This was another Three Word Wednesday post that just screamed at me. I listened.

“Cancel my labor,” Trinity said.

“Trin,” Springer said. “It don’t work that way. The baby got in. It’s got to come out.”

She closed her eyes and threw her head back. “I know, but… why can’t there be a magic wand or something?” As if in agreement, her belly heaved as the baby kicked. Trinity put her hand on the lump and caressed it.

Springer sighed. He didn’t know what to say. He was out of his element on this one, and he knew it. He needed to escape from Trinity and Grandma and their crazy babies-on-the-brain, but at the same time, he couldn’t stay away. Trinity and Grandma had started telling him that since Trinity was going to keep the baby, Springer was the closest thing around to a father. They hinted that he’d have to step it up.

He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Not because it wasn’t his baby; he hadn’t even gotten his hand on Trinity’s tits before she’d gotten herself knocked up.

It was that he was seventeen and still had a year to go before graduating high school. He worked part-time as a nighttime stockboy at the local Huge-Mart. Those weren’t particularly fatherly traits. Not if he wanted the kid to look up to him.

“And do it now,” Trinity was saying. She ran a finger under the elastic waistband of her maternity jeans. “I am sick of these ugly clothes. I want my own back.”

“Nine months up, nine months down,” Springer said, parroting Grandma.

Trinity made an exasperated noise and lumbered to her feet before tottering off.

Truth was, Springer couldn’t wait until she was her old self again, either. Before this had happened, he’d wanted to get to know Trinity better. She’d been so wild and free – before the baby. Now, she was tired and scared. She wasn’t the same girl.

Funny thing, though, was that Springer thought she might be hotter than ever like this. He liked that she looked to him for advice and guidance, even though he didn’t know anything and all he could do was keep on repeating what Grandma said.

She shuffled back into the room he was in, puffing a bit. “Really,” she gasped and held a hand behind her, canting her hips up toward the ceiling and almost doing a backbend as she tried to seat herself. She fell into the couch with a plop. “I’ve had enough. Magic wand time!”

“Trin, there’s no magic wand.”

Her breath caught. Springer peered at her; tears were filling up that spot at the top of her bottom lids, where tears gathered right before they spilled over. “You’ve been in class with me,” she said. “ You’ve seen what goes on. I don’t think I can do it.”

“It’s not like you have a choice anymore,” Springer said. He didn’t know why he was suddenly so angry; it wasn’t a place he went to often.

Trinity’s tears spilled over. Springer softened. “You’ll be fine,” he said, sliding to his knees in front of her. He put his hands on her knees. Like the rest of her, they’d grown soft, swollen with motherhood. That change, he wasn’t so keen on. He’d liked Trinity as she’d been before: angular, spiky. Maybe even a little bit hard.

She was shaking her head. “I can’t do it, Springer.”

“Yes, you can,” he said. “Women been doing this for years.” He was parroting Grandma down to her own language. As if anyone cared.

Trinity bit her lower lip and squeezed her eyes shut. A tear squeezed through.

Springer stood up so he could bend over and wrap her in a hug. A pang shot through him as she buried her head on his chest; he’d wanted so much more than this between them.

He sighed. Always second-best.

Be sure to check in at Three Word Wednesday (link’s above) and Friday Flash for some other reading fun.

It’s been a long time since I’ve visited with Trinity, Springer’s sort-of girlfriend. This week’s Three Word Wednesday prompt demanded I revisit her, since I’d left her in a pretty bad position the last time we saw her…

Lust hit with a jolt, surged through the body. It didn’t matter what he looked like, or who he was. Not usually. What mattered was how she felt at the moment, how available he was, and if he’d let her be the one who put the rubber on.

No wonder she’d gotten herself into this mess, she figured. Knocked up, living with Springer’s grandmother, trying to figure out if she should keep it or what. She had another week before abortion wouldn’t be an option.

“Detach yourself from it,” Springer’s grandmother said, patting her on the hand. The lady was smart and kind, if a bit demanding. Springer said at her age, she’d earned it.

Trinity hoped she wouldn’t be around long enough to find out what that meant. She didn’t want to grow attached to these people. They deserved better than her.

“If this was your friend, not you,” Springer’s grandmother said, “what would you tell her to do?”

Trinity shrugged, a slow raising of her shoulders that Springer’s grandmother was supposed to know wasn’t a brush-off. It was supposed to let her know that truly, she had no idea what she’d say. Abortions were big. They were loaded.

Trinity wasn’t sure she could live with that sort of pressure. She thought she’d spend the rest of her life wondering what the baby would have been like. Was it a boy or a girl? What would it grow up to be like?

