by Beth Neff
Living at Mo’s was about the closest Jenna had come to being happy since leaving her mom’s. The woman wasn’t particularly loving, had foster kids for the money. She’d even told Jenna that, didn’t seem ashamed of it or feel the need to hide it. It was the truth and Jenna appreciated that, even respected it, and felt it gave her and Mo—Margaret Osborne was her real name—something in common: a desire for the truth and a utilitarian way of approaching it. Mo hardly lifted a finger, making the kids do all the work, as many as Social Services would let her have, and Jenna hardly minded that either, actually felt useful washing dishes and taking out the trash, vacuuming and cleaning bathrooms on Saturday. She enjoyed entering a neat living room, toys and books and magazines back in closets and on shelves, kitchen counters wiped clean, piles of clean laundry to fold while watching television with Mo after the younger kids were all in bed. And Mo barely cared if Jenna went to school, though she wanted to keep up appearances, would never let her miss enough to attract attention. This school was far easier than the last one Jenna had attended, and she had no trouble getting high grades without even sitting in the classroom or doing the assignments. Jenna didn’t mind school work, but she hated being bored, still does. She was almost never bored at Mo’s.
After that came a series of homes she can barely remember, as if her memory had peaked while she was living with Mo, and she had no capacity for it afterward. She remembers feeling angry; angry at the foster who wanted the kids to call her “mom,” which Jenna refused to do, angry at the parents who acted like they’d known Jenna for years, angry at the homes that were filthy, food that was half cooked, accusations of theft when something was misplaced, fosters who acted put out by her presence or who pretended they actually cared about her. But the faces, the voices, the other kids who came and went, none of that has really stuck.
What’s stuck the most are the nights lying in bed with her chest aching, the fear that she would drop dead like Mo, the memory of the look in her eyes as the breath was sucked out of her. Sometimes it got so bad that all she could do was pack her meager belongings and slip out the door, no idea where she was going and no way of getting there but compelled to escape, as if she could leave her heart behind. She wasn’t ever good at leaving, would get spotted within a day, sometimes even came back on her own when the pounding had lessened or when she realized it was only getting worse.
Jenna doesn’t actually believe there is something wrong with her heart. She can run forever, climbs stairs without getting winded, goes for days with no pain at all, though she is always checking for it. Now that she’s gotten older though, it is magnified as much by the humiliation as by the physical sensations, as if her body wants to keep her a child, wants to keep dragging her back to a time she’d rather leave behind, and all her anger is concentrated, like the force of a swirling cyclone, just under her breastbone. She is trapped by it until she can fight her way out, leave wherever she is and get to something free, like the place at the river.
The sycamore that fell before Jenna was here has a mate. Or at least that’s the way she likes to think of it. Just feet from the remaining stump is another tree, only slightly smaller, slightly closer to the bank that sharply slopes to the water’s edge. Weeks ago Jenna noticed that the base of the standing tree was hollow, forming a little cave of roots stretching down the bank. Jenna had climbed into the opening, just large enough for her to fit when curled in a ball. She had run her hands up inside the tree and discovered a kind of shelf, not wide or level or very tall, but dry, secret, satisfying in that way that nature can be when it displays a sudden or unexpected utility: a log to sit on, a perfect walking stick, a grapevine for swinging across a creek.
Now, Jenna keeps a water bottle there, a tin she found in the barn that she washed out and lined with a paper towel to put crackers in, a little writing pad that she made by cutting notebook paper into squares and stapling the top together, along with a pencil tied to a string, and her two books, The Bean Trees, of course, and now Pigs in Heaven. Grace told her it was about the same characters, Turtle and her adopted mother, and Jenna is savoring the anticipation of starting it, not sure what she’s waiting for but not quite ready to begin. Today is not the day.
Today is for just sitting on the fallen sycamore and waiting, breathing, listening.
