Chelsea doesn’t speak to her mother as she hurries for the door. What else is there to say? When someone is driving the knife into your heart without a single iota of mercy, nothing else seems to matter. Chelsea can’t give her orders for taking care of the girls like it’s just an innocent weekend sleepover, and if she tried, her mother would just say something so infuriating that she’s afraid she’ll lose control. And not in the way of the Violence. What her mother is doing brings such a wide, deep sea of fury to the fore that she can easily imagine her digging her fingernails into those cold blue eyes.
For her part, Patricia likewise says nothing. She stands at her kitchen island, a marble statue of a woman, perfect fingers wrapped around a glass of iced tea, mouth pursed like she’s spotted a roach skittering across the floor and is trying to decide whether to call the exterminator or just get a flamethrower. Her phone is right there, ready to make the call that will put Chelsea away if she attempts any kind of fight or argument. At least this way, she has a chance.
So she leaves.
Just walks away from her daughters and gets in her minivan, hands clenched on the wheel, willing herself not to have a full-on meltdown where one of them might see it through the curtains. She holds on to a picture in her head, her two daughters in Iceland riding fat ponies, vaccinated, fed, safe, happy. She knows her mother is a narcissistic black hole of a human, but at least the girls won’t have to see their father again for a long time.
Oh God. What if he gets home and files for divorce and custody? He would hate having to spend that much time with the girls—he’s never been a fun dad who enjoys their company—but would he do it just to spite her?
Just as her mother has done this to spite her?
Definitely.
If he can’t strangle her with his hands, he’ll gladly do it with his lawyer.
He has always enjoyed hurting her, and she can see it so clearly now that he’s been forced to stop.
On the way home—well, back to the house, as she shouldn’t keep calling it home if she can’t live there anymore—she gets stuck again at that same goddamn light, staring at what she’s pretty sure is a corpse, but this time there are other cars behind her and around her, so she doesn’t turn on red even though she wants to. She thinks about calling 9-1-1 to let them know there’s a body, but since she’s infected with the Violence and being harassed by a cop, she’s not willing to take that chance.
Even when life seemed good, she hated this light. She hates the little yellow building, hates imagining what it would be like to stop here and go inside, the structure so tiny and cramped that she knows it would smell like twenty years of body odor and probably the off-gassing of a thousand cheap carpet samples. Whoever Big Fred is, the sign for his store has always infuriated her.
ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS YOU…TO BUY ME NEW FLOORS.
CUT A RUG WITH YOUR BEST GIRL. WE’LL SELL YOU ONE CHEAP! THE RUG, NOT THE GIRL!
HOP ON IN FOR EASTER SAVINGS AND SHE WON’T MIND THAT YOU BEEN FISHIN’.
GIVE HER WHAT SHE REALLY WANTS: NEW CARPET!
She hates it because every message assumes that women are powerless and have to wait for some big, strong man to come along and provide something as basic as a floor covering. Because it’s assumed that women are screeching fishwives who must be appeased with linoleum. Because every message is a joke between men about how materialistic and easily manipulated women are.
Whoever hurt Big Fred, they really did a doozy on him.
Literally, she thinks as she stares at the plaid-marked body under the eaves, the bloody splatter on the yellow wall right at head height. It’s not a kind thought, but she hopes it was a woman that took Big Fred down.
Give her what she really wants: a cure for all this violence against women.
Lower-case v.
The light turns green and she’s on autopilot. She passes by her grocery store, noting that there are very few cars there. When the Violence first broke out and people thought it was contagious, they repeated their coronavirus scare and bulldozed every shop for hand sanitizer, disinfecting wipes, and toilet paper. Once they realized it wasn’t contagious but that anyone could randomly break out in a Violence storm, those who could stayed away from public places—and other people—as much as possible. It’s almost funny, how America didn’t take Covid seriously because it was “just like the flu,” but now that a pandemic could result in being beaten to death, they’re a lot more willing to stay home.
