WITH TEN MINUTES TO go until we locked up for the night, we finally ushered the last customers out the door. I was supposed to have left a half hour ago, but we got a lastminute rush from a group out of Iowa on their way down to Branson. I turned to Midnight, who stood at the register alone. The rest of the store had a quiet, unused feel to it, like a bedroom no one slept in.
“Where’s Elise?” I asked.
“She headed out to the Brewsters’ to fix their garbage disposal, and she’s going to head straight home after that. She said to tell you bye.”
“You’re closing alone?”
“Wouldn’t be the first time. Butch was supposed to close with me, but you know.”
“Butch is an asshole, and he can deal with the overtime. I’m staying.”
The bell above the door dinged, and we both turned toward it. Horror curled in my gut as Jared strolled in, with Brett close behind. Jared smirked at me as he stuck his hand in his pocket and jiggled the change in there. All the blood drained from my face.
“You’re not allowed in here,” Midnight said behind me, her voice smaller than mine had been that time Gram busted me six months ago for trying to sneak out to meet Lance. “You know you’re not. Leave now.”
Jared lifted his gaze to Midnight, and he reminded me of a shark. Cold and totally devoid of emotion. “You gonna call the police on me, Lexi?” His lip curled in a vicious snarl. “Wait. That’s not your name anymore, is it?”
My head whipped around, and I stared hard at Midnight. Beneath the heavy eye makeup, the pale powder that made her skin appear near translucent, and the short, spiked black hair, I had a faint memory overlapping the girl before me. A different girl, with golden curls down to her waist. A farm girl who wore cute skirts and bright shirts. Alexis Peterson. We didn’t know her family well because we didn’t barter with them. They had a soybean farm, and Gram always said soybeans were for brain-dead vegans with vitamin B12 deficiencies. Alexis had been a grade ahead of me, but I still knew her the way everyone in town knew each other.
I knew her as Jared’s girlfriend.
“The restraining order says—” Midnight flinched as Jared clenched a fist.
“I don’t give a shit about the restraining order.” He bared his teeth, like those wild dogs Gram liked to evoke when she was pissed. “Did you think I’d want to touch you again after you decided to jump off the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down?”
I backed up a step, closer to the register. If Midnight could slide me the wrench, I’d use it on him. I’d pound the sneer off his lips and make him crawl out the door, the way he’d made me crawl on the sidewalk.
My movement caught his attention, and he focused on me again. “Famous Macy Evans. You still work here? I thought you’d be on your way to Hollywood by now.”
I lifted my chin, refusing to cower before him, even when my bones rattled against my skin. “Get. Out. Or I’ll call the police myself.”
Jared circled me, and I tracked him, keeping him at my front at all times. He stepped up to the DVD rack and gave it a spin. “I just want to rent a movie.”
“We don’t want your business,” I said.
He got in my face, and the stench of sour milk and beer hit me like a wave. “Why not? Are you too good for my business? You were nothing until you fucked that guy for a fly ball, and next week you’ll be nothing again.”
Brett had approached me from behind, and I didn’t notice him until he’d plucked my phone out of my back pocket. “No one is calling the police. We’re just here to rent a movie.”
I lunged for him, but he held my phone above his head, laughing like we were just fooling around. He swayed a bit. They were drunk as all hell, which made them ten times meaner than the day they’d glued those quarters to the sidewalk.
We needed to get them out of the store before it got worse, but Midnight had frozen with fear. If I made a run for the door, maybe they’d chase me out and she could call the police.
I darted around Jared, and Brett caught my arm, not hard enough to hurt, but the threat was there. He could hurt me if he wanted. “We’re not here to cause a ruckus,” he said. “You don’t have to run from us. We’ll get a movie, then be on our way.”
It happened in a blink—I didn’t see Midnight move until the wrench went flying from her hand, smacking the side of Jared’s head. He stumbled to the side, clutching his temple, and fell against the Action section, knocking the whole shelf over. Movies broke free from their boxes and skittered across the floor.
I used the distraction to rip my arm away from Brett, grab my phone, and run behind the counter. Jared got to his feet and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He’d turned beet red and an angry vein throbbed at his temple. He took one step forward. I shoved Midnight behind me, and she was trembling so bad, she didn’t even fight it.
With shaky fingers, I unlocked my phone and dialed 9-1-1. The operator answered on the first ring. “We’re being attacked by two drunk guys at the Honeyfield Video and Repair on Main.” I didn’t let Jared out of my sight, daring him to take another step in our direction.
