“It’s November,” my mother says softly. “November third.”
November third. I count back in my head, certain she’s lying. Because if it’s November, that means I’ve been in here for three fucking months.
I choke on that, trying to suck in air as my throat closes in panic. I grab at my throat. “Three months?” I scream. “I’ve been here for three fucking months?!”
I’m suffocating. I’m going to die down here. Three. Fucking. Months? It can’t be right. The Prospect reaches a hand out to me, maybe to help me, I don’t know, but I hit it away, pummeling on his hard chest with my pathetically weak fists. He catches my wrists easily, slamming me back against the wall. I look across to see my mother standing there, first aid kit in one hand, her job apparently done. “What the fuck are you looking at?!” I scream at her. I’m suddenly so fucking full of rage. I’m drowning in it. “You fucking traitor!”
“Hey,” the guy says, but I ignore him, addressing my mother. “You’re meant to be my mother and I’ve been dying in here for three fucking months?”
My words barely pierce the drugged fog enveloping her, but they do. She frowns ever so slightly, tilting her head to the side.
“Hey, girly” the guy says, wrenching my chin toward him. More tears flood my eyes as I glare into his cobalt blue eyes. “Say my name!” I scream at him. “I’ve been down here for three fucking months, and she’s my mother, and you can’t even call me by my name?!”
I’m exhausted. I let my hands drop to my sides, and in response, he loosens his grip on me slightly.
“Juliette,” he says in his thick accent. We stare at each other for a moment, his eyes impossible to read, until eventually he breaks away, addressing my mother. “You can go now.”
She leaves just as gently as she came in, bumping into the doorframe on her way out. The door closes with a soft click and as soon as she’s out of earshot, we’re staring at each other again.
“You could help me,” I say desperately. “I have money.”
He smiles reluctantly, letting me go as he steps back. “No, no, no,” he says, waving a finger in my face. “I cannot help you. I’m a Gypsy Brother. And you’re a Gypsy killer.”
I snort. “Oh, really, you’re a Gypsy Brother? Where’s your tattoo? Where’s your leather cut? Huh?”
He smiles, his eyes gleaming, and lifts his shirt up, turning around so that I can see his back. A huge, freshly inked tattoo adorns his entire upper back in a curve, identical to the tattoo Jase sports on his back. GYPSY BROTHERS.
Fuck.
“Oh,” I say. He gives me a knowing look over his shoulder, dropping his shirt so it covers his torso again. Turning back to me, he stares at me for a long while before he speaks.
“Don’t try to get her to help you,” he says, jerking his thumb toward the door. “She might look like your mama, but there’s nothing between her ears anymore, girl. Nothing but Gypsy Brothers.”
I lean back dejectedly. He’s absolutely right. She’s completely fucked up. Beyond help. Useless.
“How’d you get involved in this life, anyway?” I ask, attempting to continue the conversation. Suddenly, I’m terrified to be alone in here. I don’t want him to leave. He’s easier to cope with than Dornan.
His tattoo flashes in my mind and all of a sudden, my heart sinks. I’d been clinging to the hope that he might be able to help me, but he’s one of them now. A motherfucking Gypsy Brother, complete with the obligatory ink to seal his fate.
But he helped me. He let me shower. Brought me clothes. Brought me medicine. Brought me my stupid mother. I’m so jarred by that, so confused by his random acts of kindness despite the fact we’re supposed to be enemies. My head aches.
He grins, flashing a mouth of beautiful teeth. “It was a woman,” he says, opening the door and stepping out into the hallway. “It’s always a woman.”
He shuts the door, and I’m alone again, with his words stuck in my head.
Dornan comes in one morning a couple days later. I’m mid-vomit, my head buried in a bucket. He looks annoyed.
“I thought you said she was better,” he says to someone behind him. He steps to the side, and behind him I see my mother standing there, her expression once again blank and droopy. Fucking druggie.
She doesn’t answer him, and he snaps his fingers. “Caroline!”
She scurries forward, collecting the bucket in the corner, its only contents my urine. I’m not even embarrassed anymore that these people are handling my body’s waste. It’s all become disturbingly familiar.