New delivery companies have sprung up overnight, tough guys and adrenaline junkies and the truly desperate eager to make money by turning grocery runs into something from an Indiana Jones movie. Those who can afford it wear protective gear and helmets, carry tactical batons and other not-quite-illegal weapons. The government has been overrun with concealed-carry permits. Everybody wants to be a hero while forgetting that they could randomly and for no reason become the villain.
Her girls, at least, will have what they need. She saw the bottles of water and blocks of toilet paper stockpiled in her mother’s mudroom. Now that they’ll be well supplied, she can take what she needs from the house, fill up the minivan like she’s going on a road trip. Because…shit. Where is she going? What’s she supposed to do? Find a job in a dead market and a place to live in a time when no one trusts anyone at all? If there was more than six hundred bucks in the checking account, if it was as robust as David had always promised her it was, she’d buy a little RV and live out of there for a while. Instead she’ll be stretched out in the backseat of her minivan in a nest of pillows and blankets, her neck crumpled up and her feet scrunched under the front seat, if her guess is accurate.
At home, she breathes a sigh of relief as soon as she opens the door and David isn’t there. Knowing the way her luck has gone lately, she half expected to find him sitting at the island holding one of his guns, waiting for her. She hurries to her room to pack her bags, heart jittering at the knowledge that David could still appear at any moment. His car is sitting out front, and she knows where he keeps his spare keys, so she collects them all and tosses them in her bag. Might as well slow him down as much as she can, because once he finds out she’s gone, he’ll enlist every ally he has to find her. Huntley will take to it like a mad dog finally let off the leash. She’s got to make it hard for David to focus on her.
She already has his laptop and phone, even if it’s locked and out of juice, so she loads those in the car, too. She pushes the barrier away from her door and takes all her underwear and bras, the part of her wardrobe that’s easy-care and folds down small, tons of yoga pants, clean socks, several pairs of sensible shoes, plus a few nice but easy and professional dresses. She needs a job, but in this odd new world, she can’t imagine putting on a pencil skirt and heels and becoming some awful man’s receptionist. She could be a barista or waitress—how that would make her mother laugh. She fills backpacks and then garbage bags with her things, then tops everything off with her only coat, scarf, and hat, shoved to the back of her closet because even the coldest days in Tampa aren’t really that cold. But if her mother is right and real life is still happening up north, she might need to stay warm if she’s still there come fall.
As Chelsea walks through her home—ex-home?—it feels like the set of a TV show she used to watch religiously but hasn’t seen in years, one that hasn’t aged well. All these objects and views are so familiar, but they are not for her. She does not take the wooden box of Dream Vitality oils. No matter what her upstream managers promised her, those little bottles didn’t change her life. They didn’t keep her safe. They didn’t guard her health. They didn’t cure her. If she had time, she would break every bottle.
The beautiful kitchen table in its sunbeam is just a heavy piece of junk. The Edison bulbs are just glass and wires. The shiplap is just someone else’s old wood. The only real thing here is the bathroom door, pockmarked with indentations from a little girl’s bat. The blood has been scrubbed away, but those divots don’t lie.
Chelsea’s phone buzzes in her pocket, and she finds several texts from Ella that she’s missed while she worked. A list of things her daughter wants—far longer than what she has time to deal with, plus more requests from Brooklyn. She trudges upstairs, glancing nervously out the front windows, and does her best to get what they’ll need. She thinks about tossing in some gloves and their coats, but she knows full well her mother will want to buy much more expensive versions to show them off on their trip, as if her girls are just fancy little dolls. She collects Ella’s clothes, plus chargers and all the junk in her bathroom she needs to survive. She finds Brooklyn’s favorite stuffed animals and Green Blankie. Her van is full of garbage bags, their contents partially visible through the stretched white plastic. The girls’ bags are in the trunk, and Chelsea’s bags are where the girls should be sitting right now.
She’s about to head out when she remembers that she never had time to fully ransack David’s office when the girls were home and in danger. She’s even happier she remembered this step when she finds over a thousand dollars in cash stashed in his dresser, not to mention the folded hundreds in his wallet. She can’t get into his locked safes, can’t access her jewelry, but she is the one who keeps track of the passports, birth certificates, Social Security cards, and even their marriage license, and she takes everything with her.
