Confessions of a Teenage Leper

by Ashley Little

  “Does he have any friends there? Does he know anyone there?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Okay. Thanks, Aaron.”

  “So, he just took off? You guys haven’t heard from him?”

  “No. He hasn’t called or texted anyone.”

  “Hm,” Aaron said.

  “Can you call me if you think of anything else? Or if he tries to get in touch with you? My parents are literally losing their minds.”

  “I will for sure.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Hey, Abby?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Um, could you text me? Like, once you hear from him or once he’s back or whatever. Just so…you know…”

  “Okay,” I said. “I will.”

  “Cool. Okay. I’m sure he’s okay.”

  “Yeah…”

  “I gotta jet.”

  “Alright. Thanks, Aaron.”

  “See ya later. Good luck.” He hung up.

  It was not much, but it was something. It was the only real information anyone had given me all day that was possibly of any use. I wrote SAN FRANCISCO across my mirror in pink lipstick so I wouldn’t forget in the morning. Then I fell into bed and had a fitful sleep full of dreams where I was drowning or else trying to save someone from drowning, or both.

  I called Mom first thing the next morning and told her what Aaron had said about San Francisco.

  “Okay,” she said. “We’ll let the police know.”

  “Alright.”

  “Thanks, Abby.” She hung up.

  I tried Dean’s cell again. Same thing. If he would just check his stupid voice mail and there became room in the mailbox again, then at least I would know he was alive. But the mailbox was full, and it remained that way.

  The next day was Wednesday, and it was a long day. I felt weaker than usual, nauseous, and Scott had to do laundry during his free period so we couldn’t hang out. Jane and I played cards after we got back from the clinic, but I couldn’t concentrate and lost every hand.

  “Yo, Earth to Abby,” she said. “Are you even here right now?”

  “Sorry. I’m…having a hard time focusing.”

  “Yeah, I noticed. What’s up with you, girl?”

  I sighed. I told her about Dean disappearing and not being in contact with anyone for nearly four days.

  “He’ll come back,” she said. “He’s just out sowing his wild oats.”

  “I don’t even know what that means,” I said.

  “Sowing your oats?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Everyone’s got wild oats to sow. You’ll sow yours one day too.”

  “Okay. Whatever.”

  “Look, I’m sure he’s fine. Try to relax. You’re just at the start of your recovery. It’s important that you minimize stress right now,” Jane said, shuffling the deck.

  “Easy for you to say! Your brother’s not missing!”

  “Okay. You gotta chill out.” She set the pile of cards aside. “Why don’t you go take a hot bath?”

  “I don’t have a bathtub.” I began to cry. “I hate it here! I don’t want to be here anymore, and I don’t even have a bathtub,” I sobbed.

  “Abby,” Jane said softly, “none of us want to be here.”

  I looked into her dark eyes, shining with hurt. She was right, of course. “I’m sorry,” I said, ashamed of myself.

  She bit her lip, nodded.

  My phone rang then. It was Mom. “I have to take this,” I said. “I’ll see you later, okay?”

  “Yep.” Jane turned away from me as I answered the phone. I left her apartment and went down the hall to mine.

  “Mom? What’s up?”

  “I’ve booked you a ticket on the overnight bus. You’re coming home tonight.”

  “Okay…?”

  “The police want to talk to you. We want to talk to you.”

  “Okay.” My hands started to shake. She knew. I could tell from her voice.

  “It leaves at 8:40 p.m.”

  “And you cleared it with Dr. Mike and everyone?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Family emergency.”

  “So…?”

  “Dad will pick you up in the morning. Try to get some sleep on the bus.”

  “Okay.”

  “See you tomorrow.” She hung up.

  The bus ride was terrible and seemed to last forever. I couldn’t sleep. Obviously. Can anyone sleep on an overnight bus? As the hours ticked by, I felt worse and worse. My skin got hot and rashy. I felt weak and sick and gross. The bus stank like dirty diapers and I wanted to vomit for most of the ride.

