Follow Me Home

by Monica Goulet

  Chapter Fifteen

  My cell phone rings on Sunday night just after I turn off my light. The green glow lights up my room, and I roll over, trying to ignore it, but it just keeps ringing. When I answer, no one speaks. Then I hear muffled crying. I scramble to sit up.

  “Hello? Who is it?”

  I press the phone closer to my ear, but there’s only shuffling and static. “Jay?”

  “No,” I hear, finally. “It’s Laura.” Her voice is small and far away.

  “Laura? What is it?” I try to keep my voice low.

  “I’m sorry for calling.”

  “Don’t be. Just tell me what’s going on.” I blink until my eyes adjust and the dolls on the shelf come into focus.

  “It’s him,” she says between gulps of air. “Mr. Dawson. He hurt me again. Worse this time.”

  I spring out of my bed. Every nerve in my body is on edge. “Where are you?”

  “In my room.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I don’t know. He probably went to bed.”

  “Where was Mrs. Dawson?”

  “In bed. She pretended she didn’t hear.” Laura sniffles. “It’s – it’s worse when she tries to stop him.”

  “Can you get out? Without him hearing?”

  “Maybe through the window.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’ll be there in twenty minutes. Make sure they’re asleep before you try to leave.” I toss my phone in my bag and look down the hall. Everything’s dark. My parents are in bed. I’ve never once snuck out of the house at night. I shrink back into my room and shove some clothes under my covers.

  The walk to the Dawsons’ house takes fifteen minutes, but in the dark, it feels longer, and the sounds echo louder. The crickets scream in my ears. The wind sends goose bumps up my arms. I use my phone as a flashlight. The stars are probably brighter than the glow from my phone, but it’s reassuring somehow, in a way the stars can’t be. I take my old street to get there, even though I don’t have to. Maybe I hope it will give me a sign or something – the way people visit the grave of a dead relative and ask questions that don’t have answers.

  But instead of giving me answers, the empty lot just leaves me cold. The streetlight that used to be in front of it is out, leaving the darkness to seep into my bones. There’s dark, and then there’s blackness, and this is definitely blackness – when I look at it, I can’t even tell I’m looking at something. It’s just a black hole that seems to suck me in. I walk faster past it, glancing over my shoulder, sure the spirits of the past residents are following me – not to give me answers, but to ask me their own unanswered questions.

  When I finally see the Dawsons’ house, it’s a different kind of cold. One that leaves my hands shaking and my heart beating fast. Laura’s face is in her window, waiting for me. She doesn’t look angry, only scared, and I wonder when the anger sets in. Maybe we’re only capable of one real emotion at a time. It’s like when people say they’re excited, yet nervous about something, but it’s not true. One or the other always takes over in the end.

  I motion to Laura and hold my breath when the window creaks. She pops out the screen easily, and I wonder if she’d practiced, the way I used to practice undoing my seatbelt without Wes noticing in case I needed to make a quick exit. The drop from her window is only a couple feet, and she slides her body out and onto the ground.

  She hugs me, and it startles me – the force of it jolting me out of my memories. I don’t deserve her hug. I can’t save her the way she thinks I can. I couldn’t even save myself.

  “I didn’t bring anything,” she whispers.

  “It’s okay,” I say. I pull her farther from the house, both of us stumbling over our feet like we’ve forgotten how to walk. Fear does that to you – makes you think clearer, do things you’d never be able to do otherwise. But sometimes it grips you so hard it takes over. You forget how to do simple things like walk and breathe. Or to run while you still can.

  It’s not until we’re under a streetlight two blocks away that I get a look at her face. There’s a dark bruise growing under her right eye.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispers when we finally sit on a bench at the edge of a small playground. “I would have called Jay, but I couldn’t. I didn’t know who else to call.”

  I close my eyes, willing my heart to stop racing – to stop feeling like I’m right back in Tulsa outside Wes’s parents’ house. “Tell me what happened.”

