Shot Girl Read online

  The bully turned and sized Phin up. He didn’t seem impressed.

  Big mistake.

  “You with the crip?”

  “That’s my wife.” Phin’s tone remained even, but I saw his eyes go dead.

  My husband wasn’t a sociopath. He loved me and Sam, and he hurt when we hurt.

  But Phin had a special ability to turn off empathy if the situation arose, and it was a scary thing to witness.

  “Your wife is on my table.”

  I knew what would happen next. Phin would set down the drinks, freeing up his hands. He’d give the guy a chance to back down. Then he’d insult the guy, provoking him to swing first.

  Then my man would beat the ever-loving shit out of him.

  Except…

  That was a bad idea. A really bad idea.

  What if Phin got arrested? We were living here under fake names. We got our IDs from Harry McGlade, and they were the best that money could buy. They’d hold up to a priors search at a traffic stop. But if Phin was brought in, fingerprinted, and our prints were run through IAFIS, things could get really messy.

  Or what if Phin got hurt? What if, while he was kicking this redneck hipster’s ass, someone broke a pool cue over my husband’s head? I couldn’t stop it. Phin could wind up in the hospital.

  I couldn’t take care of Sam alone.

  I couldn’t even take care of my own bladder.

  I need to stop this.

  I tried to say something, and it came out in a squeak.

  Phin looked at me, raised an eyebrow.

  “I want to go,” I said, not recognizing the weak, cowardly voice.

  “We came here to play pool. I just bought drinks.”

  “I just want to go.” I felt my eyes get glassy. “Please.”

  Part of me wanted him to object. To man up, tell me to back off, and then feed this bully his teeth.

  But Phin didn’t do that. He nodded at me, took my elbow, and walked with me out of the bar.

  “Thanks for the drinks!” The bully hooted after us.

  It took five minutes to walk back to the van.

  It was the longest five minutes of my life.

  When I was finally inside, my brakes locked, I found my voice.

  Time to test him. To see if I can push away the man I love because I’m a scared piece of shit and deserve it.

  “Why didn’t you punch that guy?”

  “You said you wanted to go.”

  “That’s not the reason. Tell me the real reason.”

  He shrugged. “You’re being stupid.”

  “You ran away, because you knew I didn’t have your back.”

  “Of course you had my back.”

  He was wrong. I didn’t have his back. But I didn’t want to pass up this chance to harm our marriage even more.

  Full passive-aggressive mode activated.

  “You refuse to argue with me. And now you just backed out of a bar fight.”

  “You said please, you wanted to go.”

  “Bullshit. You thought I’d get hurt. You ran away, because you can’t deal with me being in a wheelchair.”

  “Jack, the only one who can’t deal with you being in a wheelchair is you.”

  The tears came, which pissed me off even more because I hate crying. “You know something, Phin? If that shithead hit me, it would have hurt less than you being afraid for me. I don’t want your worry. I don’t want your pity. I’m sick of you trying to be strong enough for the both of us. I don’t need a caregiver. I need a partner.”

  “Then start acting like a goddamn partner.”

  We didn’t talk for the rest of the night. When we pulled into the garage, Phin got out, opened the side door, lowered the ramp, and went inside. Duffy the hound dog bounded out, leaping up to me, putting his big, stupid face in my lap.

  I cried into his floppy ears.

  “A sword never kills anybody; it is a tool in the killer’s hand.”

  LUCIUS ANNAEUS SENECA

  “You don’t spread democracy with a barrel of a gun.”

  HELEN THOMAS

  GAFF

  I’ve never driven out of state b4, but I had my destination in mind. I’d discovered it on the Internet months ago, and it was a two-hour drive from my old house.

  Slawton, West Virginia. The Deerkill Hunting and Fishing Warehouse.

  Walking inside gave me twinges. The good kind of twinges, where everything seemed clearer and realer and exciting, like right b4 I got into a fight.

  Fire.

  The place was ginormous. Big as a Costco, tall ceiling, row after row of merch.

  I passed the boats and fishing crap without looking.

