The Bullet List (The Saving Bailey Trilogy, #1) (19 page)

“Clad, I’m scared to go back to school,” she says.

“God, Bailey, If I could take away all your pain and worry, I would. But the reality is I can’t, and you are bound to be scared no matter what I say.”

“You are right. Just hold me, that’s all I want from you right now. I feel like I might fall apart.”

“I will hold you together. And, Bailey, it isn’t a bad idea to fight back for once. Miemah could benefit from a decent pummeling.”

“I can’t fight her, she is indestructible,” she says, bowing her head.

“She is only human, Bailey. Her bones break as easily as yours do.”

“Are you suggesting I break her bones?” she asks with a crooked smile.

“I’m just saying, it might be a thought. You are bigger than her…and feistier. You could take her.”

“You think I’m feisty?” she asks.

“Yes,” I say earnestly.

“You are clever, and fierce. You can do anything you put your mind to, even if that thing is demolishing Miemah,” I say. “
Be a wrecking ball
.”

She pets Angel and stares off into space, deep in thought. I can hear the faucet dripping in the kitchen, and the grumble of her stomach. I exhale sharply to bring her back down to Earth, but she is gone, frozen in a different dimension.

“Bailey, what are you thinking about?” I say after the silence becomes agonizing.

“About how good it would feel to kill Miemah,” she says, and stares down at her hands, which have begun to tremble.

Chapter 25

Clad’s kiss is fresh in my mind when I open my eyes to the dull light that is making its way through the window above the couch.
Bliss
: it’s like my heart stopped, and restarted as Clad’s lips left mine. I almost let him undress me, almost let him go further, he would have if I hadn’t gotten sick.
How far would we have gone?

“You sure look cheerful this morning,” Mom comments, while sipping a glass of orange juice and reading her Alcoholics Anonymous book.

“It’s like a bible for alcoholics,” I say, of the blue leather binding on her book.

“That’s why I’m reading it on Sunday morning,” she says. “How does your head and arm feel?”

“My head and arm?” I ask, forgetting of the recent pain they have caused me.

“I guess that answers that,” she says.

“I don’t feel a thing. This medicine is great, what is it again?”

“Vicodin,” she says.

“It will be a bitch to wean yourself off of. We will both be detoxing at the same time.”

“How long do I take it?”

“A week.”

Angel is awake and stumbling around in my blankets.

“He is hungry,” I say, and scoop him into my arms to cuddle.

“Then let him down, he has a bowl of food underneath the table,” Mom says.

I kiss him between the eyes, and set him on the rug. All night he kept my stomach warm, and my thoughts from wandering too far into the darkness.

“Spencer said he would come by today,” I say and sit bolt upright. “Maybe I will play soccer with Sarah…”

“I don’t think that is a good idea, Bailey. You are still recovering.”

“I feel fine,” I argue.

“You need to stay in bed for a while.”

“I don’t want to. I feel peachy. I could definitely kick a ball around,” I say, and flex my legs to show her they are in working order.

“Don’t argue with me, Bailey,” she says, her eyes flashing me a warning. The removal of her booze has shortened her fuse to almost nothing.

“I am well, Mom. I will play soccer if I want,” I say, regretting the sentence, as soon as it leaves my mouth.

“No, you will not,” she says, and slams her book closed. “Why do you have to argue everything I say?”

“I guess I just don’t respect you anymore,” I say honestly. But my mom
doesn’t like honesty
. Her eyes flicker, and I feel my cheek burning.

“How can I respect someone who doesn’t even respect themselves?” I say, digging myself into a deeper hole. I will kick myself later for my audacity, but right now it feels amazing, leaves me feeling as light and wispy as angel wings.

“Excuse you?” she says, getting up from her chair.

“It is the truth. No one is paying me to lie to you.”

“If my mom was here, she would have back handed you for talking like that!”

“Is that who you want controlling your daughter? Your abusive mother? You want her to reign over you till the day you die?” I say, my voice rising. The back of her hand is ready to come down hard on my temple, but I grab it first.
Be a wrecking ball
, rings in my ears.

