“Elephant seal. This is their territory, right along this stretch of coast.”
“I see. So I should go back to Cambria, then.”
“Might be a good idea. They have lots of nice little motels and inns, and you could get a good night’s sleep and be safer on that road in broad daylight.”
“Thank you, Officer,” she said, and started up the van.
Especially thank you for telling me before I got stuck with a citation, she thought. Because right now just affording food and gas is plenty challenging enough.
“I have to at least check,” Bea said out loud as she drove along the dark and deserted Main Street of Cambria. Ostensibly she was speaking to the cat, but the cat was nowhere to be seen, so it fell along the borderline of talking to herself.
She drew close to the little market with the gas pumps out front. She would just shine her headlights in the direction of the door. If the girl was not there, then she must have found lodging with someone. And so that would be that. Bea could wash her hands of the situation once and for all.
She swung the van to the right to aim her headlights at the door.
In the beams of illumination, a limp and bedraggled Allie sat with her back up against the door of the closed shop. She winced into the light and threw a hand up to protect her eyes.
Bea yanked the steering wheel left and drew parallel to the door where the girl sat. She pulled just beyond the first gas pump and powered down the passenger window. Allie blinked at her in the soft light of a streetlamp.
“She wouldn’t take you in, huh?” Bea called.
“She’d already closed up the store and gone home by the time I got back here.”
“Yes, it was a longer walk than we thought, wasn’t it? I noted that on the drive back.”
“You’re telling me. I just walked it.” She sounded as though she had been crying.
Damn, Bea thought. Now I have to feel bad for her again.
“Well,” Bea said, her voice hardening over with self-protection, “you see that little parking lot two doors down? The one in front of the building that’s for sale?”
“Where you were parked before.”
“Right. That’s where Phyllis and I will be tonight.”
Allie blinked at her in silence for a beat or two.
“Who’s Phyllis?”
“My cat. Who else could it be?”
“You named your cat Phyllis? Why did you name your cat Phyllis?”
“I think we’re getting off on a tangent,” Bea said, her voice rising with irritation. “All I’m trying to say is where we’ll be. You know. If you get cold or scared or something.”
A long silence.
Then Allie said, “Thank you.”
Bea powered up the window and drove on.
Bea had no idea how much time had elapsed before the girl came around and knocked her tiny knock. She had been blissfully asleep.
She stumbled up and opened the back doors. They stood a moment, considering each other as best they could in the dark.
“Cold?” Bea asked with the slightest prickle in her tone. “Or lonely?”
“Both,” Allie said in a pathetically small voice.
Bea stepped back, and the girl came in without further comment. She walked straight to the blankets that sat folded in the rear corner of the van and laid them out on the hard corrugated metal of the van floor. She settled herself, still without speaking.
Bea lay awake in silence for a time, unsure of whether she felt the need to explain herself or not.
“This is all because of my getting robbed,” Bea said. “Before that I never took from anyone, not in my whole life. Then somebody stole all the money in my bank account and I was homeless. What was I supposed to do? I need to eat. I need gas. Everybody has to live, and so what was I supposed to do?”
A long silence. Long enough that Bea began to think Allie would never answer. Or maybe the girl had already fallen asleep.
“Some people hold up a sign that says they need gas or food. You know. They ask for money instead of just taking from people.”
“You must be joking! I would never! How absolutely humiliating!”
Another long, freighted silence.
“So what you’re saying is . . . it’s all about your pride? You’d rather steal a phone from a little girl than be embarrassed?”
Bea felt her face redden. She felt flummoxed, almost unable to speak. She struggled to open her mouth, though she was unsure what would come out of it when she did.
Before she could manage any words, Allie spoke again.
“No, never mind. I’m sorry I said any of that. I wouldn’t even have brought it up again. It’s just that you sort of asked. But it’s none of my business. You’re letting me sleep here again, so I need to shut up. I’m sorry. I have no right to judge you. Thank you for letting me sleep here tonight.”
Bea took several seconds to straighten herself out inside.
Then she said, simply, “You’re welcome.”
No more words were spoken for a time. In fact, Bea assumed they were done speaking for the night.
When Allie spoke again, it made her jump.
“So why did you name your cat Phyllis?”
“Why not? What’s wrong with the name Phyllis for a cat?”
“Well, it’s unusual. But I didn’t say there was anything wrong with it. It must have come from somewhere.”
Bea sighed deeply.
“It was nothing. It’s silly. It was just a TV show I used to like.”
“What was the name of the show?”
“Phyllis.”
“I never heard of it.”
“It was long before you were born. It was a spin-off series starring a character from The Mary Tyler Moore Show.”
“I know Mary Tyler Moore. But I never heard of Phyllis.”
“It’s not important. I don’t even know why we’re talking about it. It just made me laugh. I used to enjoy that half hour, when that show was on TV. Not a lot of things make me laugh. For that one half hour a week, I was happy.” She paused, listening to those words as they reverberated throughout the van. They sounded hopelessly silly and sad. “I don’t know if other people have that. Some foolish little thing like that, something that makes them feel everything’s okay. That makes them feel happy.”