“I think you know,” Springer’s grandmother said.

“No abortion,” Trinity said, pulling her knees up to her chest and hugging them. “I should. I know I should.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “Grandma, I don’t know if I can live with this. No matter what I do, it’s the wrong thing.” She raised her face to the ceiling, felt the tears on her cheeks. “I wish this had never happened.”

Grandma patted her knee. “I know, Trinity.” Her hand stayed there for a second too long, and Trinity knew. She tilted her head so she could look Grandma in the eye.

Grandma had known the same pulls. The lust, the searing need to be filled and completed. The blessed release when you came.

And what happened when the rubber slipped. Or broke. Or did whatever it had done.

“What did you do?” she whispered.

“I didn’t let it defeat me,” Grandma whispered back.

I’ve also cross-posted this as my #FridayFlash. If you’d like the backstory, here are the links you need:
Springer and Trinity meet
Trinity gets in trouble
Springer tries to help
Be sure you leave comments if you stop in; I love comments! It’s how I know you visited.

Susan’s note: Springer and Trinity appear here every now and then. When last we saw them together, Trinity was in trouble. It was our boy Springer to the rescue — then as now.

Springer sat down on the edge of the bed beside Trinity. She was hugging her knees to her chest, like she did all the time now. Getting herself in major trouble the way she had… it had messed her up pretty good.

“This year’s Musical Hanukkah? You up for it?”

He hadn’t expected her to say yes. Hadn’t expected her to do much else other than what she did: shake her head from side to side exactly twice. Fast, too. Nothing slow or deliberate. It was like she wanted to get done with this talking stuff as fast as she possibly could.

“Trin,” he said, trying to stop himself from moving an inch or two away from her. But c’mon, he wanted to say. How long was a guy supposed to keep getting the cold shoulder? She wasn’t even his girl and she was acting like this. “You gotta pull yourself together already. Life’s falling apart all around you.”

“Why?” she spat, her voice dripping with an edge that gave Springer the chills.

“Why what?” Springer asked, confused.

“Why do I have to pull myself together? What if there’s nothing left to pull together? Did you think of that? Did you forget I got kicked out of the house, I got kicked out of school? I’ve got nothing, Springer. Nothing.”

“Well,” he said, wondering if this was a good idea or not, “you’ve got me.”

She made an ugly face.

“And a place to stay,” Springer said, starting to panic. “Grandma was saying the other day that if you’d be willing, she’d pay you to be her companion.”

“Oh, great. I’ve gone from being a whore to … to…”

“To having a good job taking care of a sweet old lady,” Springer said. “You’ll have a place to stay and whatever you need.” He didn’t mention that he could move back home. Or stay here with Trinity and Grandma. “All you’d need to do is the cleaning, the grocery shopping, stuff like that.”

“Taking care of the garden, cooking. You know. Being a slave. Are you sure I’m not really Black, Springer? Is this the South before the Civil War?”

It was sad he’d gotten used to her talking like this.

“Slaves didn’t get paid. Grandma’s willing to pay you. And let you use her car. I bet if you wanted to go to school for something, she’d help you.”

“School?” Trinity raised her head, her chin coming forward. As her forehead tilted back, she rolled her eyes. “Dropouts can’t go to school.”

Springer sighed. All he’d wanted to know was if she was up for the Musical Hanukkah Celebration. Or maybe if he should go without her. It was looking like that was how it was going to go.

“Look, Springer, why are you here?”

“Because right now, I live here. Someone’s gotta take care of grandma.”

“I can’t take your job, Springer.”

“I wish you would.”

“Why? So you can go live life while I’m slaving away here?”

“So you can do something besides feel sorry for yourself,” he said, sstanding up. “And because I think Grandma would rather have a girl around than me.”

“You’re her grandkid. She’s not allowed to not want you around.”

As if she’d realized the hypocrisy of what she’d just said, she smiled. Sort of.

“Think about it, Trin. You’re not the only one around here who’s miserable ’cause of what happened to you. Right now, you’re the one with the power to change it all.”

She shrugged and put her chin back down on her knees. Springer left her like that, just like he usually did. At least she’d said something. A lot of somethings.

It was an improvement.

Check out other Friday Flashers, as well as Weekend Writer’s Retreat. There’s good fiction to be found on this here Internet.

I’m writing this as my Internet is down (and posting from a hotel. See previous post for why). I hope I have the right Three Words for Three Word Wednesday!

