AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hello!! Above is some artwork done by talisastark! It's a picture of Katie, so it's only fitting that to put this picture up in a Katie chapter(:
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If you must choose between two evils,
pick the one you've never tried before.
—English Proverb
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KATIE
FEBRUARY // WEEK 11
Lying in bed at night, listening to the sirens and fire trucks—like a record on repeat—reminded me that there were other people with bigger problems. But somehow, that still didn't make me feel any better. I was just about to drift off to sleep when I heard an all too familiar thud, followed by an even more familiar crash. Mum's home. On a scale from tipsy to blackout, I could only assume that she was white girl wasted with a side of slurred words, impaired vision, and irrational decisions. I waited to hear her stomp up the stairs, but that never happened.
I did, however, hear my door creak open. Usually my mother would just slump against my doorframe and whisper my name until I woke up. But tonight, she trudged into my room, lifted up my covers, that I didn't really have any intention of sharing, and climbed into bed with me. The smell of alcohol radiated off of her in violent waves, crashing down on me. It was suffocating, like drowning without water. I tried not to breathe or move, hoping that she would leave.
I almost screamed when I felt her put her arm around me, and pull me close, like a child's favorite teddy bear. And I suddenly wondered if Finn if had a favorite teddy bear. Or slept with a night light. Or was afraid of the dark like I was. I relaxed slightly at the thought of Finn, until I realized that my mother's arm had hair. A lot of hair.
"Hi, baby," a gruff voice that was most definitely not my mother's spoke to me. It was husky, deep; full of cigarette smoke and regrets.
Never in my life had I ever gotten out of bed so fast. Not on Christmas morning when I was five. Not my birthday eighth birthday. Not even that time when I was thirteen and my mother almost burnt the house down. Never. The man's hand gripped my wrist so tightly, I was sure he had cut off the circulation. But lack of circulation to my left hand was the least of my problems at the moment. I was almost surprised at how much strength he had for a very, very inebriated person.
"Baby, come back to bed." He murmured, tugging me towards him. "We had so much fun at the bar tonight." The guy gave a hard tug and I stumbled and landed on the bed, with his arm near my mouth.
I leaned closer to his sweaty, hair arm and bit down, hard. I tasted blood, metallic and warm as I broke the skin. "Ow! You little bitch!" he pulled his hand back and slapped me.
I was momentarily dazed that a person would ever even consider hitting me, but then I remembered the type of people my mother hung out with didn't exactly care about the well being of others. I bolted out of my room just as the burly guy, who had no shirt on, was attempting to get out of bed. I practically jumped down the stairs, glancing over my shoulder every few seconds, expecting Hulk himself to land on top of me and drag me back upstairs.
"Katie, don't forget the coffee." I heard my mother whisper from the couch just as I was about to leave. She didn't even wait for me to respond, or open her eyes. "Caramel/mocha latte," she said to me before rolling over.
I didn't even bother to tell her that the strange man she brought home was snuggled up in my bed. I bent down, grabbed my schoolbag, a sweatshirt, put my shoes on, and left. And I didn't look back.
△
I didn't realize where I was going until I nearly crashed into the door of Blackie's. Something that might have shocked me even more is that Jake was there... with a coffee—not surprising—and a book. My night was just getting better and better. I would have turned away and gone somewhere else, but Isabel's house was too far away to walk, it was about -10 out, and I actually couldn't force myself leave. He drew me in, like a hummingbird to a flower. The bell dinged when I opened the door but Jake didn't even look up.
"Hawthorne," he said to me as I sat down across from him with a mug of hot coffee a few minutes later. He still hadn't looked up at me, but instead, was scribbling down notes for one of his classes.
I would have called him by his last name, like he did to me, but he made me too nervous, and I didn't think I could say "Roswell," without my voice shaking. So I just said, "Jake," in a cool and calm voice. One syllable was easier than two.
"What are you doing up at such a late hour?" he asked me, before turning the page in his book and picking up a highlighter.
"I could ask you the same thing." I took a sip of coffee.
He looked up at me, about to say something, then stopped. "What happened to your face?" Jake asked me, leaning forwards.
"Nothing," I replied before he had even finished his question.
"What do you mean, 'nothing?' You have part of a handprint on your cheek." Jake seemed very upset about this as he pointed out the obvious.
