by Lacey Dailey
“Alright, look.” He pushes to his feet and pins me with a hard look. “I said this is temporary, and I meant it. If you want me to move to the next car so you can have this one to yourself, whatever, but don’t go running to all your community friends that there is homeless teenager shacking up in your extended backyard, cool?”
Teenager.
My chest deflates just a little, and I want to give him a hug. I refrain for obvious reasons. “You’re a teenager.”
His previously smooth face is now restless and irritable. “Listen, Alma, if you tell anybody about this, I’ll torch Mo.”
I gasp. “You evil, homeless bastard.”
“I won’t be here forever. I have something in the works, and I want to make it there without a bunch of complications.”
“When you say you have something in the works, you mean what exactly?”
“Not that it’s any of your business, but I’ve got a place.”
Relief fills me in gallons. “Cool. So, you just have to get there? I can give you a ride.”
“No. I have to find it.”
“Excuse me?”
He shakes his head, hair swaying back and forth. “I don’t exactly know where I’m headed quite yet. I’ll be here until I figure it out.”
“Here? As in sleeping in an old train called Mo?” Looking toward Rumor's belongings, I shiver thinking of myself sleeping there in the cold without a pillow to lay my head on. The faint buzz of mosquitos around me has me feeling itchy, and I can almost picture Rumor fighting them off as he tries to sleep. My heart really dislikes the image.
“I don’t have any other options, Alma. I could get a hotel but I’d rather save my money for food.”
“Come home with me.” The offer flies out of my mouth before I gather how absurd it sounds.
His face twists. “Absolutely not.”
“Why not?” Shut up, Alma. Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. “I have a nice house.”
“I’m sure your house is great, but you’re a stranger. Hell. I’m a stranger.”
“No. You’re a kid living in a rundown tin can.”
He scoffs. “Kid? I’ll be eighteen in five months.”
“You’re seventeen? Cool. So am I. We’re practically peers.” I jump to my feet, journal in tow. “Let’s go, roomie.”
“You’re insane.”
Probably.
“I’m not insane. I’m a person offering you a place to shower.” I look around. “Where do you even go to the bathroom? The woods? Do you want to poop in the woods, Rumor? I have a perfectly fine toilet across the field.”
He laughs richly. “Who are you?”
“Alma Underwood.” I stick out my hand. “Your new roommate.”
He peers at my hand, making no effort to shake it. “I’m not your roommate. Your offer was nice, a little crazy, but nice. So, thanks, but no thanks.”
“Why is my offer crazy?” I drop my hand. “I’m doing the right thing.”
He scans me from my head to my toes, probably assessing if I’m a grade A psycho or not. “I could rob your family.”
“There is nothing in my house worth taking.”
“I could strangle you in your sleep.”
“I’ll sleep with a steak knife under my pillow.”
His right eyebrow raises. “I could murder your whole family and kidnap your baby sister.”
“My youngest sister is fifteen, and we have a dog that hates strangers. If you escape my attic room somehow, you’ll be attacked.”
Okay, so Charlevoix isn’t exactly a guard dog. She’s a Chinese crested dog that is more creepy than frightening, but he doesn’t need to know that.
Rumor inclines his head and studies me, a bewildered expression on his face. “You don’t even know me. Why is this so important to you?”
I have no idea.
I widen my stance, my sudden determination like a rock inside of me. “Because you have nowhere else to go. Because your lack of a home tells me you probably need a friend.” I flail my arms, gesturing wildly with each word. “Because there’s something inside of me that can’t leave tonight knowing you’re in here battling train monsters.”
“Train monsters.” He muses.
“It’s a thing.”
“Somehow I doubt that.”
“Come on, Rumor, let me give me you a place to stay that doesn’t smell like mildew.”
He puts one hand on his hip and lets his other arm dangle by his side like dead weight. “Didn’t you say you live in an attic?”