“No, Mom, you will
not
hit me,” I say, forcefully pushing her hand back. “Lock me in my room, lecture me on how I should be more respectful, or kick me out, but don’t you ever lay another hand on me again, or you will be in prison keeping Dad company.”

Mom withdraws. “Get out of here,” she scoffs.

“Gladly,” I say. I shove my feet into my boots, and saunter out the door.

I won
.

I won
.

No one can touch me. I am like fire, and she is ice.

I hurry down the stairs, skipping two or three steps at a time.
I need to run
. My feet skid on the asphalt when I jump from the third to first step, and I take off down the road.

My heart is pumping overtime, and my brain is spinning like a whirly amusement park ride. I am passing cars, everything becoming a blur as I run.

I have finally gotten somewhere with Mom. She did not get to hit me.
It’s not the alcohol
, I realize with a shock.
It never has been
.

I arrive in front of the Goodwill, staring at myself in the shiny black paint of Spence’s truck.
Decent
, I think.
Made up enough to go inside a thrift store, anyway.

I open the door, and the bell chimes that a customer has come inside. I get the feeling that it hasn’t been ringing much today, because Spencer rushes from the back with such vivacity that he trips over his own feet.

“Good morning, you’re early. Sarah and I were going to come to your house later.”

“I had to leave,” I say, rubbing my arm shyly. “Mom made me.”

“Did she? What happened?”

“Nothing. I didn’t let anything happen.” Tears of victory spring into my eyes,
Mom did not hit me
.
Mom will not hit me
.

“I’m proud of you,” he says.

“Thank you,” I say, blushing, because I don’t know what to do with myself. I have never stood up to someone like I did with Mom this morning, and to have Spencer’s support means the world to me.

“I was going to do this later, but now seems like the perfect time,” he says.

“Do what?”

“Follow me to the back,” he says, not answering my question.

“But first, grab those plates,” he instructs me, pointing at mismatched ceramic plates on his worktable.

I pick them up, and stare at him, waiting to be told what to do next.

“You’re making me work? Am I getting paid?”

“No, come with me outside.”

Why so serious?
I want to ask.

We step outside and are met with a gloomy grey sky. “It’s gross out,” I say.

He nods his head.

I have resorted to commenting on the weather?
Suddenly things seem awkward between Spencer and I.

“Read them,” he says, and smiles at the ground.

“Read what?” I too stare at the ground.

“The plates honey. Read the plates.”

I sift through them, and a warm feeling rushes through me, like I am drinking cocoa on a cold winter’s day.

“
Anger, hate, abuse, loss, bullied,
” I read each word aloud and my whole body tremors. “They describe everything I have felt, everything I am.
Five little words
.”

“Why?” I ask, my voice breaking.

“I want to help you, Bailey. I have been thinking on how to unload all this baggage off you. And this is my solution. God, I hope it works.”

“Now what?”

“Break them.”

I stare at the one that reads
abuse
. On it, there is an intricate portrait of a happy little home, a cabin like from the 1800s, when times were simpler. This is the happy little home I wish I lived in, that I had always dreamt of, everything I have never had but always wanted. I toss it and it hits the dumpster, shattering in a fireworks display of ceramic.
The happy little home in pieces
.

“How did that feel?” Spencer asks, as I pick up the one that reads
anger
, and chuck it.

Release the feelings, Bailey
.

I pick up the one that reads
bullied
, and right then, Spencer hands me a hammer. I break it slowly, torturously, because this is what abuse does to you: chisels away at you until you break and splinter into a million pieces. Angry tears are spilling over my cheeks.

Hate
. Hate can tear a person apart like a semi truck running over a puppy. I get on my knees and break it by bashing it into the concrete,
over, and over again,
the rim chips, until finally a spider web of cracks form and it is shattered in my hands.

“Let me help you with this one,” Spencer says, handing me
loss
. There is an angel on it, a handsomely decorated Christmas plate.

