Counting Backwards

by Laura Lascarso

  Frustrated, I turn my attention to phase two of my getaway plan: mode of transportation. Hitching a ride is one option, but not a very desirable one. Even better than being a passenger is being the driver.

  There’s an old Ford Bronco and a Toyota Camry parked in the four-car garage, but the teacher, Mr. Thomas, keeps a tight watch on the keys. And even if I could slip them away, neither of the cars is running. At least, not yet.

  Mr. Thomas tells me the first thing I’ll be learning is how to change a flat tire. He partners me up with this guy Dominic, who has a tattoo of a Chinese dragon that starts at his elbow and curves up to his shoulder. It’s a beautiful tattoo, with all the tiny scales shaded differently to show how the dragon’s body bends and twists.

  “Nice tat,” I say to him. It’s an easy opener.

  He glances down and admires it himself for a moment. “Thanks.”

  One word and I know Dominic is not my man. But he turns out to be pretty cool. He gives me pointers on how to position my body to get the most leverage while jacking up the car and loosening the lug nuts. Then, while we’re switching out the tires, we start talking about music. Turns out he’s seen Choleric Kindness play out in Atlanta. He tells me about where he’s from, how he got involved with drugs and messed up his relationship with his family and his girlfriend. His parents sent him here to sober up, and he says when he gets out in December, the first thing he’s going to do is try to make it up to them.

  Class flies by way too fast. After school is my first therapy appointment at the “healing center.” After about ten minutes of waiting, I get called in. I glance over at the therapist—Dr. Deb—and take a look around her office. At least it smells good in here, like peppermint, and there are potted plants lining the sills of actual windows where you can see the world outside. I sit down across from Dr. Deb in a wing-backed chair. We’re close, but not too close. She looks friendly, but not overly friendly—not as if she cares if I like her or not. She introduces herself as my primary therapist and asks how my first few days have been.

  “Decent,” I say, and hope she’ll leave it at that.

  “Are you making friends?”

  “Yeah,” I say. Margo feels like a friend already.

  “Are you getting along with the girls on your floor?”

  I wonder then if she’s already been briefed about the haircutting incident—maybe by Kayla—and if so, what version she’s been told.

  “More or less.”

  “Is there anything you’d like to talk about in that regard?”

  I meet her eyes squarely. “No.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yep.” It’s not like there’s anything she can do about it, even if she did believe me.

  “Then why don’t you tell me about where you come from,” she says, “beginning with your family.”

  My family. Not a subject I want to discuss.

  “I have a mother and a father,” I say neutrally.

  “Are they divorced?”

  “Separated.”

  “And you were living with your mother at the time you ran away?”

  “Yes.” The questions are getting harder already.

  “Were you going to your father’s house?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  Why not? Why would I?

  “My father and I don’t get along.”

  “Why is that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Is he abusive?”

  “No, just . . . controlling.”

  “Controlling. Could you give me an example?”

  “He sent me here, didn’t he?”

  Dr. Deb nods. “You think that was his attempt to control you?”

  I think back to earlier this year, June, which was the last time I tried to spend the weekend at his house. The school had just mailed out my report card, and it wasn’t too great. I mean, it was pretty good considering how bad the year had been. But he still flipped out on me and told me I was grounded for the weekend. Grounded, after I’d basically been taking care of myself that whole year. My mother, too. So I waited for him to go do something in the other room, then walked out of his house and called a friend to come pick me up. Boy, was he mad at that.

  Still, I never thought he’d do this.

  “Can you remember a time when your relationship with your father was stronger than it is now?” Dr. Deb asks.

  “No. Not since he left my mom.”

  “Why don’t you tell me about it?”

  “About what?”

  “Tell me about their separation.”

  I was in fifth grade when my parents split for good. I’d just come home from school, and I was inside having a snack when my mom came back. When I saw her, I no longer cared that she’d totally left us for a week or that we had no idea where she went or when she’d be back, if she’d be back. I was so happy to see her I forgot about the entire week of worrying.

  My dad told me to stay inside, and he went out on the lawn to talk to her. It turned into a fight, something I always hated—seeing them screaming at each other. I didn’t understand why they were fighting at all. I just wanted him to let her inside so we could get back to being a family.

  She stood on the lawn apologizing, pleading with him. When I ran outside, he told me to get back in the house, but I clung to her. She was my life raft, my mother. She needed me and I needed her. My dad got into his car and told me to come with him. I wouldn’t, so he drove off. My mother and I went inside and packed our things, then left in her car. I wanted to stay, but she didn’t. She said it was going to be a new beginning for us. An exciting adventure. And it was . . . for a while.

  “He’s mad at me for choosing her,” I say to Dr. Deb.

  “For choosing to live with your mother?”

  “Yes.”

  “You think he’s still mad at you for that?”

  “I don’t know. Do we have to talk about this?”

  “Is there something else you’d rather talk about?”

  “I’d rather not talk at all.”

  “Okay.”

  We sit there in silence. I watch the hands on the clock move by infinitesimal degrees. I can’t get that memory out of my head. My parents’ faces, so twisted up with anger they were like total strangers. Me standing between them. I don’t want to dredge up those feelings. I just want them to go away.

