I
made…” I started to say, pointing one finger towards the note on the top of the
stove, which directed him to look in the oven for the pot pie I’d made him. He
slapped my hand down. It didn’t hurt, but it required him to stumble in closer
to me, and the mere sight of him, larger-than-life and swaying, made me want to
disappear into thin air. I shut my eyes tight.

“I
di’t
,
I
din’it
, you done know I…
get’r
sister…fat BITCH,” he said, spit flying down from his mouth onto my head. “
Git’r
sister’s
dinn’r
, girl.”

“We ate already, Pop,” I
said, knowing that I could argue with him until kingdom come and it wouldn’t
make any difference. Even though he could
see
the plates soaking on the drying rack, he wouldn’t believe it until he saw
it. But I’d already
fed
Jennie. I
didn’t want to make the poor thing eat a second dinner. The last time he’d done
this, demanded to eat all together, “
lik’er
real
fam’y
”, she’d gotten sick and I’d had to hold her hair
back.

My father’s drunken rages
were predictable, which occasionally made them easy. For example, it seemed
that tonight he was on the “we eat dinner together” rant, though it was well
past 8pm.

Sometimes he went on the
“you’re why your mother left” rant. Sometimes, it was “you’ll never get married”
rant, or the “why don’t you have any friends” rant, or the “more trouble than
you’re worth” rant, or the “too dumb to live” rant, or the “spending all my
money” rant
….oh
, the list went on and on, but every
night it was one of them. Same song, pretty much, same old tune with different
lyrics. I was too fat, too ugly, too dumb, too spoiled. I was just a bad, bad
girl, and I’d never be any good. I was the reason he drank, the reason my
mother left, the reason we were poor.

At 18, I’d been listening to
him sing those songs for 10 years. I could repeat them word for word. And I
even believed some of them. Hell, how could I
not
? It was hard enough being a little bit bigger than a lot of my
rich, model-
esque
classmates, hard enough being
nerdy, hard enough never being able to go out on a date or to the movies
because God forbid I left him alone with Jennie.

Having someone tell me that
I was worthless every other night only made those things harder, only made the
things he said seem
more true
. I certainly couldn’t
argue that I
did
have friends, or
that I was pretty or thin. The only thing he said that I knew was dead wrong
was that I was stupid, too stupid to ever make anything of myself. I was set to
graduate at the top of my class. It was the only way I’d be able to go to
college and save Jennie and myself from living under his roof, living out this
nightmare. Soon, Jennie would be old enough for him to start ruining, too…

“
Get’r
!
Fuckin’ stupid cunt, fuck-hic-in’
stupid
bitch,
can’t – hic –
unders’an
som’in
simple,
gon
’ eat
tug
ether
like – hic –
real
fam’ly
!” He screamed, calling me back from my
errant thoughts. I sighed, closing my eyes tight.

There was nothing for it but
to do what he said; some nights, I let him scream and scream until he passed
out on the couch. But that night…no, I didn’t have the energy for it. I glanced
at the clock;
Sabrina the Teenage Witch
would
be on soon, and we could watch that while we ate “dinner”. For some reason, Pop
just loved
Sabrina.
It put him in a
swell mood. He loved the talking cat, thought it was the funniest damn thing
since Mary Tyler Moore. It was easier, that night, just to give in.

“Okay, Pop,” I said. “Do you
want the pot pie or the chicken?”

He swayed, dumbfounded by
the simple question, its complexities surely becoming tangled in his drunken
state.

“Pie,” he finally said,
voice thick and heavy. “Wan’ pie. You girls, your
f’r
the
chick’n
.”

He pushed past me into the
living room. I heard the TV click on; some other sitcom was just ending, it
seemed. I slipped down the hall and into the tiny bedroom I shared with Jennie;
she was staring at the door, waiting for me, eyes wide.

“Jennie,” I said, crouching
down next to her slight frame. “Come have dinner again.”

“But we already…”

“I know, honey, I know,” I
said, taking her hand in mine. “But Pops wants us to eat together. So try,
okay? For me? Try to eat a little bit more?”

“Dee-Dee, I’m not hungry,”
she said, tears welling up again. My heart split in two, seeing her big blue
eyes fill with tears like that. It made me want to kill the bastard out in the
living room.

“I know, baby J, I know, but
you can eat some peas, can’t you? Just a few? Think of it as dessert,” I
coaxed, rising up. She sighed, a sigh that was far too old for her little
lungs, and followed my lead. I poured out two glasses of milk and a beer.