“I can’t,” I say, and hug the plate to my chest.

“You have to,” he says, and gently pries it from my grasp.

“I can’t let him go.”

“If you don’t, you can never heal,” he says, raising the hammer. “What are the chances you will get to see him again?”

“Slim,” I say, and wince as he lowers the hammer, chipping the angel’s face.

“What did he do?”

“Killed Jack,” I exhale.

“Will Jack come back?”

“Not a chance,” I say soberly.

“Then I think it is time to let go of both of them, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I sigh, and take the hammer from him.

“I have another,” he says.

We both go at the plate together. I have not lost something, but gained a new friendship, another truss for support.

“I know things seem bleak now, but you’ll see the sun will rise, and the birds will sing again. The world stops for no man.”

We cut our hands as we carelessly pick up the sharp broken pieces, and dump them in the trash. We both have blood running down our wrists.
Never has someone joined in my suffering.

“Do you feel at least somewhat better?” he asks.

“No. I feel
tons
better,” I say, relief washing over me as I come to terms with what I have let go of, and what I have gained in return. “Clad is wrong about you. He thinks you only like me because you miss Lydia, but I think you like me, because you feel I am worth saving.”

“If you saw a rose dying, would you trample it, or water it?”

“I would give it sunlight and good soil,” I say.

“And then it would turn out to be the prettiest rose you ever saw,” Spencer says.

Spencer and I enter the flickering fluorescent light of the back room; he straightaway fishes out a wet dish-towel, and wipes the blood from my hands and wrists.

“I’m sorry about your hands,” he says.

“Don’t be, these are cuts I’m glad to have.”

“Why is that?” he asks, wiping his own hands of blood.

“Because I got them with you.”

“Awe shucks, Bailey. You are the sweetest,” he says, and we both giggle.

“Can I tell you anything Spence?” I ask, as our giggles die down.

“ ’Course. What do you want to tell me?”

“Promise you won’t be mad?”

“Promise, Bailey, spit it out.”

“I kissed Clad yesterday,” I say, my words nervously running together.

“I see,” he says, and grimaces as he rubs his cuts in the wrong direction, exposing the red flesh underneath the blood. “Did you enjoy kissing Clad?” he asks, his voice insistent.

I think about it, and think hard, because I don’t want to answer incorrectly.

“I am not sure,” I say honestly. “Something in the back of my head kept holding me back. Like, it was wrong to be kissing him. Is that how it should feel?”

“Not if you two truly love each other,” he says.

“We have been friends for a very long time; maybe that is why the kiss seemed wrong.”

“That should have nothing to do with it; you should feel most comfortable expressing your love to someone who cares about you, right?”

“Why you gotta’ be the wise owl?” I ask.

“’Cause you keep playing the role of the turkey.”

We both snort with laughter.

“A turkey?” I guffaw.

“Yeah, you would drown in the rain if I wasn’t here to rescue you. You would drown in your own tears.”

I smile at him, the corners of my mouth tilting to the ceiling.

“Let’s go to my house, turkey. It’s time for my lunch break,” he says, grinning, and puts his arm around my waist, leading me out the door.

“Look at that,” he says.

I squint as the sun shines too brightly in my eyes; I can hear a bird chirping nearby.

Chapter 26

“You remember Bailey, don’t you Mom?” Spencer says as he re-introduces me to his mother, who is stirring a pitcher of homemade lemonade.

“Yes! How could I forget such beautiful eyes,” she says, and winks at me.

“Thank you,” I say, tracing the tile with my foot.

“That and how you don’t shut up about her, in your sleep,” she says to Spence.

“You sleep talk?” I ask Spencer, and his face flushes red. “About me?”

“Gee, Mom, you really know how to help me out with the ladies,” he says.

“Oh, as if you need any help. You are such a charmer, why you could charm a snake out of hiding if you had to,” Spencer’s mom says.

