by Julia Derek
I know I’ve been sexually abused by my dad, but I can hardly remember any of it, for which I’m very glad. The few pieces I do remember make me all cold and nauseous. Him touching me down there. Him wanting me to touch him down there. Him sticking things inside me that hurt. Him forcing me to take his pipi in my mouth and me nearly choking.
But even though he did all these horrible things to me, I still loved him when he didn’t do them. It was very strange, but I did. I didn’t want him to die. Except for on those nights he came to see me to play with me like he called it, he was a fun, nice dad. I just wanted him to stop hurt me and make me do those things to him. I was happy when it all stopped, though, and I’m ashamed when I think about that.
It was because I loved him and because I knew Mom loved him so much that I didn’t tell anyone the truth, that it had been Dad who’d molested me, not Uncle Tony. I didn’t want Mom to get upset. She was already so upset he was dead.
Now that I think about it, the only reason I told her the truth the other week was because she had looked at me in that strange, evil way when I had been about to enter the living room recently. And she had done it for so long that it had really creeped me out. So I decided that I would tell her the truth at last. When I turned 13. It seemed she secretly hated me for having shot Dad. I had suddenly felt convinced that this was so, and I didn’t want her to hate me. I wanted her to love me as much as she said she did.
We had finally gotten to Philly from where we’d take another Greyhound back to NYC. It took us almost three days instead of barely two like when we went in the other direction. The NYPD had yet to find a suspect for Wilkins’s murder, so Mom and I both felt we needed to help them out. I’m seriously beginning to wonder just how good a police force they are. I mean, how hard could it be to find the killer? It had to have been one of his patients, maybe the son of one of them, the guy that had been outside Dr. Wilkins’s apartment building. As soon as I found out who Dr. Wilkins’s patients had been, I’d work that angle. We were not worried about hanging around the New York area, because we both really did look different. And I was more often than not wearing an oversized hoodie that shielded my face anyway. On the days I didn’t, I would wear a ball cap to hide my face. People wouldn’t be able to recognize us. It was not like anyone expected us to be there anyway. The police had made that clear in the news; we were suspected to be hiding out somewhere in the country and the FBI was looking for us.
We went to a small pub where we’d be having a late lunch before taking the bus, which would depart in an hour and a half. I ordered a mountain of fries and a burger, as well as a chocolate shake from the bartender. Mom, much to my surprise, ordered the same.
We were seated at the corner of the long bar so we could get a good view of the TV mounted on the other side of the bar counter, in the middle of all the rows of hard liquor. We asked the bartender if he could put on CNN, which he did. It was almost two in the afternoon and we were hoping for updates about the investigation.
We didn’t worry the bartender would realize who we were. The pics of us displayed on TV looked nothing like the way we did now.
We had only been watching CNN for ten minutes when there was breaking news: a teenager had been arrested in connection with the Wilkins murder.
32
Mom and I both stared at the screen, taking in the news, which only lasted for about twenty seconds. Then we turned to look at each other.
“Did you catch all that?” she asked me in a discreet tone. We didn’t want to attract the attention of the bartender or other patrons of which there weren’t very many, fortunately. The bartender was in the middle of talking to a man at the other end of the bar, and it seemed neither of them had noticed what the anchor had just reported on TV. “It all went so fast I could barely keep up.”
“Yes, I think so,” I said. “They’ve arrested a teenager for the Wilkins murder.”
Mom’s already wide eyes got wider behind the square glasses. “That’s what I thought was said. Well, that’s just great, huh?” She squeezed my knee and smiled big at me. She leaned close. “Didn’t I tell you it would all work out?”
“Yep,” I agreed and returned her smile. “Does that mean I can stop trying to hide my face all the time and change my hair back to normal? I’m seriously tired of looking like an emo boy. It’s so not my style. And these glasses are so friggin’ uncomfortable.” I adjusted the fake glasses so they squeezed my nose less.
