I could have said that he needed me… that without someone like me to care for him, he'd just go down the tubes…

I could have said any or all of those, but I didn't, because it would have all been bullshit!

I knew it, and Mary Beth knew it.

If there is such a thing as redeeming social value, Johnny Waddell was NOT the person the term had been coined to describe.

The sonfabitch was worthless, and I knew it.

Miserable human being.

He lied.

He stole… from his mother, his sister, from my mother and from me…

He beat up on anyone who got in his way or who wouldn't give him what he wanted…

Me included.

In fact, the first time he took me out, he raped me.

That's right.

Just up and raped the shit out of me.

"This isn't the way to Center City, is it?" I'd asked him when I saw that there were less and less houses.

"I told you," he mumbled in that quaintly inarticulate way of his, "it's a short-cut."

"Yeah… well, usually when my daddy takes a short-cut, we get lost."

He smirked, and then he casually looked my way. "Well, some short-cuts are shorter than others."

"Listen," I said, "I think I want to go back now."

"You do, huh?"

"Yeah… I do. Can you turn the car around?"

"In a minute."

"Why? Why not now?"

"Because we aren't where we're going to be, when we get there, that is."

"Where's that?" I asked, getting more and more scared.

"Where we're going."

Then, looking levelly at me, he said, "You ask one fuck of a lot of questions. Ain't anyone ever told you that women should keep their fucking mouths shut?"

"NO! No one ever told me that. And furthermore…"

"You're wrong. You just been told."

I was going to say something, but then he started to slow the car down. "Where are we going? Where are you taking me?"