I have stepped out of the conversation, and busy myself with examining their refrigerator door. I have always thought that a person’s refrigerator is the key to their soul. There are wallet-sized school pictures of Spencer and Sarah and faded crayon drawings of dogs and trees, held on by ABC magnets. On my refrigerator, there are two things: a Smirnoff vodka magnet, and beneath the magnet, a coupon for Charmin toilet paper.

“I look like a dork right?” Spencer says, leaning his arm on my shoulder, and pointing to a picture of him with bucked teeth, freckles, and a shaved head.

“Adorable,” I say.

Sarah come’s galloping in, soccer ball under her arm, face pink from exertion. “Please tell me you will play today?” she asks, and spins the ball on her finger.

“I’m dying to!” I say, and snatch the ball from her.

“Try and catch me!” I yell as I fly through the door, and down their driveway.

“Wow,” she breathes, as she chases me up and down the road.

“Come on, Sarah, got to be faster than that if you want the ball!”

My shoe-lace comes untied and gets caught underneath my boot. I face plant it on the road, shells, and pebbles digging into my skin.

Sarah is trying without much luck to contain hysterical laughter as she helps me up.

“I’m usually more graceful,” I say, and toss her the ball.

“That fall was the epitome of grace, Bailey.”

“I hope Spencer didn’t see,” I say with an off-kilter smile, and pick gravel out of my hands.

“No, he is inside with Mom, making sandwiches. Come on; show me how well you can kick.” She kicks the ball to me, and I let it roll to a stop before I kick it far above her head, and we both watch it sail through the sky.

“Okay, you can kick well,” she says, hands on her hips.

“Want to see what else I can do?” I ask, feeling alive with energy.

“Yes, but does it involve seducing my brother? Because if so, I think you got that under wrap!”

“No, watch me,” I say.

I do two flips in the air, stopping only because I might hit Spence’s truck.

“I can do a cart wheel,” she says, shrugging. She flips in the grass once, and falls on her butt. “I used to be able to,” she says.

She stays lying stretched out in the grass, like a little caterpillar, her neck craned, surveying the landscape. “It’s a beautiful day out, reminds me of Lydia,” she says, her voice faltering.

I plop down next to her, and pick out a handful of grass, then sprinkle it over her knee. “Spencer told me about her in the hospital, well actually he told Clad. He thought I was knocked out, but I remember him talking about her.”

“Did you love her too?” I ask.

“Yes, I did. My whole family did. Even my dad,” she says, and wipes a tear away. “She never played soccer with me though; she would just sit up there, on the front porch singing with Spencer.”

“Lydia, would belt out a tune, and weave flowers together; she would make a crown for her head. Then one day she lost her hair, from the chemo. Pulled it out in tufts, and Spencer had to hold her to make her stop crying.”

“She had such pretty hair,” Sarah says.

My throat is tightening around every comforting word I think to say.
Lydia was a goddess to Spencer and his sister; I hate to think what I am.

“Spencer isn’t over her. Don’t think he ever will be,” she says, brushing the grass off her pants.

“I’m so sorry, Sarah. I’m a sad excuse for a replacement.”

Her eyes flicker at me. “A replacement?”

“I-I,” I stumble with my words, scared that I have said the wrong thing.

“Spencer likes you because you are not Lydia,” she says, the cheeriness returning to her voice. “If you reminded him of Lydia, he would be trying to stay away from you, not get closer. It would hurt too much.”

I hold her hand. “Sarah, she is with you still.”

“How do you know it?” she sniffles.

“I can feel it.” I squeeze her hand tighter.

“I feel her too,” she says, her gaze falling on a batch of pink and yellow pansies, being choked by weeds.

“Those are her flowers. The weeds tried to kill them and they still live, stubborn as can be.”

Spencer raps a spoon against the door and hollers “Soup’s on!” at us.

“No more crying,” I say, and quickly wipe away her tears. “You’ll make Spencer sad.”

She nods, and we trek up the hill of crabgrass, hand in hand.

There is a tray of turkey sandwiches, and a pitcher of lemonade set out on a blanket for us. The three of us sit crisscross and chew on large bites of the thick sandwiches piled with onions, tomatoes, and avocado
. I could be eating my brother, or cousin,
I kid myself as I eat.

