Stand Alone

by P. D. Workman

  “You’re hurt too. Have you ever had a concussion before?”

  Justine tried to nod, and regretted it.

  “Yes,” she admitted.

  “Well, you might have another. Besides the fact that you’re covered with road rash. You’re gonna be picking gravel out of your skin for weeks.”

  “Where’s Christian? I want to see Christian.”

  The paramedic talked in a low murmur to someone else.

  “Why don’t I take you to the hospital,” he suggested, “and we’ll sort it out there?”

  “No. Don’t want the hospital. I’m okay.”

  Justine staggered to her feet. The paramedic tried to stop her, but Justine threw off his hands.

  “No. Lemme alone. Where’s my board?”

  She could barely focus two feet in front of her, but someone put her skateboard into her hand. Justine closed her hands around it, feeling strengthened by the familiar touch.

  “Is it okay?” Justine questioned, looking the board over. It would be the perfect end to the day if her board was wrecked. She ran her hand over the wheels to get them spinning. Everything seemed to be in order. “I gotta go,” she said, putting the board on the sidewalk. “I gotta get out of here.”

  “You can’t go,” the paramedic told her. “You’re hurt. You’re sick. Stay here and let us get you fixed up.”

  Justine shook her head dizzily.

  “No,” she insisted. She kicked off and started for home. In a moment, she had left the crowd behind.

  A couple of times she thought she saw, out of the corner of her eye, a police car trailing her. But her head was spinning and she couldn’t even think about it, let alone focus her eyes on it or hold a discussion with the police officer if he tried to talk to her. Twice she had to stop and puke again. When she finally got home, she threw up once more into Em’s tulips, and let herself into the house. The doorbell rang a few minutes later, but Justine lay down on the couch and refused to answer it.

  When Em got home an hour later, she exclaimed in horror over Justine’s condition.

  “I just fell down,” Justine told her. “I’m fine.”

  Em insisted on caring for her, cleaning up the road rash and the cuts, applying ice to anything with a lump on it, and chattering away about how Justine needed to take care of herself, and either stop skating or start wearing protective gear. She tried a few times to bully Justine into going to the hospital, but Justine steadfastly refused. She saw the ambulance taking Christian away. He was the one that was hurt, not her.

  “It’s nothing,” she insisted, “just a few scrapes.”

  “You’ve hurt your head. What if it’s serious? What if your brain swells or you have a clot or something? We have to take care of you.”

  “Just take care of me here, Mommy,” Justine pleaded. “Just take care of me at home.”

  For an instant, she had a clear vision of Em’s face, soft and loving, hovering over her. She never called Em Mommy, and that seemed to do the trick.

  “Okay, sweetie,” Em said finally. “Okay, you just lie still and rest there, and Mommy will take care of you.”

  CHAPTER 7

  SCHOOL HAD LET OUT for summer break, and Justine had enjoyed the first couple of weeks of total freedom like a starving man given water. Today she had been out skating most of the day, but she was keeping an eye on the time. Now she sped home to ensure that she beat Em to the house. Em’s car wasn’t yet in front of the house. Justine glanced up and down the street. No sign of her. Getting out her house key, Justine unlocked the door and let herself in. Inside the door, the mail was lying on the floor under the mail slot. Justine fingered through it. Mostly bills, but there was another envelope, one that Justine had been waiting for. She snagged it and left the house before Em could return home.

  She skated to the park and sat down. She slit the flap with her finger. This was it. This was the proof that she had been waiting for. Now she would be able to prove that she was not Justine, that Em had stolen her to replace the real Justine.

  Justine pulled out the single sheet in the envelope and unfolded it.

  “DNA profiling confirms that the two hair samples come from the same subject.”

  “What?” Justine said it aloud, she was so astonished.

