𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐅𝐀𝐋𝐋! | harry styles

𝐗𝐗𝐕𝐈𝐈𝐈

A week after we arrive, I receive a package in the mail from Jack. Inside is a brand new driver's license, social security details, passports, even a card for the library in town.

It's my face that looks out at me from the papers — same brown hair, same brown eyes — but it's the only thing about it that's familiar. I take some time to read over the new information Jack sent, memorising the important details. Essentially I'm the same person, just with a few more skeletons in the closet. I try not to think about how Jack got all of this so quickly, or who he had to call in favours from. I've learned that it's best to simply say thank you, and shove all those questions to the side. The less I know, the better.

As so as it does, life continues on.

The days move one into another until they become weeks. The pain eases, but it never really goes away. It sits under the surface of my new skin, no longer raw and pink for the world to see, but still so fragile and tender that all it takes is one small tug to open a wound and out it pours.

Sometimes—less and less now—I sit out on the front deck, a tea in my hands, thinking about him. I wonder if, wherever he is, he's thinking about me. If i'm the last thing he thinks about before he goes to sleep. If he's safe. If he's happy. If he'll ever come find me.

But that's all they are - thoughts. Because that's all I have.

So, instead of wallowing, I throw all my effort into making the transition to a new town easier for Cody.

Slowly but surely, we turn the tiny house at the end of a long dirt road into a home. We clean out the large shed at the back of the property, and I sell whatever I can to the secondhand store in town. A rusted mower, a pile of broken power tools, even a motorbike - it all goes. With what i get for all the junk, I buy a sweet little pale blue Toyota from a guy in town for a steal. It smells like brake fluid and cigarette smoke, and the heating doesn't work. We love it.

While the money from Harry is a Godsend, I know that it won't go far once things like school and bills start. I contemplate online jobs, and for a millisecond look into the prospect of stripping over webcam. But apart from the fact that I don't want my face all over the internet, just the idea that I don't know who's watching feels wrong. That power shift I'd loved about dancing, the knowledge that for fifteen minutes I held that man in the palm of my hand with nothing but the subtle shift of my hips, it was addictive. To give that up feels like giving up that power, that consent.

Well, that and charging fifty cents a minute for some creep to jerk off in his bedroom was beyond desperate—even for me.

"Anthony Donovan, you get your ass back in this house!"

Washing the breakfast dishes, I watch from my kitchen window as a teenage boy storms out of the house next door, down the crooked little path, and out into the street where he jumps on a bike and pedals away at full speed. A tall, dark-haired woman follows, only to have to watch as he disappears down the dirt road, dust kicking up behind his bike tyres. Her frustration is clear even from where i'm standing, her hands set into tight fists on her hips. I watch her chest rise and fall with deep breaths. After a moment, she tightens her ponytail and walks back into the house – her face stormy.

That's the first time I get a good look at my closest neighbour.

Her house looks similar to mine, same double front house, same yard, but while I try my best to keep mine neat, it's clear there's an army of kids inside hers. Toys, swing sets, and dolls all cover the grass out front, and there are at least three bikes leaning against the fence on any given day. I've seen so many kids come and go, I'm never sure which ones are hers. It's a shambles, a complete mess, and sometimes I can hear her yelling from across the lawn, but something about it draws me in like only the sight of a proper family can.