  I passed the archery and target crap without looking.

  I passed knives and camping crap without looking.

  I did stop to look @ the guns.

  #Candy.

  I wasn’t there to buy a firearm, but I’d never seen one IRL. They looked fake and real all @ the same time, rack after rack of rifles, handguns small as a credit card and so big I wouldn’t be able to hold them with one hand.

  Dope.

  I couldn’t buy one. FOMO; fear of missing out. All fifty states adhered to the FFL to FFL law. If you are from another state, the only way to buy a gun is from a Federal Firearms Licensed dealer who has to ship it to another FFL dealer in your state. You can’t just grab it and go.

  If I’d wanted a rifle, I could have bought one in Ohio. No waiting period.

  But I didn’t want a rifle. I wanted a handgun, and both Ohio and West Virginia wouldn’t sell handguns to anyone under 21.

  Wubalubadubdub.

  Didn’t matter. I was @ Deerkill Hunting and Fishing for something else.

  Even with the research I’d done, when I found the aisle I got all overwhelmy. Some elderly dude in his forties wearing a red Deerkill shirt came up to me.

  “Lookin’ for a vest?”

  I nodded. If asked why, I had a story planned out. I just joined the Army, and as a gift my parents want to buy me body armor. Apparently some soldiers bought their own gear.

  But Old Dude didn’t ask me why. “Soft or hard?”

  He was asking if I wanted a weave, like Kevlar, or something solid, like steel or ceramic.

  “Soft.” I tried to remember the rating I wanted. “IIIA.”

  He nodded. “That’s good. Will stop anything up to a .44 mag. No rifle protection, though.”

  “I was thinking something with trauma plates.”

  “Smart thinking. It’s what law enforcement wears. That’ll stop about 93% of what’s coming at you. In an urban setting, that’s about 80% handguns, 9% shotguns, 9% rifles, 2% machineguns. In a military setting, that’s all reversed, plus add explosions to the mix.”

  “I know. I looked it up.”

  “Any fiber preference? Kevlar? Twaron? Codura?”

  “No preference. But I have a budget.”

  “How much?”

  “Under eight hundred.”

  “Doable. Color preference?”

  “Black.”

  He nodded, then walked up the aisle and took a vest off a hanger. “This is a Montag Shellmax. Shirt tails in rear and front. Might be a little long on you, but its wider in the chest so you’ll be more comfortable. Complies with requirements for 2005 Interim and NIJ 0101.04. Front and back pockets for 8x10 trauma plates. Water and stain resistant, inner moisture wicking system to keep cool. Want to try it on?”

  Hells yeah.

  Old Dude helped me into it, and I was twinging like a fiend.

  Felt like I could charge through a plate glass window.

  “Looks good on you. In your price range, too. On sale for $679.”

  “I’ll take it.”

  “Trauma plates are extra.”

  “Got them in ceramic?”

  “Course we do. Front and back?”

  “Yeah, both. How about ballistic helmets?”

  Old Dude smiled. “Right this way.”

  He showed me a smaller mode
l that fit my head. Black, an above-the-ear model (highly unlikely I’d get shot in the ears), with a chinstrap, level IV rating.

  Sweet.

  Twenty minutes later and twelve hundred dollars poorer, I was back on the road.

  Six hours beyond that, a sign welcomed me to Katydid, SC. I consulted my Google maps to find the apartment.

  My new landlord was a fat AF guy named Marko who had more hair growing out of his ears than I had on my whole head.

  Literally.

  He looked @ me funny and breathed through his mouth when I gave him the cash for the first month of rent and the damage deposit.

  “You okay?” he asked as I signed the lease.

  There were a lot of ways to read into that. “Why?”

  “The blinking. You keep blinking your eyes funny.”

  My blepharospasm. I can’t go a whole day without someone making fun of the fact that my eyelids sometimes spasm and close and I can’t control it.

  “It’s eye dystonia,” I said. “It’s a somatic disorder.”

  “Is it contagious?”

  “Naw.”

