“Dinner’s ready,” Uncle Tex boomed.
I set aside my MP3, rol ed off the bed and headed out of the room.
* * * * *
It was late. Uncle Tex and I had eaten our blanketed pigs and macaroni and cheese. Later, we had some cookies and cream ice cream. Even later, after-dinner drinks of Uncle Tex’s moonshine.
We finished watching Letterman and I got up from the couch and said, “I’m going to bed.”
I looked down at Uncle Tex. He had the phone (a rotary phone, by the way, its cord strung across the living room) sitting on his lap and he was glaring at it so hard I thought laser beams were going to shoot from his eyes and burn it to cinders.
“‘Night,” I said when he didn’t answer.
He looked up at me.
“He’s gonna cal .”
I smiled at him. Even I knew it was a sad smile.
I’d had a short conversation with Nancy, but I figured she’d soon be family, so she’d be safe. Eddie had cal ed again, so had Indy. I didn’t talk to either of them.
Hank had not cal ed.
I knew what it meant. I’d known it even before I went on my date with him.
It was dark in my room, he couldn’t see me last night, battered face, bruised body, but he knew. He could smel it on me. He dealt with people like Bil y every day. I was Bil y’s girl, even if it was once upon a time.
Hank didn’t want that stink in his bed.
I bent down and kissed the top of Uncle Tex’s head again.
“He’s gonna f**kin’ cal ,” Uncle Tex growled.
I touched his shoulder and walked away.
I got into the bed and lay there for a while.
Then I got out my MP3 player and found the song.
I listened to “Because the Night” from Springsteen’s Live 1975/85 box set.
Then I listened to it again.
On the third time around, I started crying. Not huge wracking sobs, even with the paper-thin wal s, Uncle Tex would never hear me.
Then I shut off my player, wiped my face on my pil ow and went to sleep.
Chapter Eleven
Pretend World of Bubble Gum Goodness
I rol ed out of bed feeling better than I had the day before, the aches and pains were subsiding.
The mirror in the bathroom showed me another gruesome concoction of bruising colors on my face but at least they were fading. The marks around my neck, arms and wrists were stil visible but not nearly as angry.
I wandered into the kitchen, poured myself a cup of coffee and saw Uncle Tex’s note saying that he’d gone to work and would be home around one.
I was wandering back to my bedroom, having visions of a morning spent performing more musical self-torture, when I glanced sideways out the picture window in Uncle Tex’s living room, and stopped dead at what I saw, coffee cup arrested halfway to my lips.