“Thank you Mrs.…” I say, as Spencer’s mom comes out to fill up the pitcher with more lemonade.

“Mrs. Wild.”

“Awesome last name,” I titter.

“Bailey Wild,” Spencer says.

“It has a nice ring to it doesn’t it?” Sarah says.

“It is pretty, Bailey is such a unique name,” Mrs. Wild says.

“Mom, what’s that smell?” Sarah says, breathing in deeply.

“Smells like cookies,” I say.

“It is, I baked cookies for desert!” Mrs. Wild exclaims. “I have to take them out of the oven before they burn!” She skitters to the kitchen, her long bohemian skirt swaying behind her.

“Your mom is so nice,” I say, and Spencer nearly chokes on his sandwich.

“She can be,” he says, dislodging the blob of food from his esophagus.

“I think that she could tone it down a bit,” he says and picks a flower from one of the many rose bushes dotted along his house. Spencer is tearing off the petals when his mom returns with a plate of steaming chocolate chip cookies.

“Oh don’t ruin the flowers! Spence!” she scolds him, and takes the damaged flower from his hand. “You act like a little boy sometimes.”

“Lydia used to gather the petals of a flower in her palm, and then she would blow them at my face,” he says, blowing the petals at me. They flutter down in a shower of pink and white, landing in my hair and lap. “There, that looks nice,” he says, pleased with himself.

“Take a cookie, Bailey; take as many as you want,” his mom says, laying one in my open palm.

“Thank you, Mrs. Wild,” I say and nibble it at the edges.

“Call me B.B.,” she says, and hands me a napkin.

“Okay, B.B.,” I say.

“Bailey, can I talk to you about something?” she says, her voice gentle as if she were talking to a toddler.

I lick the chocolate off my fingers. “What about?”

“Your mom,” she says, squatting down so we are at eye level.

I look at Spencer, alarmed.

You told
, I mouth to him.

“Mom! She wasn’t supposed to know I told you! What the hell are you thinking?” he yells at her.

“Don’t use that kind of language in front of the girls! I had to say something. I’m a mother, I can’t let a child slip through my fingers, even if she isn’t my child.”

“I’m not your child! You are correct about that! And you have no right to talk about my mother,” I say bitterly.

“Oh hush, all I wanted to say is that if things ever become too rough at home, you are welcome to come here, anytime.”

“Oh,” I say regretting my harshness.

“I’m sorry about your mom, Bailey, and you know what? I think she really loves you; there is a bond between a mother and daughter that can’t be severed. She carried you in her belly for nine months; you were a part of her before she even knew what you looked like.”

“I know she loves me,” I say, and put my cookie down, my appetite gone.

“I think she is a little confused, maybe lost. It’s not your fault she hits you, she just needs a little direction.”

“Yes,” I say, and it feels like a rock is lodged in my throat.

“You are welcome here always, okay?”

She gives me a hug, and my cookie falls on the sidewalk. The petals loosen from my hair, and fall into her golden locks.

“I’ll let you three finish up. I am going to get a plate of cookies ready for you to take home with you Bailey. Your mom would like some fresh-baked cookies, wouldn’t she?”

“Sure she would,” I say, and pick up my cookie, now covered by a small army of red ants.

I watch her moccasin-clad feet as they scrape over the welcome mat and a feeling of belongingness enters me.
I am welcome
.

“I’m sorry I told,” Spencer says and hands me a fresh cookie. “Peace offering?”

“Don’t be sorry. I needed to hear that.”

For every bad person like Miemah, there are countless good ones, I realize. For every splinter of lost hope, there is a sea full of dreams, and for every dreary day there is a sun to light the sky, and chase away the despair.

“Here, take this home with you,” B.B. says after she returns, and thrusts a plate of saran-wrapped cookies in my hands.

“Thank you,” I say, standing up. I bend down to kiss her cheek. She is short, shorter than Sarah, but in her small body she holds so much wisdom and passion. She is momma owl, and I can tell who Spencer gets his knowledgeable ways from.

