Fic concept:
When everything at her house got too loud, too scary, too much, she’d bike down the grassy dirt roads to the trailer park, letting the cold sluice of wind wash away her tears.
She’d feel unsafe as she pedalled— starred at by the uncanny men sitting outside. Their shadowy faces contorted in the night air, stretched out and freakish. Their leering heckles, like animals baying, snag at her as she slips past the rusted white vans. Her only consolation is her destination, her legs straining harder against her pedals.
And even when she reaches his trailer, they’d be there. But as her eyes meet his from across the dusty porch, lit up by the wan glow of string lights and stars, she feels protected, his gaze dripping over her like molasses— sweet and warm.
The bitter echoes of her house…
the fragmentary yells, the slammed doors, her raggedy cries…
fade from her consciousness, as if it was always transitory, vanishing like the mist that rolls inland from the ocean.
Her mind clears and all she can focus on is him.
“You always have a place at mine, yeah? Don’t let that shit get you. You have me, okay?”
When his warm hand slides across the small of her back, she feels like she’s come home.
…