“Take this to Pops,” I said,
handing her the foamy mug. Her little hands barely met around its girth, and
she seemed to be focusing all her attention on not dropping it. Her tongue
poked out the side of her mouth as she stared into the golden drink. I didn’t
really like to think about how I was encouraging Pop’s drinking by giving him more
booze; I only knew that he’d grumble if I tried to give him anything else, and
that the more he drank the quicker he’d pass out.

“
Thas’r
good girl,” I heard him say, loudly. “Jennie, you’re
goodest
– the good – hic – you’re the
goodest
lil
’ girl any – hic –
ol
’ papa
could wan’.”

I cringed. He used to say
those things to me, too. I wasn’t jealous of Jennie – not by a wide margin. I
was terrified for her. Pop
loved
little
kids, always had. But once you got to about nine or ten…well, that’s when
“Thank Heaven for Little Girls” turned into “Bitches
Ain’t
Shit”. At eight, Jennie was fast rounding that awful corner. And I prayed for
her every day. Prayed for her to never look her age. Maybe…

“Hungry!” Pop yelled, and it
snapped me out of my reverie again. No wonder he thought I was stupid; I had to
dive so deep into my own mind whenever I dealt with him, to keep myself safe
from his drunken rants, that I was always a little slow on the uptake.

The bag held one portion of
mashed potatoes and one portion of macaroni and cheese. For whatever reason
eight-year-olds have for anything, Jennie refused to eat macaroni and cheese.
She said it looked like little worms to her. I plopped the mashed potatoes onto
her place, the macaroni and cheese onto mine, divvying up the chicken and peas
as well, giving myself the lion’s share.

Conjuring up all my weekend
waitressing skills, I hurried out of the kitchen holding the three plates and
the two glasses of milk and deftly set them down on the fold out-tables. I took
a few bites of the macaroni and cheese, under my father’s watchful eyes. He
nodded and grunted as I took my fourth bite. The potatoes tasted like nothing,
like buttery cardboard.

“Star’
wi
’
the
chick’n
,” he said, turning to Jennie.
 
She looked up at him, a forkful of peas
halfway to her chin, eyes wide and confused and nervous. “Star’…
wi
’…
chick’n
.”

“I think you should have
some chicken first, Jennie. Don’t you agree? Good idea, Pop,” I said, startling
her with the clarity of my voice in contrast to his slurring.

I had no idea
why
Pop was demanding that Jennie eat
her chicken first, but then again I could count on one hand the things that I
really understood about him. Mostly, he was a confusing mess, but it was better
just to go along with it. Jennie nodded and put down her fork, picking up a
wing in her two tiny hands and taking a nibble that looked to be mostly
breading. I smiled down at her, nodding, and glancing up saw Pop doing the
same.

“Protein ‘s good
f’r
ya
,” he slurred, patting her
heavily on the head, blind to the way she winced at his touch. I ate some more
macaroni and cheese. It tasted a bit strange, but it was better than the
chicken.

Just as I’d thought,
Sabrina
was just starting, a re-run. Pop
stabbed into his pot pie, must have burned his damn tongue shoveling in those
first few
spoonfuls
.
Serves him right,
I thought, thinking of all the horrible trash
that spewed from that mouth. He guffawed at some joke. Bits of food flew across
the air, landing just shy of the TV. I ate a few mouthfuls of peas, feeling
sick from eating so much after already having had dinner.

I looked over at Jennie; her
mouth was working slowly, some small piece of meat or vegetable being chewed
and chewed. Her eyes drifted back and forth from our father to the television
screen. I wanted to eat, to make him happy enough to shut up about it for a
while, but each time I raised the fork to my mouth it was like some invisible
force clamped my lips shut. I felt sick. The world was starting to seem too
bright and too dull all at the same time, my head pounding, my stomach
churning. Pop looked over at me, chewing with his mouth open, eyes angry for
all their drunkenness.

“Eat,” he said. On the TV,
Salem the talking cat was wearing a pinstripe suit and a fedora, playing poker,
or something. My father was finding this insanely funny; his laughter, though,
seemed demonic. The plot line of the show was, strangely, becoming impossible
to follow.

Hemingway’s way of
describing bankruptcy was to say it happened gradually, then suddenly. That was
how it felt when the long, slow, disconnected moments of fog gave way to a
great and terrible sickness.

“Dee-Dee,” I heard Jennie
say, her voice sounding far off and distant. I looked down and was repulsed to
see that I’d thrown up some of the peas onto the front of my shirt; when had
that happened? I couldn’t remember, couldn’t remember when we’d sat down, how
long we’d been on that couch, it felt like forever, it felt like hell, it felt
like hell….