She smiled and ran a knuckle along my jawline. “Soon, honey. Soon. Let’s get back to the city first. We want to be a hundred percent sure it’s the right guy. We need more information about him and the arrest before we can let down our guard. For all we know, they made a mistake and will let him go.”
I frowned at her. “Why would they arrest him if they’re not sure he did it?”
Mom shrugged. “Everyone makes mistakes, honey, even the police. Not that I think that’s what’s happened here, but it’s better to be safe than sorry. We need to hear about the specific reasons he was arrested to have a better idea. It’ll take a while before that’s reported, like a day or two, I’m guessing. When we know that and can feel reasonably certain he’s the real deal, we can go back to our regular lives. Are you done eating?”
I pushed the plate away. “Yeah. I’m stuffed.”
“Good.” She checked her watch. “We have forty-five minutes to kill before the bus leaves. How about we go do some meditation on the benches outside? It’s nice and sunny, so it should be okay to sit there if we keep our coats on.”
“Okay,” I said, even though I wasn’t in the mood to meditate at all. It was so boring, but Mom insisted, so I knew I’d better just agree. She kept telling me how crucial it was for my brain to meditate every single day, and how I would be so grateful when I was older that she’d made me do it.
I had my doubts about that.
She paid the check and we headed outside. Once we reached the benches, we plopped down on the only empty one. She turned to me.
“Are you ready?”
I merely shrugged in response and placed my hands on my knees before she could tell me to do it. Hers were already on her knees.
“We don’t need music to do it here,” she said. “Just focus on your mantras. Say them over and over and over. Really, you shouldn’t have to have any music when meditating. It’s just for beginners to help them get in the right mood.”
I wanted to tell her that I was definitely a beginner still, having meditated only a few times, but it was best to keep my mouth shut.
She suddenly scrunched up her face.
“What?” I asked.
“I need to go to the bathroom,” she replied. “I should go before we start. Wait for me here and don’t start until I’m back.” She got to her feet and pushed down her tote bag from the bench in the process. Lots of stuff fell out from it on the old asphalted road.
“Crap,” she muttered. She bent over and began gathering the keys, the wallet, the gloves, the chap stick and stuffed it back into the bag. I had bent over as well and helped her gather the stuff. I got hold of a couple of hairbands, chewing gum, and a small hourglass that I had never seen before. It was very pretty, so I took a moment to look at it.
“Wow, this is so cool,” I exclaimed, as if hypnotized by the hourglass. “Where did you get it?”
“Toss all of it in here,” Mom said by way of answering, holding her tote bag open. I wanted to keep looking at the fascinating hourglass, but her expression dared me to contradict her, so I tossed it back inside.
She dropped the bag on the bench beside her and told me not to let it out of my sight.
“I won’t be a minute,” she said and hurried toward the pub, which was near the row of benches.
“Okay,” I said and glanced in the direction of where a bunch of girls were standing around, talking to each other. As soon as Mom had disappeared into the pub, my eyes went to her tote bag on the bench. Before giving it a second thought, I had stuck my hand inside it and pulled it
open. I wanted to take another look at that cool hourglass.
I found it almost right away and took it out. It was made of wood and gold metal and smooth glass. The sand inside was of different colors and glittered in the sunlight. I realized that it was the way the sand glittered that made it so sparkling and mysterious-looking.
I had never before seen it. Mom must have picked it up somewhere during our trip. Where had she gotten it and why hadn’t she shown it to me? She knew I adored stuff like that. Weird.
As I put it back in the tote, my fingers bumped into something square, thin, and firm in a side pocket. Frowning, I pulled it out to see what it was. It was a letter that was scuffed around the edges. There was a stamp on it. I checked the address. Who was it for?
Attn: Detective Ivan Morales
19th Precinct
153 East 67th Street
NY, NY 10065
The wrinkle between my brows deepened. What was this? It couldn’t be the letter Mom was supposed to have mailed to that NYPD detective, could it? Had she forgotten to mail it? It sure looked like that. Well, now it was too late since they had already arrested someone. I had to ask her about that when she got back. I was dying to see what she had written him. She had been so secretive about it when I’d wanted to know what was in it. I just knew it was a bunch of stuff that would make him focus on other people, not me.
