Page 25 of Pen Me

Lennox

I folded the letter into three and stuffed it into an envelope, shaking my head at myself as I did so. It was a long letter for me.

“Over here pouring your heart out through a pen like it's your first bit, Menace,” I scolded myself under my breath. “You fucking know better.”

Still, I put the damn thing in the mail when the correctional officer came around.

Chapter Thirteen

Another Family Dysfunction

Sammy

If there was one thing, I loved about being home, it was drowning my sorrows in a hot shower. There was no rush. I could wash and scrub to the point of compulsion, or until I felt better about things. My skin was always pinker than necessary when I came out and swiped a hand across the mirror, but no one was looking at it besides me anyway.

I ran the comb through my dark-brown hair and stared at my reflection in the mirror. I had dark circles under my eyes, and my normal tan complexion was a bit paler than usual. I’d been a welterweight when I competed in the ring, but I could tell from a glance, I wasn’t anywhere near that now.

“Shit.” I huffed, unsure what was stress and what was illness. “Get it together, Sammy.”

I shook my head and picked the towel up off the counter. I was looking down at the laundry basket where I dropped it when I stepped out, so I didn’t realize my entire local family was sitting around my kitchen table until I rounded the corner.

I let out a scream and jumped back, pinning myself to the hallway wall as I stared wide-eyed from my father to my mother. My gaze narrowed when it landed on Sauce.

That little snitch!

He couldn’t look at me, and for some peculiar reason, I laughed.

It was an odd sound that I didn’t recognize at first and I couldn’t stop it once it began.

“This is fuckin’ rich. You’re prospecting and dry snitching without shame. What the fuck have the Dirty Savages come to?”

“Samantha,” my mother hissed.

“Jolene,” I returned, with just as much shame and disappointment in my tone.

She shrank back in her chair, and I stalked forward, ready to pounce.

“Did you really fraternize with a married man?” she whispered, her head canting downward like she was too humiliated by such a concept to even be seen uttering the question.

“Oh.” Dad snorted, “No one gives a fuck about that, Jo. Jesus!”

He shot out of his chair and rounded on me, his hands coming to my shoulders and redirecting my attention in the process. “Honey, wh…? Are you gonna be okay? That’s all that really matters. Sauce mentioned a diagno–”

“What the hell do you mean, no one cares? She’s ruined her military career, Wyatt. She shit on her honor–”

Dad groaned and turned as he swiped the air to bat her back. His whole face contorted at her ignorance, “What the hell do you know about fucking honor, or the marines for that matter?”

He didn’t wait for her to answer before he barked, and brought his hand up to cup his ear “Huh? Yeah. That’s what I thought. Don’t ever talk to my daughter like that again.”

“Oh, fuck you, Wyatt!” Mom shrieked, “You think because you got a – a fucking–”

“That’s right. I got a fuckin’ purple heart. A purple heart, a dead daughter, and an ex-wife with no goddamned common sense.” He scoffed and tried to turn back to me.

“Uh–” Sauce stammered, looking as uncomfortable as one could be. “This has, uhm– Derailed.”

“No common sense?” Mom’s voice somehow continued to climb, “You refer to your own son by his criminal moniker rather than the God-given name we placed on his birth certificate, and I’m fucking ignorant?”

She made a wet sound with her lips and shook her head.

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