She got her tears out of the way on the ride. So that, on the off chance Teddy picked up his phone this time, he wouldn’t have to hear her cry. It wasn’t likely he’d pick up. He hadn’t any of the other nine times she’d called. But somehow she thought he might this time. Because she so desperately needed him to.
Then she realized she hadn’t brought the phone card with her. But it didn’t matter. Because she knew the card number and the pin by heart.
“This is Ted—”
Everything fell inside Carly. Sagged into the lowest possible position. She sat on her bike, feet down on the pavement, in front of the pay phone. Absorbing the letdown. Shivering slightly. It took her a couple of beats too long to realize she should have been hearing the second sentence of the outgoing greeting.
“Hello? Ted here. Anybody there?”
“Teddy?”
“Yeah. Who’s this?”
“Teddy, it’s me. Carly.”
“Carly? Why didn’t you say anything? Why didn’t you say hello?”
“I thought you were your voice mail. That’s exactly what you say on your voice mail message. It sounds exactly the same.”
“Oh. Really? I didn’t know. Just a habit, I guess.”
A silence. One of the young women from the ice-cream store waved at Carly as she walked by, her heels clicking on the concrete. Everybody knew Carly in this town because of all the time she killed here. Trying not to go home.
It was already dusk, she realized. She’d have to ride home in the dark. If she dared go home at all.
She spoke. Since Teddy didn’t.
“I’m sorry I called so many times. I don’t want you to think I’m a freak. I’m not a stalker. Normally I’d just tell you to call me back. But you can’t call me back.”
“No, that wouldn’t be too smart. I got your new address. Thanks for leaving that on my voice mail. I’m worried, though. About all the calls you’re making to here. What if your mom sees these on the phone bill?”
“I’m calling from a pay phone. I’m using a prepaid card.”
“Ah. Good. Smart. She’d make trouble for me if she knew you were calling.”
“I know she would.”
Another silence.
“Are you OK, Carly? You don’t sound so good.”
“I can’t stay here,” she said. Her voice cracking on the word here. “It’s not even safe here. I can’t even go back there tonight, Teddy. I don’t know what to do.”
She couldn’t not cry, so she cried quietly.
“God, Carly. I don’t know what to say to help. I wish I could help. But if you run away from home, you can’t come here. This is the worst place you could come. This is the first place they’d look for you.”
“Oh,” Carly said. “Right.”
Another loss to absorb. She’d really felt somehow, at some deep level, that if Teddy answered the phone, he’d save her. She could just pour herself over the phone line to Tulare. And he would never let bad things happen to her again. But he was right. She couldn’t go to him. They’d find her. Bring her back. They’d make trouble for Teddy, and it would be all her fault.
And yet…somehow she felt just a tiny bit saved. Anyway. Even his voice could save her. At least, for the moment. For as long as it lasted. She didn’t even feel cold anymore.
“So…where are you living?” she asked.
“Oh. Nowhere.”
“How can you be living nowhere?”
“Well. I’m somewhere. I mean, I sleep somewhere. But it’s not my place. I’m sort of couch surfing right now. Freeloading.”
“Are you working again?”
“Yeah. I have to. I have no choice.”
“How’s your back?”
She didn’t like her own questions. They felt like small talk. But she didn’t know how to change that.
“Not good. But I can’t afford not to work. So I’m back with Ralph. He’s throwing me a couple or three days work a week. That’s pretty much all he’s got to give me right now anyway. You know. With the economy so bad.”
“Right. Right.”
“You sure you’re OK? Is this, like…an emergency?”
Carly shifted on the bike seat. Stretched her back slightly, as if to assess the damage. The pain stopped her cold. A little cry escaped her.
“What was that, Carly?”
“Nothing. Something just surprised me.”
She couldn’t tell him. It wouldn’t be fair. He didn’t have his own place, and she couldn’t stay there even if he did. He wasn’t in any position to help her. So it wasn’t fair to tell him how badly she needed help.
