Brenda Novak - This Heart of Mine

4

A noise startled Phoenix. Earlier she’d awakened with a crick in her neck after nodding off at her desk and had stumbled to her bed, where she’d been sleeping ever since. She’d gotten very little rest the past few days; she’d been too busy, too anxious, too worried. Apparently, her exhaustion had overcome all of that. But she was still uneasy enough not to allow herself to sink too deeply into unconsciousness. At the back of her mind were those letters from Lori Mansfield’s family and the threats they contained. This was their town, they’d said. Lori’s town. Phoenix had no idea if Buddy, the brother who’d sent the worst of the letters, would actually “make her sorry,” as he claimed. But this sound...it wasn’t just the dogs, although she could hear them barking from her mother’s trailer.

She blinked into the darkness as the wooden steps leading to her door creaked again. Was someone looking for a way in? The fact that finding one wouldn’t be hard made her supremely aware of her own vulnerability. She’d opened her windows because it had been so warm in the afternoon and she didn’t have a working air conditioner. Then she’d been too out of it to remember to close them when she went to bed. Buddy could easily cut the screen on the large living room window beside the steps and hoist himself through...

Her heart in her throat, Phoenix scrambled out of bed and rummaged around until she found the bat she’d brought in from the yard her first night back. It was all she had to defend herself with, but she was determined that she would not let Buddy stop her from being part of Jacob’s life. She’d suffered enough for what had happened to Lori Mansfield. Since she hadn’t done anything wrong, besides make a couple of stupid crank calls to Lori before the accident, she’d basically been punished for falling in love with Riley Stinson. Her crush on him was what had given her the supposed “motive.”

“Who is it?” She hated the tremor in her voice. She needed to sound strong in order to convince Buddy—it had to be him—not to try anything. But he didn’t seem to be breaking in. She heard a thud, as though he’d dropped something on her porch. Then there was another thud and the tap, tap, tap of receding footsteps.

Holy shit! It sounded as if there were two people on her porch! What had they left behind? And what would it do to her?

Wielding the bat with single-minded purpose, she charged down the hall and through the front door, screaming like a banshee. “I’m not going anywhere, you sons of bitches!” she yelled.

Her mother had had a floodlight installed to discourage teenagers from coming out and throwing beer bottles at her trailer, so Phoenix could see the back of a tall figure dressed in black and wearing a hoodie. She thought he called out, “Shit! Let’s go!” But she couldn’t see anyone with him, and there was no way she could catch him. He ran off the property and sprinted down the road, too far ahead for her to even give chase.

“Phoenix?”

The dogs—and possibly her shouting—had awakened her mother.

“It’s nothing,” she told Lizzie, and squinted into the darkness, trying to make sure that was true. There wasn’t anyone else on the property, was there?

No one she could see. If there’d been two people, they’d both run off—but they’d left two medium-size boxes outside her door.

She wondered what mean thing her fellow Whiskey Creek residents had gotten up to as her mother reprimanded the dogs. “Settle down!”

Using her bat to poke the boxes so she wouldn’t have to get too close, Phoenix pushed them onto the ground. She was convinced they contained a bomb or a snake or something that was just unpleasant, like dog crap—so convinced she almost didn’t want to open them. She knew she wasn’t welcome here, didn’t need any more warnings. But one of the boxes broke apart when it struck the ground and what spilled out didn’t look dangerous or unpleasant.

From what she could tell, it was... clothes . And canned goods , which was why they’d hit the ground with such force.

She peered at the man—or men—who’d run off. Why would Buddy, or anyone else, bring her clothes and food?

Was there something wrong with it? It would be far crueler to make her believe this was a nice gesture, only to let her discover later that there were words written on the various articles, like Murderer , that he’d urinated on everything or that the canned goods were rotten or poisoned.

And what was in the other box? The one that hadn’t broken open?

Slowly descending the steps, she made her way around to find out, but she kept looking over her shoulder, checking to see whether whoever it was would come back. If Buddy had dropped off something intended to be hurtful, he’d want to stick around to make sure it had the proper impact.

There was also the possibility that he’d been hoping to draw her outside...

But everything remained quiet. There was no movement, no noise.

Just to be certain they were gone, she walked to the gate and stared as far down the road as she could. Nothing.

“Phoenix?” Her mother had managed to quiet the dogs. “You still out there? What’s goin’ on?”

Phoenix returned to study what lay on the ground, searching for movement. Had Buddy filled those boxes with cockroaches or earwigs or some other kind of bug? “I told you, nothing. Go back to sleep.”

“The dogs heard somethin’ or they wouldn’t have gotten themselves worked up like that!” her mother insisted.

“It was just me, chasing off a raccoon.” Whatever her visitors had brought, her mother didn’t need to know about it. Lizzie had been tormented enough for being odd, difficult, overweight, a recluse.

“You best be careful, girl,” her mother warned. “There ain’t nobody in this town who likes you.”

“I know, Mom. You tell me that every day,” she said, but not loudly enough for her voice to carry to the other trailer.

“Did you hear me?” her mother yelled.

Phoenix spoke louder. “I heard you. Don’t worry. I can take care of myself.” Tough talk for someone acutely aware of her own weakness. Fighting with other women was one thing. That had been frightening enough. But Buddy? He was a huge man, positive she’d killed his baby sister, who’d been only a year younger than he was, and he seemed to believe that justice meant an eye for an eye.

“Get inside and lock the door,” her mother urged. “The bastards who run this town would love nothing more than to catch you out at night.”

“I’m going,” she said, but circled the boxes that had fallen instead. Whatever they contained—bugs or snakes or rat poison—she needed to get rid of it.

Once again using her bat, she nudged the box that had broken open. It was clothes, all right. As she’d noted before, it also contained canned vegetables, beans and soup. And a shoebox. She thought that might be where she’d find the dog shit, but when she knocked off the lid, she saw that it was... running shoes ?

“What’s going on?” she murmured. The clothes were for a woman. There wasn’t any writing on them or blood that she could see. She couldn’t smell urine. Everything looked nice and new. These were name-brand items with the tags still on them.

More of the same, as well as some packaged food, filled the second box.

Who’d brought her these things?

Whoever it was had included a receipt. Whoa...someone had spent a great deal and left her the option of return or exchange.

That sure as hell wouldn’t be Buddy.

Were these gifts, then? Everything was in her size, or close, and had been dropped at her doorstep. It had to be for her. But she was afraid to trust what she saw. She couldn’t remember the last time anyone had given her anything, other than the small handmade gifts she’d exchanged with her friend Coop and a few of the other women in prison at Christmas. Cara had given her that laptop, but she’d also made Cara a fair amount of money for helping facilitate the bracelet business.