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The door flies open, slamming back into the wall. His father enters. Sometimes he looks like something out of a scary movie, more like a shadow than a man.
Sometimes he just looks like himself. That's enough.
JD is almost always on the bed when this happens. There's nowhere to go, not really, though he always tries to run.
He goes to the bathroom, trying to lock the door behind him. His father breaks the door down, almost drowns him in the toilet to punish him, and takes him away anyway.
He runs for the front door, for freedom. His father catches him, throwing him down. If he's lucky, he blacks out when he hits the ground.
He's almost never lucky.
He sat up, breathing hard and looking around in the darkness, needing to confirm that he was still alone. He hated that nightmare. Damned thing had to be the worst of them, coming on the way it did and making it hard to tell if it was real or not, always terrifying because it had happened before. It could happen again.
It could happen any day, any time. His father wasn't shy about what he did when he found them.
Not that it ever mattered. His mother had tried to get the police to help them before, but they didn't. CPS had taken him from both of them once. JD preferred his father to that. It had been hell.
He ran a hand over his face, going to his bag on the chair and pulling out his cigarettes. His mother had picked up another shift, calling to say she'd be very late.
She always managed to find those damned twenty-four hour diners, and while he knew it was good for the money, he hated it when she was out overnight. Sometimes he dreamed his father would kill her before coming for him, and he'd never see her again because his father wasn't about to let him go.
He'd proved that much. All these years, and he still hunted them.
Mine. You don't get to leave me. Ever.
JD lit the cigarette, knowing he should go outside, but his mother wasn't here and he wasn't about to stand out in the dark with a lit bulls-eye, asking to be seen by anyone and everyone. They had to rent cheap places, and more than once one of them had run into someone they wished they hadn't in the parking lot.
If they were together, they could usually manage to save each other.
More and more, though, they were alone, and he knew it was going to end badly. That was the only way it could end. Oh, sure, sometimes he thought he'd be okay if he quit school and picked up his own work, tried to be an adult and normal, but realistically, neither of them would last long on their own. The minute Bud found them, it would be over.
If his mother didn't end it on her own, as she'd almost done before. Hell, even JD had been tempted by the idea. He wanted peace, but they had to keep running. JD was sick of it. He was tired. He couldn't stand the looking over his shoulder, the constant fear.
He'd like to turn it around, make his father scared of him, but Bud just laughed when he tried to fight back. He always won.
JD pushed the curtains back, looking out into the parking lot. He didn't think all of those cars had been here earlier, but they were talking about the cheapest motel in town, where most of the people rented by the hour.
They'd paid for a night, never more than that. Bud could show up at any moment, and they had to be ready to run.
He couldn't be sure it wasn't that time again, but he wasn't leaving without his mom. There was no point. He didn't have the car, and he'd never make it to a bus if Bud had already found them.
Damn it, they'd only been here for a day. JD should be able to relax and sleep. It was too soon for Bud to know where to find them, where to look. He should need at least a few more days, if not weeks. Months. That had been nice when it was months.
It had also hurt the most when it ended, but he wished he could believe they'd have that kind of freedom again, especially since he'd met that girl earlier.
He didn't know her name, shouldn't bother learning it, but there was still a stupid part of him that hoped, that wanted things like a room of his own and friends and maybe even more than that.
He leaned his head against the wall. He was an idiot. He knew better. His father would come and ruin everything, and even if he didn't, his mother would make them run. They always did.
Veronica was not waiting in front of the school for the boy from yesterday. She hadn't chosen this spot for the morning 'meeting' of the Heathers. Heather Chandler had insisted on making sure Veronica passed inspection today, as though she was incapable of dressing herself, and the whole thing was completely degrading. Sometimes she didn't think it was worth it, being part of the Heathers.
Other times, she knew it wasn't, but she also wasn't sure how she'd survive if she tried to leave now. It was one thing before she got in with them, being ignored or ridiculed, but now she would be a traitor, and Heather would never allow that.
Veronica's life would be over.
At least until high school was done. She could probably rebuild in college. People did it all the time, reinvented themselves and became better than they used to be.
“It could be worse, but it's better than yesterday,” Chandler said, making a face and picking at Veronica's jacket.
She rolled her eyes. This would have been fine two weeks ago, and had been, but now it was unacceptable? Heather was ridiculous. “You're the one who insists on me wearing blue and only blue. I don't have that much blue in my closet, remember?”
“Fine. We'll go shopping again and fix this mess,” Chandler said. “You should already have done that, but I can see I'll have to make sure it gets done, as usual.”
Veronica started to say something, but then she saw him, dark coat easy to spot against the plain white stone of the building. She'd almost been hoping he wouldn't look as good today as he did yesterday, but from here, he did and then some.
