Only when she’s in the car, do I turn around. The men at the door, puffing on cigarettes, pay me little attention until I’m closer. My scars catch their attention, and their gazes follow me inside. I spy the two awful-looking fucking things in red. Stringy extensions and greasy roots.
I approach the bar, edging between both women without allowing them to touch me.
The round face of a clock reads 7:02 p.m.
I told Dollie five minutes.
The big hand ticks high above the barman, who gives me a wary look, probably knowing who I am. The scars tell stories, after all.
Pulling my trusty blade from its second home in my pocket, I notice instantly how the quieter of the two women gets edgy. Her posture sags, and she shifts away slightly, picking at her cuticle, which makes me sick. My glare of judgment forces her to turn her back on her friend.
I move to the other side of her, and a fake bravado crosses her face, the matching smile lingering.
My lips stay low, a contrast to the permanent happiness that I do not fucking feel etched into my face.
My T-shirt clings to my shoulders as they tense. I rotate my arm, and her gaze drops to my history of self-harm.
Stabbing the blade into my arm, the woman before me is the one to flinch.
Frozen, the color drains from her face as I scrape away my flesh, spelling out a message in my skin with the tiny blade.
YOU HURT MY GIRL.
“I didn’t mean to,” the woman’s lip trembles, and she steps back into her friend, who also watches me with an unmoving gaze.
Every set of eyes in this damn place watch me.
The blade moves to my other arm.
Cut deeper this time, or Dollie will die.
I acknowledge the voice and give in to its command, scraping another message that has blood dripping down my arm and pooling on the already dirty carpet.
Swiping at the blood reveals a new message, and the woman reads it for me.
“That wasn’t very nice.”
Still so serious, I shake my head.
“I’ll do better,” the woman promises, looking weak and meek and so fucking worthless in her tatty red dress that clings to her shapeless thighs. She falls away from me, caught by a guy in the crowd with just one tooth.
I point to it, then my missing one, tapping the empty space with my blade. It’s a clear indication that I want it, but not that I want it lost in the dirty carpet, because I wouldn’t physically touch anything that belongs to him.
He raises dirty hands in defense, and I laugh, batting the cowering man away.
Twisting back, I face the woman who can’t take her eyes off me. The second our eyes meet, she bolts to the bathroom. I follow, and before the door can slam shut, I slink inside.
Her cries and pleas only fuel my anger when I spot a clump of pink curls on the floor.
Something takes over me, and I charge at the cubicle door. The wood threatens me with another splinter, and I ignore it and her pitiful cries that keep on and on, begging, “Please stop.”
I don’t stop, can’t stop.
“What the fuck do you want!”
Tiny screws hit the floor as the lock breaks away, and I squeeze myself into the tiny cubicle with her. My height fills the space, giving her nowhere to go, and she sinks down to the dirt where she belongs.
Her hands—hands that hurt Dollie—reach for my pants, and I kick them away, not touching her but warning her not to touch me.