“You know…it’s only another year and a half until I turn eighteen. And then I’m coming back to Tulare. I mean, the day I turn eighteen. The same day. I’m moving back. And I’ll get a job, and we’ll live pretty close together, you know? And then maybe I can see you all the time.”
“I’d love that, Carly.” Said with depth. With genuine feeling that oozed through the phone and blanketed her. Soothed her.
“You would?”
“Yeah, that’d be great. I’d love to hang out with you. I’d come by after work and say, Hey, you. Want to go get a burger? And we could complain about our days or our crappy bosses or something. Well. Not really. Ralph’s a nice guy. You could complain about your crappy boss. I could complain about something else.”
“I just miss you so much, Teddy.”
Something caught Carly’s eye in her peripheral vision. She shifted carefully on the bike seat to see Jen sitting on her bike. Maybe ten feet away. Close enough to hear everything. Jen had that same look on her face. The doorway look.
Teddy? Jen mouthed the word.
Carly waved the question away. Then she realized she hadn’t heard Teddy’s answer. Had he said he missed her, too?
“So, listen, I should go,” she said, “but when you get a real address, e-mail it to me. OK?”
“You still have that crappy dinosaur of a laptop?”
“No, that crashed. But there’s an Internet café. And the library has computers. So I can check my e-mail, and they’ll never know.”
She glanced at Jen’s shocked face again, then back at the concrete. “OK,” Teddy said. “It’s a deal.”
“Promise?”
“Yeah. I promise.”
“I love you, Teddy.”
“Hey, you gonna be OK?”
“I guess. I have to be. What choice do I have?”
“It’s not a real emergency? Because I can hear something’s wrong.”
“Nope. Not a real emergency.”
“Well. If it ever is, I’m your guy.”
“I know that, Teddy. I know you are. That’s why I love you.”
“Take care, Carly.”
“Bye, Teddy.”
She hung up the phone gently. Cradled it back into position. As if it were tender. Easily wounded. As though it were the phone receiver that needed love and protection. Not her.
She looked up at Jen, who scooted her bike closer.
“Mom would kill you if she knew you were talking to Teddy.”
“I know. Don’t tell her.”
“You OK?”
“No.”
“How’s your back?”
“Bad.”
“Can I see it?”
“No.”
“Please?”
Carly sighed. Leaned forward. Jen lifted the back of Carly’s shirt. Carly heard Jen’s breath suck in. A deep gasp.
“It’s all scraped up, and it’s got your shirt all bloody. And it’s getting really bruised really fast.”
“Don’t tell Mom.”
“About Teddy?”
“About anything.”
“Oh. Um…I’m sorry, Carly. I already told her you got hurt. I called her at work and told her. She wants us to come there. Not go home. I’m sorry, I didn’t think you wouldn’t want me to tell her. Why wouldn’t you want me to tell her?”
“I just think it might make things even worse with
Wade.”
“But I told on him. You didn’t. I’ll tell him it was me. She’ll tell him it was me.”
“I guess.”
“Come on. Let’s go over to Mom’s work.”
Carly pedaled behind Jen, trying to keep up. But the pain on every push overwhelmed her. Was she in a lot more pain now than on the ride into town? Or had she really managed to keep that down, where it couldn’t get in her way?
That’s when she looked down at her left wrist. It had swelled to two or three times its normal size. She could see the perfect prints of Wade’s fingers in a fresh purple bruise.
Carly’s mom towed her into the break room in the back of the Stop-n-Shop Market. By the elbow. Jen tumbled along behind.
“I’m sorry, Lara,” she said to the only other employee in the room. “I know she’s not supposed to be in here…”
“It’s OK,” Lara said. “Do what you gotta do.”
“It’s her back,” Jen said.
“And what about this? This is nothing?”
She held Carly’s left arm up for Jen to see.
“Oh. I didn’t know that part.”
Carly felt herself turned around. The back of her shirt lifted. Again.