It breaks her heart, the thought of handing the girls’ documentation over to her mom, but she knows Iceland is the safest place for them right now. There are zero cases of the Violence in Iceland because there are zero mosquitoes there and a hardy quarantine program. The girls don’t have passports, but her mother said Randall can take care of that easily, considering his money and friends. God, the smugness on that woman’s face as she parades around her privilege in front of someone suffering—it’s disgusting.
Chelsea slides into her van, every inch of it stuffed with garbage bags and backpacks. And that’s when she breaks down. Just completely fucking breaks down. Great, heaving gasps, sobs that rack her body and make her shoulders and spine ache. Her eyes burn, her throat is numb and heavy, and she’s crying so hard that her bra is soaked from the tears and snot running down her chest.
When her phone rings, she takes a deep, shuddering breath and prepares to act totally normal and explain to Ella why it’s taking her so long.
Much to her surprise, it’s Jeanie.
“Hello?”
“You okay, kid? I can see your van shaking from here.”
Chelsea checks her side mirror and sees Jeanie standing in her driveway across the street, phone to her ear. David always said Jeanie was built like a brick shithouse, but Chelsea sees her more like some sort of ancient mother goddess, like those carved stones they find that are all breast and butt with tiny little feet. She might look fat from the outside, but she’s slabbed with muscle and sturdy as hell, and whether she’s at kickboxing or Zumba, she’s graceful and strong. Jeanie is a PE teacher who usually spends her summers running a local outdoor camp, and Chelsea wonders what she’s doing to make ends meet now that the schools and camps are closed.
She’s a scrapper, Jeanie.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
Jeanie snorts at the lie, and Chelsea gives a sad chuckle.
“Okay, no, I’m not fine. Everything is a complete mess. But I’m just crying. Nothing dangerous.”
“You safe?”
Chelsea glances at her mirror. Jeanie’s in the driveway now, approaching the car. “I’m not sure how to answer that question.”
“You got the Violence?”
She must wait too long to answer, because Jeanie barks her belly laugh and says, “Yeah, me, too. Hard to say it out loud the first time, isn’t it? Don’t worry, kid. As long as you’re not currently feeling it or inhaling pepper, we should be good. Open up.”
Jeanie’s outside the car door now, and she’s grinning because Jeanie is always grinning. Chelsea opens the door and steps out, flicking off her phone. They haven’t spoken in months, not since she ignored Jeanie’s text about going to kickboxing. Jeanie turns off her phone, too, but something she said is bothering Chelsea.
“Wait. Why pepper?”
Jeanie’s eyes go wide. “Girl, you haven’t heard? They announced it today. Big press conference and everything. Pepper is the…what’d they call it? I don’t know, but if you’re infected, it makes you storm. It triggers the Violence. Caps-something, some molecule, I don’t know. All the stores are pulling it from the shelves. Black pepper, salsa, jerky, pepper spray.”
Chelsea glances back at her kitchen, so quick, but Jeanie catches it.
“Yeah, go inside and get some, if you want. Better self-defense than a bulletproof vest, these days. Looks like you’re packing out. I don’t blame you. David finally hit critical mass?”
Chelsea takes a deep breath. It’s a long story, and she doesn’t really have time to tell it now.
“I called the Violence hotline on him…” she starts.
And of course Jeanie connects the dots. “Oh shit! So they took him away. What’ve you been doing since then?”
“Keeping inside.”
“Oh. Because now you’ve got it. Why didn’t you call me?”
Chelsea looks down and away, and Jeanie puts a hand on her arm. “Honey, it’s not your fault. You know that, right? So don’t you start feeling bad about it. I would’ve texted you, but David caught me at the mailbox and told me to leave you the fuck alone, or else. His exact words. I didn’t want to make it worse. Didn’t know if he had access to your phone. And I looked for you outside, but…well, it’s a hell of a time, isn’t it?” Before Chelsea can answer, Jeanie keeps on talking. “Wait, where are the girls?”
