Allegedly

by Tiffany D. Jackson

  “These things are mad big,” he says, smiling as he picks up a can of tomato sauce. It’s the size of a basketball. He tosses it lightly in the air, catching it one-handed. “I can sell this shit. I need all the money I can get.”

  Ted puts the can in his bag and leans his head against the wall, eyes closed with this pained expression.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask.

  He winces, opening one eye to peak at me. He doesn’t want to tell me, but does anyway.

  “I gotta leave the house,” he says.

  My heart sinks, the weight of those words like stones.

  “What? Why! I thought they said you could stay after you turned eighteen.”

  “That was only ’cause they liked me. But social services came in and said they needed the bed.”

  Ted is eighteen, death age for kids like us. He is out of the system, which means they don’t have to house him anymore. He’s on his own.

  “Where you gonna go?”

  Ted shakes his head. “I don’t know. I’ll . . . figure something out.”

  He laughs a little, his hands shaking.

  “You know the fucked up part. PO told me I still gotta check in every day, ’cause I’m still on house arrest. How I’m gonna be on house arrest and ain’t got no fucking house to live at! Said they gonna talk to my moms . . . that bitch don’t fucking want me either!”

  He pauses, then throws a can across the room. It crashes into some pots on the metal counter.

  “Some fucking bullshit! They kick me out on the street with no fucking job, but if I do some shit to put a little bread in my pocket, they gonna fucking lock me up again! What the fuck they expect me to do! And then there’s you . . . yo, you realize if you were white, you wouldn’t even be in this shit? They would’ve said you were one of those crazy white kids, like the ones who shoot up schools and shit, and sent your ass back home! But now, I can’t do nothing to save you!”

  He throws another can at the stove, the crash ear piercing.

  “FUCK!”

  There is so much pain behind his scream, so much frustration. He steps a few feet away from me, his back turned, breathing heavy. He doesn’t want me to see him cry. I stand there, not knowing what else to say other than what I came to say.

  “We should do it. Tonight.”

  “Do what?” he mumbles.

  “Run away.”

  He sniffs and whips around.

  “You kidding? In this storm?”

  “It’s not gonna be a big storm, maybe just some rain.”

  “They shutting down the trains and buses in two hours.”

  “So we’ll walk.”

  He shakes his head, like he can see right through my front. “What’s wrong, Mary? Did something happen?”

  I want to tell him about Kelly. About the look she gave me. About how even though I’m pregnant, nothing will stop her from killing me. But the less he knows, the better. He has enough to worry about.

  “It’s perfect,” I say with a straight face. “No one will notice we’re gone.”

  Ted nods, doubt in his eyes. He rubs my arms then holds me.

  “Aight. Whatever you want. I’m down.”

  The sky is a swirl of black and gray, the color of smoke. The wind slaps my face as I walk over twenty blocks back to the group home. The bus driver stopped mid-route, talking about how the wind was going to blow the bus over.

  By the time I’m inside, the sun is long gone. Then the rain starts, on and off and on again like a summer shower. I think about Momma, about the time she said she was in a tornado.

  “It was the scariest moment of my life! I thought I was gonna whip into the air and never come back down. It sounds just like people say, like a choo-choo train coming!”

  The wind whipping around the house sounds no different. It shakes all the windows and doors, whistling through the cracks, begging us to come out and play. New Girl and I hide in our room, away from Hurricane Kelly. Kelly has spoken no more than two words to anyone since she walked in the door. Her silence is louder than the wind.

  New Girl jumps at every howl and clatter. She leaps from her bed and sits in the chair propped up against the dresser.

  “We should stay away from the windows. In case they break and shatter in our faces.”

  I nod, moving farther down my bed, imagining the shards flying into our eyes, blinding us. My leg brushes against the small bag I packed for my escape. A toothbrush, deodorant, an extra pair of jeans, two shirts, my hoodie, and five pairs of underwear. Momma always said don’t ever let people catch you with dirty drawers. I want to take my SAT book, but it would be too heavy to carry. Who knows how far we’ll have to walk.

