“Hmmm.…” She chomped on her gum. “He never said that.”
“What?” I asked.
She shook her head at me and mouthed the words, “I’m on the phone.”
“Yeah, I got that,” I muttered, and she gave me a wide-eyed look like, What’s your problem?
“Okay…here it is,” she said. “Your service has been canceled.”
I seriously thought she was still talking to whoever she had on the phone.
“Your service was canceled,” she said again, when I didn’t respond.
“Me?” I asked.
She nodded. “Yeah, earlier today. Must’ve gone over your limit one too many times and pissed your dad off.” She laughed. “Happens all the time. He’ll get over it, but it will cost him fifty bucks to reinstate it. Good luck.”
I couldn’t believe I hadn’t realized this the moment it stopped working. I’d been so focused on all my other problems, though, and I’d actually thought the phone was dying because it was ancient; I’d had it for over a year. But still, how stupid could I be? He’d kicked me out. Of course he’d cancel my phone. Before I could ask about maybe getting a new plan, she had turned her attention back to her call and walked off.
“Ummm, hello? Salesgirl with the phone attached to your ear?” I said extra loudly. Everyone in the store turned to look, and a few people snickered. “I’m not exactly done here? Could you hang up and give me some customer service?”
The girl stared at me, her eyes wide again. “Ummm…I gotta go,” she said to her friend. She stepped back to the counter like I might slap her if she got too close. “How may I help you?” she asked formally.
“You could give me a little more information,” I said. “What do you mean, my account’s canceled? Like closed, or like he forgot to pay the bill?” I asked, even though I already knew.
“It appears your phone line was removed from the account by Mr. Cross earlier today,” she said stiffly. “Perhaps you would like to open a new one? I need to see a driver’s license and credit card.”
“I don’t have a credit card,” I said.
“We have some prepay options as well,” she continued, as if she were reading out of an employee manual.
Suddenly it was too much. It was like my dad kept pecking away at me, making things worse and worse. Why couldn’t he have let me have this one thing? He knew I couldn’t afford a phone. I grabbed my purse off the counter and wove through the half dozen people who were crowded into the store, waiting.
“God, what a bitch,” I heard someone say.
“It’s called customer service,” I yelled over my shoulder, but I kept going without looking back. I had to talk to my dad. And not just about the stupid phone, but about everything.
chapter 8
BY THE TIME I FOUGHT MY WAY THROUGH THE RAINY Friday night rush hour traffic, my determination to face Dad had weakened. I must’ve circled the neighborhood for half an hour trying to work up my nerve before I finally turned down our street and parked across from the house, but I left the engine idling and the windshield wipers whooshed back and forth, brushing away the rain.
The driveway was empty, but light leaked out of the living room into the yard, and after a few minutes, I saw my dad’s shadow pass behind the drapes. I killed the engine and started to get out, but then a second, smaller silhouette joined him and my body tensed. If only there was some way to get him alone.
I sat there for a long time, but after a while I knew I’d never go up to the door with Mira inside, so I drove around for an hour. When I passed the bright lights of a Mobil station, I realized how stupid I’d been. The Beast sucked down gasoline like Josh gulping Gatorade after a game. I only had thirteen hundred seventy-two dollars in my savings account, which wouldn’t last very long. Even with Josh’s sixty bucks, I couldn’t drive around randomly ever again. At least not until I got a job, which was next on my list, right after finding a place to live.
Normally, I would’ve gone to Coffee Espress-O, but I was afraid I’d run into too many people I knew, so I drove over to a little café called the Coffee Klatch that my dad and I had discovered last summer on a dusky evening bike ride. It was in kind of a paradoxical area of town where the houses had all been redone, the lawns were trim, and kids played hopscotch on the sidewalks, but you could also hear the constant traffic on Sandy Boulevard just a few blocks away. The busy, wide street cut across Portland on an angle, and along this stretch, it was lined with dicey hotels, fast-food places, and taverns. The café was on the ground floor of an old brick building that sat right in the middle of a residential neighborhood.
