Finding Tessa by Jaime Hendricks (best ereader for comics .TXT) 📗

No. Too controlling. He’d never let me be the one to leave.

I strip the bed and lay out the sheet, then wrap myself in my new blanket and dream of my future. Of finally being loved.

When I wake, it’s past dinnertime, even for me. My ex liked to eat early, as soon as he was home from work, and his dinner better have been ready, or else. I prefer my meals in the seven-thirty range, but who was I to argue with someone who controlled every last move I made? Now it’s dark, and I remember that the only thing I’ve had all day was an energy bar I packed in my purse. I have two boxes of them with me. That’s it. Energy bars and clothes. They’re cheap and get the job done, and I learned as a preteen in Foster Home Number Whatever that sometimes, it was find yourself an energy bar or don’t eat.

I’ve hoarded them my entire adult life. Asshole didn’t try to starve me like Foster Mother Number Whatever, or that one ex-boyfriend from senior year of high school, before I ran off. (Why are you so fat? I’m getting pizza, you ain’t getting shit!) That was said when I was a petite size four. The last Asshole and I ate quite well, actually. I mean, I could order the sixty-dollar New York strip, I just wasn’t allowed to finish all of it, no matter how famished I was. There was something left in my subconscious that always needed a secret hiding place full of energy bars. Just in case. I’m like a dog with a bone, hiding the damn things in clandestine corners in case I never eat again. My favorite is strawberry granola, or chocolate with frosting if I’m feeling wicked.

This morning, I ate the chocolate one.

Looking out the window, the groups of people downstairs have doubled in size and male versus female ratio. Competing car stereos blast, one playing Jay-Z and another playing 50 Cent. Everyone talks above the sound, which makes everyone shout. It’s like a garbage-people block party in the parking lot.

Thinking of the only person I trust right now, I take the card I got earlier and call Hobart, who agrees to pick me up in fifteen minutes. I spend the rest of the time covering my bruise and applying makeup that complements my bone structure. A contour brush can really go a long way. My eye makeup, overdone because of the bruise, looks harsh under the bathroom lighting, and I overcompensate with more eyeliner, which now that I step back and admire, looks good surrounding my gray eyes. Sultry. It should look better under the low lights of a bar.

I’m wearing jeans and a black silky tank and heels when Hobart texts me that he’s waiting at the light right before the shithole and will be there in less than two minutes. He didn’t want me waiting outside alone in the dark. Which is great really, because I’m used to feeling unsafe, but this situation outside right now is, in a word, hazardous. But it’s only for tonight. Tomorrow, I’ll find a place that’s safer. I needed to be here, local to the shady places, until I secured my ID in case I was being watched as soon as I took off. I wouldn’t want the ex to think I had money. His money. I’ve been swiping twenties off the grocery cash almost since the beginning.

This time around, I’m not going to hook up with the first loser I come across. Usually, I’ll find someone who sweet talks me right out of my pants, and I’ll believe that this time it’s different.

It never is, though. My mother was a product of three straight generations of white trash, and it showed. She got pregnant with the twins at fourteen—by someone who worked construction with her father. A grown man. Gave birth when she was fifteen. Jumped from loser to loser, had babies with all of them—learned behavior from her own mother, who I don’t even remember.

At least I did the right thing both times I got pregnant. My body, my choice. I really did try to break the cycle, and not popping out multiple children with no way to care for them was a start.

The TV was the unofficial babysitter in my house when I was little. The twins liked reality TV. Christopher and Kenny liked violent movies. I was raised by romantic comedies, and Reese Witherspoon was my favorite actress. I dreamed of being Elle Woods in Legally Blonde or Melanie in Sweet Home Alabama. Boss babes. Girls who get it done and are still able to find someone to love them, flaws and all.

A horn beeps. Hobart. I grab my denim jacket and open the door. Chants from the derelicts in the parking lot grow louder as I descend the stairs. Same vulgar shit as earlier in the day. One guy calls me Mami and says something about my concha. His girl slaps him across the face, then threatens to cut me, like it’s my fault that her man is staring. Hobart’s cab is just beyond her and she feels vindicated as I get into the back seat. Like her Yeah, keep walking, ho threat has anything to do with me leaving.

The cab still stinks, but I’m grateful for potbellied Hobart and his good sense.

“Thanks for coming,” I say as he attempts to pull away from the melee.

“I knew you were gonna need me, in a place like this,” he says as one of the men outside pounds his fist onto the trunk of the cab, prompting more Ooohhhhh! chants from everyone outside. “So, where you headed, lady?”

“Call me Tessa. We’ll probably be great friends for a few weeks,” I say with a laugh. “And where are we going? I don’t know, Hobart. I’m new to the area. I’m in the mood for a good meal. Take me someplace nice.”

“There ain’t nothing