On the Run

by Clara Bourreau

  Mom turns off the radio, which means we must be getting close. Traffic circles, large empty spaces, a dump, some fields, one more traffic circle. I look at the road signs, but I don’t see any for a jail anywhere. We finally make a turn at a sign that has DETENTION CENTER written on it.

  The jail doesn’t look like my idea of a jail but like a hospital. It’s white and seems very clean, and there are lots of guards, just watching. We park in an area for visitors. My mom checks her makeup, combs her hair, and puts some perfume on (too much, it stinks). She combs my hair, even though she knows I don’t like that. I don’t complain and let her flatten it. I asked Lise to shape my hair with gel this morning.

  We wait in front of an entrance where a line has already formed. Mom constantly checks to make sure she has her ID. Afterward, everything is a blur of white hallways and metal bars. But I’ll always remember the smell. It’s even worse than bleach. It smells clean and dirty all at once. My stomach gets upset: I feel like puking. Mom takes hold of my hand and I follow her.

  We’re searched a few times and everyone has to leave their keys, purses, and cell phones in a bin. I don’t whine.

  We finally reach the visiting room. It’s furnished with round tables where men are sitting and looking at the door. When we walk in, a man gets up. There are two guards near him. Mom smiles at the man. I think I recognize him. It’s my dad.

  At some tables around us, I see other children, some of them very young, even some babies.

  I feel intimidated. I thought we’d be alone. Mom told me that on visiting days whole families are allowed to come, but I didn’t think we’d all be in the same room. I see a girl about my age. She takes a large envelope and slides out a few drawings and a notebook. She hands the drawings to a man I guess is her father. At first I think she’s showing him her homework, but it can’t be homework, because he keeps everything.

  While Mom talks to Dad, I look at the other prisoners. There are young ones and old ones, but more young than old. Their girlfriends and wives are crying or kissing them. I didn’t notice whether my mom kissed my dad.

  I’m afraid to go too close to my dad. He probably notices. I wonder if he blames me for his getting caught after I was born. He doesn’t mention it. He just tells me that he’s happy to see me. That it was time for me to know the truth. I’m old enough now.

  He takes a good long look at me. He doesn’t look the way I remember him. I remember him as very tanned, with a large beard that tickles. Now he’s not tanned, his skin looks a little yellow (but maybe that’s because of the neon light: everybody seems yellow), and his beard and whiskers are gone. I liked his bristly beard.

  Before we came I asked Mom if I’m allowed to take pictures but she said no. Mom doesn’t like pictures. “Don’t worry, you’ll remember what he looks like after you visit,” she told me. “Pictures are for people who have no memory.”

  Dad asks me if I’m happy to see him, if I was scared to come to a prison. I tell him that it reminds me of a hospital and that it smells bad. I tell him that I’m sorry he’s in jail because of me. He doesn’t understand. So I explain that Mom told me he was caught when he visited me in the hospital after I was born. That makes him laugh.

  “I would have given myself up sooner or later,” he says.

  I keep looking at him to make sure I’ll remember him. I don’t speak much after that because I don’t want people to overhear me. I’m afraid to ask questions. I guess I really don’t know my dad anymore.

  Mom is the one who talks now. Eventually she tells Dad that Lise got into another fight at school. Without thinking, I blurt out that Lise is teaching me boxing moves, like how to bob and weave … in case someone bothers me.

  “Why? Are you being bullied?”

  “No. Just in case. Lise is strong. She won all her fights at the club last month.”

  My father smiles, which makes me happy.

  Then I just listen to my parents talk. They discuss the upcoming trial, the testimony my mom and my grandparents will give. My dad says that my other grandparents (my mother’s parents) will also be there, the grandparents I don’t know. He and my mom talk about friends of my dad’s who’ll attend the trial, about the witnesses the lawyers will call. They mention journalists who’ll be covering the trial, and my dad says that we’ll have to be very careful who we talk to. He says the same thing to me as Mom and Yaya: “If a stranger talks to you in the street, don’t answer him, don’t follow him, don’t show him your notebooks or your toys, even if he promises to give you a video game.”