Those of you who remember Springer may remember the girl he met at one of the Musical Hanukkah Celebrations. Trinity. For those of you meeting her for the first time, I think you’ll like her.

~~~~~~~ (this is the cool separator Anne Tyler Lord taught me. Isn’t it great?)
“Ignore the fear!” Sandusky said to Trinity. “Just leap up, ignore the fear, and go for it!”

Trinity nodded and licked her lips. It seemed so easy. Sandusky said it was unlike anything she’d ever do. It was paradise, he said.

“Leap up,” Sandusky said again. “Put your hand on that guy’s head and push yourself as high as you can. I’ll grab you and help get you up there.”

Still, Trinity held back. She’d been watching people in the pit surf the crowd ever since Sandusky had taken her to her first show, a couple months ago. She’d even put her hands up over her own head, helping keep the surfer from kicking her in the face — she’d seen people that had happened to. Swollen, black, bloody. Things broke if you weren’t careful, especially when the surfers were the assholes who wore steel-toed boots.

Sandusky was pretty sure they’d dig Trinity. Her clothes were, like always, tight up to her body. She wore simple black boots, not combat boots, not work boots. Maybe you’d call them fashion boots. But really, they were something in between. They wouldn’t hurt anyone. Not too much.

This scene was still new to her, and already, she loved it. She loved that she fit in, that only the really snooty girls Sandusky called the Dick Bunnies tried to make her feel inadequate. She loved that the more outrageous she was, the more approval she got and the more they wanted her around. And she loved the ear cuff Jameson had given her, daring her to wear it. She’d wanted to know why she wouldn’t wear the image of a guy with a hard-on. Maybe the problem was that Jameson didn’t know what one was good for.

She knew she could surf the crowd. She knew she’d love it, all those hands holding her, supporting her. Sandusky said it was like being weightless, but Trinity wasn’t so sure. She didn’t see how. Wasn’t weightless all about being in zero gravity?

“Come on, Trin!” Sandusky yelled.

Trinity licked her lips. He was right. The song was almost over. It was now or never.

She didn’t think. She looked up toward the heads in front of her, imagined herself up there.

Trinity jumped.

As Sandusky promised, as soon as her hand made contact with the head of the guy in front of her, her friend gave her the push. The guy in front grabbed at her; Trinity didn’t think he gave it a thought. When you stood in the pit, this was what you did. Feel a body, lift it up.

And then she was on her back, her arms spread out to the sides, her legs flopping open, shut, up and down. Same for her ass. She laid her head back and laughed, then jerked as someone squeezed her tit. At a hand that snuck between her legs and tried to check out the folds there.

It kept coming. Pinches. Pulls. A scratch on her hand.

It wasn’t fun.

Trinity started to fight her way down. She bucked against them, growing frantic.

And then she was on the ground and Sandusky was pushing through the crowd. He grabbed her, hugged her, and told her she’d done great.

She had. She knew it. She’d ignored the fear.

It had been totally worth it.

Ignore the fear. That sounded like a new motto to Trinity.

“Springer,” Trinity said, biting back a sob.

He looked up from shelving tissues. “Trinity. Haven’t seen you in awhile.”

“I’m a shit, I know,” she said, staring up at the ceiling. She blinked fast a bunch of times and took some deep breaths that made her chest move in big motions.

It was all Springer could to to keep from staring at her tits. Trinity had great tits. Most girls did, come to think of it.

“I need help, Springer. I’m in trouble.”

He paused, looking at her face. Her green eyes were dark. They almost matched the purple under them, stretching from one end of her eyelashes to the other. She chewed her upper lip, something he’d never seen her do before. Not that he’d spent that much time with her. Not nearly as much as he’d wanted to.

“Trouble?” he repeated, feeling stupid.

“Yeah,” she said. “Trouble.” Her eyes slid down until it was impossible for him to miss her meaning. Her belly.

“We’re not talking about something like your appendix, are we?” he asked weakly. He put a hand on the stock cart to steady himself. Stupid thing was on wheels and almost pulled him off his feet as it slipped away, like it was trying to escape this conversation.

It was a good distraction. Regaining his balance helped Springer think again.

“No,” she was saying. “It’s what you think.”

“Well, it’s not mine!”

She smiled. A little bit. Maybe it was funny to her, but Springer couldn’t figure out why else she’d picked him to come to.

“Would you… could you…” She stared up at the ceiling. Springer noticed a faint ring of dirt around her neck.

“How long since you been home?” he asked her.

She looked at him, her eyes flashing like he’d told someone else her secret.

“This is bad,” he said.

She nodded slowly, chewing her upper lip again.

“You can’t go to anyone else?”

She shook her head, teeth still pulling at her lip.

“The dad?”

She shuddered. At least she let go of her lip.