“I have a good assortment of air fresheners.” I nod toward the door. “Let’s go. If you hate it, you can leave. I’m not trying to kidnap you.”
“Really? This feels a lot like kidnapping.”
“Okay, fine.”
With my journal tucked under my arm, I turn to retreat. Despite how terribly I want to, I can’t force him to come stay with me. I probably shouldn’t have even offered in the first place. It was a crazy person thing to do.
I’m a crazy person.
But I know, I just know, I will get next to no sleep tonight knowing there is a kid my own age five hundred and twenty-eight steps away from me with no place to call home. I’m risking a lot, my life possibly, if he does turn out to be a murderer, but I can’t shake the feeling that he’s not the next Ted Bundy.
There’s something about being in Rumor’s presence that brings on a feeling I can’t quite explain. It’s new. A subtle but persistent feeling that’s gnawing at the inside of me, telling me that this small unit of human connection being exchanged by teenage strangers means something.
My natural habit of turning nothing into something is the only reason I hop down from the train car and start walking, abandoning that feeling and what seems like good moral values.
The crunch of gravel sounds behind me. “What about your parents?”
A surge of energy replaces the knot in my stomach. It sails up through my lungs and sparks into a spontaneous smile. I peer at him over my shoulder. “You let me worry about that.”
He steps up beside me and together, we walk five hundred and twenty-eight steps back to my house. With each step, I refuse to wonder if I’m making a massive mistake.
4
Stranger Danger
Rumor
I’m making a massive mistake. It’s as if every video chronicling kidnapping I was forced to suffer through as a child is screaming at me.
Stranger danger! Stranger danger!
Though I must admit Alma Underwood doesn’t look like she even knows the meaning of the word danger. If I took a big enough breath, I could blow her away. She has a slim, willowy frame, and sharp cheekbones hidden inside of a soft face. In all the minutes I’ve known Alma Underwood, the corners of her mouth have been positioned upward more so than they’ve been downward. She has an air of determination surrounding her, a spark of defiance humming low in her stomach and ready to break free when she believes deeply in something.
Less than an hour of being in her presence and I’m positive of that. Alma is a passionate girl. Whether it has to do with taking in homeless people, or something to do with the journal that is clutched in her fists in a death grip, I know that for a fact.
I'm more than a little taken back by her offer. Actually, I'm astonished by the way she's treated me since the second she met me. I'm a stranger, squatting inside of a train, with hair I haven’t washed in six days, giving off a rotten smell. Still, she doesn’t act scared that I’ll try to jump her, or totally grossed out that I clearly need to bathe. Nope. She puffs out her chest with all the confidence in the world and calls me a bastard. Maybe that’s why I decide to follow her home.
Not because she called me a bastard, but because she had a whisper of a smile on her face when she said it.
So, despite some strong inclinations telling me I’ve lost my damn mind, I follow Alma up an old wooden staircase, dimly lit and creaky. I know we’ve reached her bedroom when we halt on a small landing and she turns us to face a narrow d
oor, slathered in lime green paint. Putting her finger to her lips, gesturing for me to walk lightly, her fingers wrap around the doorknob and she leads me inside.
The first thing I notice is the lack of windows or an additional escape route. Once I get over that, I take a second to appreciate how homey she’s made this place look for what it used to be. It’s small, less than ten feet from wall to wall is my guess, but it’s clear she’s done all she can to make it feel big.
There are dainty lights dangling from the wall that comes to a peak above her bed. They remind me of the lights my dad and I used to string up on our Christmas tree each year, and they give this place the light it desperately needs. Her bed is small and clearly meant for one person, but the way she has it decorated with all those little clouds is kind of endearing. I can easily picture Alma Underwood as a girl who finds peace alongside something suspended in the atmosphere.
“So, this is it.” She spreads her arms and flashes me a crooked smile. “I hope you weren’t expecting the royal treatment.”
“This is great, Alma. Thank you.”