  The glass trembles violently in its frame. This is bad. And I’m supposed to meet Ted at eleven o’clock. It’s 9:15 and it sounds like the end of the world outside. The thought of Ted walking out there . . . I’d kill myself if anything happened to him because of me. Lightning sparks, flashing . . . camera bulbs, like in front of the courthouse. Why so many people? Where’s Momma?

  “What did you say?” New Girl asks.

  I don’t know. What did I say?

  My tongue rolls to the back of my throat and I shake my head.

  New Girl trembles. “You remember Katrina, right?”

  I remember. Momma and I watched it on CNN. There were reports of COs shooting prisoners and using their dead bodies to float on. If that happens here, I’ll be the first raft they’ll pick.

  Lights flicker and the glass shakes again. New Girl clutches the red flashlight Ms. Reba gave her.

  “If something happens, you won’t leave me,” she blurts out. “Right?”

  With a heavy heart, I glance down at my backpack and sigh. “Where am I going to go?”

  The corner of her mouth slips into a small smirk. “Let’s go to the basement. I want to see what’s happening out there.”

  We tiptoe downstairs, passing the TV room, where the rest of the girls watch some movie with Ms. Stein and Ms. Reba. Kelly peers over her shoulder, locking eyes on us. New Girl grabs my hand and we run.

  The basement is a freezer, but at least the wind isn’t as crazy. Upstairs, it sounds like the Apocalypse, the end of the world, like in the Bible.

  New Girl boots up the computer and I sit next to her. A little gray mouse runs by our feet. She scrolls through pictures people have been posting on websites. Red Hook, under water; Rockaway Beach, under water; lights out in half the city; cars floating down Fourteenth Street to underwater parking lots.

  “Didn’t they see the water coming?” I ask. “Why didn’t they move their cars?”

  “It comes fast,” she says.

  “Can’t be that fast.”

  THUMP! New Girl shrieks. What was that! Kelly? No, something bumped into the storm door. Relieved, I exhale but New Girl fidgets.

  “Mary, you can’t hide forever. You have to do something. You have to tell someone what really happened.”

  Muscles tighten around my neck and I shake my head.

  “I can’t. They won’t . . . understand.”

  “You can’t do this alone. You need a grown-up that the other grown-ups will listen to. The lawyers at the Absolution Project . . . they can help you.”

  What if they don’t believe me? What if they do? Can they save me and Bean? And Momma, what will happen to her?

  Another THUMP hits the door that makes us both jump.

  “It sounds bad out there,” I whisper, thinking of Ted.

  She sighs. “Well, at least we still have power.”

  As if on cue, the lights flicker and shut off. Upstairs, the girls’ screams fill the darkness.

  “Reba, what the hell!” Ms. Stein hollers. “Get that generator working!”

  New Girl’s hands tremble around the flashlight. The dark never bothered me. I always found it peaceful.

  Ms. Reba runs down the stairs with her heavy feet, a flashlight strapped to her head like a miner. Between that and her orange safety vest, she looks ridiculo
us.

  “Hey! What are you two doing down here?” she asks, rushing to the storm door. She unlocks the door and the wind throws it open, clocking her in the face. Icy water rushes in, wrapping around my ankles. New Girl screams. Ms. Reba curses and tries to close the door. In the quick second her flashlight shines outside, I catch a glimpse of the backyard. I hope I’m seeing things, because there is a lake out there that wasn’t there this morning.

  A waterfall pours in, fast and freezing. Ms. Reba pushes chairs and branches out of the way and finally shoves the door closed, but the water is still rising.

  “What’s going on down there?” Ms. Stein hollers from upstairs.

  “The basement is flooding,” Ms. Reba says, setting a light flash up toward the ceiling.

  “What!” The girls react but no one dares to come downstairs.

  “Sarah, go upstairs and get some pots and buckets. Mary, start moving stuff to the stairs. We need some sandbags. Everyone, it’s all hands on deck!”

  “The computers, Mary,” New Girl whispers to me, pointing the flashlight toward the corner. She’s right, if they get wet, Ms. Stein will never replace them. I nod and splash toward them as she runs upstairs behind Ms. Reba.

