Chapter 1
The streets of the city were slick with rain, the kind of downpour that soaked you to the bone in minutes. Lidia’s boots splashed through the puddles as she rushed along the dimly lit sidewalks, barely noticing the cold. It was a night just like any other, filled with the thrum of her heartbeat and the distant hum of city noise. But tonight, there was an urgency to her steps—an urgency she knew all too well.
Lidia’s phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out without thinking. Carla, the bartender from the local dive bar, was calling.
“Lidia, it’s your dad,” Carla said, her voice strained with the weight of experience. “He’s drunk again. Passed out in the back, and this time… he can’t pay the tab. I can’t do it anymore, girl. I need you to come get him, or the cops are gonna come knocking. You know how he gets. I’m asking you, please.”
Lidia’s stomach dropped, a familiar heaviness sinking deep into her chest. The feeling of dread—the knowing that she’d have to once again clean up after her father, that she’d be his savior, his enabler. But there was no choice. She had done this countless times before, and tonight was no different.
“Thanks, Carla,” Lidia said, her voice flat. “I’ll be there in ten.”
She shoved the phone back into her pocket and kept running. Each step felt like a small defeat, but there was no other option. She couldn’t leave him to face the consequences of his actions, not when he was all she had left.
Lidia was used to the bar’s smell of stale beer, cheap liquor, and the low hum of broken conversations. It was a dive, the kind of place people went to when they didn’t have anything else to hold onto. Lidia had learned to blend into the background here, to stay invisible. The less attention she attracted, the better.
She pushed through the heavy glass door and stepped into the bar. The noise inside swallowed her, but it didn’t quite drown out the sound of her heart pounding in her chest. She spotted Carla immediately, her eyes locking onto Lidia’s with a look of relief mixed with guilt. Carla was older, in her forties, with a tough exterior that had been shaped by years of dealing with the underbelly of the city. But tonight, there was something different in her eyes.
“He’s in the back,” Carla said, gesturing toward the darkened hallway leading to the storeroom. “You don’t need to see this, Lidia, but you know how your dad is.”
Lidia nodded, not trusting herself to speak. She followed the path toward the back of the bar, where her father always ended up when he was too far gone to be in the front, too drunk to interact with the regulars.
As she approached the booth, she saw Marcus, her father, slouched against the wall, a half-empty bottle of whiskey still clutched in his hand. His face was puffy, his eyes bloodshot, and his clothes—once a sharp suit—were now stained with vomit and beer. He barely noticed her enter, lost in his haze.
“Dad,” Lidia said, her voice strained, but trying to keep the anger and exhaustion from slipping through. “Come on, we need to go.”
Marcus blinked, then looked at her with a dazed smile, like she was the last thing he’d expected to see. “Lidia… my girl… You came for me again. You always come for me, huh?”
Lidia fought the urge to scream, to lash out, but she kept her composure. Her father had always been like this—hopeless, pitiful, and always, always needing saving.
She sat down across from him, her hands tight on the edge of the table. “I’m here. Just like always. But I can’t keep doing this, Dad. You have to stop. You have to stop drinking, gambling, everything.” Her voice cracked slightly, but she swallowed it back.
Marcus didn’t respond, just stared at her, his mind somewhere else, somewhere far from the present. He muttered a few unintelligible words and tried to reach for the bottle again, but his hand shook.
“You don’t understand…” he said, his voice a slur. “I… I can’t. I can’t stop, Lidia. You know I… I just need to keep going.”
Lidia stood up, her body tense, her fists clenched at her sides. The pity she’d felt for him in the past had long since worn thin. All she had now was anger—anger at him, anger at herself, and the deep, gnawing resentment of being trapped in this life.
“Come on,” she said, her voice shaking now with barely contained fury. “I’ll pay your tab, but this has to be the last time. The last time, Dad.” She threw a few bills on the table, not bothering to count them. The money didn’t matter. Not anymore. Nothing mattered, except getting out of here.
Just as Lidia turned to leave, she heard the unmistakable voice of Vince, the owner of the motel where her father sometimes stayed when things got too bad.
“I’ll handle it,” Vince said, his voice low, almost predatory.
Lidia froze. Vince had always given her a strange, uncomfortable feeling. He was the type who played nice, smiled like he was a friend, but everyone knew there was always a price. A price her father was too willing to pay.
She turned back to see Marcus, still barely conscious, his slurred speech indistinct. Vince stood nearby, arms crossed, watching her father with the same cold, calculating eyes he always used when business was on the table.
“Your dad’s good for it,” Vince said, but there was a different edge to his words tonight. “If he’s gonna keep drinking and running up tabs, we need to have something else, something more reliable.”
Lidia’s blood ran cold. She knew what he meant, what the implication was. Her father had gambled with everything he had, and the final thing left to play was her. She wasn’t naive enough to not understand the game they were playing.
“What do you mean?” Lidia’s voice was barely above a whisper, but it didn’t stop the cold fear from spreading through her veins.
Vince glanced at her, then smirked, a predator’s smile. “You know how this works, sweetheart. When a man can’t pay, there’s always… a deal. He promised me his daughter before. I’m just reminding him of that promise.”
Lidia’s knees almost gave out. The room spun. The money, the tabs, the promises—it all led to this moment. Her father had gambled her away again. She had been nothing but a pawn in his selfish, ruinous game.
Lidia stepped back, her breath shallow. Her mind raced. Was she going to be trapped in this cycle forever? She’d spent so many years saving him from his own mistakes, but this… this was beyond what she could fix. There had to be another way.
She turned and walked out of the bar without looking back. The rain hit her skin like needles, but it didn’t hurt as much as what she had just learned.
Her phone buzzed again, a message from Carla: “Don’t let him back into the bar again, Lidia. He’s beyond saving.”
But Lidia didn’t respond. She couldn’t. She was too busy trying to figure out how to save herself.