Looking around, my lips daring to form into a smile, I allow myself to recognize how great it is. Alma has a short bookcase opposite her bed. Instead of overflowing with well-loved, worn novels, it holds the greatest collection of Funko Pops of all time. There’s a tall, white dresser taking up residence beside the door, decorated with dozens of handprints and footprints of all sizes and colors. I gaze at it in wonder, pondering which ones belong to her.
“You can sleep on the floor beside my bed. I don’t own an air mattress but I do have a pool float shaped like a slice of pizza I could blow up for you.”
Who is this girl?
There isn’t a force of nature strong enough to help me hold back the spout of laughter that bursts from my lips. I glance over my shoulder to find her sitting crossed legged in the center of her bed, staring at me with an expression laced with seriousness.
“A pool float?”
She nods. “Sleeping on this floor is going to be like sleeping on concrete.”
“My other option is sleeping on a pizza slice made of plastic?”
“Better than concrete.”
“Nah, it’s cool. Don’t go through the trouble.”
Her eyebrows shoot up to her hairline. “Rumor, it will take like five minutes.”
I shrug and leave it at that. Sleeping on the floor isn’t anything new to me and asking her to pump air into an old pool toy feels like too much. This stranger put a roof over my head. She’s done more for me in sixty minutes than half of my family members have in seventeen years.
I hold no plans to push my luck. My new plan is to lay low, stay out of the way, and find what I came here to find.
I walk across the room, flinching with each creak of the floorboards, and set my duffle bag down beside her bookcase. “Do you think it’d be okay if I used your shower?”
“Sure, that’s no problem, but we should wait until my siblings fall asleep so they don’t spot you. Cool?”
“Cool.” Lowering myself to the floor, I drag my quilt over my legs and rest my left arm to the side, using my five fingers to brush out my wild hair. “What about your parents?”
“They are a non-issue.”
“I find that hard to believe.”
“No, they are. Promise.” Her bed rocks when she turns to face me. “You know that motel next door?”
“Great Lakes or something? Yeah. I was going to stay there but decided to save my money. Why?”
“My parents own it.”
“No shit?”
“For real.” Setting her journal in her lap, she flips it open and starts to fiddle with the corners of the cover. “They work the midnight shifts together. There’s no chance of them stumbling upon you in the middle of the night.”
“How did the owners get stuck working the graveyard shift? That kind of blows.”
She laughs gently, speaking in a low, warm tone. “They don’t have much of a choice. There’s not a lot of people who want to work at a motel seven miles from town. Besides my parents, the motel has two employees.” She holds up her fingers, ticking them off as she speaks. “One is me and I clean rooms. The other is Reginald, an old man who works at the front desk. Since I have school and Reggie’s pushing eighty, they work the late shift. They leave after we all have dinner together and come back to see us off to school.”
I nod with understanding. “So I should leave during the day? To avoid them seeing me?”
“I mean, you could, but they sleep most of the day. I don’t start school for a couple of weeks so we’ll figure something out.”
Pushing her journal beneath her pillow, she stretches out on her bed and regards me with two of the biggest eyes I’ve ever seen. They sort of shine the same way the grass does after it's just got done raining. Her red lips haven’t drooped since I’ve been in here, and I chalk her up to be one of those people who is always joyous. Somebody who is friends with everybody, even the homeless freaks who live inside trains and poop in bushes.
“What about you?” She ponders, brushing long bangs off her cheek. Her shiny hair is short, much shorter than mine. Cropped all around her head, the front pieces are longer and swept to the side in a lazy fashion that works well for her. If I had to describe it as anything, I’d say it’s cute.
“Rumor?”
I blink, trying to conjure up the question she was just asking. “What about me?”
“School.” She elaborates. “Have you graduated already?”
“No.” I fix my gaze on the loose thread of my quilt and wrap my pointer finger around it, only letting up when the tip starts to turn purple. “I’m going to wait until I turn eighteen, get my GED, and then apply to college.”