I made my way to the counter, past businesspeople in ties, teens with backpacks, and college students dressed in black, who congregated on soft couches, eating, drinking, and flirting. There wasn’t anyone working behind the counter, and I stood there, waiting. After about five minutes, I decided to go somewhere else, but then the swinging door to the back opened a couple of inches and a voice yelled out, “Trent! I thought you were watching for customers.”
A guy who was sitting on one of the couches behind me yelled, “Sorry. I got it.”
He ran across the room and leapfrogged the counter so he was facing me. He brushed floppy brown hair out of his eyes and smiled at me so intensely it was like I was the only person in the room. For some odd reason, instead of it being creepy, I got a rush from it. And then I blushed.
“What can I get you?” he asked.
“Ummm…”
I must’ve looked a little doubtful or confused, because he said, “It’s okay. I work here. I mean, I’m not working now, but I can make you a drink.” He nodded toward the swinging door. “Girl trouble, so I’m covering.”
“Oh. Okay. I’ll have a mocha.” But then I remembered I needed to watch my money. “Actually, make that a regular coffee with room for cream.”
I waited while he got it for me, and even though it took forever, I was so distracted by the fact I had nowhere to sleep, I didn’t even notice he had made me a mocha until he asked if I wanted chocolate sprinkles.
“Ummm,” I said, “I ordered a coffee.”
“But you wanted a mocha.” He squirted a huge mound of whipped cream on top, and it wobbled as he handed it to me. “Free upgrade for having to wait.”
It honestly made me want to cry, which I knew was not the reaction he was hoping for. “Wow. Thanks.”
“Anytime. Well, not actually anytime,” he said, “because I can’t give away free drinks for no reason, but you know, if you have to wait or you’re unhappy with the service or—” I started laughing even though my insides ached. He smiled back. “Anyway…”
One of his bottom teeth was just the tiniest bit crooked, and I wondered what it might feel like to touch it with my tongue. Like if we were kissing. God! What was wrong with me? Clearly I was losing my mind. Hello, Jamie! Remember Josh? I couldn’t believe I’d even thought that.
“Okay, well, thanks,” I said, moving away to check out the crowded bulletin boards before he noticed I was blushing again.
“See you around,” he said.
“Thanks again,” I said, heading over to the bulletin board.
Yesterday, I’d read the ads in three newspapers looking for apartments, but found out everyone charged thirty-five dollars just for the credit check. Plus you had to be eighteen, with a job and a security deposit. I wouldn’t be eighteen until April, and I barely had enough for one month, let alone two. I scanned a bunch of handwritten ads for rooms to rent and tried not to think about the fact that the cute coffee guy was wearing an NYU sweatshirt. Did he love New York too?
I shook off thoughts of him and used a pay phone by the bathroom to call on a couple of listings. The first turned out to be all the way across town and too expensive anyway. The woman who answered at the second number said I had to be at least twenty-one because if the police found minors drinking in their house again, they were “soooo busted.” I promised I wouldn’t drink, but she blew me off.
&nbs
p; After that, I sat on one of the couches making a list of what I might be able to sell for cash. I never wore jewelry because of dance class, so I didn’t have any of that. And my dad had kept the computer, which was a two-year-old desktop anyway, so it wouldn’t have been worth anything. So far, all I had on my list was my autographed photo of Laurence Olivier, which Grandpa had given me for my fourteenth birthday. It was a rare picture and worth a lot, maybe as much as six or seven hundred dollars, but I’d never sell it. I’d rather starve first. I crumpled up the paper and tossed it in the recycle bin.
I ended up closing down the café, but the coffee guy didn’t talk to me again. Although he did give me a little wave around eleven o’clock when he left. At midnight I found myself in the Beast, wondering where to go next. My eyelids drooped. A week of barely sleeping had finally caught up with me right when I had no bed to crash in. I tried to think of someplace safe to park and ended up at the Doughnut Shoppe because it was open all night.