“Dude.” Brett’s eyes grew as big as Eric’s had when I’d faked my allergy. He looked between me and the ruined Action section of the store. “Let’s go.”
He grabbed Jared, who seemed intent on staying put, hate etching hard lines in his face. Brett finally managed to haul Jared out the door, and Midnight ran to lock it before they could change their minds and come back.
I stayed on the phone until the lock clicked into place.
I called Mom and Gram to let them know what had happened and explain why it would be a while before I’d be home. Mom wanted to come right away, but I had the car, and no way would I let her walk the streets at night alone when I had no clue where Jared and Brett had gone. I assured her over and over again that the police were on their way, no one had hurt me, she could go to bed, and I’d be home when I finished cleaning up. It took twenty minutes just to get her off the phone.
Sheriff Mulder and Deputy Jeff Harrington, Lance’s older brother, came and took our statements. They couldn’t do much to Brett, but they’d bring in Jared for violating the restraining order. Jeff almost looked giddy at the idea of charging Jared. Or maybe he was just giddy he’d get to play a real cop in a town that didn’t see a lot of action outside the drunk tank. Midnight called Elise and reassured her that she didn’t need to come, the same way I’d reassured my mom. Then she called her brother Travis.
After Midnight gave her brother the details and hung up, she turned to me. “Since the sheriff can’t do anything about Brett, Travis and his friends will.”
I shivered. Farm boys had their own brand of justice.
With the police gone, the store had gone quiet again. I went into the closet/break room and rifled around in the drawers until I found the bottle of peach schnapps.
I set the bottle in front of Midnight. “We could both use a shot.”
She unscrewed the top and took a deep swallow. “You probably have a lot of questions.”
“Only if you feel like sharing.” I had a million questions, but after what she’d gone through, there wasn’t a chance in hell I’d put any pressure on her to provide answers.
She sat in front of the counter, facing the ruin of the Action section we’d have to clean up before we left. After taking another sip from the bottle, she passed it to me, and motioned for me to sit beside her. “I used to date Jared in high school.”
“I know,” I said. When she gave me a sharp look, I shook my head. “I didn’t know before tonight, but when he called you Lexi, I remembered you, sort of, from school.”
She tilted her head back until it rested against the counter. “His parents’ farm is about a mile down the road from my parents’ farm. They’re not friends. My parents are gentle and Jared’s daddy is hard, and they were always like oil and water. I think that’s probably why I paid Jared any mind. The whole Romeo and Juliet thing at sixteen is a powerful lure.”
“I can see that,” I said, twirling the bottle of schnapps between my hands.
“Anyway, we started dating, and he was something else. All the guys in our grade were afraid of him, even Brett, and as much as I hate myself for it now, it felt good to be with the kind of guy who made other people afraid.”
“Why?” I’d never gotten the alpha male appeal. My mom sometimes liked them in her romance novels, but in real life they were a total nightmare.
Midnight shrugged. “Big strong man playing the protector. No other guys would go near me. I was Jared’s girl, and that scared them enough to keep away. I guess I felt special. Being a farm girl in a house with seven other kids, I didn’t get to feel special too often.”
“I’m sorry.” When I was little, I desperately wanted to be part of a big rowdy family like the farm kids had. To be surrounded by people close to my age, instead of a bunch of old quilting Bee ladies. I’d never considered the downsides of that.
“It is what it is.” Midnight waved it away like it was no big deal. “Jared’s daddy, he had a temper when he drank, and he knew how to leave bruises on Jared’s momma where no one else could see them. Sometimes I’d be at their house for supper, and I’d see his momma wincing in pain when she bent down to take the chicken from the oven.”
“Jesus.” She hadn’t been kidding when she said Jared learned his mean at his daddy’s knee. “Did …” I clenched my fists. “Did Jared ever leave bruises on you?”
“No.” Her eyes darkened.
I blew out a breath of relief. Jared was all muscle from working on the farm his whole life, and Midnight was barely bigger than Gram. If he had hit her, he would’ve broken bones.
“How did you get out of the relationship?” I didn’t ask why they broke up. With the way things had gone down earlier, the pure terror that shook her to her feet when she saw him walk in, I knew it hadn’t been a breakup. She’d escaped.