  Around us, kids are laughing and talking to their fathers like it’s totally normal to be here.

  On the way home, I notice that Mom is crying. I turn on the radio. We sing and her tears dry up. Then we go food shopping, a special shopping trip to celebrate. Lise is waiting for us when we get back and we make crepes.

  I start a special notebook that I call “The Visiting Room.” I’m going to write down what Dad says to me, just like Lise writes things in her diary. Except I’m not going to put pictures of any singers in there. Lise comes in before I have time to hide my secret notebook.

  “So?” she says. “How did it go?”

  “Why didn’t you come if you want to know?”

  She doesn’t like my answer and grabs me from behind. I fall off my chair.

  It hurts but I’m not about to cry.

  “Did that hurt?”

  “No.”

  “Liar. So, does it stink enough in jail?”

  “How do you know?”

  “I went there before you.”

  “And why don’t you want to go anymore?”

  “There’s no point. And like I already told you, I want to be normal.”

  “Mom told him about your boxing.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did you tell him I won?”

  I nod. “Yeah.”

  She finally lets go of me. “Good, shrimp,” she says. “Have a good night.”

  In school the next day, Hassan asks me why I had to leave early the day before. I decide to tell him the truth because he’s my friend and has a right to know.

  “I went to see my dad.”

  “He’s not traveling?”

  I hesitate. “Not really. Not right now, at least.”

  Hassan makes believe he understands, just like I make believe I’m telling the truth.

  “Okay. Cool. Did he bring you any presents?”

  Suddenly I chicken out. I understand what Lise was trying to tell me. If I ever blurt out that my dad’s in jail, even Hassan, my best friend, might call me a liar and turn on me. He might even tell ugly Stephanie, and she would blab it to everybody.

  I play by myself during both recess periods; I don’t want Hassan to ask me any more questions. Actually, he couldn’t care less: he’s kissing Stephanie—in front of everyone. Really, I don’t get what he sees in her.

  During the afternoon recess, Bruno comes to see if I’ll play with him. Usually Bruno is all alone during recess; he has no friends. We make fun of him because he’s two years older than the rest of us in class. He probably noticed that I was alone. He asks me why I’m not playing with the others. I tell him it’s none of his business, and tears flood his eyes (a real baby). I would have laughed at him before, but not this time. I start to tell him about my dad, but I don’t know if he believes me; I can see him knit his eyebrows. We go back to class. I’m afraid Bruno will repeat what I just told him, but since he has no friends, he has no one to talk to.

  Now I go to the visiting room every Wednesday. I recognize the other kids who come to see their fathers. I talk to a girl who’s as old as Lise. She can’t come every week because she lives too far away: it’s a four-hour drive. So she’s here every other week, with her older sister and her mother. She says I’m lucky to live close to the detention center.

  I make drawings and think of questions for my dad; I tell him what I did during the week, if I had a fight with Lise, if we’ve be
en punished, if I won my soccer match or not. I tell him what we do on weekends. Lise still refuses to visit. She always has a good excuse: too much work, a boxing lesson, a dance rehearsal at one of her friends’. But none of us are dumb; we all know she just doesn’t want to come.

  But one night, as I’m doing my homework, Lise enters my bedroom without knocking and hands me an envelope. She knows Mom and I are going to the visiting room the next day.

  “Here, shrimp,” she says. “Give this to Dad.”

  I’m about to ask her why she won’t go herself but, for once, I don’t. I see that she’s taped the back of the envelope.

  “Don’t even try to open it or I’ll break both your arms,” Lise says.

  I put her envelope inside my visiting room notebook.

  The following day, when I give her letter to Dad, he seems happier than when I bring my drawings. It makes me jealous and glad at the same time.