"Don't worry about it." I told him, as his fingers lightly skimmed across my cheek. I tried not to flinch.
"Katie..." he pressed.
"Jake..." I responded in the same manner.
"Who did this?" he asked, still touching my face.
"I don't know." I gave him a partial truth. Jake's mouth formed into a hard line as he sat back in his chair. "I'm fine. So back to you original question, before you so rudely changed the topic on me," I said to Jake.
"Kinda like you're doing now..." he crossed his arms. I dismissed him and continued.
"Why are you up so late in Blackie's?" I asked him.
"Homework, duh." He gave me a look as if to say, what does it look like?
"Homework? At 2:45am?" My eyebrows furrowed together.
"Yeah, what about it?" Jake asked me.
"Nothing, just most people I know are sleeping at this hour," I said to him.
"I could say the same for you." Jake finally looked up at me and I couldn't help but smile slightly. "So, care to share why you're here right now?" He twirled the highlighter between his fingers.
"We're not having story time tonight," I said to him, running my finger around the rim of my faded green mug.
"Fine, don't share all your secrets with me." Jake pouted before highlighting a few sentences.
"Like you would share all of yours," I laughed a little.
"Nah, my secrets aren't very good," Jake said and I saw him frown, almost like a little kid. I felt my eyebrows furrow together in confusion, but didn't press the matter. "Well, are you gonna watch me do my homework all night or are you gonna do yours?" Jake asked me with a smirk.
Wordlessly, I reached into my backpack, and pulled out my Calc homework. I knew it would near impossible to get any homework done with Jake sitting directly across from me, but I was going to try... for all that it was worth. Pencil. Paper. Eraser. Calculator. I flipped my book open, page 324 to be exact, and wrote down the assignment in the top right hand corner, like I did with every class.
Katie Hawthorne
Mrs. Caldwell
AP Calculus
Thursday, February 12th
#5-17 odds, 20-26 evens
5. A balloon is expanding at a rate of 1 centimeter per minute... Shoot me.
9. Jose would like to build a fence, which will enclose his tomato garden... Stab me with a knife.
15. Bruno and Sally are going on a hike, up at 2946ft hill... Run me over.
22. If Nick is filling up a bathtub with 1 gallon of water every five minutes... Oh my god...
"Feel like taking a break from homework?" I asked him about half an hour later. I had made it through all of the odd problems, and that was good enough for me.
"Depends what you have in mind." He put his pen down.
I took a deep breath. "I need a ride."
"Where?" he asked me, already packing his stuff up.
"My dad's house..." I mumbled.
"I thought you hated him." Jake said to me.
"Yeah, kinda." I nodded my head. "Your point?" I looked at him.
"Well, why would you go see someone you hate?" Jake asked me quietly as a silence fell over the coffee shoppe.
"Because he's all I have left." I let out a shaky breath.
Jake opened his mouth to ask me another question, but like I said, I wasn't in the mood for story time tonight, so I stood up and walked out of Blackie's.
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Jake's truck grumbled as it came to a slow stop, in front of a house that looked familiar, only because I had been to a party here a few weeks ago. But as a house, the kind you lived in, it looked completely foreign. I almost didn't want to get out of Jake's truck, but then I remembered that I left the only home I had ever known and this was basically my only option.
"Well, uh, thanks, I guess." I looked down at my hands, which were in my lap.
"Yeah, no problem, friend." He said with a slight edge to it. I opened the door just in time for an icy gust of wind to sneak into Jake's truck. I shivered, pulling my red sweatshirt tighter around me.
"It's freezing," I said quietly, but Jake apparently heard me.
"I know it's great," he answered me.
"No it's not." I shook my head. This kid needed some serious help if he actually liked the cold.
"Are you crazy. I love the cold." Jake smiled at me.
"Why?"
"Cause hockey season." He looked at me like I was crazy.
"You're weird." I hopped out of his truck.
"You're weirder," Jake said, like it was a knee-jerk reaction.
"Bye, Jake." I said, waving my hand over my shoulder. I walked off towards my father's idea of a home and prayed it would be different than my mother's.
"Good night, Katie," Jake called as loudly as he could at 3am without waking anyone up, even though I was about to wake my father up.