  “I wanted to stay up to watch one more TV show,” she says, her voice breaking. “Mr. Dawson came in and told me to go to bed. I told him Mrs. Dawson said I could watch the show, and I turned the volume up. He flipped. Grabbed the remote from my hand and threw it across the room. It smashed into something, but I didn’t see what.” Laura stops, tears streaming down her face again. “I should have just gone to bed.”

  “It’s okay,” I say, even though it’s not. I put my arms around her and hope she doesn’t feel me shaking.

  “What should I do?” Laura whispers. I meet her eyes but have to look away. She’s looking at me like I have all the answers when I have no clue. I’m the last person she should be asking.

  I swallow. “I have to bring you back.”

  Laura shrinks into the bench. “I can’t go back there.” She’s shaking now. Bawling. I can’t watch. I look up at the streetlight instead and watch the bugs dance around it like it’s the last good thing left in the world.

  “We don’t have a choice,” I say. “Jay can’t get out and we don’t have the plan in place yet.”

  “I can’t go back,” Laura says again. Her voice comes from a faraway place. A place I’ve been and, in many ways, still am.

  “You could tell the police,” I say. The voice isn’t mine. It’s the one in my head. The one that told me to tell my parents the first time Wes pushed me. The one that told me to leave the second time he did. The one I never listened to.

  I think Laura shakes her head, but I can’t tell because the rest of her is still shaking. “They’ll just put me in another foster home,” she says, and her voice shakes too.

  “But wouldn’t anything be better than this?”

  “You don’t know what it’s like,” she says, wiping away the tears with her fingertips. They’ve stopped now, and she pulls a Kleenex out of her pocket. Her voice is calm now, steady. “You’re expected to be grateful to even have a home. But it’s not a home. It’s just a house. And the people there are just strangers. They expect you to follow rules you don’t even know, and to be grateful to them for taking you in. But I didn’t ask for them to take me. I didn’t want another family. I already have Jay.”

  “But maybe Jay can fight to get guardianship. He turns eighteen soon.”

  “After the fire? He’ll never win.”

  She’s right. He wouldn’t. Even if he did get guardianship, it could take years. “Okay,” I say. “Then we stick to the plan. We wait for Jay to come up with something. But for now, you have to go back. If you run away now and they find you, the plan will be ruined.”

  Laura walks away from the bench. “Don’t tell Jay about tonight,” she says. “He’ll worry too much.”

  “Okay,” I say, but I’m not sure I can keep the promise. “We should go back before they notice you’re missing.”

  We walk the two blocks back in silence. I hate that I’m bringing her back. It feels like I’m surrendering myself to Wes all over again. “Just try to act normal until I see you again,” I whisper when we’re back in front of her window. “Don’t do anything out of the usual. We don’t want them to suspect anything.”

  Laura nods, looking up at her room.

  “We’ll get you out,” I say. “I promise.” Laura’s eyes meet mine again, and I can tell she believes me. I’m just not so sure I believe myself.

  ****

  To say I don’t sleep much that night is an understatement. When I finally crawl out of bed I feel even worse than when I crawled in. If I
had slept, maybe I could have convinced myself last night was just a bad dream. Instead I spent the whole night picturing Laura and how empty her eyes looked when she watched me walk away from inside her room. I kicked myself the whole way home for not taking her right to the police or my parents. For repeating the same mistakes I made a year ago.

  But this is different. This isn’t me.

  I drag myself into the shower and then put on a bit of makeup to cover the dark circles. I stare at the place my eyebrows should be in the mirror, and bring my finger up to my face, tracing them like Jay did.

  I try to see what he did, but all I see is a forehead that’s too big and eyes that are lost on my face without something to frame them, so I take my pencil and draw them in.

  I want to think about the kiss – analyze it, relive it, bask in it. But there’s too much stuff filling up space in my head. And when the memory does creep back in, I find myself questioning it, wondering if he meant it and, if so, why the night ended like it did. It’s easier to push it to the back of my mind – to concentrate on Laura and how to help her.

