Praying for Rain Read online

  “Just so you know …” I say, holding the makeshift torch against the smallest piece of wood until it catches. “Mine’s bigger.”

  Rain furrows her thin eyebrows at me and then bursts out laughing when my eyes shift from her face to the breaded wiener in her hand.

  Fuck, I love that sound.

  “Why are you in such a good mood?” She smiles as I take the food from her and lay it on the hearth to warm up.

  “Because I’m about to eat the shit out of these biscuits.”

  And because nobody’s trying to kill me at the moment.

  And because I might get to sleep in an actual bed tonight.

  And because I got to see your tits … twice.

  “This whole time, I thought you were a jerk, and it turns out, you were just hangry?”

  “Oh, I’m still a jerk.” I grab the bottle of vodka off the hearth and press the ice-cold glass against her outer thigh just to make my point.

  “Ahh! Okay, okay! You’re still a jerk!” she screams, swatting it away.

  I chuckle and twist off the cap, giving her a salute with the neck of the bottle before tipping it back. The vodka goes down smooth, dulling away the hard edges of the day.

  I extend the bottle toward Rain but pull it back at the last second. “Just a sip, okay? You’re on that Hydro shit, and the last thing I need is for you to puke or die.”

  Rain smiles as she accepts my offering, and something warm spreads inside my chest that has nothing to do with the fire or the alcohol. As I watch her eyelids flutter shut and her pretty pink lips wrap around the frosty glass bottle, I wish like hell that it were me. Any part of me. Every part of me.

  “That’s enough,” I bark, snatching it out of her hand.

  She laughs and coughs against the back of her wrist. “God, I hate vodka.”

  “What else do you hate?” I ask, surprisingly interested in learning more about my newly acquired resource.

  I tear open the bag of broccoli and set it on the carpet in front of us. Rain’s hand plunges inside, pulling out a fistful of little green trees.

  “I’m fucking starving,” she mumbles, popping one into her mouth.

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  She shrugs. “I don’t know … everything?” I watch the joy drain from her face as she stares into the fire. “All of this. This town, the nightmares, what they make people do, just waiting around to die. I hate all of it.”

  “You wanna know what I hate?” I ask, nudging her with my elbow. “Actually, it’s more of a who.”

  “Who?” she croaks, clearing the emotion from her throat.

  “Tom Hanks.”

  “Tom Hanks!” Rain squeals and shoves my leg. “Nobody hates Tom Hanks! He’s the nicest guy in America!”

  “I call bullshit,” I say, leaning forward to rustle the logs with a fire poker. “It’s all just an act. I’m not falling for it.”

  Rain snorts like a pig—again—which makes her laugh even harder, and I realize this is the most fun I’ve had in a long time. I poke one of the biscuits on the hearth and decide that our dinner is warm enough.

  Thunder booms off in the distance as I hand the dick-on-a-stick to Rain. She grins and bites the tip off.

  “Savage.” I cringe.

  We both go quiet as we inhale our meals. As the minutes stretch on, I can almost see our thoughts accumulating on the carpet between us, heavy and dark.

  The dirty ones are mine.

  I wonder how many little pricks from high school stuck their dick in that perfect mouth. How many of them were invited and how many just took advantage of a pretty little throwaway. I wonder what she would be doing right now if I hadn’t pulled her out of Burger Palace. What she would be doing if the nightmares had never started. I wonder if she’s going to go home again in the middle of the night or if she’ll spend the whole thing here with me.

  Rain’s cheeks, full of food, flush pink when she catches me staring. “What?” Her voice is defensive as she brushes invisible crumbs away from her mouth.

  “I’m just trying to figure you out.”

  “Good luck. I’ve been tryin’ for years.” Rain slides the last bite of corn dog off the stick with her fingers and pops it into her mouth.

  “What were you like in high school?”

  “I dunno.” She shrugs. “Blonde.”

  “Blonde?” I snort.

