Hurt By Revenge

16

“Thanks so much for agreeing to talk to me. I know it's difficult but please let me know of any way I can help you,”Cass said to the young woman beside her. She responded with a timid smile.

It had taken Cass three days to find someone willing to talk to her. Having walked into a nearby shelter the day after, Cass had realised she'd been overly optimistic. Her expectations had been brutally crushed by reality when her request had been rebuffed by more than ten women, distrust shooting from their eyes. The woman, Hailey, had agreed only because Cass had offered her lunch at a nearby park.

That was five days ago. Their first lunch had been silent, Hailey having inhaled her food as quickly as possible and leaving just as fast. Cass hadn't even spoken a word during, having wanted to respect her space. Flabbergasted, Cass had just continued on to the next shelter the next day.

But Hailey had found her. And she'd divulged her name during their second lunch. Every lunch since then had been a revelation of Hailey’s story. Much like peeling the layers of an onion.

Hailey was a teen runaway, barely past eighteen. Having broken up from her physically abusive boyfriend, she'd found life at her old neighbourhood difficult since her boyfriend lived in the area. Her parents had not been helpful but they'd never liked her boyfriend either. They'd seen her misery as penance.

But Hailey had stayed even then. She hadn't wanted to drop out of school, knowing how important the piece of paper was. Even though her boyfriend waited for her outside her classrooms and the gate, she'd found the strength to continue. It’d helped that her boyfriend had never shown his ugly side to the public.

The tipping point, though, had been the assault from the entire football team, which her ex was in. Having been caught alone after school one day, Hailey had been powerless. And once they were done, in came her boyfriend, ready to console her. Claiming not to know what the team had planned. She didn't belive him.

Realising she was never going to be safe, she'd run, going from shelter to shelter.

Now, she was sitting beside Cass on a bench. In the park. With a half-eaten sandwich in her hands.

And watching her chew slowly, Cass wished she could do anything to help her. But pride was a delicate thing. She didn't want to squash this budding girl. Life was doing that already. Stifling her need to force her help on her, she was surprised when Hailey spoke.

“I-I want to get my GED.” Head down, she continued. “I know I'm just some girl on the street but I don't want to continue being her. I want to show my parents and those boys that I can still rise even when people try to step on me. I already have a job, a cashier, but to go further, I need that paper.” Her voice had become defensive near the end but Cass didn't mind. She knew, sometimes, something small, like being a cashier or having a gun stashed under the pillow, was all that was needed to continue.

So, looking into that fierce baby blue eyes, she wasn't surprised by her next words.

“Why don't you move in with me?”

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Later that night, Cass smiled at Kendall and Hailey, wishing them good luck, before locking herself in her office. Or, better known as the empty room on the first floor that she didn't know what to do with. She'd stuffed it with a desk, her laptop, bookshelves and comfortable chairs.

Taking a seat at the aforementioned comfortably stuffed love seat by the window, Cass took out her phone and brought up Daniel's number. She just looked at it. Knowing she had to inform him about Hailey’s presence but something in her was hesitant in contacting him.