Underneath It All by Traci Elisabeth Lords Read Free Book Online Page B

was wrong with me. Maybe my head was playing tricks on me because of what happened with Ricky. Maybe I was sick. Was I paranoid? It was maddening having these thoughts. I was edgy, annoyed all the time, and desperately needed to know the truth.

But that would have to wait.

Mom began drilling Roger. Apparently, she hadn't been talking about pot when she wanted him to stop using drugs. She was referring to cocaine, which Roger had started using and selling on a regular basis, all the while continuing to report for his job at the aerospace company. She wouldn't live with a "shifty-eyed speed freak" and wanted out.

Roger's friend Daniel came to her rescue. He'd come to visit Roger several times over the last few weeks, but it was really Mom he came to see. I could tell she liked him. They started seeing each other on the sly, but I was sure if Roger found out, my new California life would be ruined forever.

Why was my mother so damn reckless?

I confronted her: "Daniel is just another version of Roger. Can't you see that? Why go from the frying pan into the fire? At least with Roger we know the deal." She refused to listen, telling me I was too young to understand these things. Defeated, I vowed to stand my ground if she wanted to move again.

The fighting escalated, with Daniel feeding the flames. He was more than happy to volunteer his apartment as a temporary home to Mom and us. He wanted her to leave Roger and obviously didn't care about the other four lives it affected. Our house became a war zone.

Roger got wind of Dan and my mother's little tryst and threw tantrums that would have been funny in a movie but were absolutely terrifying in real life. The two grown men charged around each other hurling insults, trading punches, and bleeding on our floor. I couldn't help but think it would have been completely different if only she had waited. But she didn't. Maybe we could have put our heads together to find a better road to travel if she had.

Mom told us to pack our things. We were moving out.

I told her to forget it. I wasn't going along with her latest whim. Instead, I went to school, and when I came home she was gone. She'd taken my little sisters off to Dan's and left Lorraine and me there. I was devastated. I knew I was being defiant, but I never expected to be left behind.
How could my own mother leave me?
I waited for Lorraine to get home. I'd seen her only hours before at school so I knew she'd been dumped too. I hoped she'd be home soon. I needed her near me. I needed something to hold on to.

Several hours later my mother called. Roger told me I had to speak to her. I begrudgingly obeyed him. I knew Roger was selling drugs, and I still had anxiety about being touched in my sleep, but I also knew he was all we had. He'd been taking care of Sissy and me for a while now and that was more than I could say for my mother.

We had no place else to go.

The weeks that followed were spent chasing my tail, as I was more confused than I'd ever been in my life. Sissy and I came and went as we pleased, only relying on each other, but in my head it was like a time bomb was ticking closer and closer to the end.

Mom and Daniel's love nest fell apart as quickly as it had begun. Not realizing the heavy demands of an instant family, he'd simply bit off more than he could chew and within a few weeks he'd thrown them out. Mom called us from a woman's shelter in Torrance relaying the whole sad story. She said she was apartment hunting, and that we'd all be under the same roof soon.

I was incredulous. I couldn't stand her pretending that everything happening to us was normal. My little sisters were living in a shelter! They had to be scared and embarrassed, and I was embarrassed too —for all of us. But there was nothing I could do. Slamming down the phone, I turned around and smashed my fist into a wall.

8
School Daze
    My Walkman blared, pumping my brain full of Ozzy Osbourne. It was 7:25 in the morning and the city bus crawled