Jessica

 

For the first time in months, Jessica liked what she saw when she looked in the mirror. Her big green eyes stood out from her pale skin, aided by the dark eyeliner she’d traced them with earlier, and her lips looked fuller than ever due to the dark red lipstick she’d bought earlier today and put on just a minute ago. She looked like she was actually alive, rather than sleepwalking like she’d been doing for so many months. Who’d have guessed that a simple blind date would have made her feel so good about herself? The guy hadn’t even shown up yet, and she still felt a little thrill of excitement run up her spine. When she ran into her old high school buddy, Dara, at the grocery store earlier in the week, she’d cursed herself for agreeing to this whole deal. Dara apparently knew the nicest guy in town, Saul something-or-other. He was a botanist, which meant that no matter what his personality was, he’d be a lot calmer and easier to deal with than the last man in her life, Gary.

 

Her doorbell rang. Jessica exhaled heavily and smiled at herself in the mirror. I can do this. I got this. I haven’t lost anything. I can still date and have fun and be a regular person, she said to herself, straightening her tight black dress before walking over to the door to greet her date. “Hey, nice to meet you, I’m Jessica!” she said as she opened the door, revealing an average-looking middle-aged guy in ill-fitting clothes. She hid her disappointment as best she could, even though she had to admit to herself she was picturing somebody a little more dashing when she fantasized earlier in the day about the date.

 

“Wow, you look great,” Saul said, clearing his throat loudly as he looked up and down her body, clearly ogling her ample curves.

 

“Uh, thank you,” Jessica said, feeling a bit awkward. “Shall we get going? I figured we’d go to the Thai place you suggested in your texts earlier.”

 

“Right, come on,” Saul said, holding out his hand for Jessica to take. She stared down at it for a long moment before she realized that things would get weird and uncomfortable very fast if she didn’t accept it. Fuck, I can do this. I got this, she coached herself internally before grabbing Saul’s hand, faking another smile for his benefit as he led her to his car.

 

His hand felt sweaty and kind of small against hers, but she forced herself not to think about it. This is what people did on dates, right? Normal people, people without weird traumatic relationship histories. They held hands and made awkward small talk and ate dinner and maybe had sex if the mood was right. Maybe she’d even get laid tonight, even if she wasn’t interested in Saul as a romantic option. She hadn’t had sex in several weeks – since before the break-up with Gary – and her body was a little hungry for it, thirsting for another person’s rough touch. That’s what I’ll do, she decided as they rolled to a stop in front of the restaurant Saul had picked out. I’ll just fuck him for fun, that way there’s no pressure to make me actually like him. It’d been so long since she’d had sex with somebody who wasn’t Gary— about ten years, in fact, back when she was 16 or 17 years old. She needed to do it tonight, if only to prove to herself that she was capable of it. Gary doesn’t own me, she thought as she stepped out of the car, smiling as seductively as she could at Saul. I can do what I want, with whomever I want.

 

But before they could walk into the restaurant, two men in dark clothing stepped in front of them, smirking meanly at Saul. “What’s the matter, fellas?” Saul asked, clutching a little tighter onto Jessica’s hand.

 

It took Jessica a few moments to recognize them, but then it hit her. They were Nightwalkers, members of Gary’s MC. Before she could even open her mouth to tell them to fuck off and leave her alone, one of them reached forward and yanked Saul out of her grasp, immediately pounding him into the ground.

 

“Stop! Stop it!” Jessica yelled, jumping on the back of the first Nightwalker, punching his sides until he threw her off, sending her sliding against the rough gravel of the parking lot. Shit, she thought as she saw blood pool up on her knees.

 

The other Nightwalker offered her his hand to help her up, but she just glared at him and got to her feet herself. “Just stay out of this, sweetheart,” the Nightwalker said, gesturing over to where his comrade was punching Saul repeatedly in the face. “You’ll only make this worse.”