“Honey?” I heard Mom’s voice call me from afar. I turned my head in the direction of the voice. She was standing next to a small white truck outside the pub.
“Yeah?” I called back.
“Do you want ice cream? They’re selling ice cream here.”
I smiled at her. I loved ice cream. “Yeah definitely!”
“Bring my bag and we’ll buy some then.”
I grabbed her tote bag and was about to put the letter back where I’d found it when it struck me that I might as well keep it. I was dying to know exactly what she had written the detective. If she had forgotten to mail it, she wouldn’t realize that I had taken it anyway. I could always mail it after I had read the letter if it turned out the cops had arrested the wrong person.
Sticking the letter into my hoodie pocket, I hurried over to where she was standing, shading her eyes against the bright sun.
33
We arrived at the Port Authority Bus Terminal at seven o’clock that same evening. This final trip had gone in a flash, very smoothly, but I was still excited that we were done with buses for a while. My butt could use a break.
A few minutes later, we were walking along 42nd Street toward Times Square, bumping into the masses of people that were always walking around there. The sun had set an hour ago, so it was pretty dark out, enhancing our disguises.
“Are we going home now?” I asked Mom when we were near the subway station.
She glanced at me like I was crazy. “No, honey, what if the cops are still there? Waiting for us to return. We can’t go there!”
I frowned at her. “Why would they be there when they’ve already arrested the guy who did it?”
She rolled her eyes at me. “I already told you that we can’t just count on him being the killer. It might be a way for them to trick us and get us to come back, thinking just what you’re thinking. At the very least, we’ll need to wait a few days before we go home. You know, see what they have to say on the news regarding this guy. If it does look like he’s the killer, we’ll go home.”
“Okay, so where are we going to sleep tonight then?”
“At a hotel I know where you can pay cash. You don’t have to give your name or anything else, so no one will know it’s us.”
“Oh. That sounds like a shady hotel.”
She laughed. “It is a very shady hotel. Normally, I would never bring you there, but we really don’t have much choice if we want to stay incognito. Hopefully, it won’t be for long.”
“Okay. How are we getting there?”
“We’re walking. It’s not that far. Only a couple of miles. We shouldn’t waste money on a cab or even the subway when it’s so close. Do you think you’ll be okay carrying the backpack that far?”
I scowled at her. “Of course I’ll be okay. What do you think I am? A kid?”
She laughed again and ruffled my hair. “No, how could I ever think that? You’re my little superhero. A man. Nothing’s too heavy for you.”
“Exactly,” I grunted.
“Then let’s go there. It shouldn’t take us more than thirty minutes.”
By the time we had reached the neighborhood where this shady place was supposed to be, I was exhausted. Not that I was about to admit that to Mom, though, who herself looked beat. I had never before been in such a decrepit-looking area. The old asphalt was full of potholes and the trashcans were overflowing. A couple of buildings were boarded up. The few people who walked on the street were poorly dressed and moved like they had the whole world on their shoulders. Their faces were blank and no one made eye contact. There was a sour smell mixed with pot in the air. If the shady hotel was in this area, I could totally see why the people who lived there didn’t care either way. It didn’t look like they cared about themselves either.
A businessman-type in a nice suit and a woman with lots of makeup, big bleached hair, and tall black boots came out of the five-story building Mom claimed was the “hotel.” I quickly realized it was more of a brothel. A whorehouse. The woman was holding onto the man’s arm and giggling in his ear as we walked by them.
“That was a pro, right? Who was—” I asked Mom and turned my head to keep looking at the couple. I didn’t get a chance to finish my last question.
