Sleepless Nights(13)

He moves away from me a little and ties the strings around my waist. What does it say about me that I like it when he touches me? Does that make me a harlot or something?

Gah!

I don’t reply to him, just move around him to go stand behind a spaghetti-looking dish. The girl moves to stand next to me. We look at each other and she smiles. “I’m Chutney. Daddy called you Glossy, but I know that’s not your name. If it is though, your parents must have hated you.”

I return her smile. “My name is Ashley. Your brother gave me the other name. Not all that original is it?”

She contemplates this for a second and then she nods her head. “It’s prissy and dull. You are neither of those things. But you don’t pick the nicknames, they pick you.”

“How old are you Chutney? I have a few little brothers that would get a kick out of you.” Well, Donovan and Court. I haven’t even met Channing, so I wouldn’t know what he would think.

“I’m fourteen. How many brothers do you have? I have two, but I don’t claim them all the time.” We share a laugh before people start to come into the building and get in line.

A sense of sadness comes over me when I think about my brothers. “I have two younger brothers by my mom and one younger brother by my dad. Donovan, Courtney and Channing. You’re older than all of them though.”

“I don’t know anyone by those names, they must not go to my school. I would definitely know a boy called Courtney. Your parents must have hated him.” She giggles but I don’t join in this time.

Chutney chatters away but I barely listen as I serve food. Channing would be twelve now. Same age as Courtney. I wonder what he looks like? Does he favor his mother or our father? I guess I could ask Van or Court. Even Annabella, but I won’t. I don’t want to know anything because it hurts. Channing refuses to have anything to do with me. Not that I blame him. I left him to a fate far worse than death.

His control freak mother.

“Why do you look like someone ran over your dog?” Damien whispers next to my ear. I startle and drop my spoon into the spaghetti. Luckily it wasn’t the floor.

I turn to face him and glare. “None of your business.”

Damien’s eyebrows come together. I don’t want him guessing what’s wrong with me so I just spit it out. He doesn’t know me and he doesn’t know my family. I can say whatever I want and not have to worry about hurting anyone’s feelings. “I’ve never met my youngest brother. He lives in the same town as me, even goes to the same school as both my other brothers. But I don’t know what he looks like or what he enjoys in life.”

“Why don’t you go and introduce yourself?” The question is innocent enough but he doesn’t understand the workings of my family.

“He doesn’t want anything to do with me. Every time I’ve gone to visit him, his mother turned me away. I finally stopped going. If he doesn’t want to be in my life, then I can’t force him.” I pick my spoon back up and shovel some noodles in red sauce onto the dirty older man’s plate. “Besides, my brother Court, he’s made it pretty much impossible. He treats Channing like shit, always has actually. Court doesn’t like the idea of anyone hurting me, so he takes it upon himself to protect me, even when I really don’t need him to. He’s twelve though, so it’s hard to reason with him.”

Damien smiles and serves a little girl with her mother before turning back to me. “Either you can feel bad about it, or you can live with it. Just stop lookin’ so damn sad, it’s making me sad.”

My mouth pops open. That was kind of a sweet thing to say, though it was silly. Ignoring that comment, out loud I said, “I’m sorry I punched you. I got my first letter from Victor the other day. It put me in a bad mood.”

This makes him laugh. “What did Victor write that made you so mad?”

“Nothing really. It’s just when he was here, he never wanted to do anything. He was always hanging out with his best friend. I hate females, so I don’t have any friends myself, so I was always bored. So he writes me and is all ‘get out and do things. Get drunk. Go to the movies. Go make friends.’ I’m like, if you had ever wanted to leave the house I wouldn’t have that problem, now would I?”

Damien thinks about this and I can tell it bothers him. “Is that why you were parked outside the theater the other night? Why didn’t you go see a movie?”

I shrug. “Because it’s lame to see a movie by yourself. It’s pretty lame to do any of those things by yourself.”