  She looked at it again. She checked the name to make sure that the letter was addressed to her, and they hadn’t put the wrong letter in the envelope. It was her name on the letter. Justine had scraped together the money to pay for the DNA test, certain that it would prove her case. And instead, it was a dead end. Not inconclusive, or a matter of chances in a million, but a simple positive. She was Justine. The hair on her head matched the hair in Justine’s baby book.

  Could it have been true all along? Had Justine been wrong all these years? Were her feelings false?

  Justine crumpled that letter into a ball and threw it into the bushes. It didn’t make any sense. She just couldn’t understand it.

  Justine skated for a long time, pushing past the limits that she had reached previously. She had a thought that she might even break free of the city. Just leave, and skate off down the highway. But she didn’t. She just kept skating down random roads. Past parks and schools, malls, through residential neighborhoods. She didn’t stop for water fountains or breaks, didn’t stop to practice any tricks. Justine was lost. Not geographically, but emotionally. Where was she to go now? What was she to do?

  Justine wished fleetingly that there was some kind of skater community there. She and Christian had talked about what it must be like, in places like Los Angeles where there were so many skaters. You could get together with a whole group, wherever you went. People were used to seeing kids and young adults skating around the city. They were a thread in the weave of the city. But here  … there had been her and Christian, and now there was just her. There had to be other kids who skated, somewhere in the city, but there was no community. There were no skate parks. No skate shops. You had to order your board and equipment on the internet. There were some cheap kiddie boards at the big-box department stores, but nothing that was real quality. The internet was where she and Christian looked up new tricks too, studying videos of other skaters to figure out how to perform them. Sometimes they went to the library to watch the videos together. They never went to each other’s houses. Now and then Justine looked up a video or two at home, but they always re-watched them at the library, making sure not to leave the other person out of the loop.

  Justine bombed down a hill, watching carefully for traffic at the bottom. She didn’t even know why she cared any more. Why did it matter if she ended up in some horrible accident? Christian was gone. There was no one else.

  But somewhere out there, maybe she did have a mother, a father, even brothers and sisters  … Justine shook her head. No. The DNA test has proven that conclusively. She was Em’s daughter, and there was no one else. There was no other mother weeping over her. No father who missed her and longed for daddy-daughter dates. No brothers or sisters to fight with. There was just Em. Stifling, dictatorial Em. So what was Justine hanging onto now? There was nothing else to live for. No friends, no family, no future. What was the point in watching for trucks at the bottom of the road? If there was an accident, it would be a mercy.

  But still, she obeyed the traffic signals, watched for hazards, skated sensibly. She wasn’t reckless today, looking to hurt herself or to prove something. Today, she was sad. Lost. Intent on losing herself.

  Justine didn’t know how many miles from home she was. It was a long ways away. She supposed she could find her way back again when she wanted to. But why would she want to? Maybe it was time now. Time to just break free. To leave Em alone and to pursue her own life, somewhere else. Somewhere safe.

  It was growing dark. It had been a hot day, but the night air was taking on a chill already. It was going to be a cold night. Justine’s skin was sweaty; the sweat and the breeze caused by her skating, combined with the dropping temperature, made her shiver.
She started to look for somewhere to stop and hole up for the night. She was in a residential neighborhood, so the timing was good. It didn’t usually take her long to find an empty house once she started looking for one. Sometimes they called to her when she wasn’t even looking, drawing her in.

  A few blocks down, she came across a sad, dilapidated little house. The lawn in front was unmown. It had obviously been empty for some time, a few windows boarded up and a couple without boards that had taken rocks through the glass. The holes looked like wounds. Like someone had shot the poor little thing in the eyes. Justine quickly skirted the house and went around back. The back was even worse than the front. The yard was full of garbage and detritus. The screen door hung open, squeaking and swaying in the breeze. Justine tried the inside door, and found that it had already been kicked through the frame, and opened easily in her hand. She wasn’t the first squatter to be attracted to the empty house.