  My eyes barely stay open on the way to school, but inside, my mind is spinning. I wonder if Laura will try to cover up her bruise. If she’ll stay home so no one will see. If she already has her explanation planned out if anyone asks.

  Like I did.

  Usually I’d blame it on my clumsiness. I broke my arm the year before high school while rollerblading, so people believed me. Or at least, they pretended to. It was easier when I was dancing to say I fell while practicing a routine – that the floor was too slippery because my mom just cleaned it.

  Somehow I make it to my first class without falling asleep. Melody sits down beside me, and I look over, surprised. I look around for Taylor, but he’s not here yet. There’s still an empty desk beside Taylor’s. She could have sat there. My heart lifts a bit.

  I open my notebook to a blank page. Melody does the same. She holds her pen over it, but doesn’t write. When Taylor walks in, we both glance up. He nods at Melody, but avoids my gaze and sits in his usual spot behind me. I glance at the empty desk again. Now I see someone spilled something sticky all over it.

  She stares straight ahead, and I feel Taylor’s stare behind me. I try to shake away the feeling, but it seeps into me anyway – the feeling I don’t belong. Not in Tulsa, and not here either.

  Victoria still doesn’t sit beside me art class, even though she keeps shooting me apologetic glances. I slam my locker shut after my last class, already planning my excuse for seeing Jay tonight. My life’s become a series of lies. I wonder if you can tell so many you don’t even know what’s true anymore.

  “Kelsey, wait up!”

  I turn to see Taylor, still dressed in his soccer uniform, jogging toward me. I drop my bag back on the floor. “Hey, what’s up?”

  Taylor reaches me and leans against my locker. “Just wanted to say hi.”

  I look down the hall. “Is Melody still mad?”

  “Yeah,” he says. He spins one of the locks beside him. “I probably shouldn’t be talking to you.”

  “Probably not.” I study him and notice the dimple on the left side of his mouth for the first time. My eyes trace back to his mouth, but I realize I don’t want to kiss him – that I didn’t want to kiss him before either.

  “Are you still visiting Jay?” he asks.

  I shake my head. It seems easier than trying to explain. “I’ve only been there a couple times.”

  “You seriously forgave him for burning down your house?”

  I shrug and kick aside a candy wrapper on the floor. “I guess so.”

  “You should be careful,” he says.

  “What do you mean?”

  He pulls down on the lock he’s been spinning but it doesn’t open. “I don’t know,” he says. “It’s just, Jay has nothing to lose now. He’s already lost everything. Sometimes that pushes people to the edge. Makes them do things they wouldn’t normally do.”

  I let my bag slide off my shoulder and onto the floor. “I just saw him a couple times. I probably won’t even go back.” The lie sinks down to my gut, just another one to pile on top of the others. Soon they’ll come up to my throat, and I won’t be able to swallow.

  “Can I drive you home? You looked like you were in a hurry.”

  I look down the hall again.

  He follows my gaze. “Melody’s at a yearbook meeting.”

  I check my watch, thinking of all the things I need to do to get to Jay before visitors’ hours close. “That would be great.”

  He motions for me to follow him, and we walk out to the parking lot side by side, silence hanging between us. “Why are you still wearing your uniform?” I say, trying to break it. “Wasn’t your practice at lunch?”

  “Yeah. It went late. Didn’t have time to shower before last class.”

  “Ew.” I move away from him and he laughs. It’s infectious.

  “It was either this or miss half of Sullivan’s class and then miss the rest when he sends me to the office to get a late slip.”

  I smile, but it feels strained. I wonder if he notices. “I still think you should have opted for the shower. Now I have to get in a car with you smelling like that.”

  “Hey, you accepted the invitation,” Taylor says, unlocking his doors. “No one’s forcing you to get in.”

  “Hmm,” I say, standing outside the passenger side as Taylor rolls down the window. “Stinky boy or twenty minute walk home? I’ll go with the stinky boy.”

  “Thanks. I think. You know, I may have to reconsider my offer. I don’t stink that much.”

  I open the door and hop inside. “Just keep the windows open.”