Two police cars were parked across the street at the convenience store, which made me both nervous and reassured. Would they notice me? Maybe it didn’t matter. I parked on the outer edge of the lot and then I shifted a few boxes to the front and stretched out on the backseat, using my pink comforter and pillow for bedding.
Even with my clothes on and tucked under the comforter, I shivered from cold. Sounds of cars pulling in and out, their doors banging, made me uneasy. I buried my head under the pillow, but that gave me a crick in my neck. Finally, I must’ve drifted off because a couple of guys yelling at each other about cream-filled doughnuts jarred me awake.
“Dude. I dibbed that one first,” a voice shouted.
I peered through the window, staying down so they wouldn’t see me. Two guys in Oregon State sweats wrestled and laughed over a box of doughnuts. I watched as they got into a little gray Honda and drove away.
I plugged in my iPod, found my well-worn copy of Laurence Olivier’s biography in my dance bag where I kept it for those times I was early to class, and read by the light of the streetlamp. The next thing I knew, it was dawn and the book was pressed into my cheek, probably leaving a mark.
“Ow, ow, ow!” I said, rolling my head around, trying to loosen the stiff muscles in my neck. If my breath was half as bad as my mouth tasted, I felt sorry for anyone who got within ten feet of me.
I stepped into a puddle when I climbed out, soaking my right sneaker, and splashed across the lot toward the Doughnut Shoppe. Inside, I washed my face in the bathroom and tousled my hair with a little water. I’d forgotten my toothbrush, so I used my finger, but it did absolutely nothing, and I still felt totally gross.
“What can I get you?” asked the girl behind the counter.
I ordered the dollar-ninety-nine special. Sitting on a stool at the counter, I tore off tiny pieces of a blueberry muffin and forced myself to eat them. It was fresh, the coffee inky, and the crossword puzzle someone had left behind impossible. It wasn’t even eight o’clock yet, and my tap dance class didn’t start until nine, but I finished my food and left anyway, tucking one of my precious dollars under the saucer for a tip.
When I stepped inside from the windy, rainy cold into the warm, almost humid foyer of Bright Lights Studio, the familiar odor of floor polish, wood, and sweat enveloped me like a hug. No matter how chaotic things were in my life, the hushed voices of parents, the monotonous tones of ballet teachers calling out positions, and the soft tinkling of the piano always relaxed me.
I walked past the toe class where Liz and Megan spent their Saturday mornings, and I peeked in. I picked them out of the row of ballerinas standing at the barre, listening to Madame Zubrinski. If they saw me, you’d never know it. They both had the still, concentrated look of all the rest of the dancers in the class, and their gaze never shifted from Madame’s face.
Ballet at school was really simple stuff, and I enjoyed it, but when it had been time for me to go up on toe shoes here at Bright Lights, I’d decided to give it a miss. I wanted to be an actress, not a dancer with messed-up feet. Sometimes I envied my friends’ grace and dedication, though. Hard work had gotten Liz early acceptance at Oberlin too, and I was still waiting to hear about drama school. Assuming I could even figure out a way to go if I got in.
I stopped by the office to make sure my classes were all paid up for the quarter because the last thing I wanted was for one of my dance instructors to take me aside and tell me I owed the school money. Luckily Dad had paid for me through the end of March. What I’d do then, I didn’t know. Dancing on Saturday mornings was practically my religion.
After class, I had taken a shower in the changing room and was getting dressed when Megan and Liz rushed in and grabbed their stuff out of their lockers.
“We’re late for the ballet matinee with my grandma,” Liz explained, rushing out.
“Have fun,” I said.
“We will,” Megan called as she ran after Liz, who was probably halfway to the car already.
I spent all afternoon on one of the Coffee Klatch computers, surfing the web. By the evening, I had a whole pile of printouts on cults and religions that I wanted to mail to my dad. I’d gotten a bunch of different envelopes from the dollar store, and I tried to make it look like it was correspondence from people he knew or business letters, and not from me, so he’d open them. Once they were addressed, I walked to the corner mailbox and dropped them in.
