Vera nodded. “Are you Chad?” He nodded, opening the door wide for us to walk in. Vera and I glanced at each other once before stepping across the doorway. With just that one look, we crossed the threshold and didn’t look back.
Chad walked us through the one-story apartment. He kept saying things like “I know, it’s not that big” and “sorry, it’s not much”, but I didn’t understand what he was going on about. The place was huge. It had a kitchen, a living room, a bathroom, and three bedrooms. Plus, the patio opened right on to the beach.
The beach was the first thing I saw and it took me a solid minute to take my eyes off it. When I first noticed it Chad was sayin’ something about how the microwave didn’t work right, but I couldn’t hear it. I was too busy starin’ at the big blue expanse in front of me.
The waves crashed in a continuous cycle and people were playing in it! I didn’t know how they did that. Weren’t they afraid? Weren’t they worried that once they stepped in the deep blue they’d never come out? I kept wondering, watching little kids and big adults jump around as white foam crashed over their heads. I only stopped cause Vera dragged me away by the elbow.
“I’ve got two extra rooms,” Chad said, gesturing at two open doors. “They’re pretty much the same except one overlooks the beach and the other overlooks the street.”
Vera grabbed my arm so hard I swore she drew skin. I pulled it back with a squeak, giving her a look. “What’s that for?”
“Can I have the beach room?” Her brown eyes grew round and wide. “Please, I’ve never seen the beach but in pictures. Please!”
I massaged my arm. “Yeah, okay.”
Chad squinted at us then shrugged. “I guess that’s it. You’ve seen everything. I’ve got to head to school in an hour, so, uh”—he placed his hands in his pockets and teetered on his heels—“just have the cash ready by the first of the month.” Without another word Chad disappeared into the room across from ours, shutting the door.
Vera and I exchanged looks. “He’s a bit off his rocker, right?” Vera asked.
“Maybe that’s how people act out here,” I offered, not wanting to believe the man we were agreeing to live with was even remotely odd.
Vera nodded. “Maybe…” She shook her head, replacing her frown with a smile. “Let’s move in!”
“Do you even have anything to move in?” I certainly didn’t. All I had was a backpack with a few changes of clothes and a toothbrush I’d bummed off a church in Colorado.
“You know what I mean. I’m checking out my room!” Vera disappeared into her bedroom, leaving me in the living room. I stared at the open door that led into what was now my room. From my vantage point in the living room I could discern the outlines of a few objects, but not much. I should have gotten it over with and just walked in, but it was the oddest thing; my feet were somehow stuck to the floor.
Like I’d stepped in taffy.
I’d never had a room. I mean, I’d had a room that I’d slept in before, but never my own room. Daddy was very clear on that. It wasn’t my room, it was his room. Everything belonged to him. Even I belonged to him. Eli was the only one who’d ever made me question that; he was the only person who’d ever made me think I could belong to myself.
Vera squealed, startling me from my thoughts and memories.
“What’s wrong?” I yelled, still not moving from my spot.
“I have a closet and a dresser. Do you?” I couldn’t answer her as I still hadn’t gone into my room. Twisting my mouth into a determined frown, I stepped from the spot and into the room.
My room.
The walls were blank, no pictures or anything to speak of. Three were painted bone white while one was a stark contrast in aqua. The room had only one window and it overlooked the street. If I craned my head hard enough I could faintly make out the blue of the ocean. The ocean. The actual blue, vast, and apparently never-ending ocean.
Mostly I just saw the deep black tar of the street, dotted with cars of all colors. People walked along the pavement, some dressed only in swimsuits, as they made their way to the beach. They were smiling, pushing their friends, and laughing. I turned from the window and back to my room.
I still couldn’t believe it. My room. To do anything I wanted with. The bed was already made with white sheets and a faded blue quilt on top. A light wooden dresser, like the color of wheat grass in the noonday sun, was pushed up against the wall. A long mirror hung over the back of a door. I went to that door and opened it.
“I have a closet!” I called back to Vera.