I walked up the icy pathway, trying not to slip and die. It had started to snow, so if I hadn't been looking, I probably would have fallen. I took a moment to stare up at the flakes coming from somewhere. I stuck my tongue out and caught a particularly fluffy one. Then I realized I was catching snowflakes on the front steps of my father and his other family's house... which was awkward, so I hiked my backpack farther up onto my shoulders, took a deep breath, squared my shoulders and knocked on the door. Three times. I didn't think they would have heard two knocks, and five knocks would have been too overbearing.
I stepped back from the door a little bit as it opened. Thankfully it was my father and not some other member of my family. "Katie," he said to me, clearly surprised that I was standing on his doorstep at 3am. Yeah, I'd be surprised too if I found someone standing on my doorstep at 3am, or in my house. Oh wait, that was a daily occurrence with my mother.
"Hi," I said.
"What are you doing here?" he asked the obvious question.
"She did it again." I said through chattering teeth. "I thought she was going to stop this time, but she didn't." I shook my head as I felt a salty tear slip down my cheek. I looked away before he noticed and tried to wipe it away. I would have brought up the fact that a guy that my mother brought home had crawled into bed with me, but I didn't even care anymore. "Is that offer still on the table?" I looked up at him.
"Of course, it is." My father opened the door wider to let me inside.
"Michael, who's there?" A lady with disheveled, yet beautiful brown hair hurried into the foyer. She wrapped a robe around her as she looked me over.
"Katie's going to be staying with us." He said to the woman, who glanced at the clock on the wall.
"I'll get you some of Ava's clothes. You look to be about her size." She said to me before walking upstairs, her footsteps light at a feather.
"She's okay with this?" I asked my dad pointing in the direction his wife just went.
"She's the one that suggested it," he told me as we walked into the kitchen.
"Glad to know this wasn't even your idea. You didn't even want me." I took a seat at the high top counter.
"No, no, no," he said quickly, putting his hands up. "I told her about you and that was the first thing out of her mouth. She asked me, 'Well, why isn't she living with us?' I didn't even get the chance to make the suggestion. She beat me to it." He rambled.
"Oh," I said.
"I'm gonna do this right this time, Katie." My father sat down in the seat next to me. "Just give me the chance to let me be a father. Your father. I'm not so bad at it." He smiled a sad smile at me.
"I'm not so good at letting people in." I whispered staring at the shiny specs in the granite countertop.
"Because of me," he guessed.
"Because of you." I nodded, staring at my hands.
"Maybe I can change that." He put his hand over mine.
"Good luck," I told him. I was trying not to be sarcastic, but that answer just slipped out.
"I can't change what I did in the past, but there's always tomorrow."
I didn't exactly know how to respond to that, nor did I want to respond to that. Thankfully, the lady returned just in time with a set of PJs that looked as soft as a cloud.
"These should do just fine." She held out the PJs. "Come on, Dear, I'll show you to your room."
I hopped off the bar stool. "Night, Dad." I said, the words sounding like a different language to me.
"Night, Katie. Sleep well," he replied. I don't even remember the last time someone said good night to me. But I kinda liked it.
"We'll put you in the room next to Ava." The lady said to me.
I nodded as she turned on a light. To start off, the room was about three of my old rooms glued together; the bed was ginormous, though I wasn't about to complain; there were beautifully polished hardwood floors instead of moldy, damp carpet; I had a walk-in closet, a dresser, two night tables, a desk, and a television... which was on the wall. And to top it all off, my windows—yes plural—had curtains. I had no idea what to do.
"What's your name?" I asked softly.
"Nora," she smiled at me.
"Th-Thank you," I stumbled to get my words out. I wanted to hug her, but that seemed weird so I didn't.
"This should have happened a long, long time ago." Nora said to me while pulling the covers on the bed back. The bed looked like a cloud. An actual, literal cloud, flat yet goofy, soft and welcoming. I bet it felt like one too. "The bathroom is across the hall." She pointed to another room.
And that's what she left me with. And then I was all alone. The silence wrapped around me, like a cocoon. I changed into Ava's PJs, which consisted of soft, baggy green pants, and a pink t-shirt. I got into bed slowly, just to make sure all of this was real and I wasn't having some terrible nightmare. I pulled the covers up around me, which smelled like fresh laundry and hope, and drifted off to sleep.