HARDCORE: Storm MC(95)

“I can't believe you fucked with my bike,” Cain said, stunned.



“Believe it, babe,” Missy shot back. “Hunter told me to keep you from hurting yourself, and even though it's not exactly my dream job, a gal's gotta do what a gal's gotta do. Now, what board games do you like? You don't strike me as a Monopoly kind of guy. Candyland? No, I'll bet you're into Risk, right?”



“Go take a flying fuck at the moon,” Cain snapped.



“Golly, I don't think I've ever played that one,” Missy answered. “Was that Parker Brothers or Milton Bradley? Anyway, I'll be back in an hour. Try not to do anything to fuck yourself up before then. Or do. Whatever. The sooner this gig ends for me, the better.”



As Cain stood and fumed, Missy walked back out through the garage. He heard her car start up and watched her pull away, hating her freedom to come and go as she pleased while he was confined. He'd never felt so trapped, not even during his prison stretch, not even when they'd thrown him into the Hole for weeks at a time.



Being a prisoner behind iron bars and concrete walls wasn't so bad. People could get used to it, even learn to make the most of it if they tried.



But being a prisoner of one's own body was miserable.



And inescapable.





Chapter 18



Missy



As Missy drove to the Shop-N-Stop, she sang along with the radio at the top of her lungs, hoping to drown out the maddening frustration echoing in her head.



When a song about first loves and first kisses came on, she couldn't help thinking about her first boyfriend, Milo. They'd taken half their classes together during freshman year of high school, and after a couple of weeks exchanging glances and passing notes, Missy had walked up to him and asked him point-blank if he wanted to be her boyfriend.



They'd dated for about three months, during which time Milo had talked a blue streak about his dream of becoming a famous writer. She'd nodded encouragingly, unable to share her own aspirations because, well, she didn't have any. If Milo noticed this curious silence on her part, he'd never given any sign. With him, it was often hard to get a word in anyway, and that suited Missy just fine.



He'd been extremely sweet to her, probably because no girl had ever paid attention to him before. He bought her flowers and held her hand whenever they walked anywhere together, and even though his kisses were sloppy and inexperienced, they were always earnest and sincere. Hunter had teased her about dating a nerd, but she didn't care.



She'd never considered what kind of future there might be with Milo. She'd been content to just go with the flow, and to encourage his fumbling hands to explore her body when they were alone in the woods outside of town. She didn't mind. It felt nice, and she enjoyed sharing the secret with him.



One night, his parents were out of town and he invited her to his house. When she got there, he held up a wrapped condom with a trembling hand—he'd found it in his father's sock drawer. He'd asked her whether this was what she really wanted at least four times, and when he was finally satisfied that she meant it, they had lost their virginity to each other in Milo's small bed surrounded by his posters of superheroes and scenes from fantasy novels. It had hurt a bit, but it had also felt like a tremendous relief to get her first time over with. They'd managed to find two more occasions to have sex before the thing that happened on Valentine's Day.



Milo—and his mom, the driver—had come to pick Missy up and take her on a special Valentine's date to the Brandy & Beef Bistro, one of the fancier restaurants in Micanaw. He was wearing a suit and a goofy grin, and he'd brought her a long-stemmed red rose. Hunter snickered and said Milo looked like a queer ventriloquist dummy, but their mother had chided him and insisted on getting a picture of the happy couple before they went out.



As Missy's mother was trying to figure out her new digital camera, their father burst in with a bloody towel pressed to his arm. He'd been stabbed by a member of a rival club, and he cursed a blue streak, loudly listing every gory act he would visit upon his attacker as Missy's mother cleaned and dressed the wound.



Milo turned pale green and asked to be excused.



After that, whenever they were in class together, Milo refused to look in Missy's direction and never spoke another word to her.



Missy had learned two valuable lessons from her first foray into sex and dating. The first was that nice guys could be very useful short-term accessories—they gave her plenty of gifts and affection when she wanted attention, they gave her space when she wanted to be left alone, and what they lacked in raw sexual intensity, they made up for with eagerness to please. The second was that once they were exposed to even a fraction of the outlaw lifestyle she and Hunter were part of, they never stayed around too long.