  The power is off so it’s safe to unplug them. I wrap the cords around the monitors and lift. Damn, it’s heavy. Maybe I’ll start with the keyboard and mouse . . .

  Then, something yanks my ponytail and I fall backward so fast I don’t have time to scream. I’m underwater! I can’t breathe! I can’t tell which way is up or down. My head pokes out just long enough to see what’s holding me.

  Kelly.

  With a nasty grin, she shoves my head back under. Water burns up my nose as I scream, struggling against her weight, thrashing and choking, reaching for anything.

  Kelly is so strong. Probably won’t even break a nail as she kills me. I kick the floor, trying to get my balance until I feel her dragging me, more dirty water clogging my mouth. She launches me and THUMP! My head hits the door and I fall back into the water with a flop. I can’t see . . . water in my eyes . . . my head . . . I’m dizzy.

  Get up! Get up! Run!

  I scramble to my feet, gasping and coughing for air as she punches me dead in the face. The world is spinning . . . black spots . . . buzzing. She pins me against the door and I try to kick her . . . until I feel something sharp pressing against my stomach and freeze. The blade kisses my skin.

  “Say anything,” she whispers. “And I’ll cut it out of you.”

  Bean! Bean! I’m so sorry, Bean!

  “Please,” I choke, trembling. “Don’t.”

  Kelly grasps the back of my neck with her cold hand, forcing me to look at her, to stare deep into her eyes. The eyes of a real killer. Then the knife is gone. She shoves me one last time before walking away, as if nothing ever happened and the darkness becomes darker.

  chapter eight

  Notes from Dr. Jin-Yee Deng,

  Psychiatrist at Bellevue Hospital, NY

  Over the eight months she stayed at our facility, Mary never said a word. Even when her mother came to visit, she remained mute and detached. Then, in July, on a regular Wednesday morning, Mary began talking to colleagues and nurses. She was lighthearted, almost playful. It was a break from her psychosis. Unsure if we would witness this type of activity again, we spoke in depth. Over the course of four hours, we learned more than we had in eight months. Maybe more than we’ll ever learn again.

  A week after the storm, with the blade pointed at Bean still fresh in my mind, Cora Fisher takes my call and schedules an appointment on a Saturday without hesitation.

  The office for the Absolution Project is in Manhattan, which is a big deal. Whenever we went to the city when I was a kid, Momma would starch and press our Sunday best, scrub behind my ears, and pick the dirt from under my nails until they bled. She’d tie special ribbons in my hair and slick my face, elbows, and knees down with Vaseline.

  “Don’t want nobody thinking we live in no ghetto.”

  So I couldn’t help myself. I scrubbed under my nails, wrapped my hair in a bun, drowned my face with lotion, and put on the dress that didn’t fit me with my best pair of jeans underneath. I washed my laces in the sink last night with dish soap. They’re still damp as I slip them through my sneakers.

  I take New Girl with me since she seems to know all this legal stuff. She lets me borrow her long black sweater to go over my dress. At checkout, we ask if we can go into the city to help out at the food donation center. Ms. Reba lets us go. We take the train to midtown, passing the big Macy’s that takes up an entire city block. The sidewalks sparkle in the sun like diamonds baked into the ground. Even though we told Ms. Reba, I’m a little worried about my anklet. We’re all the way in the city; it has to be more than three miles. I figure the quicker we get to the meeting, the faster we can get back to Brooklyn before the marshals come searching for us. I pull New Girl along and walk faster.

  Security has our names at the front desk of a tall glass office building. We take the elevator to the twenty-eighth floor, our ears popping all the way up. New Girl knocks on Suite 2801, nervousness pinching me. A woman swings the door open, her smile dropping at the sight of the black eye Kelly left on me.

  “Hi, there,” she says, stunned, and I recognize her voice from the call. “Come on in.”