  We learn that Dad’s trial is set to begin in a few days. It’s mentioned on the evening news, before anything else, before the Israel-Palestine conflict, before the space walk, before the local strikes, before the flood reports. My dad’s story is at the top of the news hour!

  I’m getting dinner ready with Mom while Lise gabs on the phone. Mom wants to know what I did at school; she tells me what she did at work; we listen to the radio; we wait for Lise (who’s blabbing away) and for the pasta water to boil. Mom puts some tomatoes in the oven.

  As we wait for everything to cook, Mom turns on the TV. We watch a game show; then the news starts. And my dad comes on the screen.

  I don’t recognize him right away. The newsman shows a black-and-white photo of Dad that I’ve never seen before.

  It’s a scary photo, with Dad looking straight ahead, bug-eyed. It’s an ugly picture, and there’s a stain on it.

  That’s when the tomatoes start to burn. Mom doesn’t notice because she’s looking at the TV. The newscaster explains that the Cantes trial is about to begin. I think it’s rude not to give my dad’s full name, Rafael Cantes.

  They show other photos of my dad, of the banks he robbed, and they interview some of the bank employees. “It happened so quickly,” one says. “He was armed but he didn’t use his weapon.”

  “We were scared,” says another, “but he left the same way he came in.”

  The newsman says that Cantes was working alone, that he had already been arrested once, that he had gone into hiding in Africa years before. They question his lawyer, a fat man with his hair in a ponytail. I remember seeing him at our house. He’s the one who smells like fish. He’s a good speaker who says that my dad never used his gun. That he never killed anyone.

  We don’t watch the end of the news. Mom opens the oven; the tomatoes are like charcoal. We eat the pasta without them.

  Lise wants to know if Mom is going to attend the trial and if we’ll have to as well. Mom just says that we should continue to live our lives as usual but that we have to be extra careful in the street.

  “Why?”

  “Because journalists will probably try to take pictures of you. I already talked to the principals at your schools, but you never know.”

  I don’t see why journalists would be interested in Lise and me.

  The next day I begin to understand.

  All my classmates heard the news. Some brought their parents’ newspapers to school, even though they never read anything, not even comic books. Maybe the teacher will give them extra credit for it.

  In the school yard they all come over to me, especially older kids from the sixth grade.

  I’m surrounded. Everyone is looking at me, when yesterday most of them didn’t know who I was.

  “So? Your dad? Did he kill people?” one kid asks.

  “No! He just robbed banks. He’s not a murderer.”

  Bruno is one of the kids who says nasty things. I guess he’s happy to be on the side of the strong ones for a change. But I’m not a baby and I don’t cry.

  Hassan comes to my rescue—until Stephanie starts to meddle.

  “Yeah! In any case,” she says, “my mother doesn’t want me to talk to you.”

  “I’m not surprised, if she’s as stupid as you,” I shoot back. “Anyway, I don’t want to talk to you either.”

  She’s about to cry but Hassan takes her side.

  “You can’t say bad things about other people’s parents,” he says to me. “It’s not cool.”

  “Wait a minute! Didn’t you hear what she said about my dad?”

  Stephanie takes Hassan’s arm. “Come on, Hassan! You can’t hang around him anymore.”

  Hassan hesitates but leaves with her. Later, in the cafeteria, Hassan winks at me as if to tell me he’s sorry, that we’re still friends, but I eat alone anyway.

  I can’t wait for the end of the school day so I can go home.

  Now I understand why Lise wants to be normal.

  She’s probably going through the same thing at her school, because tonight Lise doesn’t call any of her friends and she’s all moody, slamming doors and playing loud music in her room.

  As we’re setting the table for dinner, a man rings our bell: he wants to take some pictures. Mom gets really angry. She tells him off with words I’ve never heard before. She pushes him outside and threatens to call the police. He still manages to take a picture as Mom gives him a last shove. She’s very upset.

  I want to tell her what happened at school but I don’t. We eat in silence and we watch the news.

