Prescient

Chapter 15

"What do you mean your fault?"

Tanya jerked away from her daughter so suddenly she almost fell off her chair.

"Oh my God, Maggie, what have you done?"

"I...It's just that I, well Lyle and I, we" Maggie began.

"For Christ's sake, if there's something you know you have to tell us now," Michael interrupted.

"Do you know what happened to her?" Tanya asked. "Do you know where she is?"

"Well, I don't know—maybe—"

"Just spit it out, Margaret," Michael snapped.

"I would if you'd just shut up and let me."

"I'm sorry. You're right, sorry. It's just, if you know something..."

"I dunno. Maybe. As we already put out there, Lyle was selling a bit of pot and... well I said pot, but it wasn't just weed. It was—"

"Great. Barely home an hour and already with the lies."

"Don't start, Michael," Tanya said, her sharp admonishment no competition for the look of daggers in her eyes.

"Yeah, who the hell do you think you are, Michael," Maggie began. "You're the reason I left in the first place and here I am, trying to fix shit and you're on my back. So why don't you just—"

"You left because we weren't going to tolerate you doing drugs in our house," Michael cut in. "So you packed up and ran off without saying a word; off to someplace where you could do your shit and ruin your life, so I think—"

"Enough!" Tanya called out before standing up and beginning to pace around the room. "Both of you, enough, okay. Maggie, you need to stop this right now. You finally came home and owned up to your mistakes and we are so proud of you for that, but you need to also own up to the fact that Michael never treated you with anything but acceptance and kindness. He treated you like you were – like you are – his own flesh and blood and girl, this house – this home – you've come back to, he pays for with the money he works his butt off to earn.

"But Maggie, most importantly you need to realize that, even though he's maybe not doing such a great job at showing it right this minute, he loves you; he cares about you so much and he always has. When you didn't accept him into your life, when you ran away, that broke his heart as much as it did mine.

"And Michael, you just need to shut up right now and let Maggie open up to us because our daughter has finally come home. She has asked for our help and we're going to make sure she stays here and gets all the help she needs. No matter what she has done in the past and most importantly, no matter what it is she has to say right now. Okay?"

"No matter what?" Maggie repeated, her mind and hands doing battle with the urges inside her wanting to scratch her skin off.

Tears and mucus streaming down her face.

"A-huh, no matter what. Right Michael?"

"Yeah, of course."

"Right. So whatever you have to tell us now, honey, we're here for you. But listen, we need to find your baby sister okay, so just tell us what's going on."

"Well, about a month ago, Lyle decided to have a go at selling some speed, you know. He was like, 'Well why not, how many people do we know on it? We could make more than selling weed,' and I thought yeah, sounds like a good idea to get some extra cash. So he hooked it up with our dealer and got a whole heap of the shit on tick but—"

"On tick?" Tanya asked.

"Yeah, like on loan kind of. He got it without having to pay upfront and then we were gonna cut it – that means mix it with other shit like milk powder and sugar to make more of it – then sell it all, pay our dealer back, and make a tonne of profit.

"But we kinda had a bit of it ourselves, then a bit more, and kept using more – and we did sell some too – then we realized we'd used so much that even with what was leftover, we couldn't make back what we owed. Even if we cut it more.

"So what Lyle does, he says, fuck it, let's just keep the shit and the little bit of money we had because it's not like we could get the full amount anyway. Lyle says all we have to do is tell Gizmo—"

"Gizmo?"

"The dealer. That's just what everyone calls him 'cause he's short, fat, and really hairy and his beard and hair all sticks out everywhere and he looks like one of those furry gremlin things. Don't even know his real name.

"Anyway, Lyle says all we have to do is tell Gizmo some junkie jumped us and took all our shit – we even trashed the place to make it look convincing.

"The thing is when Lyle rang Gizmo and told him, Gizmo didn't say shit, he just hung up on Lyle, rocks around our place like, less than half an hour later, beat the shit out of Lyle and tells us we're full of shit. He was on to us straight up.

"Gizmo reckoned he could tell our story was bullshit, that it wasn't the first time people had tried to rip him off like that and that even if we really had been jumped, we still owed him the money. He said to Lyle, 'Pay what you owe or else it's not just you and your junkie slut that's gunna pay.' He said..."

Maggie paused for a moment, looking between her mother and step-father. If her guilt at that moment was a palpable thing, it would be heavy and expanding, filling the space between herself and her family. Growing larger and feeding off the very oxygen they were breathing.

"He said," she continued, sobbing. "That it would be our families he'd go after first."

"Oh my God," Tanya gasped.

She had already suspected where this story was going right from the start, but now it had been confirmed and the blow was harder than she expected. The feeling twisting her insides induced instant nausea. The thoughts of what this filthy drug dealer might have done—what he still was doing—to her innocent girl was unbearable. Thoughts of what might be happening to Kaylah had already plagued her day in day out but not it all seemed so much more real.

"I'm so sorry, Mum," Maggie said, looking wide-eyed and heartbroken. "But I think Kay-Kay's been kidnapped as payback for what me and Lyle did. That's why I think it's my fault she's gone."

***************************************************************

Thank you for getting this far! Hope you're still enjoying my story and if so please hit that star button to vote! Ta-ta for now but not for long!