  “Why did you run away, Taylor?”

  “I thought we weren’t going to talk.”

  “I’m just asking questions. I’m trying to learn your side of the story.”

  Why did I run away? It isn’t the right question. The right question is, why didn’t I run away sooner? Why didn’t I have a plan? Why didn’t I do a better job of disappearing?

  “I don’t know,” I say finally.

  “What were you doing when you made the decision to run away?”

  I think back to a few weeks ago. It was a weeknight and it was hot, too, I remember, because the AC wasn’t working. But my mom didn’t want to call the landlord to fix it because we were late on the rent, which was pretty standard by then.

  “I was on my way to the bathroom,” I say to Dr. Deb.

  It was the middle of the night, and I had to go pee. I came out of my room and tripped over this guy who was passed out in our hallway, some sleaze my mom brought home from the bar. I’d heard them laughing earlier that night, and I’d just locked my door and gone to bed, figuring he’d be gone by the time I got up, which was usually the case. But there he was, lying in my hallway, fat and bloated and disgusting, while my mom was passed out in her own bedroom across the hall.

  “What happened to make you want to run away, Taylor?”

  It wasn’t what happened. It was what didn’t happen. It was like everything came crashing down then. I could no longer pretend that she was going to stop drinking, that she’d wake up the next day and decide to change. She wasn’t even trying to hide it anymore. She gave up on sobriety and she gave up on me.

&
nbsp; “I just wanted out of there,” I say at last.

  “Out of where?”

  “Out of our apartment, out of my life. I wanted out.”

  I taste the memory in my mouth, like sour oranges, and it makes me sick. I don’t want to go back there.

  “How did you feel in that moment, Taylor? Right before you ran?”

  But I can’t answer her, because the feeling is rising—stronger and faster than ever before. I feel the fist squeezing me, cutting off my air. My heart’s pounding and my mouth goes dry and I have to get out of there. I have to just go.

  I jump up and run out of her office, tearing down the hallways as fast as I can, right past the safety manning the door. When I get outside, my face hits the sunshine, my shoes hit the grass, and I’m running. Running for my life. I sprint away from the healing center as fast as I can. It feels so good to blur everything around me, leave everything behind, and focus only on what’s in front of me. After a few more strides, my chest opens up and I can breathe again.

  “Stop!” a safety shouts. I fly right by him, past the soccer field and the maintenance shed. Seconds later I hit the back fence and grab hold of it, shaking it with both hands until the metal bites into my fingers. Another safety comes up on my side and I run the other way, pumping my legs as hard as I can. I’m not going to stop, for him or anyone else. I feel so good in that moment, so free. I could run forever.

  That’s when the safety’s arm appears out of nowhere.

  With superhuman strength he clotheslines me in the chest. My feet fly up, my back hits the dirt, and my head smacks the ground with a tremendous thud. My eyes roll back into my head and snap wide open.

  I stare up in a daze at the ultrabright, cerulean sky.

  CHAPTER 7

  I’m lying there in the grass with my throbbing head and aching chest when the laughing begins. It erupts from my gut with volcanic force. I can’t stop it. I can’t control it. I’m so shocked by the force of his takedown that I laugh, like a maniac, while the safeties stand over me like sweaty, red-faced devils. It’s the same thing I did when the cops caught up with me, but I can’t explain that to them. I can barely breathe. Besides, I don’t think they care.

  They haul me to my feet and drag me up the hill. I laugh. They take me into the first floor and shut me in a time-out room, and my laughter escalates to semi-hysteria. I lie down on the cold, hard floor and grip my cramping stomach, trying to calm down, trying to breathe.

  Finally the laughing gives way to spontaneous giggles, then a steady he, he, he and at last, hiccups. I wipe the tears from my eyes and roll over onto my back.

  Now I’m angry.

  That a grown man tackled me—roughly, even by boy standards—and they stuck me in here just for running. I want to smash something, but there’s only a toilet, a sink, and a metal chair, all bolted to the floor. There’s nothing I can break, throw, or pound, except something of my own, and I’m too damn sore for that. Plus, there’s a safety outside the door, watching me through the reinforced glass, and a camera behind a cage documenting it all.

  I think back to when I was nine years old and this police officer came up to my car door window, asking me where my mom was. My dad was out of town, and we were parked outside a bar because she needed to get some money from a friend inside, but she’d been in there for a while—two hours at least. I should have just gone inside and gotten her myself, but I’d never been to this place before, and I figured if I just waited long enough, she’d eventually come back out.

  I didn’t want to answer the officer’s questions, but he promised me my mom wasn’t going to be in trouble, so finally I told him. The next thing I know they’ve got my mom in handcuffs, and they’re stuffing her into a police cruiser while I scream and fight with them. All I want is to go with her, wherever they’re taking her, I don’t care, just let me go. But I can’t because that same lying cop is holding me back.

  I spent the night on a cot in a complete stranger’s house, in a room crowded with kids, one of whom spent the whole night wheezing and moaning. I can still smell that room—like Cheez-Its and dirty diapers. It was a night I’ll never forget.