  I got into the station at six a.m. Dad was there, looking like he’d been on an overnight bus himself. He gave me a hug and took my bag.

  “So what’s going on?” I said when we were in the car, headed home.

  He looked over at me then back to the road. He sighed. “We’ll talk about it later. After you’ve had a rest and something to eat.”

  I closed my eyes. I was dizzy. When I opened them again we were in the driveway and Dad was opening my door. We went inside. He made me scrambled eggs and toast and juice and sat with me at the kitchen table while I ate. He gazed out the window. A crow hopped on the power line in front of our house. A garbage truck drove past.

  “Where’s Mom?”

  “Sleeping. She was up most of the night.”

  I nodded. Pushed my plate away.

  “Finished?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why don’t you go up to your room and rest for a few hours? The police will be here at nine.”

  “Dad?” I said, my voice shaking.

  “Yeah?”

  “Can you tell me what all this is about?”

  He looked down at the table and worried a spot in the wood with his thumbnail. “You remember James who I work with?”

  “The computer whiz guy?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Yeah, I remember him.”

  “Well, we had James do some looking around on Dean’s computer to see if we could get any insight into where he might be, and who he might be with.”

  “Oh.”

  My dad rubbed his eyes. They were red and watery.

  I stared at him. I wanted to cry. I know he did too.

  “Anyway,” he said. “We can talk about this later. Go sleep for a bit.”

  “Okay.” I went upstairs, took off my clothes and got into bed. I didn’t think I’d be able to get to sleep but I was wrong.

  When I woke up, Mom stood over my bed, watching me. It was a little freaky.

  “Hi, Mom,” I said, pulling up my covers.

  “Get dressed and come downstairs please. The police are here.”

  “Okay.”

  She kept standing there for a moment. I looked around the room, toward the door. “Okay,” she said, and left the room.

  Two police officers stood in our living room. A man and a woman. They introduced themselves to me. Officer Santiago, that was the man, and Officer Boylan, the woman. I shook their hands and we all sat down. Dad brought everyone coffee, and after that, they pretty much got right to the point.

  “We’ve come to understand that Dean was operating a webcam business out of this house,” Officer Santiago said.

  I looked at the carpet, feeling everyone’s eyes on me.

  “For the purpose of conducting sex acts in exchange for money,” he continued.

  Dad cleared his throat.

  “Did you know about this, Abby?” Mom said.

  I nodded, staring down at my hands.

  “Why didn’t you tell us? Why didn’t you tell SOMEONE?” Mom screamed at me, her face scarlet. “YOU SHOULD HAVE TOLD US, ABBY! You should have TOLD US!”

  Dad shushed her and pulled her close and she crumpled against his chest, convulsing with sobs, her throat hoarse from already crying so much.

  The worst part was, I didn’t know how to answer her. Maybe I never will.

  “How long have you been aware of the ex
istence of your brother’s webcam business?” Officer Santiago said.

  “Not long,” I said. “A few weeks?”

  “Do you know how long your brother has been conducting his business for?”

  “No.” I shook my head.

  “TWO YEARS, ABBY!” my mom screamed at me. “OVER TWO YEARS! That means he was a child selling sex to adults. To…to pedophiles! My child.” She broke down again, her body wracked with sobs.

  “I didn’t know,” I whispered.

  There are things I’ve done that I’m ashamed of. There are things I’ve done that I regret. But I knew not telling anyone about Dean was bigger than all of those things combined. And that if anything had happened to him, I would never forgive myself.

  The police asked me more questions while Mom and Dad sat on the couch, glaring at me. Did I know any of the clients? Did I know the names or locations of any of the clients? Did Dean talk about any of his clients in particular? Did he ever talk about meeting any of them in person? Did he get offers to meet them in person? Was I involved in the webcam business in any way? And more and more and more questions.