“And a dresser?” she questioned.
“And a dresser!” I replied. Seemingly content, Vera didn’t reply and silence hung in the air. Faint sounds from the street outside drifted in. Like whispers of happiness, I could hear people’s laughter and joy. As I sat down on the faded quilt, messing up the neatly folded corners of the bed, I couldn’t help but think it was too good to be true.
SIX YEARS BEFORE
“Wait, hold up! What’s ya name?”
I paused. Every fiber in my being told me to run. I was already going to get a beating for leaving the house. The day was so beautiful, though. The sun was shining bright and the trees were just now blooming. The blossoms only bloomed for a few weeks before disappearing into green leaves.
I just wanted to smell it, feel it, before it all disappeared. Suddenly I found myself walking down the street, exploring things I had no right to explore. I was almost four blocks away from my house, the farthest I had ever been. I kept expecting something terrible to happen, but it never did, so I continued walking.
The sounds were incredible. I heard children laughing and playing. The cars zoomed by me, their speed whipping my hair in front of my face. Birds chirped and talked with one another. In the distance I heard someone mowing their lawn. I even heard people cussing!
It was… surreal. Even the air around me vibrated like a dream. It was so, so much better than a dream, though.
The boy had been following me for a block before he spoke. I thought about running away and back home. I didn’t know him. Then again, I didn’t know anyone.
I turned to face him. “Grace. My name is Grace.”
“Grace…” The boy rolled my name around in his mouth like hard candy. “That’s a nice name, Grace. My name’s Eli.” Eli smiled at me like he had a secret. I felt uncomfortable, hot and cold at the same time. I looked around, expecting someone to run up and tell me I shouldn’t be talking to him, yet all I saw were people going about their regular spring routine.
I spun around and walked away from the boy, not wanting to push my luck.
“Wait, Grace.” Eli grabbed my arm and pulled me back. I looked at his hand upon my wrist in horror. He was touching me. I was unclean. If Daddy found out, I was more than in trouble, I was dead.
I yanked my arm back, terrified.
“Sorry!” Eli said, holding his arms up and away from me. “I just wanted to get ya number before you left, that’s all.”
“My number?” I asked, perplexed. “Like, my age?”
Eli laughed. “No, like your digits. You know, ya cell phone.”
“Oh, right.” I shook my head, feeling like an outsider once again. I could watch from my window all I wanted, but I would never belong in this world. “I don’t have one.”
“How do I reach you?” I shrugged at his question, feeling more and more uncomfortable. The longer I talked with Eli, the more likely it was Daddy would wake up and find me missing.
“You don’t.”
“Do you have an email?” Eli pressed.
“No.” We didn’t have many electronics at our house. We had one landline that Daddy kept in his study but no TV, no computer, and not even a digital clock. We had a refrigerator, but we didn’t have a microwave. I had a feeling if this boy took even a glimpse into my house he would run far, far away.
Eli rubbed his chin, nodding at my response. “You’re a unique one, ain’t ya Grace?”
I shrugged again.
&
nbsp; Still rubbing his chin, Eli spoke quickly. “I have an idea. What if we meet back at this exact spot and this exact time tomorrow?”
My eyebrows must have shot behind my head. He wanted to meet me again?
“I don’t… I’m not…” I stuttered. I was rarely able to get out of the house. I wasn’t allowed to leave the house, which meant I had to sneak out. Why would I risk it all to meet this boy?
My chest constricted and my head felt light, but for the first time ever, I felt a sense of freedom. I looked up at Eli, still unsure of what I was doing, and responded.
“Okay.”
I shouldn’t have been so happy. That was my first mistake. My happiness made me forget the time and that made me late. My happiness made me feel like it was okay to be late. Worst of all, my happiness made me forget what all of that meant, what would happen when I got home.
He was waiting for me when I arrived. I knew he would be angry that I’d left. I knew I would get the switch or a belt. I knew that. I did. I may have been twelve, but I wasn’t naive—at least, not about him.
