Page 72 of Existential
The loaded silence returns. I count Hooch’s breaths as he gently scrolls the page up every so often, working his way through the texts. His eyes twitch, his jaw slowly working side to side.
The messages were bad, sure, but I didn’t think they were out of the ordinary for a bunch of outlaws. I mean, the stuff Digits said? It would have just been to scare me, right?
“Where is he?” The forced calmness in Hooch’s tone has my skin flush, my heart seizing in my chest, and tears threatening to spill over.
“I don’t want to cause trouble. Just ask him to back off and we’ll leave it at that, okay?” Last thing I need is to be known as the vagrant girl who started an internal war.
“No,” Hooch states, shaking his head. “It ain’t okay.” He flicks back up the page, tapping it to stop at the point he was searching for. I cringe as he reads the message aloud. “Rule 24 of the charter states that a member only offers a ride as pillion to single women in exchange for sexual favors. You owe me, slut.” He lifts his gaze to mine. “That, my fairy friend, is bullshit. No such rule.”
I open my mouth to tell him that I didn’t believe it, that I’m not that gullible, yet he silences me with a raised finger, scrolling with his other hand to find the next message.
“You think it’s okay to lead a man on? Make me ditch Heather for you, and then freeze up? You get a patch, the only thing it’ll say is ‘Ice Queen’ given your cunt is a cold and frigid wasteland.”
“Something going on I didn’t know about when you showed up at our clubhouse?” Hooch asks.
My chin quivers, my frustration at the accusation of being so loose manifesting in my tears. “You think that low of me?”
“No. But somethin’ made him think you were keen on him.”
King squeezes my shoulder. “You think perhaps Digits has blown it out of proportion in his head, brother?”
“I’m sure he has,” Hooch answers. “But I want to know details before I go tear his fuckin’ dick off.”
“I didn’t do anything.” I bury my face in my hands, pushing the tears back with the heels of my hands. “He offered me a ride back to the clubhouse to have a shower and a hot meal, and I accepted. I was fucking starving and, as it turns out, too useless to even steal something to eat. So I jumped at the chance thinking I could just cut and run after I was done.” Moving my hands to my legs, I lift my head and plead with Hooch. “You were the reason I stayed. And you know that. You asked me to, otherwise I would have left that night.”
Digits words circle through my mind. “He used you.” As much as I want to ignore his dig at Hooch, the line stung of truth.
He did use me. He used me to clean up their grounds, and then he offered to pay me to deliver a message and let me go afterward. He had no genuine feelings toward me at the start, so why would he now? Even King admitted he’d openly use me to make Hooch better. They’re just a bunch of opportunistic assholes.
“How does this help you?” I ask, looking at both men.
“What do you mean?” King asks.
“It’s a bit far-fetched,” I scoff, “that you’d do this for a stranger, right? One of your own: an old lady, or a property girl, I could understand. But me?”
“We don’t tolerate this kind of behavior towards women, Dagne, I told you that,” King stresses.
“He needs to know he can’t get away with it,” Hooch adds.
“That’s not the only reason, though, right?” I edge out of the chair, backing away from the two of them. “You get a kickback from this, don’t you.”
Neither of them says a single thing. It’s all the reassurance I need.
“I won’t be a part of your games anymore.” I fix Hooch as he hangs his head. “I’m done being used. I’m not your pawn.”
He rises from the seat as I wrench the office door open, but he doesn’t come after me. His guilt anchors him to that throne of lies. They’re all the same, the presidents of this ill begotten club. They use and manipulate to get what they want, damn the cost.
Well, stuff them. Stuff them all. Seems no matter where I go, people are all doing the same thing: sucking the life right out of the world around them.
Including me.