“Sure,” Allie said.
“Really?”
“Yeah. I think everybody has something that takes them away for a little while, and then they feel good.”
A long pause. Bea felt disinclined to say more on the subject.
“Happy isn’t all that easy,” Allie said. “People talk about it like it is. People throw the word happy around like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Like if nothing is dragging you down from it, you’ll pop right up and be happy without even trying. But it was never that way for me.”
“No,” Bea said. “It was never that way for me, either.”
When Bea opened her eyes again, it was morning. Fully light.
Allie was sitting up, petting the cat and staring into Bea’s face.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” she asked the girl.
“I know where I want you to take me.”
“Up the coast, you said.”
“I need to change my mind. I mean, if I still get to.”
“Remains to be seen. Where do you want to go?”
“My house.”
Bea sat up, pulling the lever that raised her chair into its upright position.
“You have a house? Why on earth would you be here if you have a house you can go to?”
“I can’t live in it. The IRS slapped padlocks on it. The neighbors would notice if anyone was living in it. They’d probably report me or something. But I could get in. It’s my house and I know how to get in. I know which windows usually aren’t locked and if they’re locked for some reason I could even break a window and get in. I doubt the alarm is on. I don’t see how it could be, and even if it is on for some re
ason, I know the code.”
“And what do we gain by going there?”
Allie held her arms wide as if to indicate herself and her immediate surroundings.
“Not sure if you’ve noticed, but I’ve got nothing here. I don’t even own a toothbrush or a change of underwear. I could get clothes. I could get cash. I have some cash in a piggy bank from when my grandparents used to give me birthday and Christmas money. And so long as you’re going to a pawnshop, I have stuff we can pawn. I have a MacBook, and an iPhone 6, and an iPad. And even a little bit of jewelry.”
“I don’t know any of those things you just said. Except for the jewelry. And I know what an iPhone 6 looks like, but I still find it all confusing.”
“Electronics. Expensive toys. Stuff that’s worth money. That’s all you need to know, right? Then we could eat. Then we’ll know what to do for food and gas.”
“We?”
Bea couldn’t help being mildly affronted that this girl had called them a “we.” As if she had just assumed she could stay on with Bea, when no such invitation had been extended.
Then again, if someone was inclined to attach herself to Bea for the scant shelter she owned, wouldn’t it be nice if it was someone with food and gas money? That sounded most appealing indeed. Like a vast relief. A rest.
“Well . . . yeah,” Allie said. “I mean, if you’re willing to share your van, then I’m willing to share my money. That’s only fair.”
“Then . . . on to your house,” Bea said.
PART FOUR
ALLIE
Chapter Twenty-One
The True Value of Canned Garbanzo Beans
Allie rubbed the lumps on her head as they drove south again. Slowly, gingerly rubbed them. As though the touch of her hand could draw the pain away. As though anything could.
There was the lump above her left temple. That was where she had hit her head on the window when that awful man threw her into the backseat of his car. And there was the painful egg on the right, near the back, where this crazy old woman had thrown her against the side of the van by swerving. Because she’d thought Allie was carjacking her.
She could still feel the shopworn dregs of the trembling. Deep in her thighs, and in that low place in her gut that would first feel nausea if she had eaten something bad. It was a sickening location that felt so integrally part of Allie that maybe nothing that lived there could ever be fully expelled.
Such a close scrape with the worst outcomes the world had in store for a lost girl.
She wondered if her parents had been told yet that she had run away. Probably. She should call them. Let them know she was okay. But she had no idea how. She didn’t even know where they were being held.
“What’s with your head?” Bea asked her, interrupting those thoughts.
First, Allie said nothing. She just waited. She thought it went without saying. Apparently she was wrong.
“Bumped it.”
“On what?”
“The car window when that guy was kidnapping me. And the side of your van when you thought I was a carjacker.”
“Oh. Right. Sorry.”
“I guess it was an honest mistake,” Allie said.
The use of the word “honest” seemed to stop everything in its tracks.
They didn’t speak for several miles. The cat climbed up into her lap, and Allie stroked her rough, dry fur. The purring felt good to Allie. It eased the trembling some.
“I owe you another apology,” Allie said suddenly. But not to the cat.
She had been aware of her own thinking, of course. But she had not known she was about to say anything out loud.
“For what?”
“I think I’ve had some unfair thoughts about honesty.”
For a minute that statement just sat there, and no one cared to comment. There was no sound but that of the tires on the road, and the cat purring. But sooner or later Allie would need to elaborate.
“The girl who got me in all this trouble . . . Well, not all of it, I guess. I was in trouble when I met her. But anyway, she’s the one who brought me to that awful place. That house where I got sold for saying no to . . . her . . . whatever he is. I’m getting off track. There was this girl, and she said I was really super naïve. I kind of took offense to it. I thought it wasn’t true, or anyway that I wasn’t as bad as she was saying. But now I think she was right. I didn’t know anything about the world until I got thrown out into it all of a sudden. So I had these ideas, but they were childish ideas, I guess. They’d never really been put to the test. Like a real-world test. You know what I mean?”