Every question brings a new flush of shame and rage, but Jeanie is the closest thing to a real friend that she has left, and anyway, what does she have to lose, telling the truth? “My mom’s going to take them for a while. Get them vaccinated. I have to find a job.”
Jeanie frowns at the mounds of bags barely visible through the van windows.
“So you’re just leaving?”
Chelsea takes a step closer to the van. Every moment now means something it didn’t before.
“There are no jobs here. I’ve got the sickness. I need to go up north, where it’s cold.” She squints up at the sun; it’s already in the mid-nineties in Florida. “Colder. I need to make enough money to…” She cuts herself off. She doesn’t have time to get into the thing with her mom and money and vaccinations. “Support the girls. But I need to hurry. David could be coming home any moment. So I guess this is goodbye.”
She looks up at Jeanie, wondering if theirs is more of a hug friendship or just a nodding sort of thing, at this point. They used to have coffee, go to neighborhood Bunco, do Zumba. When she was selling Dream Vitality, Jeanie was the only person who bought any, even if it was just a bottle of lavender and a diffuser, and then Jeanie was the only person willing to tell her to back off about the oils, already. But in the last few months, David had gotten bitchier about Jeanie, and Chelsea couldn’t take it anymore, so she just stopped answering.
Oddly, Jeanie isn’t frowning, not even that polite sort of social frown people use when they don’t know what to say. Jeanie’s dark-brown eyes are alight and crinkling in the corners like Santa Claus.
“What is it?” Chelsea asks.
“You’re going to think this is crazy, but I’ve got a lead on a job. Jobs, plural. Pays really well. And they don’t care if you’re infected because they’re promising vaccination.”
“What is it?”
Because Chelsea will do anything for her girls, but…there are some jobs she just can’t do.
Jeanie pulls out her phone and shows her an email. A flyer, really. As Chelsea realizes what it offers, she shakes her head.
“The Violence Fighting Ring?”
Jeanie nods. “Sounds badass, right?”
“No way. That’s insanely dangerous.”
“No, it’s not. You have to keep reading.”
Chelsea waves a hand and steps back toward the van. “You can’t be serious. When we’re storming, we’re just gone. Monsters. If you have it, you know that. We can’t fight each other. We’d kill each other.”
Jeanie pulls back her phone, chuckling. “You didn’t read it all. It’s like pro wrestling. It’s all made up. You just pretend to fight. Costumes, props. They’ll train you.”
“If it’s just like pro wrestling, then why aren’t they using pro wrestlers?”
“Because they want it to seem real. Real people, people you don’t expect. No steroids, no insane bodies. Regular folks, caught in the throes of the Violence and battling it out on the stage.”
Chelsea backs into the van’s open door, sits on her seat, and chews her lip. “Why?”
“Because it’s all bread and circuses! The people are scared, and they need entertainment. Didn’t you watch that old show, GLOW, about the underground women wrestlers? This is like that. We could get in on the ground floor. Tryouts are in Deland through Sunday. I was going to leave tomorrow morning, but maybe we could head out tonight, if you need to hop town.” She shoves her hands in the pockets of her jean shorts and rocks back on her heels in her flip-flops. “No prior experience needed. Girl, I’ve been shopping and making deliveries for rich assholes for weeks—for crappy tips—and I’m ready to make some real money, do something fun. And get vaccinated. It’d take years to get it, otherwise, at the going rate. Don’t you want to get the hell out of…” She waves her arms at Chelsea’s house. “Don’t you want to get away from this?”
“Not from my girls,” Chelsea says, oddly breathless.
“Oh, it’s only Deland. Just two hours away. Come with me. Make a bunch of money. The pay is good; a hell of a lot better than the delivery shifts I’m picking up. Believe me: Nobody here is hiring, and nobody up north wants a new employee with a Florida tan. You need that vaccine. And it sounds like your mom will keep them safe.”
