Before I reach for the doorknob, the scent of cooked chicken from down the road hits me.
My stomach rumbles. I had double practice and a lifting session and haven’t eaten much today.
Turning, I take in the lights of the food trucks lined up in the park down the street. There’s a Korean BBQ place, a taco bar, and my new favorite is Burt’s, the gyro place.
I jog to the park. As I’m fishing through my jeans for cash, I notice Julia.
She’s sitting on the curb, her long legs stretched out in front of her. She counts dollar bills and puts them in piles. A lone tear falls down her cheek.
Is she trashed?
She stumbled around me earlier, but that could be because she didn’t have shoes.
She’s going to get herself in trouble if she keeps flashing cash.
Fuck it, I think, heading over to her. Just call me the Patron Saint of Drunken Girls.
It’s only when I’m halfway there that I notice the kid in the black hoodie standing behind her.
3
Julia
It’s not enough.
My hands clench as frustration rolls over me.
When I started at HU my freshman year, I had scholarships and a work-study that covered everything. Times were great. I was a normal girl and I felt free, as if I were on an exhilarating adventure. I went to class and soaked in knowledge, I joined clubs, I went to poetry readings, I went to art museums.
I loved the rolling hills, the ivy that grew up the old buildings, the trees. I’d sit on the grass in one of the parks and read or draw. I wasn’t popular, I’m an introvert who often needs to decompress alone, but I made friends.
Everything changed when my mother got hurt my sophomore year. Suddenly, at nineteen, I was thrust into the role of caregiver while trying to go to class. I picked up a second job at the bookstore to help while she got back on her feet. When she got worse, I wrestled with how to balance it all. My grades dipped and I became reckless.
I needed to forget that my life was falling apart.
I partied. I slept with guys I never intended to see again. I lost my scholarship.
I missed seeing that my mom was in a deep pit of despair and pain.
Then life turned upside down when Connor appeared my junior year.
I quit my other jobs （that didn’t pay well） and turned to stripping to try and stop the spiral. It worked—for a while.
But summer arrived and the clientele disappeared.
And tonight . . .
I swallow down anger. I hate that I followed Scott to the alley. It was stupid and na?ve. He could have hurt me. Most of all, I despise that he enjoyed his power over me.
Just like Connor.
Whatever I do, it’s never enough. I’m just picking up speed on this downward slide, hoping I can survive until graduation.
And who knows how deep the hole will be when I get there?
Or what my mental state will be?
Every time a man sticks money under my bikini brief, there’s a heaviness inside of me as the girl I was before slips further and further away.
I’m just about done counting it out—for the third time—and the number hasn’t changed. Two hundred and fifty dollars.
I promised Connor five hundred.
I look around at the college kids forking over money for giant hoagies they’ll regret devouring tomorrow morning. Paying off a loan shark is not on any of their minds.
Suddenly, a hand swoops down and grabs the pile of money off the curb.
“Hey! Stop!” I jump up, too shocked to move for the moment.
People at the food trucks turn and watch as a guy in a black hoodie launches himself over the bushes and heads to the far end of the park where there are no lights.
“He stole my money!” I shout, but no one seems to care.
All right. I’ll save myself. As usual. I take off running in my bare feet as a blur passes me, racing after the thief. He catches up with him before he reaches the end of the lot and grabs his hood. The thief swings back like he’s on a yo-yo, legs flying in the air as he thuds to the pavement.
I rush up to the guy on the ground. My money pours out of the kangaroo pocket of his sweatshirt. I reach down to take it back.
“What do you think you’re doing?” I call out. “I need this!”
The skinny kid—and he’s just a kid, maybe fourteen—looks terrified. He scrambles to his feet.
“I’m sorry!” he says and rushes off, his sneakers making squishing noises on the pavement.
“You should be,” I yell.
My savior takes a step to follow, and I reach out and put a hand on his arm. Or I should say huge bicep. Tingles of awareness zip over me. Eric.
He bends over with his hands on his knees as he catches his breath. “You don’t want me to chase him down?”