  My stomach drops back to the lobby. This is a mistake. Ms. Cora doesn’t look like a lawyer. She looks too young, like eighteen, dressed in loose jeans and a red sweater. And she is Indian, like the ones Momma says take all the jobs overseas. I don’t want another bad lawyer, though I never picked the first one. New Girl nudges my arm and walks in. I play it cool and follow.

  “I’m glad you could make it,” she says. “Right this way.”

  The office is very small and somewhat tidy with lots of polished cherrywood furniture and fake plants. There is a bookshelf with thick textbooks that look like encyclopedias. Just like the ones I used to read at Alyssa’s house. She leads us into a small conference room where a young white guy with thin black glasses is setting down a plate of cookies next to bottles of water.

  “This is Terry, my assistant. Terry, say hi to the pretty ladies.”

  “Pleasure meeting you,” he says, extending his hand. I don’t take it.

  We take our seats, quietly staring at each other, not knowing where to begin. I really want one of those cookies. They look delicious and I’m starving, but I don’t want to look greedy. She glances at me, then at the cookies, pushing the plate in my direction.

  “Here, please have one. Have more than one. They’re for you.”

  I hesitate, then take two. New Girl takes four.

  “Water,” Terry offers. I take a bottle. Fiji; that’s an island. Wonder if the water is really from there.

  “Well, first off, let me start by saying, I was glued to . . . just fascinated by your case from day one, when I first started law school in fact,” Ms. Cora says. “I think you had just turned nine. Oh, that means you had a birthday recently, right?”

  She knows my birthday. I don’t even think Momma knows my birthday.

  “Well, from the very start, I believed they mishandled your case, entirely,” she continues. “And the outright biased media coverage that persecuted you, a child, before you ever stepped into a courtroom . . . it was just unethical.

  “Now, I don’t know all the specifics but I feel your testimony—your true adult impression of the night’s events—could drastically change the outcome. But we must first have enough reasonable evidence to persuade the judge to consider an appeal. And that’s the hard part, getting a judge to consider reopening a case on a deceased infant.”

  “Alyssa,” I say.

  I hate when people refer to Alyssa as just a dead baby. She had a name.

  “Alyssa. Right.” She smiles. Terry fidgets in his chair.

  “Then after all that, I can be . . . emancipated. Right?”

  “Well, one step at a time,” Ms. Cora says.

&nb
sp; I sit back, sipping more water. Am I really about to do this? Am I really about to open up this can of worms and boxed-up secrets?

  Ms. Cora smiles at me. “Mary, what’s most important to you right now?”

  I rub my stomach, knowing what’s at the top of my list.

  “Keeping my baby.”

  “Okay, then that’s what we’ll fight for,” Ms. Cora says, knocking the table with her knuckle.

  “But . . . I don’t have any money.”

  “Let me worry about that for now.” She smiles, warm and genuine, but the hairs on my arms spike up.

  No one is this nice for no reason. It’s time to go! This is a trap. I mean, it doesn’t seem like she is trying to trick me, but I’ve been tricked before and I can’t make another mistake, not with Bean. But go where? Maybe New Girl’s right, I can’t go against the grown-ups alone. Maybe this lady really can help me.

  “Okay . . . what do I need to do?” I ask.

  “Well, first, I’d like you to tell me, from start to finish, what really happened that night.”

  I bite my tongue hard, swallowing the taste of blood. Does she mean, like, what REALLY happened? Why? I mean, I don’t know these people.

  “Mary, you can trust us,” Ms. Cora says. “We’re here to help.”

  She reaches across the table and tries to hold my hand. I snatch it back. Terry and she share a nervous glance. New Girl nudges my arm and nods at me.

  “Do it, Mary,” she says.

  My throat tightens, staring at these strangers. How could I tell them what really happened and have them not hate me?

  “You’ll think . . . I’m a horrible person.”

  Ms. Cora nods.

  “Mary, trust me,” she says. “The only way to change your circumstances is to change what you’ve been doing up to now. It’s scary, I know, but there’s no judgment. I’m here to help you, but the only way I can is if you tell me the truth.”

  That sounds a lot like what Ms. Claire told me.

  Change is scary. But can I trust her?

  Guess there’s only one way to find out.