Free Down 'N' Derby by Lila Felix

heels, packed up my clothes and went back to the hotel.  I had a message from Renee, my best friend from New Orleans asking me to call her.  I was originally from the New Orleans area in the small city of Slidell.  I moved away after high school to get away from everyone who knew me when I was little and knew that Simon had beat the shit out of me for four years and I was too stupid to do anything about it.  I ran.  I just needed a breather from that life.  I drove for three days straight and didn’t stop until I was nose to nose with the Pacific Ocean. 
                  The phone rang as I returned Renee’s call and I couldn’t wait to hear her voice.
                  “Ugh, ga-ross, I feel skeezy just talking to you on the phone while you’re in Vegas.”  Renee had a real aversion to gambling and strippers, thus she had a very bad opinion of Las Vegas in general.
                  “It’s not that bad.  But I think I’m gonna skip out on tomorrow and go home.”  I could hear her get up and start walking and I knew she knew something was up.  I never skipped out on work, especially since I was saving up for college.
                  I heard a door shut and she said, “Ok, spill it.  What happened?  You never play hookey.”
                  “I saw a guy that looked like Simon.  It really, really gave me the creeps.”
                  “Oh gross.  Want me to stab him?”  This was my best friend, loyal as all get out and wouldn’t hesitate to choke someone for me.
                  “No, I’m sure he’s gone.  I’m just gonna head home in the morning.”
                  She breathed heavily into the phone, “Summer can’t end fast enough.  I can’t wait until you start at Loyola, it will be good to see your mug more than once a year.”
                  “I know.  But I will miss the beach.”
                  “Yeah, but you miss the gumbo more.”
                  “Ain’t that the truth.  Ok, I’m off to bed.  Talk to you soon.”
                  “Ok, stay safe,” Renee always said that at the end of our conversations.
                  “I will.” I hung up, now realizing that I was too tired to even eat.  I took a long, hot bath and then crawled into the cushy hotel bed and slept like the dead. 

Chapter 15
    Maddox
    Fact: One time when I was about eight, I ate some kind of chocolate flavored cereal for breakfast when Mom was sick.  What I didn’t realize was that I had already caught her stomach bug too.  Brown foamy chunks everywhere, yeah, Count Chocula could kiss my ass.
     
                 
                  I could hear Nixon heaving from the other room until dawn.  He had insisted we get separate rooms for the night since the hamburgers we ate were coming out of both ends of him.  What he didn’t realize was that I could still hear everything through the thin motel walls, might as well be a chain linked fence between us for all the good it did. 
                  We had missed the first day of the car show.  He was just too sick to go.  I, on the other hand, had always had a stomach of steel.  I could eat anything and it never made my stomach upset.  That’s why when I was a kid I was Mom’s guinea pig.  I would always try new recipes and if I liked it, then it stood. 
                  I showered and got dressed in jeans and a wife beater.  We found a motel with laundry facilities since Nixon joked that he was now turning his boxers inside out.  I knocked on his door and he answered looking haggard as hell. 
                  “I’m going to do some laundry.  Let me do yours, I know you’re still sick.” He opened the door wider and showed me a half empty bottle of some chalky looking stuff. 
                  “Nope, I’m good.