After a terrible night's sleep, I looked in the mirror once again; switching out various clothe items in front of me, trying to decide what would be most appropriate for the day's task. I asked the all-knowing internet, but it offered me nothing other than to be grateful that it hadn't rained, as the rain would have made it nearly impossible to clean the TP off the house. Finally I selected my outfit, which wasn't very different from my usual wardrobe, just a little cheaper. I hopped down the stairs and took a seat on the couch; I wanted to be ready when Rae arrived. I had been to preoccupied to remember that Phil's teacher said that he was paying other neighbourhood kids to help with the cleanup, too, and when it dawned on me — my social anxiety took over like an all-encompassing shit storm. What if they were mean? What if they were really kind, but I said something stupid? What if I made an ass out of myself in more ways than one?

I guess I was monologging longer than I though realized, because a knock on the front door brought me out of my own head. I scrambled off the couch and to the door, checking my hair in the small mirror on the way out. I swung the door open and what I saw pierced my heart like a bayonet.

"Hi, Jack." Rae said it as if I couldn't see the huge bruise on her face, stretching down from her eye all the way under her cheek bone. My jaw dropped as I connected the dots in my head. I raised my hand to her cheek unthinkingly, but she swatted my hand away.

"Don't... please," she said. "My dad wanted to give me... us a ride to the old guy's house. He's over there." She tilted her head in the direction of an idling car with a middle-aged man in the front seat. I recognized the man as her father. We shook hands at the airport and he seemed normal enough.

Except he couldn't be. Rae gets a big-ass bruise on her face the day after she comes out; that's not a coincidence. I couldn't imagine it was her mom. Rae's mom was petite, frail like a leaf in fall. And her father wore a crucifix around his veiny neck. Not just a crucifix; a boney, bloody Jesus was was strung in the middle of the cross, and you could practically hear him saying, "I died for your sins! No mixed-fabrics, no shrimp, and most of all, no sapphism!" It was all a rich tapestry. I couldn't help but suspect.

But I didn't have to for much longer.

"Okay," I said. Rae turned away and walked towards the vehicle. I shut my front door — breathless, like I had been punched in the stomach.

As I neared the car, I saw Rae's father's hands; gripped around the steering wheel like they were seared to it. His knuckles were red. Scraped. My heart constricted. It was all so casual.

I got into the back of the car. I had barely closed the car door when her father stepped on the ignition and the automobile jerked forward. I looked around for the seatbelt, but there was none. It didn't have them.

I'm gonna die, I thought.

I grabbed the overhead handle and the startled look on my face was probably more apparent than I thought in the moment. Rae smiled at me, but I found it hard to smile back. Her father broke the intense silence.

"So, Raegan never told me why you two were going to this mysterious house. Can you shed some light on that, Jacquelyn?"

I wanted to beat him. "Oh, you know." I wanted to rip the hair out of his thick skull. "We were just walking and..." I felt like he deserved to die. "We saw this house covered in toilet paper. We had to offer to help." But I couldn't even imagine what Rae felt.

"Yeah," Rae added. "The man who lives there is older, so we figured we could lend a hand."

"Hmm," her father hmmed. "Will there be other kids there?"

"Yes," Rae said.

"Good, very good," he said. "And how's your brother?" I wondered what he was playing at.

"He's fine." I said, making hard eye contact with the cruel man in khaki pants in the rear view mirror.

"Does he have a girlfriend?" he asked. I clenched my teeth, as Rae looked at her feet and held her own hand.

"Phil is emotionally immature," I answered simply.

The car jumped over a speed bump, and I slid closer to Rae in the leather bench seat. We locked eyes, only to look away immediately and tuck our hair behind our ears. It seemed like her father saw with his bird's eye view, and lurched the car accordingly sliding me back into my seat and away from his daughter. I hit my face on the window. It would have been funny if it didn't suck.

The house heavy with ass-wipes was hard to miss, so we didn't have to say a word and her father stopped the car.

"Bless your heart, Jacquelyn," he said, an evangelical silhouette with hellfire burning in his eyes.

"Don't need it," I said, maintaining eye contact for longer than I should have. I opened the door and climbed out of the car, slowly sauntering towards the house. Rae did the same, but her father called for her to stay a minute.

"When do I pick you up?" he asked, the car idling, and the fumes drifting up into the blue sky and disappearing.

"Two-thirty. Dad, turn off the car."

"Do I have to drive down this terrible road again? There were bumps on bumps."

"Just pick me up at Jack's if you hate the road so much."

Her father looked at me, and I pretended to smoke a cigarette. "Fine. I'll be there 2:30 on the dot. Don't go into her room." He put pedal to the metal and screeched away before she could say anything. Her short hair blew in the gust of wind. She turned around and smiled a pseudo-smile at me. Even though a wide grin was on her face, she looked... sad. All I wanted to do was help.

But I didn't know how.

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Gary Watters is now my mortal enemy. 

Sheesh, anyway, thanks for reading this chapter. I know it was a bit of a darker tone, but I think that you'll like where this is all going in the long run...EEEEEEEKK!!!!

Singing off, I hope that your day and life is only describable as akin to falling in a bed of pink and red roses with your considerate and devoted life-partner beside you after devouring an entire red-velvet cake with vanilla icing. 

See ya tomorrow!