  Taylor starts the engine and some awful country song blares from the speaker.

  “Seriously? This is your music of choice?”

  Taylor shrugs. “Just on Mondays. I like to mix it up. I have wide musical tastes.”

  “Widely awful maybe.”

  “That’s not nice,” Taylor says, turning the volume up a few more notches. Some guy is singing about taking a girl for a ride in his big green tractor. I slouch down in my seat and roll up the window.

  “I thought you couldn’t stand how bad I smell.”

  “I’ll take it over being seen listening to this.”

  Taylor laughs. “You shouldn’t worry so much about what people think about you.”

  My body tenses. “I don’t,” I say. I sit back in my seat but keep the window down. “Hey, where are we going? I never told you where the rental is.”

  Taylor smiles and drums his fingers on the steering wheel. “I was waiting for you to clue in and tell me. For now, we’re stopping for milkshakes.”

  “Milkshakes? But I need to get home.” I’d forgotten everything, just for a second, but now it all comes back. Jay. Laura. Getting to the detention center tonight.

  “But if you were walking, you wouldn’t get home until much later, so even if we stop, you’ll still get home in time.” Taylor pulls into a parking lot with an ice cream trailer parked on it. “What do you want? Vanilla, Chocolate or Strawberry?”

  “I’m okay. You go ahead.”

  “You’re turning down ice cream? Not allowed. Pick one.”

  “Umm, I don’t know. All of them?”

  “You want three milkshakes?”

  “No. Three flavors.”

  Taylor looks at me sideways and shrugs. “You got it. Wait here.” He hops out and comes back a few minutes later with two milkshakes.

  I take off my lid and study the pale brown liquid. “I hope this tastes better than it looks.”

  Taylor laughs. “Me too.”

  I give him directions to the rental house and we sip on our milkshakes. Mine tastes gross, but I slurp it like it’s the best thing in the world. When we get to my street, Taylor slows down and pulls to the curb near the house.

  “So what was the big hurry to get home?” he asks.

  I take another sip of my milkshake, but the bottom tastes
watered down and warm. “Just things to do. Homework, mostly.”

  Taylor nods, but I don’t think he believes me. “How long do you have this place for?”

  “I don’t know. Until we have a new house, I guess. My parents are going to rebuild it.”

  “That’s good, right?”

  “Yeah, I think it is.” I take another sip, but I only get air. “Thanks for the ride. And the milkshake.”

  “No problem.”

  “See you tomorrow?”

  Taylor nods as I reach for the handle, but the door doesn’t open.

  “Sorry,” Taylor says. “It sticks sometimes.” He reaches over me and yanks the handle. It opens and Taylor pauses, his head inches from mine.

  Maybe he was going to kiss me, or maybe he’s just testing me. Either way, I don’t know, because this time, I’m the one who turns away first.

  Chapter Sixteen

  My parents are bent over the coffee table studying a document when I walk in. “What’s that?”

  My mom looks up. “Hi honey, how was school?”

  “Okay. What is that?”

  “Plans for the new house,” my dad says. “I just met with the builder. Want to see?”

  “No thanks,” I say, kicking off my shoes at the door. I don’t think I can handle talking about the new house right now. All I want is Laura and Jay’s house back. I want their parents back. I want to have known Jay before all these bad things happened to him. “What’s for dinner?”

  “Hamburger casserole.”

  I scrunch up my nose and try to slip back into normal Kelsey mode. “What’s wrong with plain old hamburgers?”

  “This is healthier,” my mom says. “It has lean beef.”

  My dad shrugs behind her, giving me a helpless look. I try to smile, but it doesn’t quite get there. “Can I have the car tonight? I need to get some more clothes. I have no pants left for this week.”

  “Sure, honey,” my mom says, not looking up from the table.

  It’s almost too easy. I suffer through the hamburger casserole, pushing it around on my plate until it looks like there might be less than when I started. I help them clean up and laugh half-heartedly at my dad’s bad jokes. They’re already poring over the house plans again when I slip on my shoes and head out the door.