  Marko didn’t follow up with more questions. No one ever does.

  Garbage.

  “The ad said utilities are included,” I confirmed.

  “Water and gas are. Cable, internet, and electric aren’t.”

  “The electricity is on now.” The overhead ceiling fan and light whirred with a mildly annoying buzz.

  “You gotta get it switched over to your name, Guthrie.”

  I didn’t like that he used my first name. Too familiar. Creepy.

  We stood staring @ each other for a few seconds. Dude wouldn’t leave.

  “Anything else?”

  “No. Welcome to my building. It’s my pride and joy. I built it six years ago, and I’m really choosy with my tenants. It’s good to have you here.”

  He held out a chubby hand. I shook it.

  Moist and limp. Like holding a newly killed frog.

  I broke the handshake first, and Marko grinned @ me and waddled away.

  The small studio apartment I rented was on the ground floor—key if you need to make a quick exit—and had pile carpeting that smelled like shampoo, a bathtub with a clear plastic shower curtain and a giant mirror on the wall, and a gas stove.

  I’d never used a gas stove b4, but after playing around with it I figured out you press the dial in to get the piezo electric switch to spark, lighting the gas.

  Fire. Literally.

  I started my laptop and searched around for a WiFi connection. Six of them within range, none of them public.

  B4 I ran my password cracker or checked the hacker databases, I began with the first hub and tried the obvious passwords.

  123.

  1234.

  12345.

  123456.

  1234567.

  12345678.

  password.

  qwerty.

  Blink182.

  abc123.

  123123.

  I began to laugh when the last one was accepted.

  Srsly? 123123?

  Yeet LOL. This scrub deserved to have all his data erased and his credit cards swiped.

  Laterz.

  My first job was Googling to find the local power company, and set up my new electric account using automatic withdrawal from my bank account.

  Other utilities?

  Naw.

  I didn’t need a phone, landline or cell. Didn’t need Internet, thanks to neighbor 123123. Didn’t need cable.

  So I unpacked. Food in the fridge and cabinets. Kept my clothes in my suitcase. Set up the few personal items I’d brought along next to my sleeping bag.

  A Powertac 1300 lumen tactical flashlight.

  A sick ex-library copy of Blood Pact of the Suburban Eliminators: The Rathlin Massacre School Shootings by Homer Schorrington.

  A Spec Ops XX736 spring-assisted folding knife with a high carbon steel tanto blade.

  A Victorinox Hercules Swiss Army Knife.

  Three bottles of the different meds I take.

  And my lucky charm; a Zippo lighter with an etched Marlboro design on it.

  I picked up the lighter and thumbed open the top.

  I liked the sound, so I did it ten or twenty more times. Then I spun the flint wheel over and over and over, watching the sparks. It didn’t light bcuz it had no fluid.

  Fiending, I went into the kitchen—my kitchen—and found a pack of American cheese and a can of tomato soup. I ate a slice of cheese and spent a few minutes stabbing the soup can with my folding knife, trying to open it bcuz I’d forgotten to take a can opener. I managed to jab it a few times through the top but there was no way I’d get the whole lid off.

  I couldn’t microwave the can, bcuz everyone but scrubs know you can’t microwave metal, so I looked through the cabinets for a bowl and then remembered—derp—that I didn’t have any dishware.

  So I started my stove, got a medium flame going, took off the paper soup label, and put the can directly on the burner, figuring I could heat it up a little then drink it from the holes in the top.

  I ate more cheese, then made a list of shit I needed.

  Can opener.

  Food.

  Plates. Bowls. Forks. Glasses.

  Pillow (how’d I forget my frakking pillow?).

  I looked around the empty apartment. Did I need furniture?

  I had a computer. Didn’t need a TV.

  Maybe a desk and chair?

  Naw. Floor is chill.

  Stool, for the breakfast bar?

  Waste of money. I could eat standing up.

  What else do I need to adult?

  Lighter fluid.

  Marlboros.