“Shit,” her mom whispered on a long exhale.
Carly heard Lara suck in her breath. Pretty much the way Jen had.
“Carly.” Her mom spun her back around and grabbed her hard by both shoulders. It hurt. Her shoulders and her back. Both. “Listen up. Do I need to be taking you to a hospital?”
Carly shook her head.
Her mom’s eyes snapped shut.
“My eyes are closed, Carly. I can’t see you. I can’t see you nod your head or shake it. So you have to talk to me. You want to stop talking to me again a minute later, fine. But right now, talk to me. Do we need to get you to an emergency room or an urgent care place?”
“No,” Carly said.
“You sure?”
“No.”
Carly’s mom opened her eyes.
“You’re not sure?”
“I think it’ll be OK, but I’m not sure.”
“Then I’ll ask you again tomorrow. OK?” Carly nodded.
“Shit. Lost her again.”
“You need to go home, Jocelyn?” Lara asked. “Take care of this? We’ll get by.”
“That’s not fair to you and Tom.”
“We’ll manage. Really.”
“I can’t afford that, though.”
“Jocelyn. I think this might be more important.”
“Oh. Yeah. Yeah, of course. You’re right. This is more important.”
“They just keep going around and around in a circle,” Jen said.
They lay close together on a twin bed in the corner of the tiny house. Behind a standing screen. Both the screen and the bed were on loan from Wade Two. The fold-out couch hadn’t panned out because it wouldn’t fit behind a screen.
Carly didn’t know how long they’d been listening to the fight in the bedroom. Twenty minutes maybe.
“Why don’t they just stop if they can’t say anything new?”
“Because she’s not going to leave him over this,” Carly said. “So she has to make it into something she doesn’t have to leave him over. And she’s not there yet.”
“Did you do what he said? Bait him about being unemployed?”
“He started it.”
“Geez, Carly. Are you trying to get killed?”
“He was baiting me. Until I couldn’t take it anymore. Just like he says I did to him. But when I lost my temper, all I did was talk.”
“I know he was lying about how you just fell back. I saw him push you.”
“Did you tell her that?”
“Yeah. But she kept saying it might be hard to tell the two apart. You know. Just by looking.”
“Great. See? What did I tell you? She’s not going to leave him over this.”
After another half hour of muffled shouting and a few moments of ghostly quiet, Carly’s mom stomped into the room, pulled aside the blind, and turned on the lamp by their bed.
Carly winced and covered her eyes.
“I’m considering this half your fault, Carly. I don’t know what the hell you were thinking, talking to him like that about his job situation. Don’t you know a man doesn’t feel like a man when he’s not working? When somebody else has to provide? This is at least half on you, girl. But I made it real clear he’s never to lay a hand on you again. And if he does, we’re out of here.”
“We know,” Jen said. “We heard every word of it.”
“You keep out of this, Jen. But I know you, Carly. And I know you’d use that as a way to get what you want. So here’s the deal. You never say a word to Wade again. Ever. About anything. Got that? You break that rule, you’re on your own. You keep your mouth shut, I’ll protect you. OK?”
Carly said nothing.
“A nod will do.”
Carly nodded. Barely.
“Right. Should’ve known. Keeping her mouth shut is what Carly does best.”
She stomped away again.
“Turn off the light, Jen, OK? It’s in my eyes.”
“OK, Carly. You want some aspirin?”
“Yeah. Thanks.”
“Funny Mom didn’t think of that.”
“Not really,” Carly said. “I don’t think it’s so funny. Mom thinks about men. And not too much else.”
NEW MEXICO
April 30
Carly woke suddenly. Sat up in the dark. She looked over to find Jen already awake. Sitting on the edge of the narrow twin bed.
Something had gone crash in the bedroom.
“How long have they been fighting?” Carly asked.
“I think it’s a new record. I can’t believe you slept through it.”
“Can you tell what it’s about?”