“It started after we’d just eaten supper and his daddy was in a bad mood. Drunk, of course.” Midnight’s expression hardened. Not like when she and I got into it over dumb work pranks, but absolute, unfiltered rage. “He and Jared got into an argument, don’t even remember over what, and his daddy backhanded him. Right there at the table while he was sitting next to me. I froze, scared out of my mind. I still see his split lip and feel his shame from that night. He dropped me off at home, said he’d call me later, didn’t want to talk about it.”
I grabbed her hand and found it sweat-slicked. “His dad deserves to burn in hell.”
“Without a doubt,” she said. “Jared never brought it up again. Then one night we were all drinking at the Brewster farm. Jared and Brett had one too many beers and started throwing their weight around. Jeff Harrington got mouthy and Jared coldcocked him. Laid him right out on the barn floor.”
“Deputy Jeff?” Holy shit. No wonder he looked happy about hauling in Jared.
She nodded. “I’d been drinking too, and everyone wanted to leave after that. I was pissed he ruined our night, so I said …” She swallowed. “I didn’t even mean it seriously, but I said he was just as bad as his daddy. He turned on me then, and I swear to God, I saw his daddy in his eyes. I backed away, but he grabbed my hair and wrapped it around his wrist, like he was about to drag me out of the barn and do God knows what.”
“That was not your fault.” I squeezed her hand. “No matter what you said to him, no matter how much you were both drinking, it wasn’t your fault.”
“I thought he was going to kill me,” she said, her voice a whisper on the air. “Travis came up behind him and hit him over the head with a manure shovel. Jared fell to the ground and Travis grabbed me and took me straight home to tell our parents what happened. They made me call the police and file a restraining order.”
“I’m glad they did,” I said.
“I was so scared he was going to break into our house and drag me out by my hair to finish what he’d started. I cut it all off that night.”
I understood then why she’d given me that look the day I came to work all done up after my Dirty Dancing video. Like she’d recognized my chosen armor, because it was hers, too. The short black hair, so different from her golden waves, the heavy powder and eyeliner, the general bite in her voice. All perfectly constructed to keep people an arm’s length away. Never letting anyone look too closely, forgetting all about Lexi until Lexi ceased to exist.
“Is this why you and Elise had trouble the last time you were together?” I asked.
“Relationships are hard for me.” She picked at the black nail polish on her thumb. “I’m trying to get better at them. I told Travis I was bi when I was fifteen, so he’s the only one in my family who knows about Elise. She probably should’ve been done with me a long time ago, but for some reason she thinks I’m worth it.”
“Because you are worth it.” I gave her a shoulder bump because I knew she wasn’t the hugging type. “I’m sorry I never considered you might have your own stuff going on. I only saw my best friend hurting, but you also make her really happy, so I guess it evens out.”
“Thank you.” She stood and offered me her hand. “I’m sorry I put liquid laxatives in your Dr Pepper after you removed the F from my shift supervisor sign.”
“I take back my sorry.”
She laughed. The sound surprised me as much as it had the day I pulled the wrench out to scare that hipster. It wasn’t one I heard often. “Too late.”
“I sat on the toilet for two days!”
“Trust me, I’m aware.” She gave me an evil grin.
I sighed, shaking my head at the mess spread out before us. “We really have to stop brawling in the store. We’ll both be fired if we keep this up.”
“Who’s going to fire us?” She smirked. “Butch?”
“Fair point.” Lucky for us, none of our fights occurred during those two hours a month when Butch remembered he had a job and actually attempted to do it. “Should we get started?”
We tipped the shelf back up, and it took us half an hour to hunt down all the tapes that had broken out of their boxes. Another two hours to put them back in alphabetical order. We finished and locked up, and out in the parking lot, Midnight stopped me.
“I know you’re in the middle of some stuff right now,” she said.
Understatement of the year. “Yeah?”
“Now that you know my situation, I hope you’ll believe me when I say you’ll be okay. Sometimes you just have to get through it before you can see it, but on the other side? You’ll figure out who you are and what you’re really made of.”
“Promise?”
She nodded and gave me a genuine smile before climbing into her car. Huh. I think I just became friends with Midnight. This week kept getting stranger.
And the next time Butch bothered to show up, I’d chew him five new assholes, and I didn’t care if he was the manager. He’d probably fire me and then forget he’d done it the next day anyway. He never should’ve left Midnight to close by herself, and if those people from Iowa hadn’t come in, I wouldn’t have been there with her when Jared showed up. I rubbed my arms against the chill, wishing I’d brought a hoodie to tug on over my clothes.