  There was a whistling sound, and I freaked for a second, then looked in the kitchen and saw my can on the burner was erupting steaming tomato soup in all directions. I ran to it, got squirted on the arm—savage level legendary pain—and I slapped the can off the flame and it fell onto the floor, continuing to spit my dinner everywhere.

  Can’t even. The struggle is real.

  I ran my burned arm under cold water, added paper towels to my grocery list, then walked out of my apartment and headed to the car to go shopping.

  Halfway to the store I remembered I didn’t turn the stove off.

  That should be no big deal, right? It’s just a flame. What’s the worst it could do? Burn the building down?

  #WhoCares.

  #NotMyBuilding.

  I had my cash in a money belt around my waist. Only thing irreplaceable was the Marlboro lighter. But that was a lighter. Meant to be heated up. If the apartment burned down, the firefighters would probably find it intact.

  No need to turn back.

  I got to the market, some ginormous department grocery superstore that sold food and car tires and TVs and flowers and booze and books.

  Shopping was brutal. The layout of the store didn’t make sense. Everything was too far away from everything else, and there were too many choices.

  I bought the shit I recognized. Same soup. Same cheese. Same lunch meat. Same bread. Same cereal. The milk looked different than the stuff my Moms bought, but milk is milk, right?

  What’s the difference between 2% milk and whole milk?

  Was 2% like just a tiny bit of milk, the rest water?

  I got the whole milk.

  Plates and bowls and silverware were hella expensive, and they sold it in packs. I didn’t need a set of eight bowls and dinner plates and salad plates and mugs. I didn’t need sixteen forks.

  I thought about buying microwave food that came in its own trays, but there were too many choices, and I didn’t recognize any brands.

  Hold up… fast food comes with forks and napkins. I could just buy a burger or a pizza and use those.

  I put back the roll of paper towels. Then I looked @ pillows.

  Okurrr. The feather pillows like I had @ home were killer expensive.

  I got a cheap one. Finna be fine.

&
nbsp; Prolly.

  The store bill was monster, over fifty bucks. And a whole bunch of people stared @ me while I took off my belt to take money out.

  Note to self: keep some cash in wallet.

  I didn’t get the squares there bcuz I forgot so I stopped @ a gas station and went into the shop while I filled up the tank.

  The guy behind the counter looked like one of the dickasses @ my old school, sides of his head shaved and pimping a pencil-thin douchestache.

  “Pack of Marlboros.”

  “What kind?”

  “Marlboros.”

  Bruh rolled his eyes. “Reds. Lights. Medium lights. Ultra-lights. Menthol. Smooth. What kind?”

  Hell if I knew. “Smooth.”

  He handed over a pack. The blue cover design looked like my lighter.

  “I also need lighter fluid.”

  “What kind?”

  “I got a Marlboro lighter.”

  “Plastic one? Or a metal one, like a Zippo?”

  “Zippo.”

  He gave me a yellow bottle. I waited for him to ask for ID, and was ready to show him my Driver’s license to prove I was 18 today.

  The dickass didn’t even ask.

  Which was good. I didn’t know if gas stations could trace your ID when you showed it to them, and I didn’t want Moms tracking me down.

  “You got a car?”

  “What?” Why did he want to know that?

  “A car.”

  “Why should I tell you?”

  Another eye roll. Griefer punk. “Which pump, kid?”

  Oh. “Pump six.”

  “Fifty-eight sixty-one.”

  Woes.

  “Gas was only forty-bucks.”

  “Smokes and fluid, shorty.”

  Shorty? I should smack his dickass.

  I paid and got the hell out of there.

  Then I got lost.

  I didn’t want to use the GPS bcuz it might be trackable, and I left all my printouts in the apartment. To make it worse, the bright lights @ night made me blink more than usual, making it harder to see.

  My hands started to shake a little, and I remembered I didn’t take my meds today.

  Doctors, shrinks, teachers, counsellors, and my moms all thought I needed them for some made-up diagnosis, but I always knew they were trash.

  I looked up what they said about me.

  Functional neurological symptom disorder.

  Borderline personality disorder.

  Passive–aggressive personality disorder.