Free Braver by Lexie Ray Page B

sending me to the floor. I saw stars as I tried to crawl away, people shouting all around. My vision cleared just as Mike fell on top of me, his weight making me feel like I was suffocating. He grabbed at my breasts with bruising force, pushing my legs apart with his knees.
     
    It was Tito all over again, this time with an audience, even though I’d promised myself it would never happen again.
     
    “Get off me, motherfucker!” I screamed, punching him in the face. “Get the fuck off me!”
     
    He bit one of my breasts before the two bouncers at the door could pull him off me. Mama was right there behind them, her eyes blazing with a cold fire I’d seen once before — the night my old roommate Jazz was attacked. I felt chilled to the bone even though I knew she was there to help me.
     
    “Get out,” Mama hissed, her teeth gritted as she glared at Mike. “You’re blacklisted.”
     
    “I never want to come back anyway!” he shouted as the bouncers hauled him away. “Fuck this place and all you whores! You took everything from me! Everything!”
     
    The nightclub had fallen into a hush, even the pianist stopping his playing. Mama turned  to the stage and swirled her finger in a circle, indicating he should be playing right now. The music started back up, but I had a feeling that he wouldn’t be hired again. Mama was like that — anyone who contributed to a problem she cut loose.
     
    “Meet me in my office,” she muttered before pasting on her smile. I took a deep breath and gathered my ruined shirt around myself, going quickly so I wouldn’t become even more of a spectacle.
     
    As I left, I heard Mama schmoozing with the customers. “Please let me buy you all a round of drinks because you had to see that nasty little incident,” she was saying. “Oh, just a lovers’ quarrel. Jealousy’s a hell of a thing. No, totally under control.”
     
    I winced as I went. The punch Mike had landed on my jaw had jarred me, all right, and the place where he’d bit me was tender, a nasty, mouth-shaped bruise already making itself known. What was even worse was that we were losing money on the incident with Mama buying drinks to smooth feathers. She was treating this as an investment she had to make. Invest now, keep them coming later.
     
    When I got to the office, I had a little cry, allowing myself just a few minutes of tears. The situation with Mike had been scary — downright terrifying. It had been just like Tito, when I hadn’t been able to defend myself. I dabbed at my eyes and blew my nose. Not much harm done, I told myself, looking in the mirror. I could borrow needle and thread from one of the girls and sew some buttons right back on my uniform. The buttons were the only damage to the shirt, which was lucky.
     
    I examined my jaw, which was swelling up. I cursed Mike, but figured it could’ve been worse. I’d seen kids back in the old neighborhood knocked out cold with similar punches.
     
    My makeup was running, I realized, wiping the eyeliner off with another tissue. I tucked some of the strands of my hair back into some semblance of order and reapplied my red lipstick out of habit. I put on more every spare moment I got.
     
    There were two beads of blood on my breast, I noticed, on the bite mark. They made me feel sick, like I’d been attacked by an animal. Taking a shuddering breath, I cleaned the blood up and found the first aid kit Mama always kept in here. The antiseptic burned the tiny cuts on the blackening bruise, but it gave me comfort that I was getting any germs out. I could even go to the nearby clinic and get it looked at tomorrow, I told myself, for even more peace of mind. Yes, that’s what I would do.
     
    I jumped as the door burst open.
     
    “Cocoa, what the hell was that?” Mama demanded. “I’m dropping about four-hundred bucks on alcohol right now to smooth over that incident. That’s the worst thing that’s ever happened on the floor! What did that motherfucker