HARDCORE: Storm MC(168)

I nodded. “Yeah, it did get noisy sometimes. I’m sorry. I tried to keep everybody quiet. I’ll make sure to do a better job tonight.”



“It’s okay.” She shrugged it off philosophically. “I’m used to it.”



There was no hatred in her voice, no anger or pain. That was just the way it was for her. She was used to living with noise coming from downstairs.



I took a chance, feeling my way into the conversation. “Did your mommy always have a lot of people over?”



“Yeah. I mean, not every night. But a lot of nights.”



“And you would always stay upstairs in your room when that happened?”



“Yeah. I had my toys up there, and a TV and movies to watch. It wasn’t so bad. Then I would go to bed. Sometimes I would leave the TV on so I didn’t have to hear downstairs.”



“That’s pretty smart,” I said mildly. “Did anybody ever come upstairs? I mean, did you hear people in the hallway, outside your door?”



“Sometimes.” She traced the floral pattern of the bedspread with one finger. Her hair was a mess, total bedhead. I smiled at her when she wasn’t looking.



“Did anybody ever come into your room?” I said it as calmly as I could, like it was normal for it to happen. I didn’t want to scare her off.



“No. I was always alone.” She shrugged. I breathed a quiet sigh of relief.



“What do you think about Lance?” I asked, propping up on one elbow.



“What do you mean?”



“I mean, is he nice to you?”



“Yeah. I guess so. I mean, he wasn’t always. When I first got here, he pointed a gun at me.” She linked her hands in the shape of a gun and pointed it at my face.



“What?” I didn’t mean to shout it, but she’d shocked me.



“Yeah. He didn’t mean it, though. He told me he thought somebody left something bad at the front door. It was just me.” She shrugged, laughing it off like it was nothing. “But I cried when he did it. It was scary.”



“I bet it was!” I wondered how Lance would feel if I stuck a gun in his face, then reminded myself he’d probably already had that happen more than once in the past.



“After that, it was okay. He asked me lots of questions about my mommy, and where I live. He asked me for my address, but I didn’t remember it.” She avoided my eyes when she said that. The kid who could bluff her way through how many hands of poker didn’t remember her address?



“Why didn’t you remember it?”



“I was too scared.”



I looked at her in my best teacherly way. I had to assert authority again. “Gigi. I know you know your address. Why don’t you tell me the truth? Remember what I always say about the truth? It’s always better to be honest. Right?”



She nodded, looking down at her hands. “Is it wrong that I lied?”



“In this case, sweetie, I don’t think so. But why did you?”



“Because Mommy told me not to tell him. She didn’t want him to go there.”



I frowned. It made sense to an extent. “Did she say why?”



Gigi shook her head, tousled hair bouncing on her shoulders. “No. Just that I shouldn’t tell him, no matter what.”



Rae might have been afraid of Lance taking Gigi back to her. Or maybe something was scheduled to go down there that she didn’t want anybody else to be part of. Whatever it was, it was over by the end of the week. The house looked dark and deserted when I checked it out. Rae had most likely fled somewhere.



“So if Mommy told me to lie, is it okay that I did?”



“Yes, it’s okay. You did it because Mommy asked you to.” I patted her on the back, then hugged her when I saw how upset she looked. “Don’t you worry about it even one little bit. You’re a very good girl.” Then I pulled away. “Though you did trick everybody you played cards with last night.”



She grinned. “That’s not lying. That’s bluffing.”



***



When we went downstairs, teeth and hair brushed, both of us dressed, we were the only people there. I knew more than a few people had spent the night—I remembered watching them stumble upstairs. Lance was one of them. It was already past eight o’clock, but I guessed that was practically pre-dawn to the people sleeping it off in the upstairs rooms.



“It’s so quiet down here right now,” Gigi whispered. “It’s always quiet like this in the morning.”



“Are you always alone like this when you first wake up?”