And Bill knew this.

But he didn’t care.

He just wanted to fuck with me. Probably with Mitch too. But definitely with me.

And he was using his children to do it.

But that flash I had wasn’t just understanding what was happening right then in my apartment. It was understanding what Mitch had been telling me, what people who knew and cared about me had been saying and showing all my life.

I was not a Two Point Five. Behaving the way they behaved, speaking the way they spoke, making the threats they were making would not occur to me. I would never, not in a million years, do any of that.

Because that was not me.

And it never had been.

So when the reply came, it was me who gave it.

“Get out of my house,” I said quietly and all eyes turned to me.

“What?” Mom asked.

“Get out of my house. Now,” I repeated with an added directive.

Mom’s eyes narrowed. “Marabelle Jolene, have you been listenin’?”

“I have,” I told her. “And I’m not listening anymore. I’m not breathing your air anymore. I’m done. You laid it out, now I will. This is the last conversation we’ll have not through attorneys. Unless I have to see you, I will never see you again. Do your worst. Right now, we’re done.”

“You don’t get this,” Aunt Lulamae butted in, “but my Bill’s got good shit on someone. They’re kissin’ his ass to get it. You don’t take this deal, Marabelle, you could lose both those kids.”

“And you don’t get this,” I retorted. “I do not care. If you think for one second I’m allowing you…or her,” I jerked my head at Jez, “anywhere near my kids, think again. It’s not going to happen.”

“You’re wrong,” Aunt Lulamae returned.

“We’ll see,” I replied instantly. “Now, get out.”

Mom leaned a bit toward me and said with soft menace, “You need to think about this deal, girl.”

My voice was clear and strong when I shot back, “No, I don’t. And you know I don’t. And you know why I don’t. But I’ll point it out. You both have records. I don’t. You both have not had steady employment in your lives. I have. Neither of you have seen those children until ten minutes ago. You haven’t sent birthday cards or Christmas presents. They’ve lived their whole lives in Denver; they’ve never been out of state and definitely not to Iowa. Their father is a drunk, drug addict dealer with two strikes. That woman,” I jerked my head at Jez, “left her infant daughter and didn’t see her again until whatever reason brought her here. And if you think we won’t figure out what you bribed her with to get her here, seeing as my man’s a freaking decorated police detective, you’re even more stupid than I thought and I had a lifetime of evidence suggesting you’re flat out dumb.” My eyes pinpointed Mom and Aunt Lulamae in turn and my voice dipped quieter. “And I have a really good memory. A really good one. You push this, you take this to court, I’ll be calling up all sorts of stuff on both of you,” my eyes shifted and narrowed on Jez, “all of you. There is no way in hell you’re taking either of my kids from me. And yes,” I looked to Aunt Lulamae, “I said they’re my kids because they are my kids. And seeing as they’re mine, I love them and they love me, I will exhaust myself, I will run myself ragged, I will bleed myself dry and I will do this to make sure they’re safe, protected and stay with me. You’re here simply because Bill is stupid, he’s petty, he blames me for his mistakes and he wants to fuck with me. He knows he has no prayer in the world. He’s smart enough to know that. He’s using you but you’re not smart enough to know that. Now, you can take this further and endure me wiping the floor with the lot of you in a courtroom or you can crawl away and stay away. Because you are not welcome here, you are not welcome in my home, my life or my kids’ lives and you never, ever will be.”

When I finished, I held their eyes and I was calm, in control, breathing steadily and although Mitch’s arm around my waist giving me a strong squeeze felt great, I didn’t need it.

I didn’t need it.

Because I wasn’t a Two Point Five. I wasn’t an Eight. I wasn’t a Ten.

Mitch was right. My classification system was bullshit.

Bottom line, what I was is a decent person.

And I always had been.

“Fuck me,” Jez muttered, studying, me, “didn’t buy into this shit.”

“Shush,” Aunt Lulamae hissed to Jez, “we got this.”

My body jolted in surprise when I heard a burst of laughter. I looked toward my kitchen to see Elvira had an arm thrown out to hold onto the edge of the counter and her entire, petite, rounded body was visibly shaking with hilarity. Her head was thrown back and her other hand was beating, palm flat, at her well-endowed chest.