  “That was the only thing I was ever good at. Being blonde. Being pretty. Being a perfect little trophy. I wasn’t real outgoing, so most people just thought I was a stuck-up bitch, but I got good grades. I made my mama proud. I dated the basketball star and went to church every Sunday. You know, small-town shit.”

  As she talks, I begin to see glimmers of that girl in the one I’m looking at. The mascara smudged under her eyes. The half-inch of blonde roots I never noticed before. The killer fucking curves she was hiding under all that baggy clothing. Rainbow the bombshell became Rain the badass.

  But both of them are just disguises.

  I snap my fingers as it hits me. “You’re a chameleon.”

  Rain gives me an offended glare. “What, like I’m fake?”

  “No. You’re adaptive. You change how you look to suit your environment, to survive, like a chameleon.”

  Rain rolls her eyes at me. “And what are you?”

  “Me?” I point to myself with the bottle of vodka in my hand. “I’m good at figuring people out.” I give her a wink and take another swig. Wincing from the burn, I twist the cap back on. “Guess it’s a by-product of changing homes every six to twelve months.”

  I set the bottle down on the carpet next to me, but when I glance back over at Rain, she’s not looking at me anymore. She’s staring at the corn-dog stick in her hands.

  “Wes?” she asks, twirling the wood between her fingers.

  “Yeah …”

  Rain tosses the stick into the fire. It flickers blue as it catches, probably from all the fucking chemicals and preservatives.

  “What happened to your sister?”

  Fuck.

  I swallow and decide to just rip the Band-Aid off.

  “She starved to death.”

  There. I said it. Let’s move on.

  Rain’s eyes shoot open as she turns to face me. “What?” She shakes her head, confusion rippling her forehead. “How?”

  “Neglect.” I shrug. “She was only eight months old. My mom was an addict and could hardly take care of herself, and our dads were both out of the picture. I managed to get myself to school and scavenge for food in the dumpster behind Burger Palace, but I never once thought about feeding my sister. She was just a baby, you know? I didn’t even think she ate food.”

  “Oh my God, Wes.”

  Rain’s mouth falls open like she’s going to say more, but I cut her off, “She used to cry all the time. All the fucking time. I would play in the woods or at my friends’ houses every chance I got so that I wouldn’t have to hear it. Then, one day, the crying just … stopped.”

  I remember the relief I felt, followed by the horror of finding her lifeless body, faceup in her crib.

  “The cops came when I called 911, and that was the last time I saw my mom. My case worker said I could go see her in jail, but …”

  I shake my head and glance at Rain, waiting for the typical condolences to come pouring out of her parted lips. I’m so sorry. That’s just awful. Blah, fucking blah. But she’s not even looking at me. She’s staring into the fire again, a million miles away.

  “My mom got pregnant when I was about eight or nine, too.”

  My stomach drops. Rain never mentioned having a younger sibling, so I’m pretty sure this story doesn’t have a happy ending.

  “I was so excited. I loved playing with baby dolls, and I was about to have a real one that I could play with every day.”

  “Did she have a miscarriage?” I ask, hoping the answer is yes.

  Rain shakes her head. “My daddy gets real mean when he’s been drinking. He never
puts his hands on me, but sometimes, when he gets like that, my mama—”

  Rain suddenly goes so still. It’s as if somebody turned her off. She stops talking. She stops breathing. She even stops blinking. She just stares into that damn fire as all the color drains from her face.

  “Rain …”

  She clamps her hands over her mouth and nose, and I know any minute the rocking and hair-pulling are going to begin.

  Oh shit.

  “Hey.” I put a hand on her bare shoulder, but she recoils from my touch. “Rain, tell me what’s going on.”

  She shakes her head, a little too hard. “Nothing,” she lies, forcing herself to meet my stare. “I’m just … I’m really sorry about your sister.” The sadness in her voice is sincere, but when she yawns, it’s fake as hell. “I’m so tired. I think I’m gonna go to bed, okay?” Rain doesn’t even wait for my response before she’s practically running out of the room.

  What.

  The fuck?