I didn’t leave often, not unless he said I could and when he said I could it’s usually with Mama or him. I’d only left without his permission twice before. Once when I was ten, because I’d heard the Independence Day parade for years and years and I just had to see it.
I had to.
There were fireworks and I could hear the laughter all the way up in my room, four streets away. Four streets away I could hear laughter.
So I left. It was just as amazing as I’d imagined it would be. They had corn dogs and fried green tomatoes and people were getting their faces painted. No one paid attention to me, which was just as well, because I wanted to watch them.
I wished I could say I had a good time, but I didn’t. Despite all the fun around me, I had a horrible time. I was too worried about what he’d think.
When I got back, he beat me, but he didn’t beat me that hard. Still, I learned my lesson, and from then on I listened to the parade from inside my room.
The second time I left it was for Mama. She was sick and wasn’t getting better. Her fever wouldn’t break and he wouldn’t let us call the doctor. I went to a pay phone to dial 911. Mama ended up having appendicitis. Nothing about that was fun. I hated leaving. I hated dialing on the phone. I hated when they took her away and I had to be alone with him. He beat me, of course, but not that hard.
So I think my biggest mistake that time was that I actually enjoyed leaving. He saw it on my face when I came home. Unlike the parade and unlike Mama’s hospitalization, that time when I closed the door against my back, the joy was plastered across my face, ingrained in my skin. The joy was like sunshine in my body.
There was nothing taking that away from me.
But Daddy tried.
The second the dark oak door snapped into place, Daddy grabbed my arm and whipped me into the living room. I cried out in pain, feeling my shoulder snap out of its socket. It wasn’t the first time Daddy had dislocated my shoulder. Later Mama would come with a towel for me to bite down on and she would shove it back into place.
It wasn’t the first time Mama had done that, either. Mama and I had a routine just as much as Daddy and I did.
After Daddy finished beating me raw, Mama would come in with the antiseptic to clean the wounds. She would sing to me until I fell asleep, sometimes rubbing my legs because my back was too sore.
I used to imagine that Daddy sent her, as if he wanted to see to my wounds, as if he cared about me.
Daddy had been beatin’ me for as long as I’d had memories, so of course when I was little I liked to think he still cared. I liked to think him and Mama had some kinda agreement, like he would beat me for being bad, but then he’d have Mama take care of me.
Then I saw him beat Mama. I realized Mama didn’t have anyone tending to her wounds. Daddy wasn’t doing it and, up until that point, I hadn’t been either. After that I realized they didn’t have any agreement. Mama wasn’t bad, so why was he beating her?
According to Daddy I had a demon inside me. God had told him so. He had to beat it out of me every now and then to keep me good. I didn’t feel like I had a demon inside of me. I felt like I was just me. Just Grace.
I knew Mama was a good person. I knew she didn’t have a demon inside of her.
As I lay there with my newly dislocated shoulder, waiting for the next lash of Daddy’s belt, I’d have bet cash money that Daddy was the one with the demon inside.
I looked up to see Mama standing in the doorway. Wearing pajamas with her hair up, I wished she’d come for anything else. I could briefly remember her coming to my room to read me bedtime stories. I must have been seven the last time she did that. Now she only came for this. I looked away, shaking my head.
“I don’t want to do it tonight, Mama.”
“You know what happens if we don’t, sugar.” Mama held up the towel, tears in her eyes. If we didn’t put my shoulder back into place, not only would I be deformed, but I wouldn’t be able to use the arm. I bit down on my jaw and gestured her over with my good arm.
There were no words exchanged between us. I felt the bed sink with her weight. The towel was placed next to my head; I reached out with my good hand and placed it between my teeth. I was prostrate on the bed, my head buried in the sheets, towel in my teeth.
Mama didn’t count down; she never did.
I screamed out as she popped it into place, the feeling like a whipcrack of pain starting at my shoulder and spreading through my body. The pain happened in an instant but it was so intense and excruciating it left me breathless. I was tired, feeling like I’d run around the house twenty times. Nausea filled my gut and I swore I blacked out for a moment.