“I’m going to drive her home, and then go back to work, Ma,” Spencer says, and gives her a parting hug.

“You really like my mom, huh?” he asks once we are in the truck.

“She is a great mother. I would trade her for mine in a heartbeat.”

“No you wouldn’t,” he says, and puts the truck in gear. “Don’t say that.”

“I mean it though,” I say.

“You only get one mom, don’t take her for granted.”

I can hardly believe he is telling me to not take Mom for granted, when that is what she has been doing to me for years.

I climb down from the truck, and look to see if Mom is home. There are four indentations in the dirt and gravel where her car usually sits.

“Good bye,” Spence says, and backs his truck from the lot.

“Good bye!” I shout at him as he zips down the road.

“Let the fun begin,”
I say to myself.

I push my face against the glass of the living room window, and see the house is as clean as a hospital.
It is safe again
. I step inside, and put the plate of cookies on the counter. I pop the top off the bottle of pills that Mom has strategically placed on the table, so I would not forget to take it. I drop four pills in my mouth in the hopes that a double dose will knock me out.

I strip myself down to my bra and underwear and stretch out on the couch, my arms above my head and my feet atop the arm rest. Angel scrambles up and kneads his tiny paws into my stomach, circling to find a comfortable spot to lie.

“Hey, boy,” I say, and scratch his head. “Will you keep me company while I sleep?”

He yawns, exposing the insides of his pink cave-like mouth.

My chest rises beneath him, like the roll of a gentle ocean, and my quiet breathing eases him into a land of dreams. I imagine his heart fusing with mine, and our bodies becoming one, his soul diminishing the darkness that has stalked my mind for years.

There is a knock at the front door, no, a
pounding
. A rapping that sends a chill down my spine as it pulls me out of a paralyzed state, brought on by the Vicodin. Angel bounds off the couch, and barks towards the door. I sloth to the door, and open it not remembering that I am undressed.

“Hey, Bailey! Oh, where are your clothes? Is this a bad time?” Alana asks and looks over my shoulder.

“There never is a good time for you to come knocking on my door,” I say, and motion for her to come in.

“You and clothes must have a bad relationship,” she says, and puts a gaudy-looking basket of food on the coffee table. “For your birthday.”

“You’re a little late,” I say. I sit back down on the couch and she stays standing, close to the door.
Good, I will probably be kicking her out soon anyway.
“You never came to see me.”

“I’m really sorry about that, Bailey! I just couldn’t, not after I saw you in the locker room, battered and bleeding. I thought that it would be too traumatic to see you hooked up to machines, and wrapped in gauze like a mummy.”

“That’s the story you’re going with?” I ask, taking a bag of Doritos from the basket.

“It’s not a story, Bailey it is the truth. It is much better this way; you are practically healed aren’t you?”

I crack a chip in two between my front teeth. “You could say that.”

“I wanted to see you, really, but it would be too much for me. I hope you can understand.”

“I understand,” I say nonchalantly. “Is that all?”

“Is this Angel? Clad told me about him at school. Cute puppy.” She gets on her knees to pet him.

My heart speeds up. “Don’t touch him!” I scream, as if he is a bomb ticking away on the carpet.

“Wows, Bailey, I was just going to pet him,” she says, floored by my reaction. “You sure are uppity now.”

“I don’t want you petting him.”

“Yeah, why not?” she asks through clamped jaws.

“Because you didn’t have the decency to check up on me when I was lying in an unfamiliar bed, in an unfamiliar room, alone with my hallucinations.”

“You are such a bitter bitch,” she says, stomping one foot in frustration.

“I am bitter, but I’m no bitch. Would you not be bitter if someone tried to kill you?”

“I would get over myself, build a bridge and get over it, Bailey. I told you my reason for not visiting.”

“I don’t think our friendship is the same as it used to be,” I say, and put the bag of chips on the table. They have begun to taste like cardboard in my mouth.