  She walked through it slowly, exploring it in the quickly fading light. Vandals had spray-painted the walls. Someone had started a fire in the middle of the living room, and luckily it had not spread, had not burned the house down. There was nothing of value. Nothing for anyone to take. Justine didn’t feel like anyone had been there for a long time. It would be safe for her to stay there without fear of discovery. No security company checked this house out regularly. The ashes and the spray paint were old, no one had made it their home. It was Justine’s, waiting for her, calling for her to sleep there and to bring Monica and to make it theirs.

  As the night fell, Justine stretched out on the floor, staring up at the ceiling. Rebuilding the house in her mind. She had been here before. It felt like home. Here was a home for her and for Monica. It was cold, though, and Justine worried about Monica. She was younger and frailer than Justine. Permanently a baby in Justine’s mind. You had to take care of babies. You couldn’t just leave them and expect them to care for themselves. In her imagination, she cuddled Monica close to her, sharing her body heat, even though she was shivering in the cool night. They were protected from the wind, other than what worked its way in through the cracks and the holes in the windows. But she was still cold. Christian would have shaken his head at her in despair.

  “If you’re going to camp out, why don’t you prepare ahead and take care of yourself? Someone else had a fire here, you could light another one. You could have a sleeping bag, or at least one of those silver space-age blankets to wrap up in. And food. And water. You’re dehydrated.”

  Justine knew she was badly dehydrated. She had skated for hours without a drink. She was thirsty, her mouth and throat dry. But she didn’t care. That wasn’t the point. She didn’t sleep in the house to camp out. It wasn’t for entertainment. It was because it made her feel better. It felt right, being there, alone with Monica, in the darkness. All by themselves.

  The wind blew harder. Justine hadn’t checked the weather reports, but she vaguely remembered talk on TV that morning about the storm that was expected tonight. A big system. One that had already moved through several of the nearby cities, causing flooding and devastation. But she was protected. She was inside. She and Monica.

  As the night progressed, she got cold, and squirmed and turned on the floor trying to get more comfortable. Her bones ached. Her muscles, warmed up from skating, were now cooled off, cramping, tight. The wind blew and the rain fell. The roof leaked. Justine moved a couple of times, but couldn’t seem to get out of the damp. Water pooled on the living room floor. A few times, she got up and paced, trying to warm herself up and to loosen her cramped muscles. She walked Monica back and forth, whispering to her, comforting her. Monica didn’t like the storm. She cried and fussed. Her little voice was weak and soft. Justine cuddled her close.

  Thunder boomed and lightening flashed. Sometimes it was so loud it made her jump.

  By morning, she was crippled with the cold. She lay on the floor, barely able to stir. The cold had worked its way into her bones. Into her muscles, joints, and sinews. Her clothes were damp. Her whole body hurt. But she still had no desire to leave. As the day warmed up, she gradually stretched and rubbed and moved her joints, working out the creaks. Then she just sat in front of the ashes of the old fire, muddy and smeared by the rain that had come in through the leaky roof. It made little beaches and ripples, like sand at the seashore.

  Justine wiped her parched lips, worked up a little spit to lick them and wipe them clean, but then they dried again and cracked painfully. Monica had survived the night and was still with her, watching over her. It was Justine who was the baby now. Helpless to leave or to take care of herself. Just sitting, watching, and listening. Why should she leave? This was home. This was where she wanted to be. The day marched on outside the house. She watched a sunbeam squeeze through a crack in the boarded up window, and then stretch out bit by bit throughout the day. Justine got too tired to sit, and lay down, staring at the nonexistent fire, listening to the nonexistent TV. She whispered occasionally to Monica, who was still sitting beside her, stroking her hair. Justine had flashes of vision. The dark shag carpet. People walking up and down the hall. A banging on the door. She saw policemen and nurses. Em’s face flashed over her, and Justine groaned, pushing it away. Em had no place in her dreams. There was no Mommy in the house. Just her and Monica.