She had to be wrong about that. She'd made a fool of herself in front of him yesterday, falling on the steps like that. He hadn't laughed, though he'd said he would, and she'd tried for something cute with the physics thing. God, she was such a moron.
“Jeez, Veronica, drool much?” McNamara asked. “He's in my American History class.”
“What's his name?”
“Who cares?” Chandler asked, and Veronica looked at her. “No, you have got to be kidding. I offer you the crème of Remington society, and you want to slum with that loser?”
“I don't know, Heather,” Duke said. “He's kind of cute.”
“You are such a pillowcase,” Chandler told her, shaking her head in disgust.
Veronica ignored them, stepping forward as he got closer. She didn't know what it was about him, but she wanted to know, not just a little, but everything. She'd never been this interested in a guy before, not any of the ones Chandler approved of and tried to set her up with or the ones that she'd had a crush on when she was a lot younger.
That made her bolder than she might have been before. “You never told me what classes you wanted help in.”
He shrugged, not looking at her. Yesterday it seemed like they both couldn't keep their eyes off each other, but now he wouldn't meet her eyes. “Maybe your price was too high.”
She frowned. That wasn't right. She hadn't even told him what it would be, mostly because she didn't know. She had no idea which classes he was in besides the one McNamara had mentioned, and she didn't know what they'd been doing at his last school or how much he'd moved around.
“You don't actually have to be a sex slave to get my help, you know. I mean...” She felt herself go even redder than she had the last time. “I mean...”
The coolness he'd had at first left him, and he smiled at her. “You're cute when you're incoherent.”
“Sure. That's what all the girls like to hear.”
“Seems to work on you,” he said, giving her a bit of a smirk. She wanted to smack him. She wanted him to kiss her. Was this normal?
“I know you're in American History,” she said, trying to be calm and not make more of a fool of herself. “You have Emerson for that?”
He reached into his coat and took out a cigarette, lighting it up and taking a drag before he shrugged again, sounding bored as he looked away from her. “No idea. Wasn't paying much attention. Doesn't matter. Don't need to bother with tutoring. Won't be going back.”
“But you're here.”
“Appearances are everything, you know.”
She didn't know what was up with him, but she didn't like it. One minute flirty and fun, the next distant and cold. She thought about it, and it was crazy, but she did it anyway, reaching for his cigarette. He watched her with surprise as she took a drag.
“Haven't you ever heard not to judge a book by its cover?”
“Hmm,” he said, leaning into her. “Maybe the cover's what they want you to see.”
“Exactly,” she whispered, aware of how little distance there was between them. “You know, it's not fair. I don't even know the title.”
“Oh, and here I thought you were only interested in the dirty bits inside.”
She shook her head. “I think I'd like to know from cover to cover.”
“You a bookworm?”
“For the right kind of book.”
“Like what?”
“You,” she told him, and she really did think that time he might have kissed her, had Chandler not chosen that moment to ruin everything.
“Veronica,” Chandler yelled in that voice that was both warning and command. “Let's go. Now.”
JD swore he was about to do something really stupid before that blonde interrupted them. He had told himself he was keeping his distance from the girl. He'd walked around the building because his mother had sat in the car watching him this morning, like she didn't think he was going to go in. Sometimes he hated how well they knew each other.
And sometimes he knew she didn't know him at all.
Still, he knew they weren't staying. He could always tell when their time was short, and from the way both of them were on edge, they probably weren't going to last the week here, so there was no point in going to school.
No point in going near the girl, much as he wanted to.
He had tried to put her off, but she'd taken his cigarette, and damned if he didn't want to kiss her right then. He had stupid idea about running off with her or trying to find a way to stay, neither of which was possible.
“You've been summoned.”
She nodded, looking back at the others before facing him. “I don't have to go.”
“Probably should,” he said. “Not worth sticking around. I'm not going to.”
She frowned. “What does that mean?”
“Just what I said. I'm not staying. I never do. That's the way it works. The only constant in life is change,” he told her, taking out another cigarette.
“So this doesn't mean anything to you?”
He should just say no, it didn't. That was simple. Easy. The word didn't come like it should. He couldn't stay. He knew that. He couldn't afford to care about her. He'd have to leave her behind, and if his father knew about her, he might hurt her.
He had to say it didn't mean anything. He didn't.
“Veronica,” the other girl called again, looking like she just might blow a gasket.
“In a minute,” Veronica said, her eyes not leaving him. “What is this, some kind of game to you?”
He found himself wanting to tell her that it wasn't, actually almost telling her the truth—that he and his mother ran from his father years ago but he somehow kept finding them. That they had to keep running, that he couldn't have anything close to a future because his father was a bastard.
What the hell was it about her that made him want to break all the rules and spill his guts? He didn't tell anyone about his father.
“You know what you can do with this stupid game of yours?” Veronica asked, and he knew she was about to tell him where to shove it.
He should have let her.
Instead, he kissed her.