Randomly Randomness

Who's Watching the Children - 10/09/2014

I wasn't a vicious person, nor vindictive, nor even hateful, but God's honest truth, there was only so much a person could take before they completely lost their $hit. And in the last five weeks or so, I'd taken a lot--from my mother-in-law, from random kids throwing trash in my yard and screaming obscenities at me, from the cashier at the freaking HEB Grocery Store who couldn't get past the fact that I had a British driver's license, to my eldest stepson who was a drunken, belligerent, misogynistic manwh0re. Why take it? Why stay? 

The kids.

I know I know. I had received numerous lecutures from Helen and Sonya -- both of whom were half a world away and unable to stage a real intervention like I probalby needed.

Rob and Ellie weren't even my kids. They were my stepkids. But I'd spent my childhood being bounced from foster home to foster home because no one in my family wanted me. I had issues. And while I understood that I couldn't save the world, that didn't stop me from trying. With Rob you had the whole p0t thing. I got it; I really did. He was withdrawn and moody like most teenagers but he wasn't just my step-son, he was my husband's step-child as well. Blood or no, he didn't like to deal with stuff, same as my husband. His bad habit was his way of escaping. From me, from his sister (i supposed), from John Paul and Jane, and his dead biological parents, especially his biological mother's suicide, and Lord only knew what else. I just couldn't let that go. There was something about him I just couldn't let go of. At least not without trying to get through to him. There was a whole big world out there waiting for him to find it. And if anyone knew about beating the odds, I did. 

And then there was Ellie Jane, my mother-in-law's little spy, only twelve years old -- and the perfect storm for a future abused woman. Daddy had taught her that men were emotionally distant. Way to go, Wade. John Paul, the aforementioned belligerent drunk, had taught her that women were disposable. And Jane May had taught her that love was conditional. Like I said, Perfect Storm. In a few short years Ellie would break (and spend her entire life doing what she was told and selling pieces of her soul, never escape her grandmother and end up getting face-punched on a regular basis) or snap (and act out, and drink and smoke, get into all sorts of terrible trouble and cause her family all sorts of embarrassment -- and still end up an abused woman). 

Sadly, Ellie was a very untrustworthy little Pefect Storm. For this I blamed her grandmother. I found it incredibly difficult to be nice to someone, even a child, when I knew they were spying on me. And then there was the whole pork thing. I didn't eat pork, the rest of the family did and Ellie kept trying to slip it into my food. Like it was funny. Which it was if you were Ellie or John Paul. Or Rob. Or even my husband who thought it was stupid that I make such a big deal about there being pork in my meatballs. 

And that is how Robert and I ended up crusing home in a brand new Audi S7 that I had found, purchased and asked to have ready the day before we got on that G4. 

***

We'd gotten out of Austin shortly after noon, quickly leaving behind six lanes of traffic, but Rob had been right. We'd probably be late getting home.  Oh well. It wasn't like I could hide a brand new car anyway. 

"So--" Rob kept rubbing the console and the side of the seat with his hands.  Leather. 

"Yes, dear?"

"The Revered Rose...stole Sarah and Annie."

"Yes." 

"How long have you known?"

"About a month. I didn't do anything sooner because of the girls. It's one thing to take out the Reverend -- and his wife -- it's another thing entirely to destroy a child's life. And that's what will happen. Do you understand, Rob? I know that everyone hates the Reverend Rose and that they're afraid of him. Which, quite frankly, is ludicrous. But those girls don't deserve ... any of this."

"I understand."

"And you understand that you can't tell anyone, anything.  We can't risk the Revered getting wind of this and destroying evidence that might help to convict him."

"Yes, ma'am. How long do you think it'll take before they arrest him?"

I glanced at him from the corner of my eye, more to gauge his mood than anything. "A few days; a week. Depends on whether they can get a judge to sign off on the warrants and subpoenas and whatnot, or if they decide they need more evidence."

"Can we watch? When they take him?" He stared at me, his eyes a clear, hard topaz, his lips compressed.

"Absolutely, sweetheart."