Did I really want to go back to Florida? I loved my aunt, uncle, and the rest of the family. But I had missed Colorado. I really had. All these years.
That eased the harshest edges of my fear.
If I was going to stay here, I needed to figure this bat situation out, because there was no way, even if I stopped panicking, that I’d be fine with having a bat swooping around while I slept. I couldn’t keep doing this, and nobody was going to come and save me. I was a grown woman, and I could handle this.
Tomorrow, I’d start to figure it out.
After another night in my car.
I was going to get that damn bat out of the house some way, somehow, damn it.
I could do this. I could do anything, right?
Chapter 10
I didn’t need a mirror to know I looked like hell because I sure felt like it the next morning.
My neck hurt from sleeping in every position imaginable in my car for the second night in a row. I was pretty sure I’d probably gotten a solid two hours of sleep on and off. But that was better than zero hours if I’d stayed inside.
I still made myself wait until the sun was totally out before going inside.
And then I immediately stopped when I spotted Amos’s face staring out at me from the living room window.
And I knew it wasn’t because of my incredible beauty, because fortunately, I’d managed to cover myself with the blanket the same way I’d done the night before, covered from head to toe like it was a rain poncho. Without him saying a word, I knew he was wondering what the hell I’d been up to. There was no way I could pull off looking like I’d gone to the store or a run in the early morning because I was tiptoeing with my shoes barely hanging onto my toes.
“Morning, Amos,” I called out, trying to sound cheery even though I felt like I’d gotten run over. I knew he could hear me because they opened the small rectangular windows under the big, main ones to keep the house cool.
“Morning,” he replied in a voice that was cracking with sleep. I’d bet he probably hadn’t gone to bed yet. “Are you… okay?” Amos asked after a second.
“Yep!”
Yeah, he didn’t believe me at all.
“You feeling okay?” I asked him instead, hoping he wouldn’t ask what the hell I’d been doing.
He shrugged a bony shoulder, still watching me way too closely. “You’re sure you’re all right?”
I replied the same way he had, I shrugged. Did I want to tell him about the bat? Yes. But… I was the adult and he was the child, and I didn’t want to remind his dad that I was staying in the apartment more than I needed to, so I figured I had to deal with as many things as possible on my own to make this work.
“I need to get dressed for work, but have a good day today,” I croaked.
I wasn’t fooling anybody.
“Byeee,” I called out before hopscotching across the gravel.
“Bye,” the kid replied, sounding confused.
I couldn’t blame him for being suspicious.
And I hoped he didn’t tell his dad, because I didn’t want him to change his mind. Oh well.
And like I’d been traumatized, my heart started beating faster as I unlocked the door and slowly climbed the stairs, flipping on all the lights and looking at every wall and every section of ceiling like the damn bat was going to fly out and attack me. My heart raced, and I wasn’t proud of that either, but I knew I had to come up with a plan; I just didn’t know what.
Part of me had expected to see my arch-nemesis clinging onto something upside down, but there wasn’t a single sign of him.
Oh fuck me, please don’t be under the bed, I pleaded before getting to my hands and knees and checking under there too. I hadn’t thought about that spot until now.
Nothing.
And even though I had started sweating again, and I was cursing the fact that I hadn’t applied deodorant before I’d gone to bed, I checked just about everywhere I could think of where my friend could have hidden. Again.
Under the table.
Under the sink in the bathroom—because I’d been dumb and left the door open when I’d fled for my life.
Under every chair.
In the closet, even though the door was closed.
But he was nowhere.
Because I was paranoid, I looked everywhere again, fingers trembling, heart galloping and everything.
And still nothing.
Son of a bitch.
*
Despite having only slept a solid two hours, when nighttime rolled around, I was on fucking guard.
I’d thought about buying a net, but we’d sold out at the shop and I checked Walmart and they were out too, so I’d grabbed a plastic trash bag, ready.