SARAH HAS STOPPED a little ways back, afraid to come too close, in case Jenna doesn’t want her here, waves her hand a little, simply says, “Hi.”
“Hi.”
“If you want to be alone, I can leave.”
Jenna surprises Sarah a little by shaking her head no, then says aloud, “Should I be coming in for lunch?”
It’s Sarah’s turn to shake her head. “I don’t think it’s quite time. I just see you coming back here sometimes, and I thought I could join you but if you don’t want me to, I understand.”
Jenna slides over a little on the log, even though there was plenty of room before, and Sarah moves gingerly forward, sits carefully beside her. “Are you okay?”
Jenna looks at Sarah sharply, then away. “I’m fine.”
They are quiet for a moment, and then Jenna says, “I’m sorry about the party. I just . . . I couldn’t do it.”
“That’s okay. It was really just a cake.” Sarah has, of course, been wondering what made Jenna leap up from the table like that, never actually heard if Grace found her that night or if Jenna just came back by herself. Though she hadn’t been aware that she was thinking about it, she felt a rush of relief when she looked out the front door the next morning and saw Jenna in the garden.
Ellie had tried to bring it up at the next counseling session, saying that there must be some feelings about what had happened at the party, “inviting” the girls to talk about it. No one had responded, of course, but since then, Sarah has been chewing it over in her own mind. She can’t help but notice the irony of Lauren getting exactly what she wanted. Sarah can’t yet determine how much impact Jenna’s little outburst and the resulting failure of the party has had, but it feels like everybody is talking a little quieter, stepping a little more carefully, as if they are carrying something they’ve just realized is extremely fragile. Sarah is caught between her sympathy for the others who were hoping for a nice little party and a rather uncomfortable itch for something to happen, a craven attraction for whatever Lauren might do to expose the fatal weaknesses.
But she hasn’t been able to ignore the realization that she is a little mad at Jenna, not so much because she ruined the party, or could possibly be in league with Lauren, but because of the way the attention has shifted, kind of like when her stepfather had a temper tantrum and then everybody else had to tiptoe around like he was the one who got hurt. It hadn’t even occurred to her to feel sorry for Jenna or to imagine that Jenna’s behavior was anything but a total lack of interest in, even scorn for, the rest of them.
Until now. Jenna seems completely deflated, guilty about ruining everything and Sarah realizes that something must be hurting her, too, that she didn’t leave because she wanted to but because she had to, something inside her making it impossible to stay.
“Do you still hate being here?” Sarah asks.
Jenna doesn’t speak for a long time. “Not as much, I guess. You?”
Sarah is instantly sorry she has asked the question. She wanted to hear from Jenna, not think about an answer for herself. Before she can formulate any words, images blink through her mind like those flip books where the movement of the drawings comes from turning the pages: the clink of warm clean plates, steaming brown rolls that melt the butter the instant the knife touches the crumbly surface, the splash of ducks into the creek, Ellie’s smile and the way she lays a hand on your shoulder and squeezes gently without looking at you or even saying a word. All of Lauren’s words—that they have been sent here only to work, that lesbians shouldn’t be allowed to have a program for girls, that the counseling is bogus—echo in h
er head. And what about the street, her friends there? How can Sarah even allow herself to imagine belonging anywhere else? She glances down at the old scars on her wrists, clasps her hands together to stop herself from reaching under her shirt and running her fingers over the tender, raw place just above the waistband of her shorts.
Finally, Sarah shrugs, unwilling or unable to commit herself. “Well, at least it got the attention off Lauren.” Sarah glances at Jenna to check her demeanor, but she is sitting perfectly relaxed, doesn’t seem to have reacted to what Sarah has said. “Um, or maybe, you know, Lauren’s thing is no big deal.”
“What thing?”
“Has she been talking to you?”
“I don’t know. She talks all the time. I guess I don’t pay much attention to her.”
They both nod slightly, grunt at that.
“What is she saying to you?” Jenna asks.
