Her Mother’s Grave

Chapter Forty-Seven

JOSIE – THIRTEEN YEARS OLD

There was a man in her mother’s bed. This wasn’t at all unusual, except that it was the same man who had been in her mother’s bed every morning for the last two weeks. The noise of their vigorous nighttime activities was hard to sleep through in the tiny trailer, but she made sure to be up, showered, dressed, and out the door every morning before either of them got up, taking the shortcut through the woods to wait for Ray on his back porch. Josie’s mother and the new guy weren’t around in the afternoons, usually returning to the trailer after dinner, by which time Josie was firmly barricaded in her room. Josie didn’t like it when men stayed over, but she loved it when her mother had a reason to ignore her.

When she finally met him, it was by accident. A stomach virus had kept her up most of the night, and as she was stumbling from the bathroom to the kitchen to get a glass of water, she stumbled smack into his bare chest. The impact sent Josie flying backward, her ass hitting hard against the kitchen tiles. The lights switched on, and Josie threw up a forearm to avoid the sudden glare. Standing over her, looking impossibly tall, was a guy who had to be closer to Josie’s age than her mother’s. Shaggy brown hair fell across his face. He wore only boxer shorts, and the muscles of his long torso rippled when he reached down to help her up.

“Hey,” he said. “You okay?”

She nodded, suddenly very aware that she must smell like vomit.

“You don’t look so good,” he told her. “I’m Dex, by the way. Your mom said she’d introduce me, but you’re never here.”

Oh, I’m here, Josie thought. All her mother had to do was knock on her bedroom door, but now Josie saw why her mother wouldn’t want them to meet. She couldn’t take her eyes off his flat stomach and the trail of hair that dipped into the front of his boxers. She’d seen Ray shirtless a dozen times, but Ray didn’t look like this. “How—how old are you?” Josie asked.

Dex laughed. “I’m twenty. I know, I know, there’s a bit of an age difference, but your mom, you know, she’s really cool.”

Josie didn’t bother responding to that. Dex didn’t seem like he was there as the result of a drug-and-alcohol-fueled bender like most of them. He actually wanted to be there, which made him either really stupid or every bit as cold-hearted as Josie’s mother. Josie’s money was on stupid; she’d seen her mother manipulate men before. She pushed past him and got a glass from the overhead cabinet, filling it with water and gulping it down. Immediately she regretted it as nausea roiled in her stomach.

“You sick?” Dex asked.

Yeah, he definitely wasn’t the brightest.

Ignoring him, Josie tried to push past him, but before she could get through the living room, the nausea overcame her and vomit exploded across the carpet in front of her. Holding her stomach, she swayed on her feet. It was only the water she’d just had, but the smell was rank. Her mother was really going to make her pay for this.

Then Dex was at her feet, blotting the carpet with paper towels. He left and came back with cleaner he’d found under the kitchen sink. “You should go lie down,” he said. “I got this.”

Josie knew she should thank him, but she was afraid if she didn’t get into her bed that instant, she might not make it. She ran to her room and clambered into her bed, pulling the covers up to her neck, letting the illness pull her under its choppy waves.

She didn’t even remember falling asleep, but when she woke up, on her nightstand were four cans of ginger ale and two sleeves of saltine crackers. She sat up, confused and sure she must be dreaming. Reaching over to examine one of the cans, her feet bumped into something hard and plastic beside her bed. A bucket. For her to throw up in. For a moment, Josie wondered if her grandmother had been there in the night, but she knew better. Her mother never allowed Lisette inside the trailer. There was no chance it was her mother, so it had to be… Dex?

It was two weeks before their paths crossed again, and when they did, she only managed a mumbled “Thanks.” It made her nervous when men were nice to her. It always came at such a heavy price—her mother’s rage, a bargaining chip, or something worse. Occasionally Dex would invite her to join him and her mother while they ate or watched television, but she always declined. He invited her to go to the movies with them or out to eat, but again she refused. He always looked a little disappointed, but he had no idea of the way things worked in her mother’s world.

Then he started approaching her when her mother wasn’t home. He had practically moved in by this point, and while her mother was off doing whatever she did to earn money to keep the trailer roof over their heads, Dex tried to draw Josie out, offering her rides to and from school, wanting to take her for ice cream, asking if she needed help with her homework, trying to get her to watch TV with him. One day he brought home a dozen donuts and offered her some, pointing out that he had gotten six of her favorite kind: French crullers. How he even knew that was beyond her. Had she told him?

As if sensing her question, he said, “The last two times your mom got donuts, the French crullers mysteriously disappeared. I took a wild guess.”

Josie stood in the middle of the tiny trailer kitchen, her stomach growling at the sight of the donuts, and put a hand on her hip. “Look,” she told him, “I’ve already got a boyfriend, I don’t need anyone’s help, and I sure as hell don’t need another one of my mom’s pervy boyfriends trying to be ‘nice’ to me. I wouldn’t touch you for a million donuts, so just cut it out. Okay?”

For a moment, he stared at her wide-eyed, shock slackening his jaw. Then, slowly, a smile spread across his face and he began to laugh. He bent at the waist, holding his belly, just laughing his ass off. Josie shot him the dirtiest look she could muster.

Finally, he said, “You’re pretty sassy, you know that? How many ‘pervy boyfriends’ did your mom have before I moved in?”

Josie walked away from him, taking up position on the living-room couch where her homework was spread out. “Enough,” she said.

“I’m not being nice to you because I want something from you, and I’m certainly not a pervert.”

“That’s what they all say,” she muttered as she picked up her pencil and tried to focus on her homework.

A French cruller on a folded paper towel appeared next to the worksheet in front of her. “We’re living together,” he said. “I’m dating your mom. I don’t want anything from you. I’m just trying to talk to you, to maybe make you look less miserable once in a while.”

“Well, don’t try being my dad either,” Josie snapped.

“I’m not trying to be anyone’s dad,” Dex replied. “Your mom and I, we’re just having fun.”

“I know,” Josie said. “I hear you every night.”

Again, he laughed. “You’re a whip,” he said. “Anyway, have some donuts, don’t have some donuts. I’m going out. If you want a ride to school tomorrow, I can take you.”

He flashed a smile at her, his green eyes vibrant beneath a shock of dark hair, and left the trailer. Josie listened to the sound of his car pulling away and wondered how long he would be in their lives.