 

“Gary sent you here, is that it?” Jessica said, brushing the dirt and grime off her now-bloody knees.

 

The Nightwalker didn’t reply verbally, but his sheepish smile told her all that she needed to know. Fucking Gary. Of course that motherfucker had heard that she was on a date, and there was no way he could just let that pass without ruining it for her. She crossed her arms and watched as the Nightwalkers kicked and punched at Saul, turning him into a bloody pulp right before her very eyes. But she knew not to get involved yet. These guys weren’t above hitting a woman, even if she was “Gary’s girl,” his own personal property according to everyone in this godforsaken town.

 

“All right, all right, that’s enough!” she finally yelled when Saul went still and stopped resisting. “I think he gets the message, okay? Date ruined, guys. Mission accomplished. Get the fuck out of here,” she said to the Nightwalkers.

 

The one who attacked Saul first and fucked up Jessica’s knees reached down and grabbed Saul by the collar, shaking him awake so he could properly threaten him. “You get out of town. Tonight. It’s your punishment for touching shit that doesn’t belong to you. Don’t let Gary ever hear about you again, or you’ll learn that this is just an appetizer. Don’t make us feed you the main course.”

 

Jessica rolled her eyes at the flimsy metaphor before walking over and helping Saul stumble to his feet. “Come on, give me your car keys. I’ll get you to the hospital,” she said, wincing under Saul’s weight until she successfully deposited him in the passenger’s seat of his car.

 

On the ride to the emergency room, Saul didn’t talk to her at all. Maybe it was just because he was too injured to move and not because he thought she was responsible for this whole mess; but either way she couldn’t blame him.

 

She was poison. She had been ever since Gary first put his dirty hands on her, and she’d never be free. Not really. He’d always be waiting in the shadows, ready to infect anything and everything in her life. There was no escape.

 

No, fuck that, Jessica thought as she dropped Saul off at the emergency room curb and parked his car in the hospital garage. I’m tough. I’m tougher than he thinks. He doesn’t get to control me. He doesn’t get to boss me around. I could leave tomorrow and go someplace else, some town or city or state or country where Gary has no power at all. The only issue was the money. She didn’t have the cash to blow out of town without help, and the only person in town who could help her was Gary himself, and clearly that wasn’t going to happen. Her job at Sully’s, the bar attached to the Nightwalkers’ compound, just didn’t pay enough to let her pay her rent and buy food and plan for a future. Not to mention the fact that working at Sully’s gave Gary constant access to her. He knew her schedule. He knew what she was wearing, what her mood was, who she was talking to. There was no way to get out from under his thumb without leaving her job behind.

 

Jessica dug her phone out of her purse, originally intending to call a cab or otherwise phone her friend Macie to get a ride back to her apartment, but then another idea struck her. Tonight was the last straw. Gary would just continue to push and push and push into her life until they were back together. Not again, she swore to herself. I’m not going back to him again. I’m finished with him. I have to be. She had to tell him that she was done, for real this time.

 

She pushed the button to call Gary, tapping her feet anxiously against the sidewalk’s pavement as she headed toward the nearest bus stop. He picked up after two rings. “Dollface,” he said, using his old nickname for her. “What’s the news?”

 

“Cut the crap, Gary,” she spat into the phone. “I know you sent your stupid little goons after me and my date tonight. It’s pathetic, you know that?”

 

She heard Gary click his teeth impatiently on the other end of the line, but he didn’t say anything right away, so she launched back into her tirade. “We’re not together anymore. You don’t have a right to interfere into who I see or don’t see. I don’t understand why it’s so hard for you to just back off and leave me the fuck alone.”

 

“Aww, come on, you don’t really want that,” Gary said, making his voice syrupy sweet. It disgusted Jessica. For a second she wished that they were in the same room so he could see the revulsion on her face, but on second thought it was better that she was far away from him, in case he got angry. He could be so controlling and intimidating, getting up in her face just to scare her. Her stomach broiled over in anger just thinking about it. “You know you’re my girl, Jess. You always have been. You always will be.”