“Why’d you do it sugar?” Mama’s sorrowful voice filled my ears. “Why didn’t you just stay?”
I didn’t know. I didn’t know the answer to Mama’s question. I should have stayed. I could have avoided the beating and not been there with her, feeling the most excruciating pain. Those moments with Mama were worse than the beatings.
It wasn’t fair to her.
I kept my face down in the sheets so she couldn’t see my tears, but mostly so I couldn’t see hers. I knew she was crying. I hated that I made her cry. If I had just been good then we wouldn’t be there. If I had listened and stayed inside like a good girl then Mama wouldn’t have to do this.
Slowly I turned my head to the side, feeling the wetness of my tears dampening the sheets against my cheek.
“Am I a demon, Mama? Am I evil?” I looked into her watery blue eyes, pleading. I didn’t know any more. If I was good then good things were supposed to happen to me. Good girls didn’t get beat. Right?
Mama sighed and rested a hand on my calf. She made little circles on my skin that offered small comfort.
“I brought you another book.”
Perhaps the only good thing about those moments with Mama was the books. Sometimes when Mama visited me after my time with Daddy, she brought me a book. It started out as bedtime reading, stuff like Goodnight Moon, but as I got older Mama started giving me real books.
She gave me books that Daddy couldn’t know about. She showed me where to hide them, under the floorboards. The first time she gave me a book, To Kill a Mockingbird, I didn’t realize what she was doing. That is, I didn’t realize the risk she was taking.
I was about seven at the time; it was the first time I’d seen Mama get beat. I went to tend to her like she did me. At the end of it she reached underneath the floorboards, pulled out a tattered looking book, and handed it to me. I had all the books she’d ever given me hidden under the floorboards like beating hearts.
Our agreement was a tacit one. We’ve never fully talked about the risk or the deal, but we both knew what it meant. At least, I liked to think we did.
“What’s this one?” I asked, taking the book gently and admiring it. The first thing you notice about a book is the cover. I knew the saying “never judge a book by the cover�
�, but you couldn’t help it! I’d read some books that had pretty terrible covers and turned out to be amazing, so I did agree with the saying… but still, I loved a good cover. This one wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t amazing. It was just some guy standing on the beach.
“Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe,” Mama explained.
I looked up at her. Mama never told me anything about the books she gave me. She didn’t want to influence my opinion. At first I hated that. I hated not knowing what I was getting into. Eventually, though, I learned to love it and wouldn’t have it any other way. Each book she gave me was a key to another world. I would hate to have someone try and muddy that journey before I began.
I smelled the book, breathing in the freedom contained in the yellowing pages.
“Thank you, Mama.”
I left, even though it was going to get me beat. I left, even though Daddy was still awake. I left, even though he would discover my absence in less than ten minutes. Nauseated, terrified, but feeling something for myself for the first time in my entire life, I left.
Robinson Crusoe did more than endure years on his island; he prospered. He was shipwrecked but built a home and a family and a farm, eventually escaping anyway. He got out and got back to his real home. I stayed up all night reading Robinson Crusoe. The books were never long enough.
It got me thinking that maybe I was shipwrecked. I was shipwrecked but not living the way Robinson Crusoe did. Instead of building a farm, I was letting the cannibals get me. Instead of looking for a way off the island, I was accepting my fate.
So I left. I left to explore my island. Eli was already waiting for me, at the exact same spot where we’d met the day before. When he saw me he ran up, concern etching his features.
“What the hell happened to you?”
Eli’s cussword slapped me with nearly as much impact as Daddy’s hands.
“Could you not cuss?”
“What?” Eli looked at me as if I were speaking another language. I knew by the times I spent listening at my window that cussing was a common thing, a thing people did freely. The first time I heard the word “damn” was when, listening through the window, I heard my neighbor say it after stubbing his toe.
Let Me Go (Owned Book 2) Page 2
