“Is something missing?” he asked, crossing the room to check the windows and opening the bedroom doors to look inside.
I glanced around and felt a shiver creep across my skin.
“No. It doesn’t look like it.”
Caleb checked the bathroom. When he came back into the room he shook his head. “Everything looks secure. Are you sure someone has been in here?”
Fear tickled my spine and I folded my arms across my chest. It sounded crazy, even when I could see nothing had been moved or taken. I just knew someone had been inside the apartment when we were out.
That’s when I saw it.
Or should I say, didn’t see it.
The meatloaf.
After burning it, I had left it on the counter to cool while we were out. But the meatloaf wasn’t there and after looking around the kitchen, I found it in the garbage bin.
“Are you sure you didn’t put it in there before we left?” Caleb asked.
Was I?
“I’m sure,” I said. But even as the words left my mouth I started to doubt myself. Had I thrown it out and just forgotten? I was preoccupied, so it was a possibility.
Caleb checked the window overlooking the kitchen and it wasn’t locked. It lifted up, and a cool breeze blew in from outside. We looked at each other. Someone could’ve easily gained entry by climbing through it.
But why break in to throw away a burnt meatloaf?
That would have to be the weirdest MO ever.
“Where do you keep your spare change?” he asked. “If it’s missing, we’ll know someone has been in here. Thieves aren’t going to leave any available cash behind.”
I kept my change in a pottery dish on the coffee table. The few dimes and nickels were still there, but my necklace, the one Autumn’s mom had given me for Christmas a few years ago, was missing. And I distinctly remembered taking it off that afternoon and placing it in the dish.
My necklace is missing,” I said. “It’s a silver Tree of Life symbol surrounded by a circle of diamonds. I took it off and put it in there this afternoon because it kept snagging on my collar.”
After checking my bedroom dresser, my jewelry box, and in the bathroom, there was no doubt it was gone. I looked at Caleb and couldn’t hide the worry from my face.
“Someone has definitely been in here,” I said, shakily. And they had deliberately thrown the meatloaf in the trash to let me know they had been. “Do you think it was Amy?”
He shook his head. “Not after the scare she got when three men in Kings of Mayhem cuts rode up on bikes and demanded all your stuff back.”
“Then if it wasn’t her,” I couldn’t hide my panic. “Who broke into my apartment and why?”
HONEY
I lay frozen in my bed. My body stiff with fear. My limbs so rigid I thought they might snap. I heard the sound of glass breaking, more yelling, and then sobbing. It was my mom. She was crying again. Because he was hurting her over and over. With his words. And then with his fists. I wanted to go to her. To help her. But the last time I stood up to him I’d felt the back of his hand on my face and the cut from the skull ring on his finger. It had sliced into me and given me a cut on my cheek that needed five stitches. Mom had cried and told me she was sorry. But still she invited him back into the house the very next day when he turned up with a bottle of liquor for her and a stupid stuffed toy for me.
Now they were at it again.
I pulled the quilt over my head and pressed my palms over my ears.
When the air was gone and I needed to resurface for fresh air, I pulled the quilt down, and to my horror came face to face with the man who’d tortured my mom and me for the last six months.
Mom’s boyfriend.
He was standing over my bed, smoking his cigarette and looking down at me.
“No,” I breathed, terrified.
I could see it in his face. The gleam in his eyes. The energy radiating off him. I squeezed my legs together. I knew what he was there for and it terrified me. I was twelve and just waking up to what that look meant in the eyes of boys and men. I was well developed for my age. Mrs. Butler, our neighbor, said I was blooming.
Whatever it was, I hated it. Because it made boys and grown men look at me with that very look in their eyes.
“Go away,” I demanded, shaking.
He just sucked on his cigarette and grinned, evilly. I could see the sweat beading on his forehead and dribbling past his temples, and when he smiled, his teeth were yellow. He snickered and flicked his cigarette onto the carpet. When his hands clamped over my mouth, I could smell nicotine and grease. I tried to fight. I screamed. I kicked. I fought with all my might, but it was no use. He was stronger and easily overpowered me. He held me down and stuck his disgusting mouth on mine. I thrashed. I snapped my head from side to side.