 

“Not anymore,” Jessica shot back without hesitation. “I’m done with it. All the fighting, all the cheating, all the bullshit you put me through—I’m finished. I can’t do it anymore. I won’t.”

 

“That’s what you say right now,” Gary said. “But you’ll be back. You always come back to me, baby. We’re meant to be.”

 

“Stop it! Stop with the bullshit, Gary. We’re toxic, and you know it. We’ll never be happy together. I wish you would just let me go. Just let me go. I bet we’ll both be a lot happier that way,” Jessica retorted.

 

“You don’t know what you’re saying, Jess,” Gary said. His tone got harder, even though he was still trying to placate her. “You sound stressed out. Maybe I can help you relax.”

 

“Ugh, you’re disgusting,” Jessica said, barely suppressing the urge to hang up on him right then and there.

 

“What? You know, I heard you were going out tonight. You must be pretty horny, huh? If you’re that desperate for a fuck, you can always come by and see me. You know I’m always up for a round in the sack with you.”

 

“Go to hell!” Jessica yelled, no longer trying to be polite or reasonable with him. There was no sense in trying to argue her way around Gary’s bullshit. She was stupid for even attempting to make him understand her. You’d think after so many years dealing with him I wouldn’t be so dumb as to actually have hope, she thought to herself, feeling her heart sink down into her chest as if it were weighted down with heavy rocks.

 

“You’re in a bad mood right now, I can tell,” Gary said in a patronizing tone of voice. God, he was so fucking condescending. It drove her out of her mind. “Why don’t you call me again when you’ve calmed down, maybe when your period is over?”

 

“Oh, fuck you!” Jessica shouted into the phone before hanging up, shoving it back into her purse and ignoring the shrill ringing that the phone emitted a few seconds later. It was just Gary trying to call her back to get the last word. Well, he didn’t deserve it.

 

As she walked toward the bus station, Jessica felt trapped, like she was stuck in a dark cave with a huge boulder in front of the entrance. It was like she could see one sliver of light from the outside, but the boulder was so big and heavy that she couldn’t lift it on her own, so the light only taunted her, reminding her of the freedom that she’d never reach.

 

But there, at the bus stop, a sign caught her eye—pretty blue and green colors standing out against the oranges and reds that otherwise covered every surface in this town as a result of the Nightwalkers’ dominance. Everywhere was their territory, everywhere had to bear their colors. For some reason the splash of different colors here made Jessica’s heart seize up in her chest, a persistent tug of hope lifting it up from the abyss into which it had fallen as a result of the conversation with Gary. She stepped closer to read the writing on the sign.

 

THE GORGE—OPENING NEXT MONTH. STAFF WANTED. CALL 283-473-9107 TO INTERVIEW.

 

It was a bar! Another bar opening up, and it was outside of the Nightwalkers’ territory, if the address written at the bottom of the poster was anything to go by. This is perfect! Jessica inwardly thought, barely repressing the urge to jump for joy. Instead, she typed the number into her phone, promising herself that she’d at the very least make inquiries later. If she was going to leave Sully’s, she had to have a backup plan, and here one was, falling right into her path. It was like God had sent her to this precise place, just to give her a way out of the situation that she’d been trapped in for years.

 

Jessica was so absorbed in the poster, staring at it for several long moments, before she realized that she wasn’t alone. Her first reaction was fear; goosebumps prickled along the back of her neck. Was it Gary, or another one of Gary’s cronies, sent here to give her another message, to remind her that she wasn’t her own person? Jessica swallowed heavily to steady herself before slowly turning around. There was a man standing behind her, reading the same sign as she was, but he wasn’t a Nightwalker, at least not that Jessica could tell. She didn’t think she had ever seen him in town before. He was handsome. Tall, with dark eyes that pierced into her like knives.