  Night fell again. Justine listened to the thunder crash, felt it shake the house, watched the lightning on the walls. She heard and felt the patter of the rain and the dripping roof. It chilled her to the bone. She tried to hold onto Monica. Tried to keep her alive one last night.

  Some time deep in the night or early in the morning, she heard voices.

  “Flooding,” it said nonsensically. “Have to evacuate.”

  “No one there. Empty house.”

  “Have to clear every house.”

  There were voices, hands, faces. Someone was swearing. They were shaking her, shouting at her.

  “Just pick her up and get her out before the water gets any higher. Call an ambulance when you get to higher ground.”

  Justine coughed, swallowing and trying to raise her voice as one of them heaved her up in his arms.

  “Monica,” she croaked.

  “What?”

  “The baby,” Justine flailed her arms, searching. “Where’s Monica?”

  “The baby? You have a baby here?” Repeated curses. A strong light swept around the room, lighting up every corner. It shone in Justine’s face, forcing her to shut her eyes tightly, and cover them with her hands as the light still pierced through her lids. “Where was she?”

  “She’s crazy. There’s no baby here. No sign of one.”

  “Gotta check anyway. Can’t take the chance. Fan out, check every room. Move it, the water’s getting too high!”

  Justine was taken out into the cold night air. Rain poured from the sky in sheets, drenching her instantly. It revived her slightly and she opened her eyes. She opened her mouth to the rain, letting it wet her dry lips and tongue. The man carrying her strode through water, Justine could hear it swishing around his legs, and rushing down the street like a river. They moved up hill and he got free of the water. He lowered Justine to the ground, and other people crowded around her.

  “  … she okay? What happened?”

  “Are you okay, ma’am? Can you talk?”

  “In there?  … supposed to be empty  …”

  Justine tried to form words with her mouth. Tried to make sense of what was happening, but she could only take in fractured images and bits of sentences that didn’t seem to make a whole. She grasped at the hand that searched for her pulse, holding tightly, trying to ground herself in reality, back in the physical world.

  “It’s okay,” a man’s voice soothed, and he held her hand between his big, rough, strong hands. “It’s going to be okay.”

  Justine clung to him.

  “Help me,” she begged, her voice barely a croak.

  “I will. I’m here. What can I do for you?”

  S
he held onto his arm, tried to sit up, but was very weak. Instead of pushing her back down and telling her to be still, he gently helped her to sit up, and she leaned against him, then wrapped her arms around him. If she could just hold onto someone, maybe she wouldn’t swirl into the darkness, like the flood waters. He put his arms around her.

  “Shh. You’re safe,” he reassured her.

  Justine closed her eyes and held her face against him. This was right. This was how it was supposed to be. Now she was safe.

  CHAPTER 8

  EM TALKED TO THE fireman in the hallway, confused by the past couple of days’ events. He was no longer dressed in his full gear, but the handsome dark blue uniform they wore while on duty. He had wavy brown hair and a young face. His name badge said ‘Porter.’

  “I don’t understand  … where did you find her?” Em questioned, “I reported her missing, but the police wouldn’t do anything  …”

  “She was in an abandoned house in the evacuation area. Laying on the floor. I don’t know how she got there or what she was doing. But she was in pretty bad shape when we found her.”

  “An abandoned house,” Em sighed in exasperation. “And if it wasn’t for the flood, you wouldn’t even have found her. She could have died in there.”

  He nodded gravely.

  “I just talked to the doctor, it sounds like she’s doing better now, and on the mend. I just had to drop in and make sure it all worked out okay.”

  “Thank you so much for looking after her,” Em said with feeling. “I don’t know what I would have done if she just never came home.”

  Porter shook his head.

  “It could have been bad,” he agreed. He paused as he started to turn away. “And she wasn’t—there was no baby, was there?”

  “Baby?” Em questioned, frowning. “Do you mean was she pregnant?”