  I hear a door slam down the hall but no crying. At least, not yet. I’m sure she’s too busy digging a little white pill out of a little orange bottle.

  Whatever. I am not going after her crazy ass. I’m gonna sit right here, enjoy this fire, drink this entire bottle of vodka, and pass the fuck out.

  I take a nice long pull from the ice-cold bottle and hear what sounds like music coming from down the hall.

  So what? Maybe she falls asleep listening to music.

  Then, I recognize the song—“Stressed Out” by Twenty One Pilots.

  Twenty One fucking Pilots.

  She’s in his room, listening to his music, wearing his clothes, like she still belongs to him. But she doesn’t, and it’s high fucking time that she got that through her head.

  Fueled by three or four or six shots of vodka and Rain’s erratic behavior, which is obviously contagious, I stand up and stomp down the dark hallway she disappeared into, mad that my bare feet don’t make any sound on the worn-out carpet. I want her to hear me coming. I want my footsteps to rattle off the walls.

  This bullshit ends now.

  My eyes take a second to adjust to the dark. I see three doors in the hallway before it turns left, but only one is shut. I walk right over to it and give it a hard shove. The music gets louder as it swings open, and there, sitting cross-legged in the center of a bare mattress, is Rain, rocking and staring at a glowing MP3 player in her hands.

  “Get up,” I shout.

  Rain jumps. Her head swivels toward me, but she doesn’t move.

  “I said, get the fuck up!” My voice booms in What’s-his-face’s tiny bedroom, but I don’t even try to rein it in. I don’t even think I can right now.

  I’m furious that I see a nine-year-old version of myself in her lost eyes, and I want to slap it out of her. I’m furious that something is hurting her, and she won’t let me murder it. But mostly I’m furious that I didn’t find her soon enough to stop whatever it is from happening in the first place.

  Rain hops up, standing next to the bed with the glowing device in her hands, and stares at me. She’s not crying. She’s not running. And, for the first time since I laid eyes on her, she’s awaiting her next command like a good little soldier.

  “I need you to get something through that pretty little head of yours right now.” I take two steps into the room and point my finger directly at her face. “Everybody … fucking … leaves. I don’t know what’s going on with your family, and honestly, it doesn’t matter. Because people are temporary. Everyone you love, everyone who’s hurting you—they will all fucking leave, one way or another. They might die, they might get locked up, or they might just throw you away once they find out how fucked up you are, but they … will … leave … you.” I drop my hand and take a breath through my nose, trying to calm myself down.

  Shaking my head, I close the distance between us with a final step and continue in a slightly less homicidal tone. “Our job … is to say fuck ’em and survive anyway. That’s it, Rain. That’s our only job. That took me twenty-two years to figure out, and I wish you had twenty-two years to figure it out, too, but you don’t. You have two fucking days. So, I need you to man the fuck up because I can’t do my job without you.” Emotion—one I don’t remember feeling since I was a kid—strangles me, cutting off my voice before the last syllable of my confession.

  Rain shakes her head as a new song begins to play. “That’s not true.” Her voice is quiet but strong. “Because I’m not gonna leave you.”

  The singer begs her to save his heavy, dirty soul, but she drops him onto the bed and buries her face in my heavy, dirty soul instead.

  Her embrace on my bare chest makes me feel like I’ve been skinned alive. I’m nothing but raw pink meat in her arms. My scales, my fur, my leathery hide … it’s all been ripped away. Rain’s touch penetrates through every layer of defense I thought I had, reaching places that have never seen the light of day. I hate this feeling. Every muscle in my body tenses in response to the pain, but I hold her to me anyway.

  Wrapping my arms around her warm, curvy body, I slide a hand up her back and thread my fingers into her short, damp hair. “Oh, I know you’re gonna leave me,” I growl, pulling her head back so that she’s looking up at me in the dark. “So, until then, I’m gonna use … you … up.”