Chelsea isn’t so sure about that, but it’s also the best idea she’s come across. She hates the thought of driving north into a place she’s never been with no real destination in mind, all alone, knowing every moment that she could run out of money or pop a tire or snap and kill someone. She understands that the delivery services don’t pay enough to survive, and she knows she’s not qualified for much, considering she has a high school diploma and no references. David cut off every ray of hope, every avenue of escape. Did he do it on purpose, or is it just a side effect of his shitty, controlling ways?
“I have to leave today, Jeanie. I can’t be here if he—”
Jeanie puts a hand on her arm again, squeezing gently. “I know. I know you can’t. I just need to finish packing, and we could go. Might be good for you, y’know?”
Chelsea feels like she’s standing on a precipice, like she’s staring down into an abyss that’s endlessly dark and yet somehow welcoming. She had no options, and now she has one. Even if it’s insane, at least she won’t be alone. At least she’ll have hope.
“I need to take this stuff to my mom’s house. The girls’ things.”
Jeanie nods, her grin widening. “Sure. Do what you’ve got to. I can be ready in an hour. Or you can park in my garage overnight and David won’t have a clue. So you’re in?”
Chelsea steps out of her minivan and looks up and down her street. This neighborhood should be a haven, but it’s a prison. This is a place where instead of reaching out to help their less fortunate neighbors, the HOA mails letters detailing every step out of bounds. Who is hiding in their house, hoarding food and paper goods, and who has left, and who is sick or hurt or dead? There’s no way to tell. From the outside, everything is fine. If not for the high grass, that overturned car, and the one pile of blackened rubble, it could be any day here for the past ten years. She would’ve thought a group of people living behind the same high fence and gate would bond together, reach out to help one another, but here they are in a crisis, more separated than ever.
No, she will not be sorry to leave this place.
She’s almost tempted to set the house on fire herself, leave David just as adrift as she feels now because of him.
But she can’t. Once everything is back to normal and the courts and insurance companies catch up, that house will represent all the money they have, and she needs whatever resources she can find for her girls, even if David will fight like hell to keep her from getting what’s hers.
Yes, Brian is a good lawyer, or at least a cruel, scrappy one. But for the first time, Chelsea thinks that maybe she can get to a place where she, too, can have a lawyer who believes in her rights.
“Sure. Yeah. I mean, why not? I’ll be back in an hour or so.”
Jeanie does a little wiggle of happiness. “Good. I’ll go make a playlist and put together snacks.”
As she drives to her mom’s house, Chelsea lets herself hope. She considers what it will be like, leaving with Jeanie, under no threats from David. Singing songs, eating hamburgers and fries and milkshakes, playing trivia games. If she thinks of it like a road trip, it’s easier somehow. Less permanent. Less real.
She doesn’t want to fight anyone, but then again, she doesn’t really want to do anything except hug her daughters.
When she gets to her mother’s neighborhood, Homer doesn’t wave and open the gate. Instead, he steps out of his little guardhouse, unsnapping the holster where he keeps his gun.
“Sorry, Ms. Martin, but you’ve been removed from the list. I can’t let you in.”
Chelsea’s heart drops, her cheeks burning. “But my girls are in there!”
Homer frowns like a basset hound with bad news. “I can’t do anything about that. I’m just doing my job. Mrs. Lane said you could leave their things with me, and she’d take possession of them later.”
Yeah, that sounds exactly like something her mom would say.
Chelsea holds back another flood of tears as she helps Homer unload the garbage bags and backpacks containing the clothes and blankets and toys she gave her girls, remembering each item and how it came into their lives. Brooklyn’s favorite hoodie, bought to keep out the cold on a chilly night at Disney World. Ella’s pillow in the soft, faded, ragtag cover they sewed together on a Girl Scout retreat. Memories on memories, stuffed into bags like so much trash. She leaves them piled behind the perfect little guardhouse and drives away.
Of course. Of course she won’t get to see her girls one more time.
Her mother always has to get in the last word.
A strange new rage builds in her chest like a fire smoldering.
Perhaps, she thinks, she won’t mind fighting someone after all.