  I’ve got to get out of here.

  I stare up at the one fluorescent light, at the moth pinging into it, over and over again, trying to . . . I have no idea what it’s trying to do, but I feel like that moth, ramming my head against an invisible wall, getting nothing from it but a wicked headache.

  My throat aches with thirst, so I go over to the sink and drink till my belly sloshes around like a bucket of water. The safety drops in a tray of food—dinner—but I’m too unsettled to eat. I sit down in the chair and stare at my thumbs, which is an old habit of mine. Maybe it’s an only-child thing, but when I was little, I used to make my thumbs talk to each other. I’d even draw little faces on them, some happy or surprised, silly even. But I’m too angry for that now. My thumbs would just yell and scream at each other, like my parents. I stare at my thumbs for what seems like hours and try to remember what I was like back then. But I can’t. It seems like that part of me died without me even knowing it.

  Finally a safety opens the door.

  “Not so funny anymore, is it?” I recognize him from earlier that day, not the one who tackled me, but the one who first told me to stop. I glare at his mucky boot heels as he leads me out to the lobby, where Tracy is waiting. She crosses her arms over her chest and looks at me like I should have known better.

  “I left my dinner behind. Can I go back and get it?” I ask. I’m suddenly starving. Tracy agrees, but the first-floor safety tells me dinnertime is over and besides, it’s already been thrown out.

  “Seems you caused quite a ruckus out there today,” Tracy says to me on our way up to the third floor.

  “I just went for a run.”

  “Well, those boys don’t like to exercise much, so next time you feel like running, better clear it with someone first.”

  When we get to the third floor, the girls are all standing in their doorways like they’re waiting for me. Or more likely, gossiping about me. I want to scream at them to stop looking at me. I feel like I’m walking up a sandy hill, trying to keep from slipping backwards. Maybe I am going crazy. Or maybe it was there all along, waiting for a place like Sunny Meadows to bring it out in me.

  Tracy waits for me in the hallway while I go to the bathroom. On my way out, I catch my reflection in the murky mirror. With my chopped hair and crazed eyes, I get a glimpse of the woman I never want to become.

  My mother.

  Back in my room I lie in bed and wait for lights-out, but when it finally arrives, I can’t fall asleep. My stomach’s growling and my limbs are tight and tense. I get out of bed and pace the floor, trying to wear myself out so I can fall asleep and end this awful day.

  “You up?”

  I stop mid-stride and glance down at the air vent. Him again. My mysterious stalker, whose voice I’ve been searching for all day. He must have heard my footsteps.

  “What do you want?”

  “Meet me,” he says simply.

  The memory of my spectacular takedown on the lawn and subsequent time spent in isolation is still fresh, but if I have the choice between pacing the room until I fall into a restless sleep and getting off the floor . . .

  “I want your key,” I say, speaking directly into the vent. I want there to be no mistake about it. “The key to the stairwell. That’s the only way I’m coming down.”

  There’s a long pause, and I wonder if he’s considering it, if he’d actually give it to me.

  “Okay.”

  “I want it waiting for me at the top of the stairwell.” I know I’m pushing my luck, but I also have nothing to lose.

  “Fine.”

  I remember Margo’s matches in my backpack. A light source. I can get the key and find out who he is. Mystery solved.

  “See you in a minute.”

  I go through my ritual of sneak and stealth, sure that I’m going to get caught, but at the same
time not really caring. What more can they possibly do to me? I get out to the stairwell and close the door behind me. When I turn around, I see the key glittering like a jewel on the top step. I pick it up, fit it into the lock, and twist, engaging the deadbolt, then twist it back. I give that key a big, sloppy kiss and tuck it safely into my sock.

  I could go back to my room. I have the key and that’s all I need, but I want to know who he is, and I have just enough courage left to try to find out. I descend the stairs quickly, finding it easier to navigate my way in the dark this time. I creep into the darkroom.

  “Marco,” he says from across the room. He has ears like a dog.

  “Polo,” I say back. With his key in my sock, I’m suddenly in a much better mood.

  “Did you find what you were looking for?” he asks.

  “I did. Thank you very much.”

  “You’re welcome. Come sit.”

  “In a minute.” I dig in my pocket for the matches. I’ll give him one more chance to confess.

  “I saw them bring you in,” he says. “Today on the lawn. Why were you laughing?”

  So, he was there to witness my bout of temporary insanity. How many others saw me? I wasn’t really paying attention to who was out there watching. He could be anyone.

  “You must think I’m crazy.”

  “Not crazy. You looked . . . scared.”

  “I wasn’t scared. I was just . . . surprised. I did the same thing when . . .” I’m about to say, when I got arrested, but he doesn’t need to know all that.

  “When what?”

  “Nothing. Forget it.”

  “Come sit,” he says.

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re making me nervous.”

  “You can’t even see me.”

  He groans like I’m the one being ridiculous. “I told you before I’m not going to hurt you.”

  “I don’t sit on couches with strangers. So if you want me to sit, you’ll have to tell me your name.”