  Rain presses up onto her toes at the same moment that I dive for her parted lips, and our mouths collide like the train wreck that we are. I tilt my head sideways and plunge my tongue into her mouth, unable to get my fill. I’m gripping her hair too tight, but I’m powerless to release her. Instead, I slip my free hand under that sad excuse for clothing and grip her full, round ass. My heart jackhammers in my chest as I swallow her responsive moan.

  Her hands slide up my back and around to my front, skirting over my pecs and locking behind my neck. I feel her nipples against me, hard as pebbles beneath that unworthy dipshit’s jersey, so I pull it off over her head and toss it to the floor. I can barely see her in the darkness, but I don’t need to. My hands read the curves of her body as they skim every square inch of her goose bump–covered flesh. She shivers as I knead her perfect tits, and when I break our kiss to pull one perky, needy nipple into my mouth, her hand reaches for me.

  She grips me through the silky fabric of the athletic shorts, which were already tented and struggling to contain what she’s done to me. My cock is at full attention, swollen and throbbing in her hand, as she gently holds my head to her breast. Her touch is so tender; it causes another surge of emotion to tighten around my throat. It hurts, the way she touches me. It’s fucking killing me.

  And I’m going to let it.

  Rain slides her hand up and down over my shaft through the slippery material as I suck and tongue and worship her other nipple. My every breath on her flesh elicits a reaction, and when I kiss my way back up to her mouth, when I slide both hands over her full ass and tease her slick folds from behind, that reaction is a purr so sweet it vibrates every nerve in my body like a guitar string.

  Rain dips her fingers into the waistband of my shorts and guides them down, carefully releasing me. Then, her lips take the same amount of care as they travel from my mouth to my jaw, forging a trail of lingering kisses down my neck and sternum. She takes a step back and bends at the waist as she continues her descent. All I can do is stand here and let her cut me open. That’s what her trail of kisses feels like—the slice of a fucking scalpel. She’s peeling back my layers, exposing all of my unlovable insides, and she’s pretending that she likes what she sees.

  But she doesn’t. No one ever has, and no one ever will.

  The second she sinks to her knees, just before she puts that lying mouth on my cock, I grab her by the hair and pull her head back to face me. “You don’t have to do this,” I rasp. And, for once, I’m shocked to realize that I mean it.

  I want to be inside of her but not like this. This is how the bar flies try to please me. The tourists and college girls and drunken divorcées. They get down on their knees and
look up at me like porn stars while they suck me off, practically begging me to fall in love with them.

  Daddy issues, all of them.

  This bitch has daddy issues, too, and here she is, looking up at me with big, desperate eyes, about to put my cock in her mouth to win my approval … just like the rest of them.

  “You don’t want …” Rain’s voice trails off as I drop to my knees, too.

  Grabbing the backs of her thighs, I pull her forward until she’s straddling my lap. Her tits are flush against my chest, her lips are once again grazing mine, and I’ve got her plump, round ass in both hands.

  “Perfect,” I whisper.

  Rain smiles against my mouth as she begins to slide her wet pussy along the length of my shaft. I devour that smile. I chew it up and swallow it. And I feel it burn like fire inside of me, illuminating things I thought were gone forever.

  Things I hoped would stay that way.

  I don’t want to press her to have sex. Hell, I don’t even know if she’s done it before. But, when Rain threads her fingers into my hair and cradles my head in her hands and sinks down onto me with a gasp, I’m suddenly the one feeling inexperienced. This isn’t sex. This is so far outside the realm of sex that I don’t even know where I am.

  All I know is that it hurts. There’s pressure everywhere. My chest feels like it’s about to explode. My head is pounding. My eyes burn like I’ve been pepper-sprayed. And my balls are already tightening in response to Rain’s warm welcome.

  I wrap my arms around her waist and try to accept everything she’s giving me even though it cuts me to the bone. I try to give it back, but I feel clunky and uncoordinated. I don’t know how to do what she’s doing. I don’t even know if there’s anything left of me to give.

  She’s not afraid as she pulls me in fully, grinds against me, and sears me with her napalm kisses. It’s like she’s done this a hundred times before. And that’s when I realize … she has.

  In this very room.