“Not really. All I’ve got so far is Mom thinks Wade’s a bastard, and he thinks he’s totally justified. I still can’t really tell why she thinks he’s bastard.”
“Was it ever in doubt?”
Jen didn’t answer. Or laugh. Or even smile.
“What time’s it? Do you know?”
“Last time I went in the kitchen it was one thirty. So maybe two.”
Carly sat up on the edge of the bed next to her sister and listened.
The bedroom door flew open, banging against the wall. Both girls scooted straight backward on the bed. They couldn’t see through the screen, so they had no idea what was hurtling in their direction. But they could hear.
The screen flew away and fell to the floor with a startling bang.
Their mother stood over the bed.
“Get dressed, girls, and get your things together as fast as you can. We’re leaving.”
“No,” Wade said. “I don’t think you are.”
They all three looked up to see him standing with his back to the door, that look of eerie calm in his eye. Carly could see just enough of his face in the spill of light from the bedroom to ice every inch of her torso.
Nothing moved, and no one spoke for a long time. Or at least it seemed long. Carly looked at her mother’s face and saw fear. She tried to remember if she had ever seen her mother visibly afraid of anything. Nothing came to mind.
“Is that a threat, Wade? Are you telling me you’re going to do something bad to me or my girls if we try to walk out that door?”
Time slowed to a crawl, leaving Carly unable to tell if five seconds or five minutes had passed. Probably five very slow seconds.
“Jocelyn,” Wade said. “Baby. This is me, baby. This is us. Don’t walk out on us. After all we’ve been for each other? I can’t believe you’d walk away. We just need to talk is all.”
“We been at it for hours, Wade.”
“Yelling. Gimme an hour talking. Lemme remind you what we mean to each other. Then—I swear—you wanna walk out that door, I won’t stand in your way.”
Another time freeze.
Don’t do it, don’t do it, don’
t do it, Carly thought. She almost said it out loud. But she stopped herself because it might set him off. She could feel the frozen energy of Jen just inches from her right shoulder.
Carly watched the air go out of her mom. Watched her grow smaller and less rigid. She slumped down onto the couch.
“Talk, then.”
“Not in front of them.”
“Then where’d you have in mind?”
“We’ll go for a drive. Like we used to. Remember how we used to go out for a drive and just talk?”
Nothing moved for a long minute. This time Carly counted off the seconds. So time couldn’t play any tricks on her. She counted to fifty-seven.
Their mom rose to her feet.
“Girls, I’m going for a drive with Wade. Be back in an hour. While I’m gone, you gather up all your stuff. Get it ready to go. I know we don’t have boxes and nothing much in the way of suitcases, so use some kitchen trash bags, or just stack it all together so it’s easy to take out to the car. OK?”
“Sure, Mom,” Jen said.
“OK,” Carly said.
Wade and their mom walked out the door.
“God, that’s so depressing,” Jen said. “I can’t believe that’s all our stuff. What happened to all the stuff we used to have?”
“A lot got left in Tulare. And I think Wade threw stuff away. I heard him tell Mom once that when we leave stuff around, he throws it away and we never know the difference.”
“Geez. Thank God we’re getting out of here.”
“Maybe,” Carly said. “I’ll believe it when I see it.”
“She wouldn’t be having us get our stuff ready if we weren’t going.”
“We’ll see.”
“I’m so sleepy I can’t stand it. I’m going back to bed.”
“Yeah, go ahead. What time’s it, anyway? It feels like more than an hour already.”
“I don’t know. Look in the kitchen.”
Carly squinted at the clock above the stove. It was nearly four thirty.
Carly sat bolt upright in bed. Light poured through the front windows. The screen still lay flat on the floor. The bedroom door hung open. Carly could see that the bedroom was empty.
She shook Jen by the shoulder. Hard.
“Huh? What?”
“Jen, wake up.”
Jen sat up blinking. “What? What time is it?”
“I don’t know. But it’s light. And they’re still not back.”
Walk Me Home Page 22