“Stop staring, Shane,” Mom snapped and pulled my arm. “And, yes, probably,” she added as we entered the building with its dimly lit hallway and dull carpets that had seen better times. A set of old wicker seats with a table in the middle sat in a corner. Facing the wicker set was a small ticket booth covered by glass and that was built into the wall. I could tell that someone sat in that booth, which looked very illicit.
Mom strode up to the woman in the booth, who looked to be severely overweight and had charcoal hair with silver streaks in it. She had lots of hot pink lipstick clearly applied in an attempt to make her thin lips look fuller. They so didn’t. I stood closely behind Mom, who smiled and leaned toward the woman.
“Hello, can we get a room for a night or maybe two?” she asked.
The woman looked her up and down, then her gaze moved to me and she cocked a painted brow as if mildly surprised. But she didn’t say anything, just grabbed a key from the wall beside her and told Mom that the cost was 50 bucks a night.
“And you have to pay before each night to get the room,” the woman stated in a husky voice.
“Okay, we’ll pay you for this night now, and then in the morning, if we decide to stay another, we’ll pay the rest. Is that okay?” Mom pulled out fifty bucks in ten-dollar bills from her wallet.
“Yes,” the woman replied and placed the key on the small shelf attached to the booth. She reached for the cash through the narrow hole under the glass and pushed the key to Mom. She had the longest, pointiest nails I had ever seen and they were painted in some scary dark color. As they were hashing out the details, I was still struggling to believe that Mom wanted us to stay in this seedy place—it was so not her style—but I figured she knew what she was doing and that we were desperate. It would only be for a day, max two, and I could survive that.
When a cleaning lady came around a corner, pushing a cart full of supplies, I felt a little better. If they had a cleaning lady, it couldn’t be too bad, I told myself.
Mom grabbed a hold of my arm and told me to head for the steep stairs. We were going to the second floor. We mounted the long stairs in silence and continued into one out of four doors on that floor. The door had been left ajar and it smelled surprisingly okay inside the small studio-like space.
There was only one big bed there, queen-size, a chair and a table, a cooking plate above a small refrigerator in a co
rner and what looked like a bathroom attached to the room. An old TV sat on a small dresser facing the bed.
Mom removed her backpack, which was bigger than mine, and plopped down on the bed.
She placed her hands behind her head and leaned back, gazing at me. “I know it’s not a luxury place, but it’s clean, that I can promise you. We won’t get bedbugs from sleeping in this bed.”
“Good to know.” I removed my own backpack and dropped it on the floor. “I need to use the bathroom.”
I crossed the small space over to the bathroom and walked inside, closing the door. It was old and rusty and the toilet bowl was stained, but it did smell like stuff was clean at least. I did my business and hurried back out.
Mom was lying on the bed, looking like she was sleeping. I curled up next to her and closed my eyes, too. It didn’t take long before I had fallen into a deep slumber.
34
When I woke up, it was dark outside the window. I could spot the outline of a moon, which was half full, behind a few flimsy clouds in the night sky. There was a medium-sized window right above the bed with thin curtains that had been left open. At first I was confused as to where I was, but then I saw Mom lying beside me on the still made bed. Wow, we must have slept for a while, both of us more tired than we had thought, passing out like that, I mused. I wondered what time it was.
I pushed myself up into a sitting position, careful not to wake Mom. The bed felt sturdy, not like it was about to collapse like the ones down in Miami. I was still wearing my jeans and oversized hoodie. Placing my feet on the carpeted floor, I padded over to where I had hung my jacket on the hook attached to the door and found my burner phone. I checked the time on it. It was about four thirty in the morning.
Turning around, I glanced over at Mom. She appeared to be sleeping soundly, breathing deeply. She always complained about what a poor sleeper she was, so I was happy to see that she for once had managed to get to sleep and then stay asleep. I myself felt wide awake and didn’t feel like crawling back into bed. And I was hungry. I was pretty sure that I had spotted a bodega as Mom and I had made our way over to this shady place. Like a block or two away. I should head over there and see if it was open. Sometimes those places were open 24/7. If not, there had to be a 24-hour drugstore somewhere close.