Springer held his arms open and let her fall into his hugs. For a second there, it felt the way he’d been hoping it would: like he was in the arms of an angel. But then he reminded himself that he was the one doing the holding, and she had a huge mess that it was up to him to fix.

Of course, he didn’t have the first idea how.

The Sunday Scribblings prompt this week is Adventure, and Springer’s sure about to embark on one. Carry on Tuesday‘s found its way in here, too. And that’s all. For now.

It used to be that if you wanted tickets to a show at All Access, you either stopped by Guitars by Gus or at All Access. You handed over the ticket price and walked away with a ticket. An actual, honest-to-God, printed up ticket. All professional and shit.

Springer knew he wasn’t the only one who didn’t like the way All Access had signed on with TRA. He’d heard from damn good sources, folk who’d stop in after they finally kicked the last drunks out, that they hadn’t wanted to use TRA at all. Problem was, they didn’t have much choice. No one did anymore. Not if you wanted to sell tickets to things.

He guessed he wasn’t the only one who’d gotten the early word about tickets going on sale a day early. He’d sat down at nine-thirty, getting up at nine so he could be awake after another all-night shift filled with plenty of coffee and not nearly enough pick-me-ups of the illegal variety. He’d made his TRA account, gotten his brand-new credit card approved and on file. He hadn’t wanted to get a card; Springer preferred cash. He’d seen too many people come into the store and hand over credit card after credit card, hoping one of them would be approved so they could buy their groceries. Credit cards got people into trouble. Springer didn’t want to be one of them. This card was for a twenty-dollar ticket. Nothing more.

Credit was the only way to get tickets, and dammit, he was going to be there. Everyone was talking about Deadly Metal Hatchet. About how cool The Hatchet was. About how they were doing this show here in Riverview, their first time this far North, as a thank-you to ShapeShifter. Rumor had it they’d be opening for ShapeShifter on their next tour. Given that the guys in ShapeShifter turned out for shows all the time, it was certain they’d be there.

Springer knew it was stupid, but he wished he’d be able to hand Eric a demo of his own one day. First he needed a band, then the cash to make a demo. Not to mention the music. But he could dream. And besides, musicians needed to go out and hear other musicians. They needed to sit and dream about when it’d be his turn up there.

Right now, there was no dreaming. Just a lot of pushing the F5 key, waiting for the screen that he’d use to buy the tickets.

And then, it happened. The dreaded white page with the little box near the top. Connection Interrupted.

He’d been disconnected from the TRA site.

He couldn’t buy the tickets.

For half an hour, he clicked on the button, getting more and more frantic.

And then he got through. One ticket, twenty bucks. It was his. They were charging his credit card … Two hundred eighty bucks? What the hell?

He looked more closely. Somehow, all those F5s had loaded seven tickets into his cart. For a second, he thought about buying them and scalping them. With his luck, he’d probably get caught and thrown in jail. Besides, what if he got stuck with them? He wouldn’t have two hundred eighty bucks for months.

Springer logged out and logged back in. Ten more minutes of Connection Interrupted. And finally, one ticket in his shopping cart. He hated the whole shopping cart idea; cool people didn’t use carts. They loaded up their arms and dumped everything on the belt.

The ticket price caught his eye just before he pressed the confirm button. Forty bucks?

He logged out and back in, getting frantic. It was well after the time the tickets had gone on sale. They’d be gone fast. But forty bucks for one ticket? No way in hell was that right.

He fumbled for his cell phone. Trinity was going to get her own ticket. Long story why.

“Forty bucks?” Trinity asked. “Do you believe this shit? TRA, man. I fucking hate them.”

“I get why.”

“Let me try two… see if it’s cheaper… Holy fuck, it’s more!”

“You can get through? I keep getting disconnected.”

Just then, Dad yelled up the stairs for him. “Your grandmother needs you. Stat!”

Springer curled his upper lip. Dad cleaned bed pans. He had no reason to use words like stat. But he did; he thought they made him sound smarter.

“Let me finish this, Dad,” he called through the closed door. “One second and I’m Grandma’s all day long.” Grandma napped every day after lunch. She liked it when Springer stretched out on her couch while she laid down in her bed; she said it made her feel safe. She’d made noises about Springer coming to live with her because we all knew that those home invasions never happened where there were young kids in the house. Not that a young kid who worked the late shift would be around when most home invasions happened.

“Now!” Dad thundered up the steps.

Springer told the computer to charge his credit card.

Connection interrupted.

He screamed and dropped the cell phone, Trinity still on the line, into his coffee cup. Dad came running.

It wasn’t just TRA that Springer was disconnected from.

Time for some Sunday Scribblings! Be sure to see what the DISCONNECTED prompt inspired in others. And gang? Leave a comment. Let them know you were by.