I’d also found a company on the web who would send in a team to rescue people from cults, and I called from the pay phone at the café. What did I have to lose?
“Hello,” I said, when a man answered the phone. “I’d like some information on your services.” I explained about my dad.
“No offense, but you sound kind of young. How old are you?”
“Why?”
“Well…” He stopped talking, and a hacking, wet-sounding cough filled my ear. Yuk. “Sorry. Bronchitis. As I was saying, our services don’t come cheap.”
Figures. “How much?” I asked.
“Three thousand for the capture. Plus expenses. Six thousand a week for deprogramming. Usually takes one to six weeks.”
“Oh.”
“Still interested?” he asked.
“I guess not.”
“Have a nice day.”
“Yeah…thanks,” I said, but he’d already hung up.
When I came outside, rain poured down in sheets, and by the time I was behind the wheel, my drenched body shook with damp cold. The Doughnut Shoppe had seemed safe enough, so I parked there again. It took me a while, but eventually I fell into a really light, dream-filled sleep. In it, I wandered around in a snowstorm without a jacket. When someone knocked on the window, I sat up fast, totally disoriented. I peered through the glass. Two uniformed police officers motioned at me to join them.
I pulled on my coat and climbed out. “Hi,” I said.
The cops stood there like a pair of blue salt and pepper shakers—exactly the same size, shape, and posture. It wasn’t until the one on the left spoke that I realized she was a woman.
“You living in this vehicle?” she asked. Her voice was deep and gravelly, not like a cigarette smoker, but like after you’ve had laryngitis and it’s still sort of raspy and almost sexy. She was definitely Pepper.
The cold air shocked me awake fast. “Ummm…no.”
“Runaway?” asked Salt, stepping forward. He peered into the SUV, shining his flashlight on my stuff. “What’s with all the boxes?”
“Oh, those? That’s just my stuff,” I improvised. “I go to…to Southern Oregon U, and my dad’s moving, so I had to drive home and pick up some of my things from the house to take back to the dorms.”
The woman officer met my eye. “So why are you sleeping in the parking lot?”
Good question.
“Oh, yeah…well”—I tried to keep my voice as casual as possible—“I was supposed to stay at my boyfriend’s house, but somehow we got our wires crossed, and I can’t get ahold of him. I’m heading back to Ashland
as soon as it gets light. I didn’t want to drive through the mountain pass in the dark.”
“Right,” Pepper said. I couldn’t tell if she believed me or not.
“I thought it was safer than driving five hours at night,” I explained. “Sleeping here didn’t seem like a big deal.”
“A girl alone in a car is always a big deal,” she said.
“Yeah…I guess.”
The weather gods chose that moment to do me a huge favor, and a gust of icy wind ripped through the parking lot. The light drizzle turned into a driving rain, and I put my hands up to shield my face from the stinging drops. “It’s only for a few hours,” I yelled over the wind.
“Well,” said Salt, grabbing hold of his hat to keep it from flying off, “make sure you’re gone in the morning.”
“I will.”
“And lock your doors,” added Pepper.
I dove into the Beast and huddled under my comforter, wide awake, for a long time. I couldn’t afford to be questioned by the police again because they might ask for ID and discover I was only seventeen and my dad’s house was less than three miles from here. They’d probably take me back to him, and if he said he didn’t want me, they’d ship me off to my mom’s in Los Angeles. Somehow I doubted they’d care that the last time I lived with her, not only had she been arrested for shoplifting beer, but they’d also found stolen lunch meat tucked under my Big Bird T-shirt. I had to find somewhere besides my car to sleep.
chapter 9
ON SUNDAY MORNING, I PULLED THE BEAST INTO the grimy parking lot of the Regis Deluxe Motel. It was more like a strip of narrow spaces with faded white lines than an actual lot, and most of them were empty. McDonald’s and Burger King wrappers fluttered around, accumulating in little piles by some dead-looking bushes near the front doors. VACANCY flashed in the window, but both the Cs were burnt out. Below it was the sign that had caught my attention.
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