 

For a second, she was tempted to say something, to ask if he was looking for a job, too. But eventually she just ducked her head and walked past him, deciding to walk the rest of the way home. There was no point in trying to talk to cute men. There was no point in acting like a normal woman, like somebody who had choices of her own to make. Not when Gary still held his hammer over her whole life, ready to slam it down on her head any second that she tried to resist.

 

Well, not anymore, she said to herself, walking faster to get back into her apartment. My fear ends soon. I’m getting out. I’m getting away from you, fucker.

 

# # #

 

Pax

 

Pax’s apartment was a piece of shit, to put it lightly. He had moved into a unit on the edge of town and it was a dilapidated, leaking disaster. But between all the odd jobs that Pax had worked over the last two years, it was still all he could afford. Goddammit, he thought as he stared up at his leaking ceiling. It was days like this that he really regretted what had happened with the Army two years before. If he had just shot himself in the toe, his life would have been going fine, but no— He had to flip out on his superior officer and get dishonorably discharged. Really, there was no one to blame except himself, but that didn’t stop Pax from being angry at literally every other human that walked the face of the earth, resenting everyone else for their apparent security or happiness or health. Most days, Pax wanted to climb up the highest mountain and scream about how much he hated the world, but he had too much life experience at this point to think that it would make a difference.

 

He sent a quick message to his landlord, Arnold, complaining again about the leak in the ceiling, but he knew he wasn’t going to hear back from him for several days at the very least. Arnold was in an MC, the Nightwalkers, which apparently ruled over this tiny town and consumed all of his landlord’s time. It was annoying, but at least the rent here was cheap and people left him alone. That was all Pax wanted, really, the luxury of his own solitude. But more importantly, he needed a fucking job. Badly. He’d started buying only ramen noodles at the local grocery store, trying to tide himself over cheaply until he found something to get some income, but he was starting to feel weaker and weaker as the days went by. He needed to eat more and sleep less and actually function like a human. But it was a self-perpetuating cycle. He’d worry about his money and beat himself up for getting into this situation in the first place, and then as a result he’d feel so drained of energy that he wouldn’t even leave his apartment for days at a time.

 

But today, he’d have to get out to buy some food, at the very least. So he forced himself into the freezing cold shower, put on some sweatpants and a tank top, and headed out into the night. He intended to go straight to the grocery store and then head back home, but for some reason his feet got to wandering, taking him into a part of town that he hadn’t explored before. It was nicer, the buildings less-broken down and more expensive-looking. It’d be nice to live here, he thought to himself as he passed by sturdy-looking apartment buildings.

 

In the distance, his eyes spotted a bus stop, plastered-over with various advertisements. Maybe there would be job postings there that he could consider. If he didn’t get income soon, he’d have to leave even his ridiculously shabby apartment, which meant he’d just have to leave and find another town to put down roots. He was tired of jumping around everywhere. He wanted to stay in one place, at least so that his body and mind could get some much-needed rest.

 

When he approached the bus stop, there was somebody already standing there: a slim yet curvy young woman in a tight black dress. Pax was so distracted by the frantic way she was typing on her phone that it took him several moments before he noticed the job posting directly in front of her. “The Gorge,” he mouthed to himself, memorizing the phone number written on the poster. He had a mind for memorization. He never forgot anything once he committed to it.

 

The girl eventually turned and walked past him, not even looking him in the eye. Pax shrugged it off, even though her face lingered behind his eyelids for several moments after she disappeared. She was strikingly beautiful, really, dressed like she was going to a party rather than hunting for a job. But it didn’t matter either way. Pax wasn’t interested in having anything right now, even with the most gorgeous woman that he’d seen in town so far. Relationships and Pax didn’t mix well. He could handle a casual hook-up here and there, but usually women got attached to him very quickly, which was the ultimate turn-off. He was a lone wolf, through and through, and nobody was about to change that.