L Akers - Fight Like a Man

Gabby and her sisters had all been through hell at one time. Before meeting their forever husbands, each of them had dealt with some sort of abuse in their lives. They were stronger now, and one thing they’d all learned was to never believe someone wanted to be in the bad position that they were in. Sometimes a person just didn’t know how to take the first step to change their own journey. They needed support and a hand up. Most of the time if you gave them that hand, they’d grab it.

Gabby laughed out loud.

Mei needed more than one hand.

Stop it, she chided herself.

She was sliding into a terror-fueled hysteria. She was tired, afraid, and possibly lost. Her legs were nearly give out, twitchy and rubbery.

“Let’s slow down, Mei.” Gabby slowed to a fast walk and continued to plod along, her feet feeling heavier and heavier.

Mei gave her a grateful look. She’d been dragging, too, barely keeping up with Gabby.

Gabby was panting. I’d kill for a cold bottle of water, she thought and then shivered, realizing that wasn’t even funny in these circumstances, even if she hadn’t said it out loud.

She had thought about killing those men. She realized that somewhere deep inside of her, she was capable of it, too. For a moment, she wasn’t looking at the biker in the woods. She was looking at a man from her past. A man who’d nearly forced her to take her own life. He was a monster, just like the bikers. Did killing a monster make her a monster, too?

She hoped she’d never find out.

They stopped to lean against a tree to rest. Mei stared worriedly behind them.

Gabby breathed silently, although it was an effort, and her lungs were seriously getting pissed from the abuse. She didn’t want Mei to know just how worn out—and scared—she really was. Sweat dripped off her nose, hitting the dry leaves with an exaggerated plop . There were no other sounds, other than the distant tree frogs and cicadas. She listened harder. A breeze rustled up some leaves, but when it quieted, she heard nothing again.

The near silence was deafening.

She waved a hand at Mei and they slowly trudged forward another fifty feet.

Finally, through the trees she, she saw daylight and a glimpse of the highway covered in cars that had given up their fight and now lay haphazardly parked in two sleeping lines. There wasn’t a person to be seen.

Until there was.

Larry’s car came into sight, barreling down a clear gap and then swerving to zoom down the shoulder of the highway. He slid to a stop beside the two rows of gridlocked stalled cars, throwing up loose asphalt.

Gabby’s heart leapt. They’d found them!

But how? Can they see us? Through the trees?

She watched him jump out of the car and stomp to the other side.

What is he doing?

“Hey! We’re here!” she screamed, pushing the brush and branches out of her way, trying to break free of the forest to step out onto the road.

She heard Olivia and Emma yelling, but couldn’t make out their words.

Why is no one looking at me and Mei ? Maybe they haven’t seen us?

Starting to panic, she hurried, walking faster and trying to break into a run. Maybe they were out of gas, too? Maybe the bikers were coming? Had they found a way to fix their tires? Were they right behind them?

Gabby looked to the left but could only see more stranded cars and now, a small group of people were walking a few miles back, no bigger than toy soldiers from this distance.

A stitch in her side struck her suddenly and she bent over in pain. “Run, Mei! Catch them!”

She stared through the trees as Mei pushed harder, opening a bigger space through the limbs and leaves. Now Gabby could see Larry. H was in a rage, throwing their make-shift T-shirt bags out of his car.

He was dumping them.

Asshole!

All other thoughts flew from her mind as the belief planted itself firmly that they’d be stranded, hours and hours away from home, on foot. The bikers would find them soon. They’d be taken to some Sons of Anarchy-type clubhouse and forced to be Old Ladies.

She may never see Jake again.

Or worse.

She stood stooped over, with one hand clutching her side, paralyzed with fear. It all caught up with her. She was tired of being the one always in charge. Tired of Olivia being so flaky and undependable. Tired of Emma being so invisibly quiet except when she was being the peacemaker. She couldn’t handle the pressure. All she wanted was to get herself and her sisters home safely. But she’d screwed up everything so far.

She leaned farther over, grabbing her knees. She couldn’t breathe.

Her bag slid up and hit her in the back of the head. The sweat that soaked her clothes turned into a prickly bath of ice water. She turned her head up just in time to see Larry get back in the car, and leave Olivia and Emma standing still on the side of the road, shoulders slumped, their bags at their feet.

Probably waiting on Gabby—or someone—to tell them what to do next.

To hell with it.

She was done.

They were on their own. She couldn’t be the boss anymore. She sucked at it and had only got her sisters into a bigger mess than they were in at the beach resort. Olivia should be stepping up; it was her husband after all that was the prepper. With their elderly father now living out of town with his fiancé, Grayson was sort of the new family patriarch. Didn’t that make Olivia the matriarch? Surely, she learned something from Grayson.

She swallowed past a lump in her throat and stood up straight. Mei had stopped, waiting as though in limbo between Gabby and her sisters out on the road. Gabby was ready to explode.

Furiously looking around, she stalked over to an abandoned bike dumped in the ditch. She got on the bike and turned it the opposite way, calling out behind her, “Go. Walk with them. I’m going on my own from here.”

GABBY RANTED AND RAVED, throwing her fist into the air and then giving Larry a double one-finger salute to his rear-view mirror. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t leave her sisters—and she’d left her bag. She’d meant to. They’d need it worse than her. But she wasn’t so angry she didn’t realize she needed it too.

She’d only ridden a minute up the road before turning around and pedaling back as fast as she could to try to catch Larry. But he was too far ahead.

He’d driven slowly away, leaving them stranded, answering her one-fingered salute with an obnoxious honk of his horn. She hoped the bikers found him.

“Piece of shit!” she screamed, straddling the bike.

She jumped off of it and let it fall to the ground and whipped around to her sisters. “Why’d he dump us?” she yelled.

Olivia backed away from her.

“Calm down, Gabby. It’s not her fault,” Emma answered. “He’s a coward. When we told him about that gang, he said he didn’t want to be caught with us.”

Olivia held up her arm. “But look, I still have my Rolex. We can find someone else to trade with. Although I’d really like to keep it…”

Gabby rolled her eyes and clenched her jaw and turned, stomping back through the ditch to the tree-line where she’d dropped her bug-out bag. Mei stood beside the bag, silent and wary, staring at Gabby with guilt pinching her eyes.

“It’s not your fault,” Gabby muttered. “Come on.”

Olivia tried to pick up the bike, dropping it on the first try. “Let’s take this. We can take turns riding it,” she said.

Gabby kept walking. “Fuck that bike.”

She snatched her bag up with a heavy hand and trudged back to the road, stepping out in front of her sisters and leading the way.