Sarah hesitates. She’s spent nearly three years living on the streets, struggling to be a part of a world that had almost stricter rules than the one she came from. The first rule she learned, the one most ingrained, was about loose lips. Nobody knows anything they don’t need to know, nobody says anything they don’t need to say. Friendship wasn’t intimate sharing. It was loyalty: loyalty to the street and its rules, loyalty to the people and habits that meant safety.
Sarah doesn’t realize how anxious she has been to talk until the words are backed up in her mouth, ready to spill out. She was hoping Jenna would catch on, not require her to explain, that the code would have stretched far enough to include her here. She doesn’t know how to apply what she’s learned, who she has become, in this place. She’s not sure if Jenna can be trusted, if the conditions call for her to violate her own standards. Somehow, without really understanding why, she wants to believe Jenna herself can help her make sense of it.
“About Ellie and Grace and I guess even Donna being lesbians,” Sarah blurts out.
“What about it?”
“Well, exactly. But Lauren wants to make a big deal out of it, like, she thinks that if she can get us all to agree on it she’ll be able to get out of here some way. That they shouldn’t be allowed to run a program for girls, if somebody found out that it could get them all in big trouble or something.”
Jenna doesn’t say anything. Sarah sees her look away, down the river, as if checking a route she is planning to take. Everything is just as it was a moment ago, and yet Sarah has the sense that she has scraped open an ancient scar, the edge of the horny scab revealing the pinkest, most vulnerable skin below, and soon it will begin to itch. She feels like she is waiting to see if Jenna will scratch it.
“Lauren isn’t going anywhere. There’s nothing she can do about being here, and the sooner she figures that out, the easier it’s going to be on everyone.”
Jenna’s voice has a lecturing quality, a distance, as if the words have been read out of a manual—Prison Alternatives for Dummies. Somehow, it seems to Sarah, Jenna hates the sound of her own words, is mad at herself for reconfiguring the truth so it is palatable and innocuous, like patting a vicious dog on the head with your feet planted firmly just inches away from his smiling jaws, knowing all the time that his chain won’t allow him to reach you.
But Sarah is satisfied, happy to avoid the danger. She is willing, for the moment, to be placated, to believe that Jenna isn’t worried, doesn’t take Lauren’s threat seriously, or at least has forged a path around it that Sarah is anxious to follow. Lunch is being served, the sun is shining, their muscles are growing stronger each day, their hearts are steadily pumping, and Sarah knows she has old scars, too, some of them healed over, nearly invisible, and some she still picks at sometimes, causing them to bleed.
TUESDAY, JUNE 19
LAUREN HAS A TERRIBLE, POUNDING HEADACHE. HER temples are throbbing and the pain, the sheer weight of her head, has made her neck stiff and uncomfortable. The headache is just one symptom of her period, which also includes acute abdominal cramps, bloated hands and feet, and heightened sensitivity that makes her skin feel bruised.
At least that’s what she told Grace and has almost convinced herself. That’s why she’s up here, first lying on her bed staring at the ceiling, then in the bathroom, examining her face for blemishes just inches from the mirror, now back in her room and killing just a bit more time to be sure everyone has gone out, is as far from the house as possible.
Lauren can’t see them from her window right now, but she can see the huge garden and the sight of it makes her not even want to look out. She is certain she has been assigned the worst room since it’s always sunny in here, extra hot, and she can hear everything that goes on outside, making her feel like she has absolutely no privacy. It seems like all the heat from the kitchen comes right up the stairs and through her door, too, and Lauren is sure she can smell the lingering odors of cooked food, going sour and fetid in clouds of heavy air in the corners of her room. One corner is actually higher than the surrounding landscape of her cluttered floor, filled with an ever-expanding mound of dirty clothes, growing with all the enthusiasm of toadstools on a compost pile.