  I answered all of them as best as I could, but really, I didn’t know anything. I told them what Aaron had told me. That Dean thought he could be happy in San Francisco. Officer Boylan nodded and wrote in her notepad. They told us that they were going to seize Dean’s hard drive and all of his computer equipment and turn it over to the FBI. The FBI would work on getting the transaction history from before Dean turned eighteen so they could try to build a case to prosecute all of his clients during that time.

  “If or when Dean returns home,” Officer Boylan said, “we’re going to want him to testify against the clients he had as a minor.”

  “When,” Mom said, gritting her teeth. “Not if.”

  Officer Boylan nodded once, and looked at Officer Santiago. Then Officer Santiago drilled me with another round of questions.

  When they were finally done, I felt more exhausted than I ever had in my life. Dad walked them to the door. Mom stared at me, hard, while I pulled my legs up to my chest and tried not to fall apart.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  She shook her head. Her eyes were puffy and bloodshot. She hated me. I could tell.

  I felt cold and shaky and nauseous. My head hurt. Everything hurt.

  “Go back to bed, Abby,” she said. “You look like hell.”

  I got up again in the late afternoon. The three of us ordered a pizza and watched TV while we ate it. I could barely eat, I felt so weak. I knew they both hated me, and I didn’t blame them. I had a bath, because I could, and went back to bed. I slept without dreaming and woke up in a cold sweat, shivering and blistering and wanting to die.

  I didn’t want to go back to Carville the next day, but I had to, because I’d had a reaction. A reaction happens because the drugs are killing all of the leprosy bacteria (which is a good thing) and your body is allergic to the dead bacteria floating around in your system. All your joints hurt so bad that it’s painful to stand or walk or sit or even be in bed. You get massive headaches, your skin puffs up and you get more lesions and basically look and feel like a pile of crap. Nobody knows exactly what brings on reactions (not everyone gets them), but it probably has something to do with stress.

  So Mom and Dad drove their leprous daughter back to the clinic in Louisiana, not knowing if they had lost their only son. I curled up in the back seat because it hurt too much to sit up. We didn’t talk, we didn’t listen to music, we didn’t eat sunflower seeds or M&M’s. We just sat together in the car for seven hours, bearing the impossible weight of our sadness.

  As soon as I got back, they started me on a new steroid treatment that was supposed to calm down the reaction. I slept for the rest of the day and all through the night and woke up Saturday, hoping with everything in me that while I’d been sleeping Dean had come home, or they had at least heard from him.

  There was no news.

  I got a muffin and juice from the kitchen then went for a little walk. Dr. Mike had told me that getting a bit of exercise would increase my circulation and help my body to heal faster. I was determined to walk for at least twenty minutes, even though I was super weak and exhausted. I found Scott, reading under a pecan tree by the lake.

  “Hey, Tex!” He stood up when he saw me. He moved in to give me a hug.

  “Better not,” I said, backing away. “I’m really sore today.”

  “Oh,” he said. “Okay.” He shoved his hands in his pockets. “Where have you been? I missed you.”

  “My brother’s still missing, and the police wanted to talk to me, so I went home.”

  “Oh no. Are you okay?”

  “Not really.”

  “Sorry, stupid question.”

  “Yeah.”

  “How long has he been gone for now?”

  “Gone? You make it sound like he’s dead.”

  “That’s not what I meant, Abby. Come on.”

  “Okay. Whatever.” I took a deep breath. “I’m just…yeah. Today will be the sixth day.”

  “Oh, man. That’s…”

  “Yeah, look, I should go,” I said as tears pricked my eyes.

  “Do you have to? I was just going to take the rowboat out for a spin.”

  We both looked over at the old rowboat. It looked like a rickety hunk of junk.

  “Good luck with that,” I said.

  “Thanks,” he said. “Okay, well, I guess I’ll see you at dinner then?”

  “Okay.” I turned away from him and walked back to my apartment as fast as I could. I wanted to be away from everyone in a dark cool room where I could breathe. And cry.