  While we’re brushing our teeth, Lise tells me that Mom is going to testify tomorrow. That’s why Mom is on edge. Lise explains to me what happens during a trial; she looked it up on the Internet at school (because at home, the computer is in Mom’s room and she’d know it if we used it without telling her). I tell Lise about all the kids who came up to me at recess, even the older ones, and how Bruno sided with the others. She looks at me and says that if I keep getting bothered, she’ll personally take care of it. In the meantime, she teaches me new ways to defend myself.

  “You don’t look at them, they don’t look at you,” she tells me. “You don’t speak to them, they don’t speak to you. And if they pick a fight with you, do what I just showed you.”

  My dad has been on the TV news for the last three days. I’ve had it!

  I don’t want to go to school anymore. I have no friends now; only the older kids want to talk to me, and it’s always to ask questions about my dad. In class, I have the feeling everyone is making fun of me.

  Even my teacher is acting differently. If I misbehave, she scolds me more than she does the others, but when someone picks on me, she always comes to my defense. Still, with the new boxing moves Lise taught me, I can take care of myself, without her help.

  • 4 •

  The Escape

  On TV, they announce Dad’s escape. Somehow he managed to get away just as he was about to leave the courthouse to go back to jail. That’s the big scoop of the day for the news-people. Some witnesses tell the journalists that it happened very fast and that he probably had help. He was in a room guarded by policemen when he fainted. They opened the window while they waited for the ambulance to arrive; Dad ran to the window and slid down along a gutter. He mounted a scooter that was waiting for him in the street. Then he vanished, without a trace.

  The phone rings right after the news. It’s Grandpa. He wants to speak to my mom. I hear him say, “It can’t be true, it can’t be true.” Mom isn’t trying to hide her tears. Lise is the one who makes dinner—half-cooked rice with rubbery chicken (she’s lousy at cooking; the only thing she doesn’t mess up is yogurt cake). Mom tells us she has to visit a patient tonight. It’s a lie: there’s no appointment on her calendar. Does she really think we’re that dumb? We know she’s going to my grandparents’ to talk about Dad. Why can’t we just talk to one another like a normal family?

  Usually when we’re alone, Lise and I like to watch TV, but tonight we clean up the kitchen. Lise washes the dishes and I dry. We put our
pajamas on and we stay in Lise’s room, where we play cards without fighting, and we don’t mention Dad’s escape. But we don’t think about anything else. We know it’s serious. I want to ask Lise a few questions but I can see that she wants to cry too.

  It’s late when Mom gets back, but I’m not sleeping. My glow-in-the-dark globe lights up my room. She comes over to kiss me before going to speak to Lise for a long time. I want to listen to what they’re saying, but I fall asleep.

  The next morning when we go out, I see a car stationed in front of the house. Inside the car, there’s a man reading a newspaper. My mom goes over to talk to him.

  “Since you’re out here, maybe you can take my son, Anthony, to school,” she says.

  I don’t want to go to school with him, but Mom explains that he’s a policeman and he’s here to keep an eye on our house in case my father shows up. She makes fun of him for not being clever enough to stay hidden. That’s how I end up riding to school with the policeman. His face is oily and pockmarked. I start calling him Mr. Pizza Face in my head.

  I stay quiet on the car ride because Mr. Pizza Face looks mean. The car stinks of cigarettes and old sandwiches, and he listens to a stupid radio show where all anyone talks about is politics and old movies I’ve never heard of. I hope he doesn’t come to pick me up at school this afternoon.

  He doesn’t. It’s Lise who comes. We don’t see the policeman, so maybe he listened to our mom and is spying on us from some hiding spot. At dinnertime, Lise and I are allowed to watch TV, which is how we’re getting updates on Dad. He was spotted on a country road. A woman says that she was afraid of him but that he didn’t harm her; he just wanted her to drive him to—

  Mom shuts off the TV without a word. Lise takes me to her room. As I climb the stairs, I turn my head and see my mom with her face in her hands.

  That night, I sleep in Lise’s room.