“What will you study?”
I sigh outwardly, letting my lips flap, not bothering to hide my annoyance with not knowing. “I have no clue.”
“Me either. My older brother is at the University of Michigan studying mathematics.”
My focus snaps to her, the skin around my face tightening in horror. “Oh God, that’s awful.”
“Right?” She laughs. “I didn’t inherit the genius gene. Clearly, since you know—” she gestures between us. “—I brought home a stranger.”
My cheeks rise with a chuckle. “Yeah, I doubt you’ll be winning any awards for that decision.”
Still giggling, she tucks her hands beneath her head and adjusts herself so she’s lying on her side. “Is your real name Rumor?”
If I earned a penny for every time somebody asked me that, I would have never spent a night in a train named Mo.
“Yes. It is,” I tell her, trying not to look exasperated.
“You must get asked that a lot, huh?”
I let my head fall back against her paneled wall. “Like you wouldn’t believe.”
“It is a unique name.”
“So is Alma.” I grin. “Is that your real name?”
“Yes. I’m named after the town.”
“What town?”
“Alma.” Laughter swims in her eyes. “Did you grow up in Michigan?”
“Chicago.”
“Well, that explains it."
Thankful she doesn’t ask me how or why I ended up in Flat Rock, I don’t think before I ask, “Were you conceived there or something?”
“No. Well… " Her eyes glaze over while she considers my bizarre question. “No, I don’t think so. My parents are just obsessed with this state. Everybody in my family is named after a town in Michigan.”
“Come again?”
With a twitch in her lips, she holds up her hand, palm facing me. “Okay, Chicago kid, this here is the mitten. And by mitten, I mean Michigan.”
My eyes roll like a couple of bowling balls. “Yes, Professor Alma, I got that.”
“Anyway, here–" She uses the tip of her finger to stab the center of her palm. “—are my parents. Harrison and Clare. Over here is my brother Shepherd. Down toward the thumb is my sister Len
ox. This is me, Alma, of course. Last but not least are the twins. Holland is here, and Jackson is at the bottom.” She stops moving her finger around and goes to drop her hands before suddenly flipping them back into position and stabbing the top of her hand. “Oh! Way up here is our dog Charlevoix.”
I blink.
She smacks her hands together with a satisfied smile and tucks them back under her head. “It’s a shame our last name isn’t Michigan. Wouldn’t that be wild?”
The bubble of laughter that bursts from my chest is uncontrollable. I roar without restraint, trying to remember to breathe all while trying to shut the hell up. Alma is laughing with me, tears brimming in her eyes and a finger slamming over her lips to remind me to cool it.
I shove my face in my quilt until I can get a grip. When I’m sure I can behave, I drag my face from the fabric to look at her.
Her face is glowing. “Silly, huh? Being named after a town? My siblings and I count our blessings. There are some pretty whack names in Michigan. I thank the universe every day I wasn’t named Pigeon, Colon, or Dowagiac.”
That sets me off like a firecracker, and I let my hysterics out into my quilt again, wiping my tears with the end of my sweatshirt sleeve. I laugh like I haven’t in a really long time, praying Alma doesn’t think I’m laughing at her or making fun of her family.
I’m not. Not even a little bit. I’m laughing simply because it’s silly– completely and utterly nutty that it almost doesn’t seem real. It kind of makes me wish I was named Pigeon so I could be part of the family full of people that must be just as strange as the daughter who took in a stray teen.
Her contagious, airy giggle keeps me laughing, all while something in my chest starts to warm me from the inside out. For the first time since I packed my bag and hopped on a bus, I feel grounded. Almost like I can stop running and catch my breath a little because this kooky girl with the kooky family has given me a pit stop in my race.
I believe the feeling that warmed me is gratitude. Gratitude towards Alma Underwood and her little attic room.
“Ya know, I just thought of something.” She smacks her palm against her forehead. “I let you into my house and I don’t even know your last name.”