CHAPTER FIFTEEN

NATALIE

No one will ever tell you that a woman’s shelter is just like high school. 

Cliques are everywhere, gossiping in their echo chambers and everybody shuns the new girl. 

I tried to fit in, I really did. 

But with homeless women, drug addicts, and abuse victims with Stockholm Syndrome as my peers, there wasn’t really much for me to connect with. 

Quite honestly, it was misery. Almost as miserable as Antigua’s place, but at least the women back there had common pains and struggles even if our backgrounds were different. 

Every face at the shelter looked like there was no longer a person there, just a shell of their former selves. 

Is that what I looked like? I couldn’t even trust my reflection in the mirror anymore. 

I went through the motions like a robot. Cleaning up my part of the shelter and searching online for jobs and resources while barely talking to anyone. It always turned into a conversation about how badly she needed a hit, or that he really did love her but they just needed some space so he could go to anger management. 

Searching my old college out of curiosity, I saw that tuition nearly doubled since I was enrolled there and my heart sank. Going back to school with nothing but five-thousand dollars and the clothes on my back seemed utterly fruitless. 

I was one year away from graduating with a degree in marine biology. I loved the ocean and I loved science. My favorite internship was the summer I spent at the Oregon Coast Aquarium. I had gotten a great letter of recommendation from the executive director and planned to use it when I applied for a job there. 

That all seemed like a lifetime ago. Picking up where I left off felt impossible. How would I even get back to Oregon, let alone find a place to stay? That would eat into my five-thousand in less than a week. 

At Sol’s place, I thought I was starting to find happiness. Most of that came from Ari. She reminded me what pure, innocent joy was. I started feeling happy with Sol too, and I thought he did with me. 

Which was why I kept trying to wrap my head around why he dropped me off here like a stray cat. 

Rationally, my brain could understand it. He didn’t want women coming in and out of his daughter’s life. I had to admire him for that. It was my heart and my body that couldn’t understand. 

What would he do if I showed up on his doorstep again? If I said I’d watch his daughter but not sleep with him, or vice versa? Did it really have to be one or the other? Was it so bad to have both?

I wrapped a thick blanket around myself in my bunk bed at night, pretending it was him wrapped around me. 

I felt so strongly that he didn’t use me, or at least didn’t mean to. He wouldn’t have taken so long to tease me and made sure I came like a waterfall if he did. He wanted me in his bed throughout the night, all the way up until the moment I woke up and found him gone. 

I refused to believe his mind changed so drastically in such a short amount of time. He didn’t seem like that kind of person. Every decision he made, he was confident and sure of himself. 

Waking up after another restless night in my uncomfortable bunk bed, I shivered against the cold that chilly morning and reached for my sweater. 

Rather than soft cashmere, my hand landed on the solid wood bed frame. I sat up and looked down to the floor thinking it had fallen, but it wasn’t there either. Confusion turning into panic, I rummaged through my small laundry bag of clothes. Not in there either. 

I looked all around the bed and then the room I shared with five other women, coming up empty. Someone had stolen my Anthropologie sweater that Netta got me. 

It was the nicest thing I owned and someone probably snatched it to sell for weed. Fuck. 

I wasn’t deaf, I could hear whispers from the other women about me. Part of the reason they snubbed me was because I came in wearing nice clothes. I heard “rich bitch”, “princess” and all kinds of other insults. 

Little did they know. I probably would have fit in better if I wore that bloody shirt I escaped in. 

Still, I should have known I would have been made a target.  

Shit! The money!

I ran back to my bed and desperately rummaged through my belongings, silently pleading for the money to still be in its hiding spot. 

Relief swept through me when I saw the money clip and crisp bills just where I left them-- wrapped up in a pair of panties in my dirty laundry.

I held the panties to my chest against my racing heartbeat, glad that no one was around to watch me before stuffing them back in the laundry bag. 

Not a moment after returning the money back to its hiding place, one of my roommates burst through the door, sending it bouncing off the wall. 

Janelle, with her wiry blonde hair, sunken dark eyes and arms full of tattoos that looked hand-drawn by a child, looked around the room and laser-focused her gaze on me. 

From what I gathered, she was a homeless woman who stayed at the shelter off and on. She was tough, abrasive and led her little clique of followers around everywhere. I was one of the first new targets she tried to intimidate. 

“Hey, rich bitch,” she said to me as a way of greeting. 

“Hi Janelle,” I replied. 

She studied me for a few uncomfortable seconds while I just sat on my bed, wondering what she wanted. For a moment I wondered if she was the one who took my sweater. 

“Say, who’s your coke hookup?” 

“My what?”

“Where do you get your coke at?” 

I lifted an eyebrow at her, not backing down. 

“I don’t do coke.” 

“Yeah fucking right,” she spat. “That’s what all you pretty rich people do. None of this cheap crack shit like us in the streets.” 

Antigua had a coke empire. But I wasn’t about to tell her that. I wouldn’t wish meeting that man on my worst enemy. 

Solomon probably moved it too, though I never saw him using it himself. Something told me he’d never keep it in his house with Ari there, if he kept it at all. 

Janelle’s face was suddenly inches away from mine, revealing rotten teeth and breath that smelled like old garbage. My stomach roiled and I moved to get away from her, but she held my arms in a surprisingly strong grip. 

“What the fuck are you even doing here, pretty rich bitch?” she snarled in my face. “Did Daddy take your car away?” 

“Let me go!” I cried loudly, hoping someone would hear me as I tried to pry her talons off my arms. 

“You sure got a pretty face and a pretty little coke nose.” she taunted. “I bet you even got a pretty little pussy too.” 

“What?? No!” 

Horror ripped through my body as I tried even harder to fight her off. This situation felt oddly familiar. The sudden realization came to me that rapists and sexual predators weren’t always men. 

“Ever had your cunt fucked by another bitch?” Janelle asked crudely and flicked her tongue at my face. “I promise you it’s so much better than dudes with their stupid cocks.” 

“No!” I screamed at the top of my lungs and used my last ounce of strength to finally shove her backward. 

She careened back but just laughed as she swaggered toward the door again. 

“Tonight I’m popping your bitch cherry.” 

She blew a kiss at me before leaving the room, slamming the door behind her. 

I sat on the edge of my bunk bed just long enough to take a few deep, full breaths before grabbing my clothes. Double-checking to ensure all the money was still there, I gathered up everything that was mine and walked out. 

I left the bedroom, passed the front reception area and walked straight out onto the sidewalk. 

There was absolutely no way I could stay there any longer.