“I wish I could say I do,” Bea said. “No offense, sometimes you just go on and on and I can’t make any sense of it.”
“Sorry. I’ll try to be clearer. I lived all my life with these parents. My parents. They pretty much gave me everything I needed and most of what I wanted. So then here I am going around saying you shouldn’t steal. You shouldn’t take anything that doesn’t belong to you. But maybe I have no right to say that, because I never needed anything. I was thinking about what you said. About how everybody needs to live. Like, if a person has no food to eat, and no way to honestly get it. He’s going to take the food. You can’t blame him for that. He can’t be expected to voluntarily die just because the world doesn’t care enough about him to make sure he at least has enough to eat. You don’t try to shove thoughts about honesty at a person at a time like that, because the whole world is dishonest. The way it’s set up. And it’s not his fault.”
A silence. Allie was unclear on how her speech was being received. Maybe she was just a spoiled girl and even admitting so hadn’t let her off the hook. Maybe she was so sheltered that even her admission of being sheltered was that of a sheltered child, but in some way she was unable to see.
“So . . . ,” Bea began. She sounded cautious. “Let’s say you were starving. You were going to die any day of starvation. Would you go into a supermarket and steal a can of tuna?”
“I’m a vegan.”
“Nobody’s a vegan when they’re starving.”
“That’s not true at all. When you don’t eat meat for a long time your body can’t just digest it again all of a sudden. I wouldn’t steal a can of tuna just so I could throw it up all over the sidewalk. That would be a huge waste.”
A sigh from the driver’s seat.
“Okay, fine. So what do they have cans of at the supermarket? That you could eat?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe . . . garbanzo beans?”
“Fine. Would you steal a can?”
Allie sat with that for half a mile or so. She knew, but she wanted to be sure before saying it out loud. Everything was changing now. Life was revealing itself to her, and she was revealing herself to life. She had to be clear on who she was proving herself to be.
“Yes,” she said firmly. “I would steal it.”
“So everybody’s principles are negotiable. Even yours.”
“No. Not negotiable. I don’t see it that way at all. It’s more a matter of what’s really right. I thought right and wrong were completely black and white, but they’re not. It’s not that I’d be starving, so I’d do the wrong thing. It’s that right and wrong would be different than I thought, because we’re talking about a person’s life. My life is more important than a can of garbanzo beans. And not just because it’s my life, either. Any life is important. Some things are just more important than others.”
“But you’re not starving now,” Bea said. “And you’re willing to go through your house and steal electronic items that rightfully belong to the IRS.”
Allie felt herself bristle slightly inside.
“Those things are mine.”
“Not really. Your parents bought them for you with money they should have paid to the government.”
“Not every penny. They owe the government some money. Yeah. The IRS’ll sell the boat, and maybe even the house. But then that’ll probably be enough. They don’t need to sell every little item
we own. It’s not that big a debt.”
“But you really have no idea how much they owe.”
“No,” Allie said. “I guess I don’t.”
Another mile or two passed in silence. Allie took to rubbing the lumps on her head again. This conversation was making her stomach hurt.
“I’m not trying to discourage you,” Bea said, and it made Allie jump. “I want nothing more than to be riding with someone who has cash. I’m all on board with that. So take the electronics, by all means. I’m only trying to discourage you from acting like you’re better than I am.”
Allie sighed. How long would she be riding with this woman? Surely not until she was eighteen. Somehow there had to be a plan. Something beyond this. But Allie didn’t have one. So she turned her thoughts back to the conversation at hand.
“I’ll try not to do that so much anymore. Tell you what. If I’m wrong, and my family owes the IRS the money from every single thing we own, then whenever I can, when I have enough money to do it, I’ll pay the IRS for the stuff I took. I’ll just send it in. You know. Anonymously.”
“Oh, you’ll do no such thing,” Bea said, sounding irritated. “Everybody says things like that. But then life goes on. You’ll forget.”
Allie opened her mouth to say it wasn’t true. That she would never forget. Never renege on that commitment. But Bea interrupted her thoughts before Allie managed to get any words out.
“Oh, never mind. Forget I mentioned it. You really would remember. I just realized that. How depressing.”
They rode most of the rest of the way to Southern California in silence.
Just as the Ventura Freeway began to back up going through the San Fernando Valley, as traffic slowed to a crawl, Allie voiced something. Something that felt big. Something that had been sitting in her head and chest for a long time, but without words.
It seemed Allie had missed the moment when the thoughts and feelings forged themselves into words. Instead she simply heard the words as they came out of her mouth and thought, Right. There it is. That’s what’s been rattling around in there, all right.
“I keep thinking about the girls who didn’t get away.”
Allie and Bea : A Novel Page 15