She continued to laugh for a while then she sobered, still chuckling and wiping under her eye as she noted the obvious, “Hilarious. You got this. Ohmigod, that’s funny.”

“You think they got more sway than the District Attorney?” Mom asked, sweeping an arm out to Mitch and me.

Elvira totally sobered and focused sharp eyes on my mother.

And when she spoke, her voice was quiet.

“Yeah. Not to save you trouble but to save them the pain in the ass all you all got written all over you,” on the “them” she jerked her head toward Mitch and me, “let me explain somethin’. Detective Mitch Lawson is well-known in these parts for bein’ a good cop and when I say well-known, I mean, he’s made the papers. He decides he and his girlfriend are gonna take in a coupla kids that don’t have it too good and give them good, and the DA decides to give them to the likes of you just so he can get some info from a dirtbag, the papers get hold of that, he’s not gonna look too good. The DA likes lookin’ good. And, in case you haven’t clued in, I think Mara and Mitch here are willin’ to throw just about anything at you and won’t mind wadin’ in with the media to keep those kids safe.”

She turned her head to Mitch and me.

Then she said, “Sorry, gotta lay this shit out.”

Before either of us could respond, she turned her head back to the Trailer Trash Trio and when she spoke again, her voice was even quieter.

“Now, I know all about Bill Winchell. And I know who he’s got dirt on. And I know that person gets whiff that he’s talkin’, the number of breaths Bill Winchell’s got left to breathe on this earth just lowered significantly. Police protective custody or not, he’s dead man walkin’. If he’s too stupid to know that, he’s your boy, you go talk to him and you educate him. Right now he’s facin’ a not very happy future that includes a limited wardrobe selection. But at least he’s got a future. He talks, he won’t have that. You get me?”

I looked from Elvira to the Trailer Trash Trio to see Jez still looked indifferent. Mom was studying Elvira closely. But, surprising me, Aunt Lulamae looked pale and uncertain.

Elvira spoke again and when I looked back at her, I saw her eyes were on Mitch.

“I know the boys are fired up to take that guy down but that stupid cracker’s makin’ this play just to fuck with you, he needs a wakeup call.” Her eyes honed in on Mitch and she finished, “And you know it.”

“We’ll tell him to add the Witness Protection Program to the deal,” Mom said and everyone looked at her.

“You can tell him that but Winchell won’t get it,” Elvira replied. “He might have info but not enough to buy him that kinda deal.”

“You can’t know that,” Mom returned.

“Woman, you don’t know me but what I do, I know everything that’s goin’ down in Denver. I know that. I know a lot more. And I know, your boy don’t shut up, next time you see him, he’ll be in a coffin,” Elvira retorted.

Everyone was silent. Aunt Lulamae shifted. Mom glared at Elvira. Jez looked like, if she had a watch (which she didn’t), she’d check it.

Mitch finally spoke.

“I think you’ve been invited to leave.”

Mom transferred her glare to Mitch. Jez took a half step toward the door.

Aunt Lulamae looked at Mitch too and asked on a jerk of her head toward Elvira, “What she said, is it true?”

“Yes,” Mitch said flatly.

Aunt Lulamae looked at Mom. Mom continued to glare at Mitch.

And that was when I knew Mom was the mastermind (as it were) of all of this. This was not about Bill, Billy and Billie.

This was about her and me.

This was about her taking me down a notch.

Mitch was right again.

All my life, I had been in a competition with my mother. She wanted to take me down, hold me down, best me. She made nothing of her life and she wanted to make sure I didn’t make anything of mine because if I did, it would make her feel worse about the fact she’d thrown hers away.

And there I stood next to a good man, a handsome man, a solid, respectable man in a fabulously decorated apartment and across the breezeway were two children who adored me and a cadre of friends who had my back.

And she couldn’t stand it.

“Move on,” I whispered and I felt Mitch’s arm tighten and saw Mom’s eyes come to me.

“What?” she snapped.

“You don’t exist for me, not anymore. Not after this, not even before this but definitely not after. We’re done. I’ve moved on. Now you need to move on too,” I advised.

“Marabelle Hanover, don’t you stand there and tell your Momma what to do,” she kept snapping.

“Okay then, don’t move on. Your choice. But take your bitterness and regret for throwing away your life somewhere else. Don’t you see?” I lifted a hand and kept it up. “You can’t beat me.”