Helena Hunting: Cracks in the Armor

Rocking the boat didn’t seem like a smart idea after the trial. It had been a nightmare. I understood, in a way I hadn’t before, Lisa’s and Hayden’s absolute disdain for The Dollhouse and the people in it. I was still trying to get my head around Damen’s involvement in Hayden’s parents’ deaths and my complete lack of awareness of it.

That Brett dude had been on my mind a lot lately. I’d vaguely remembered him hanging around back then, but he never really stood out. Hayden had been hard not to notice, though. At three years my junior, he’d been just a kid when he started coming around Art Addicts, the tattoo shop where I began my career. Piercings had been his thing in the beginning, which wasn’t my deal, so I hadn’t had much to do with him. It wasn’t until after his parents were dead and he started working at Art Addicts that I got to know him. By then he was more damaged than any of us could have realized.

Looking back, I got why Damen hired him. Why Hayden had been treated differently, given more leniency than most. He’d been a mess, and he only got worse over time until he was on the path to complete self-destruction. I told Jamie we had to do something, and he’d intervened. Getting Hayden out of Art Addicts had helped. But none of us could replace the family he lost or erase what he’d seen.

Tenley was the real reason he was better. I just hoped this was it for them; if she ever took off again, Hayden would be done. We’d never get him back from that kind of fall. He was way too in love with her. Their kind of connection freaked me out. It was a weakness I could never afford.

I felt obliged to help out my parents financially, but at least I wasn’t attached to them the way Hayden was to Tenley. It sucked not to have a relationship with them, but at least that way they couldn’t screw with me emotionally. Most of the time.

Jamie dropped me off at my apartment on his way home. I grabbed my mail, picked up one of the newspapers from the pile on the floor, and climbed the three flights of stairs. My complex didn’t have an elevator. No nice carpet lined the hall, just commercial-grade short nap, brown from lack of cleaning. The walls, once white, were nicotine yellow. Horrible floral deodorizers only partially masked the smell of cigarette smoke. I stayed in the apartment for two reasons: it was a ten-minute walk from Inked Armor and the rent was affordable.

When Hayden moved into the new house, he offered me his condo. But I didn’t have enough saved up for a down payment. I disliked the idea of paying him rent, and I didn’t want to tell him how tight finances were. It was hard to put away money when I was still passing over a good chunk of my paychecks to my family.

A few months ago I’d forked out three grand for a new furnace. It had been the middle of February, right around the time the trial started. The temperature had dropped into the low teens and my mom had gone a week without heat before she called to ask for help. I’d been her last resort, as usual. She’d only caved because she’d gotten sick. Her doctor had told her one more bout of pneumonia and she’d be at risk of hospitalization.

My stepdad made her call me because she couldn’t afford to be off work. He couldn’t afford for her to be off work, was more like it. The deadbeat dick spent most of her paychecks on beer, cigarettes, and poker. He was a waste of space, but my mom wouldn’t leave him. As a result of our differing opinions, I hadn’t seen her much lately. My stepdad, I didn’t give a shit about. I missed my baby sister, though, who wasn’t a baby anymore, but officially an adult. She graduated high school last year. I hadn’t been invited to her commencement. She got good grades but my parents couldn’t come up with the money to send her to college, so her options were limited for any kind of future.

As soon as I entered my apartment, I could hear the neighbor’s TV through the wall. They were watching something involving guns and revving engines. It was preferable to the sound of them having sex. I locked the door but left the dead bolt off, in case Sarah came by later.

My next stop was the shower. The tub remained a grimy gray color, no matter what I scrubbed it with. The toilet and sink were just as bad. I despised my apartment more than usual after spending the evening in Hayden’s new digs. Once the self-care routine was done, I tidied the bathroom and set out fresh towels for Sarah. She liked to shower as soon as she came in from work.

I grabbed a beer and made a couple of sandwiches, one for me and one for Sarah. I covered hers with plastic wrap and put it in the fridge to keep it fresh. Then I dropped down on the couch, used the coffee table as a foot rest, and flipped channels until I found Cops reruns. I was too preoccupied to enjoy them, though. I couldn’t get Tenley’s reaction to the Xbox out of my head. I shot H a text, apologizing for any problems I’d caused, hoping Lisa had been right and he’d fixed it with a little bump and grind. I got a message back from him twenty minutes later. He told me not to worry; there would be a used Xbox waiting for me at work tomorrow if I wanted it.

Relieved, I relaxed back into the couch, but I was bagged. I headed to bed just after one in the morning, too tired to wait up for Sarah any longer. If I was lucky, I might get some middle-of-the-night company. It wasn’t about the booty call, although that was a bonus. It was just nice not to sleep alone all the time.

I pulled into an empty spot at the back of The Sanctuary. This lot was reserved for staff. It prevented patrons from following dancers and waitresses to their cars at the end of the night. It also allowed management to keep an eye on some of the girls who liked to make a little money on the side.

I popped the trunk and cut the engine. Preparing myself mentally for the night ahead, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. It was just six hours. Then I could go home and wash away the stink and the dirty feeling that came with this job. At least tomorrow I didn’t have classes, so I could sleep in.

My internship would start in less than two weeks. I didn’t want to think about how little time I’d have then; I was already spread so thin. I hardly had time to hang out with Tenley and Lisa as it was, and I saw Chris once a week if I was lucky. Which I hadn’t been lately. We hadn’t seen each other in sixteen days.

Before I got out of the car, I checked my phone for messages. There was one from Chris, inviting me over once I was done with my shift. I had been excited about seeing Tenley and Lisa tonight and hooking up with Chris later, but I couldn’t pass up the shift when Xander called me in. As much as I wanted to text Chris back and say yes to the invitation, I couldn’t. I had to wait until my shift was finished first. Sometimes the clients got a little too touchy-feely and seeing Chris afterward was too difficult to manage. I shoved the phone in my bag and got out of the car.

I didn’t bother to lock the doors. It had nothing to do with my faith in the security cameras that panned the lot at regular intervals. Or the beefed-up guy manning the back door. Occasionally the security guard got distracted. This happened most often when one of the dancers came out for a “breather.” By leaving the car unlocked, I made sure no thief had to bust a window to get at the nonexistent contents. The only things in there were a box of tissues, a lip balm, and the owner’s manual. The car itself was a piece of junk. Replacing a broken window would cost more than it was worth.

I grabbed my bag from the trunk and headed across the pavement. Max, one of the security guards I knew from having worked at The Dollhouse, was leaning against the door, looking bored. Everyone who worked security was on rotation, according to management. Except for Grant, Xander’s right-hand man; he was practically glued to Xander’s ass. That meant that Max, like the rest of security, spent two hours of his shift back here, staring at parked cars. Their job was to escort the girls to their cars and make sure they weren’t soliciting on the side. Not that it didn’t happen anyway. It just happened less with Xander’s guys.