  Why was Scott so nice to me anyway? It didn’t make sense. Sometimes I wanted to scream at him, “GET AWAY FROM ME! I’M A LEPER!”

  There had to be something seriously wrong with that guy for him to like me.

  I tried to nap, but it was so uncomfortable to have my body touching the sheets that I couldn’t stay in bed for very long. I took a long, hot shower and felt a little better. I wanted to do something but not with people around. I decided to visit the Carville library. I thought maybe I could find a really good book that could take my mind off everything, or at least help me relax a little bit. If that failed, I hoped they would at least have some old issues of Cosmo kicking around. Dr. Mike had said the same thing Jane had, that I needed to eliminate stress from my life, as much as possible, if I wanted my body to calm down and for the disease to go away. Which I did, obviously. But with Dean MIA (and quite possibly hacked up into little pieces inside someone’s freezer) and the dead leprosy bugs floating around inside me, I was finding it difficult to eliminate stress from my life.

  On my way to the library I saw Lester and Grace.

  “Hello,” Grace said. She didn’t know who I was, only that someone was passing them in the long corridor.

  “Hi, guys,” I said.

  Lester grinned. “That’s our girl. Where you been, honey? You missed Mardi Gras!”

  “Yeah,” I said. “My brother’s missing, so I had to go home.”

  “Oh, Lord.” Lester’s hand flew to his heart. “We are so sorry to hear that.”

  Grace shook her head. “That’s terrible news, Abby.”

  “Yep,” I said. “Pretty much.”

  “Listen,” Grace said. “We were just on our way home to have some tea and cookies. Why don’t you join us?”

  “I really shouldn’t. I have to—”

  “Come on,” Lester said. “They’re chocolate chip, your favorite!”

  “How did you know that’s my favorite?”

  “Because that’s everybody’s favorite!” Lester laughed.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t really feel like talking right now. No offense.”

  “Tell you what, you do the seeing, we’ll do the talking,” Lester said.

  I smiled.

  “Deal?”

  “Okay, deal,” I said.

  I followed them to thei
r little cottage. The hens and the turkey clucked around in the backyard. Lester and Grace said hello to the fowl and checked that they were all inside the fence, then we went inside. Grace made the tea and set a blue teapot on the table. Then she took a plate of cookies out of a cupboard and set that on the table. Lester brought over three teacups and saucers. All three had different flowers on them. He arranged each cup so that it matched the flowers on its saucer. I have no idea how he did that. Maybe it was a coincidence. Maybe there were tiny chips and bumps on each cup, like a Braille code, so that he would know which one matched which saucer. I didn’t ask, because sometimes things like that are better left unknown.

  We each had a cookie. The chocolate chunks were big and gooey and still warm.

  “These are really good,” I said.

  “Grace made them special,” Lester said.

  “Oh. Is it a special occasion?”

  “It’s Saturday!” Grace said, then laughed.

  “That’s as good a reason as any, I guess,” I said.

  I took a sip of my tea. The flowers on my cup were magnolias, the state flower of Louisiana. I don’t know why or how I knew that, but I did. I set the cup down and turned it in its saucer. It was strange being with Grace and Lester. People I would have never met, never talked to or even given a second glance. It was weird to think of all the events that had led up to me being in that moment with them, sitting at their kitchen table, starting with the church barbecue, nearly seven years ago. If a magnolia tree had been planted the day I ate the armadillo, it would only just be blooming for the first time.

  “Abby?” Lester said. “Did you hear what Grace said?”

  I looked up. “No.” I coughed into my hand. “Sorry. What?”

  “I had a brother who died, too,” Grace said.

  “My brother’s not dead,” I said. “He’s missing.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry,” she said, flustered. “I got mixed up.”

  “I mean, I guess he could be dead…” I swallowed my tea and choked on it a little. Saying it felt so wrong. Like it would somehow make it true. I knocked on the wooden table, wishing I hadn’t said it out loud.