Lauren eyes the heap warily. She can hardly believe that, on top of everything, she is supposed to carry her clothes all the way down to the horrible dark damp basement of this god-awful creaky, old house, and that she is the one who is supposed to wash and dry them. She’s almost out of clean clothes again, actually wore the same pair of shorts two days in row, not that anyone around here would even notice, and the pile of laundry taunts her like the ultimate betrayal. She’ll just have to talk Cassie into doing her laundry again, though she hasn’t found her nearly as retiring or compliant as she was at first, and Lauren has wondered if the girl might even be avoiding her.
Not that Lauren could care less. It’s not like she wants to be friends with someone like Cassie. There’s something weird about her. Lauren is pretty sure she’s not retarded, doesn’t think she’d be here if she was. Lauren doesn’t even know what Cassie did to get herself here. She’s mentioned some creepy uncle Gordon visiting her and her grandmother and it could have something to do with him. Maybe she killed him. Lauren figures, if she did, he probably deserved it. But, then again, she’s pretty sure this program wouldn’t be open to a murderer, no matter how justified the crime. Besides, Cassie doesn’t seem capable of sticking it to anyone unless maybe they were threatening to hurt her dear old Gram. Maybe she was an accessory to the demise of the Big Bad Wolf.
She’s still working on Sarah, but she knows better than to trust a street kid. Sarah’s sweetness is all a ploy, Lauren is convinced, a way to be sure adults never suspect her of anything, though she would, as Lauren’s mother likes to say, steal your coat right off your back.
She kicks at the pile of clothes, shifting it ever so slightly, sneers at the actual dirt on her favorite camisole. Who, in this day and age, doesn’t have air-conditioning? She reaches her hand through the open window, lays her palm against the screen, proving to herself that no breeze is blowing, that the air in her room is just as stifling as she thought even with the fan they gave her on high, blowing hard enough to flutter the pages of the Teen Vogue magazine, the one she’s read a hundred times now, with every oscillating pass. Lauren picks up the magazine and throws it and herself onto the bed, lies sprawled there on her back, tears filling her eyes and spilling down her cheeks into her ears.
It’s all Jason’s fault. She repeats the words in her head like a mantra. The thought pulls her into a current where she likes to float. She’s been here before and likes the story that starts this way. It was Jason, not her. He made her do it. It was his greed and his imagination and, yes, even his pride in her, that made him believe she could do it, could do almost anything. He knew she was good, and it wasn’t even her fault she got caught.
It was those mirrors, those stupid mirrors. The clerk never would have seen her slip the pendant off the counter into her bag, neve
r would have noticed that one missing out of all the ones she’d laid out to show Lauren, if she hadn’t seen the reflection of the movement in the mirror, just the barest glimpse of something out of the corner of her eye, and got suspicious. Lauren had been in that particular store dozens of times, taken things, little things mostly, from right under that same girl’s nose. She was a total dunce, nowhere near alert enough, under normal circumstances, to cause the least problem for Lauren. There was no reason for it to have gone wrong this time.
But, no. Lauren doesn’t like when the story goes this direction, gets away from her. She likes it orderly, step by step. She escorts her mind back to the jewelry counter, sighs to see herself sitting on one of the high stools, a real customer, someone they have to pay attention to. She’d bought the watch, the one with the turqoise inset, kind of pretty but nothing she’d ever wear, snapped her credit card smartly on the counter, forged her mother’s name, nearly the same signature as her own. And then, oh! Look at that lovely pendant. Do you mind showing that to me? Lauren is so polite, so demure. They never suspect a thing. Her clothes and her makeup and her hair and jewelry all show that she’s got style, money, that she’s someone who can really appreciate the beautiful things they have here, but she’s not bossy or patronizing. If they remember her, which they always do, it is with delight. Remember that nice girl, that lovely blonde? A compliment here and there, apologies for taking so much time. She can’t get by with being invisible, that’s a given. So she lures them in with impeccable manners and, of course, flattery.