The ride to the airport is silent. I have so many questions but am afraid of the answers I may get in return. I know I should ask, but can’t bring myself to speak the words. So I just stare out the window, silently saying goodbye to my life. Well, what life that I have. I have friends but nobody close enough to notice I’m gone. I have a job at the local coffee shop, but they’ll just replace me. Actually, being put in such a desperate situation goes to show that I really don’t have much to show for my life. It’s depressing. Having an overbearing mother does that to you. She doesn’t allow much of a social life, so, of course, finding friends in college that like to just stay in and watch movies is hard. Hell, I just celebrated my twenty-first birthday and it was depressingly typical; fancy dinner, wine and parents included.
We arrive at the airport and the cab driver gets our bags out of the car while mom throws some cash in his seat. I grab my suitcase and follow her. I slow my walk as she heads toward a big, burly man with a big gut, who has his arms crossed in front of his chest. He’s wearing torn blue jeans and a black t-shirt where tattoos seem to snake out and claim every inch of his hairy arms. My mother walks right up to him, her body language confident, so I double my step to catch up. As I get closer I see his leather vest has patches on it; the left patch reads ‘TRIGGER’ and the right reads ‘Ghost MC.’ My breath catches in my throat; ‘MC’ as in motorcycle club? I have seen enough documentaries and TV shows to know bike clubs are not a force to be messed with.
I look a little lower on his leather cut and see a diamond shaped patch that says ‘1%’. My throat seizes up tighter as I try to speak, worried what my mom's intentions are. I don’t remember exactly what the 1% means, but I know it’s bad. “M—mom.”
She throws her hand up to shut me up.
What the hell is she doing? This is not some casual pedestrian to ask for directions.
“I’m Lady, do you have something from Bull?” my mother says, assuredly.
Lady? Her name is not Lady, it’s Sadie. And who the hell is Bull?
The scary man called Trigger eyes her up. “Yeah, here are your plane tickets. Bull pulled some strings to get you on the next flight. You’ve got an hour before the flight leaves to L.A.” The big, burly man hands my mother an envelope, his voice deep and ominous.
He points at my mother. “You tell Bull this makes us even.“ He looks at me and then at my mother. “Safe trip, ladies,” he says as he walks away.
“Yeah, thanks.” She says opening the folder to peek inside.
What the hell? She acted as if she was talking to a damned girl scout. She isn’t fazed at all, but I am about to piss myself.
“Mind telling me what the fuck is going on?” I curse at my mother, tired of this whole charade.
Her eyes widen at my language. She is not pleased; go figure. My whole life I’ve been told how to act and what to say. Always told to stay on the right path; the path my mother and Stevin are paving for me. It pretty much consists of nothing but school. Little does she know, I am still undecided on my college major. She’d have a stroke if she knew I didn’t have my whole life planned out. She has never let me do anything wild or reckless. She always catches me right before and then yells at me about how I act just like my father and she didn’t go through hell to give me a better life, a better path, for me to mess it up. It seems like that is the only time she is around, to tell me what a failure I am. The last time I tried to gain any independence, I was nineteen and I was tired of being on lock down.
“You look smoking hot, if you don’t get laid tonight there’s no hope for womankind,” Daisy says, eyeing my strapless black dress.
“You look pretty hot yourself,” I compliment Daisy, giving a sultry wink. Daisy was the new girl working at the coffee shop, whom I’d taken a liking to. She knew of a club that didn’t card, so we were headed out in hopes of hooking up with a hunk.
I eyed myself in the mirror one last time; black dress, red heels, and red purse. Yep. I looked like a vixen.
A half hour later, still giggling, we arrived at the club only to find my mother and Stevin waiting at the entrance.
Fuck! Mother Fuck!
“Danielle Lexington, what are you thinking?” my mother said, grabbing my arm tightly.
“Get off!” I yelled at her, making a scene.
“You look like a prostitute. Get your ass back in that cab and go home now,” she yells in my face, spit flying against my skin.
“I’m nineteen years old. I’m an adult. You can’t boss me around anymore,” I yelled back at her, pulling my arm back with vengeance.
“You want to be an adult, act like one,“ she hissed back.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, rage filled my spine. I wanted to punch the woman who calls herself my mother.
“I’m done with your shit, I have enough money to move out,“ I said calmly, ready to finally see the blow on her face from me abandoning her. It took me nearly a year to save, but I finally had enough for a decent start; a start without my mother.
She smirked, making my unusual courage flee.
“Oh, honey,” she sneered. “I’ve already cleared that account; you have nothing.” Then she grinned like the devil, making me gasp in horror.
“What?” I asked, mortified yet completely enraged.
“Go ahead; leave, move out, go live in the streets. You came from trash, you might as well live like it,” she said, pointing out for the millionth time how I’m nothing but my father’s spawn. Finally, someone she despises more than me; my father, whoever he is.