Chapter Sixteen
One month.
Four weeks.
The little girl still counted, waiting... waiting... waiting for something that didn’t seem to be happening. She kept coming up with reasons why her mother hadn’t shown up yet. Maybe it took a long time to fix the front door? Maybe she was still sleeping?
She didn’t know. She was still only four. Nothing about it made any sense to her, but she was trying to listen, trying to be a good girl.
Sitting in the bedroom, at the desk against the wall, she clutched the light blue crayon as she colored all along the paper, making a sky. Other colors were scattered around in front of her, while most were still wedged into the box. The Cowardly Lion had given her one of those big packs of crayons, over a hundred colors, some even glittery. She spent most of her time drawing, Buster sitting on the desk in front of her, watching, also waiting.
Waiting to go home.
Grinning, she set the crayon down, admiring the paper. She’d drawn the Tin Man, but not as the Tin Man… she drew him like the person he looked like, although she wasn’t really good at drawing people. He looked kind of like a balloon animal, but she had his eyes right—gray, like the rain clouds.
She didn’t want him to be lonely, and she didn’t like his flying monkeys, so she drew herself standing with him.
Besides, she was kind of lonely, too.
“Come on, Buster,” she said, snatching up the bear, tucking it beneath her arm. “Lets go show him.”
The little girl made the trek down the big, winding stairs, taking them one at a time. There were so many it always took forever. She was getting used to it, though.
Getting used to the palace.
Noise echoed out from the Tin Man’s den. The flying monkeys were there tonight, and they’d brought along some women. The group was drinking from bottles of that clear liquid, the stuff that made the Tin Man make faces. Music played through the den, a woman singing foreign words the little girl didn’t know.
The little girl strolled to the den, the double wooden doors hanging wide open. She paused there, eyes wide. People were kissing, some dancing really close.
The light was so dim.
Where was the Tin Man?
“Vor,” a voice called out, using a word she recognized, one the monkeys called the Tin Man sometimes. Vor. She turned in the direction it came from, seeing the Cowardly Lion in the center of the crowd. He pointed her way, saying something she didn’t understand to the man right beside him. Tin Man.
A woman with long brown hair sat on his lap, straddling him, wearing just a bra and a skirt, her other clothes missing. He pushed her aside, his bloodshot eyes darting to the little girl in the doorway.
“Ah, there’s my kitten!” He grinned. “Do you need something? Come here.”
His tone was off. Too nice. Not right. A voice in the back of her mind whispered for her to hide, a voice that sounded just like her mother’s. It was too late, though, because she’d already been spotted, so she carefully approached him, trying to ignore the looks the others gave her.
The Tin Man sat up further, forcing the woman from his lap. She slid to the floor instead, sitting by his feet, not going far. The little girl looked at her. She was young, like the little girl’s mother, while the Tin Man was kind of older. She wouldn’t call him old, no. He had no gray hairs at all. But he had hands that weren’t soft and eyes that sometimes crinkled.
The little girl paused in front of the Tin Man, her stomach feeling sick when she looked him in the eyes. They were black, like midnight, the gray all gone.
“I drew you a picture,” she said, holding out the paper.
“How sweet.” He took it, squinting. “Is this me?”
She nodded.
His eyes cut to her.
Use your words. He didn’t say it, but she heard it.
“Yes, Daddy.”
“And is this you with me?” he asked, holding it up, pointing at it.
Her cheeks grew warm as people all around them looked. She’d just meant to show him. “Yes.”
He turned it back around, studying it, still grinning. “It is perfect, kitten. I need to have it framed.”
Her eyes widened. “Really?”
“Of course,” he said, setting it aside, on the table, before patting his knee. “Come, sit.”
She wanted to say no. She wanted to go back up to her room, away from all of those people, away from the woman giving her weird looks from where she sat on the floor, but his expression left no room for arguing. She sat down on his knee, facing the side, and he wrapped his left arm around her. She used to sit on her mother’s lap all the time, but she didn’t much like sitting on his, wearing the white nightgown that still itched.
He smacked the woman’s shoulder, motioning for something with his hand, and she handed him a rolled up dollar. He gripped the little girl tightly, so she wouldn’t fall to the floor, as he leaned the whole way forward, nearly face-planting the table, and snorted a line of white powder.
Letting out a deep sigh, he leaned back in the chair again, his smile glowing.
“Do you love your Papa?” he asked, rubbing her back.
The little girl tensed at that question.
His stark black eyes regarded her. “It is okay, you are allowed to love me, no matter what your mother may have said. I am your father; my blood is inside of you. You might look like the suka, but you are half of me.”
Suka. The little girl knew that word.
It was one of the bad ones.
She still didn’t answer. She didn’t know how. What if she lied by mistake? Would he be mad?
After a moment, he laughed, hugging her to his thick chest as he ruffled her hair. “One day. Even your mother once loved me. It is inevitable.”
The little girl relaxed, her nerves easing. She didn’t know if she’d ever love him, honestly, but maybe, if her mother loved him and he found his heart, it could happen.
Everyone around them laughed and joked, growing louder as time wore on. The little girl watched them.
The Tin Man grabbed a bottle of that clear stuff, pouring some into his glass.
“What’s that?” she asked.
He held out the bottle, bumping her arm. “Try it.”
She just stared.
“Aw, my kitten is a scaredy-cat?”
People around them laughed, that ugly laugh, the mean one she didn’t like. Her face turned red as she took the bottle and put it to her lips. The second it touched her tongue, she gagged, her mouth on fire. It burned. Coughing, she couldn’t catch her breath, swallowing a mouthful before she dropped the bottle, spilling it all over herself. The Tin Man caught it, laughing, as he slapped her on the back.
“Breathe,” he said, slipping out of the chair, shifting her onto it alone. “Vodka is not for the weak.”
“You’re so cruel,” the brown-haired woman said, still sitting on the floor. “She’s just a little girl. She shouldn’t even be here.”
“She is my little girl. I say where she should be. Besides, what do you know about being a parent?”
“Probably more than you ever will,” the woman mumbled. “Poor girl.”
The moment those words were out of her mouth, something snapped. The Tin Man grabbed the woman, fisting her long locks, and yanked her away from the chair, her shriek loud.
The little girl tensed, tears in her eyes, as the Tin Man slammed the woman’s head into the table in front of them, over and over, white powder flying like dust all around, coating her face, as blood poured from her nose and her mouth. She choked on it, begging, but he didn’t stop.
BAM.
BAM.
BAM.
The woman went limp as he continued to grip her by the hair, raising her face up to look at her, whispering, “poor girl,” before dropping her to the floor in front of the chair.
Everyone around them watched, the other women disturbed, but the men acted like it was normal. The little girl shook and sobbed, wetting her nightgown as she clutched Buster to her chest, staring down at the floor.
The woman’s eyes were closed, as if she was sleeping, just like the little girl’s mother had been.
She’d wake up, wouldn’t she?
The Tin Man turned to her. His eyes were still black. He tipped back the bottle of vodka, taking a drink straight from it, before he pointed it at her. “Go back to your room, kitten. Be a good girl for Papa. Clean yourself up.”
The little girl stood, running from the room, going up the stairs as fast as she could.