Chapter Text
Laura doesn’t know which one of them brought the gun, all she knows is that it’s currently laying on the floor, not even three feet from her, inches from her foot.
How dare they leave her there- how dare they?
Leo gives her a look of the purest disgust before he goes. It’s one she’s used to of course, by men who see more honour in paying for sex than being payed for it, a sneer that shows exactly how subhuman he finds her.
Her shoulders are aching from having her arms tied back, her head hurts from being hit against a wall by Leo, and she’s bruised in all sorts of places a person should never be bruised. She hurts. God, she hurts.
Ronette drags herself on her knees over to where Laura’s sitting almost the minute the door swings closed behind Leo, and she starts hacking away at the cords around her wrists with a pocket knife. Wrists come free, shoulders return to their natural position, twinging with pain.
The gun remains, Leo either too drunk or too stupid to have taken it with him.
Ronette lifts herself into a proper sitting position and leans against the wall. Laura flexes her fingers, stretches her arms up and around, wipes the drying tears from her cheeks. She pulls herself fully upright and leans back next to Ronette. Her dark hair is matted in her face, the bright smudge of red lipstick smeared across her face. She wipes at her mouth with the back of her hand, but it only makes it worse. Ronette hits the back of her head gently against the wall, exposing the pale length of her neck, the imprints of fingertips already starting to darken. Laura wants to press her hand there, a soft touch to comfort, rather than harm, but her arms ache when she moves them, and it’s all far, far too much.
“I’m sorry about that,” Ronette whispers. There’s no one else to hear, of course, but her voice is weak and raw, it’s the best she can muster.
“It’s not your fault,” Laura croaks back. “I could have just said no, you know.”
Ronette turns her head the slightest fraction. “Could you have?”
Laura sighs. “I don’t know. But it’s still not your fault.”
“I didn’t know they were going to tie you up.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t know they’d be so drunk.”
“I know.”
“God, Laura, it’s never been like that before. Were you scared?”
Laura doesn’t really know how to answer that. She’s had worse, of course, much worse - BOB had made sure of that long ago - but it’s hardly as if she can tell Ronette as much. “Yeah, I was,” she says instead, just barely more than a breath. “Were you?”
“Yeah,” is the reply. It’s quiet, and whether that’s because Ronette is losing the last remains of her energy, or because the ringing in Laura’s ears is muting the world around her, she doesn’t know. “I was really scared. I didn’t know they were going to bring that gun, I thought we were done for for sure.”
Laura doesn’t say anything to that. The gun, of course.
She leans forward just enough to pick it off of the ground, then allows her aching body to fall back against the wall. The gun is heavy and cold in her palm, much heavier than the cheapo one that Bobby got to look intimidating to dealers. She doesn’t know what model it is, of course, only that it’s heavy and black and definitely loaded.
She clicks the safety off, then back on again, just like Bobby taught her how to do in case she ever got into trouble. It hadn’t stopped her getting into trouble, of course, but it got Bobby off of her ass about coming to deals with him, at least. Bobby was almost as dumb as James, sometimes.
Ronette watches her flick off the safety again with a kind of sick fascination. “Do you think they were gonna kill us?”
“I don’t know,” Laura whispers. “I wouldn’t have let them, Ronette, I promise I wouldn’t have let them.” It’s an empty promise, but Laura supposes there’s no way to disprove it, and it makes Ronette’s tense body relax just the smallest amount, so it’s probably fine.
“Would’ya?”
Laura smiles. “Yeah, I woulda.” She aims the gun towards the opposite wall and mimes shooting. “ Bam! I woulda shot them right in the head if they pulled anything.”
Ronette giggles. “I betcha would have, Laura.”
Laura moves to relax against the wall again, but just as she does, the loose door to the cabin slams open on it’s creaky hinges and smacks against the wall. Ronette jumps, but Laura sceams. God no, not here, not now. Laura can feel the angry, broken tears coming, this isn’t fair, it isn’t fair.
Laura screams and screams and screams .
BOB’s face swims in and out of her vision, her father, BOB, her father, BOB, and then he’s walking towards them, and then Ronette is screaming too - is that a hammer in his hand? And Laura doesn’t know what Ronette can see, her father, or BOB, or something else completely, but she doesn’t care. A ring is laying on the floor next to her, that ring wasn’t there before, but it will protect her, it will .
BOB sees her lunge for it, screams. It fits on her finger perfectly, and then BOB is BOB, and her father is gone and he’s running towards them, and the gun drops from her hands as she pushes Ronette out of the way. Ronette hits against the other wall, her shoulder crashes into the wood. BOB slams Laura into the wall, forearm pressed against her throat, holding her still. She kicks him, knees connect with his gut, and he doubles back. Laura slides the ground, and he slams her head back against the wall, his hands are at her neck, she feels the snapping of her necklace’s metal chain, a clink as it falls to the floor. Her hand is inches from the gun, it closes around the metal. Cold, heavy in her palm. The safety is off.
She doesn’t hesitate any longer.
The shot rings out through the cabin, maybe through the woods, even, going right through his gut. A flock of birds takes off from a nearby tree, and as he stumbles back, Laura shoots again, higher this time, right at his head, once, twince, hits home. What looks like oil, but can’t possibly be, smears the floor as he hits the ground, oozing from the wound in his head and the matching one through his stomach.
And then BOB isn’t BOB anymore, and Ronette is sobbing next to her as her father’s body lies on the floor in front of them, and it’s not oil any longer, it’s just blood, blood pouring from the hole in her father’s head and staining the wood floor.
He’s dead. He’s so obviously dead that it almost makes everything around him dead, eyes wide open as blood trickles down his forehead, eyes cold, skin getting paler by the second as fluids are drained from his lifeless body. He’s dead, but Laura doesn’t care. She shoots him again, and again, and again into his lifeless body until the cartridge is empty, and then keeps shooting, the empty click, click, click accompanying her sobs. When she can shoot no more, she drags herself over to the body and kicks it. She rips his clothes and punches and hits and screams until her throat is raw, and Ronette’s hands are pulling her away.
She’s fighting, she’s fighting to get back at him, to rip and tear and make them all see some small fraction of what she’s felt for half a decade.
“Laura, oh my god,” Ronette’s saying through sobs. “Oh my god, Laura, Laura, he’s dead! Laura, you killed him!”
“He would’ve killed us!” Laura screams. “He would have!”
“Who is he?!”
Ronette is sobbing, Laura is still struggling to get away. Through the silence of the woods, the owls are hooting their off-tune song into the night. She tears herself away from Ronette and falls to her knees. Her body aches.
“He’s my dad,” Laura sobs, and then she blacks out.