Relief sloshes up through my body when Marie races around the corner, stumbling over cracks in her sensible heels. Her hair bounces out to the sides and strains against the clips that hold it to her head. Her green jacket flaps open over its matching green skirt. A wild patterned silk scarf hangs around her neck. I have to suck in a deep breath to stop from crying.
She pulls me into her arms and squeezes tight. When she lets go, her eyes are glassy. “I heard about that poor girl,” she says. “I was terrified something had happened to you.”
“I’m fine,” I say. I’ve said it about three hundred times since they found the girl in the stairwell.
“How’s your mom? Is she going to her meetings?”
I nod. Lying to Marie makes me feel like I belong in Bluebird Estates.
“Good,” she says, and reaches up to sweep the hair out of my face. She places a hand on my cheek. I’m taller than she is now.
The dance team is getting restless. Marie drops her hand.
She slides her giant purse from her shoulder to her wrist, digs inside, and pulls out what I have been waiting for all summer.
A metallic pink pencil with a sparkly unicorn eraser on top.
“Happy first day of school, Little Mouse.”
I wore waterproof mascara because I knew this was going to make me cry. Marie’s runs in black streams down her face. On my very first day of school, I had only been living with Marie for a few weeks. I was so scared. I didn’t know anybody. Nothing was familiar. When I woke up that day, a special pencil was perched on my pillow next to my head. It’s been our tradition ever since.
Marie produces a tissue and dabs her face. She’s going to have to fix her makeup before she goes to her job at the bank. “Come over for dinner sometime soon. I have mail for you that I forgot to bring.” Marie lives two blocks from school. Getting mail to me wouldn’t be hard. But I appreciate that she’s giving me an excuse to see her.
I nod. If I speak, I’ll start crying again. She hugs me, turns quickly, and walks away.
I grip the pencil next to my heart and take two breaths to compose myself before sealing it inside the front pocket of my backpack. I turn and smile at Paige. That’s her cue to release the dance team. They race over to me.
I’m smothered in arms as they all try to hug me at the same time. No one says anything. They’ve elected a spokesperson to broach the delicate subject of my home life. They know where I live now, and most of them knew me when I lived with Marie, but otherwise, they, except for Paige, know nothing more.
Sierra steps forward, and the others back up. She looks down at her hands. “We saw about that girl on the news. We’re so thankful that you’re okay.” She pauses. This is probably harder for her than asking James McEllis to the winter formal last year. “Are you okay?”
I smile my big Clairmont Explorers Dance Team smile at them. “I’m fine. Really. That girl is already out of the hospital.” And long, long gone.
Sierra’s shoulders relax. The others have probably been coaching her on what not to say to me since it happened. I hate that they pity me. I have to be extra nice, extra helpful to everyone so that they will see me as a team member, a friend, and not a girl who was released from foster care to her messed-up mother in public housing on the other side of town.
The first bell rings. With more hugs, the dance team scatters. I walk with Paige.
I can’t keep it inside anymore.
“That girl has friends too, you know. Right now at Northside, they aren’t hugging her and saying they’re glad it wasn’t her. Because it was her. How would everybody here feel if it had been me and that girl’s friends were celebrating?”
Paige doesn’t say anything. We don’t talk about things like this. We talk about nail polish and lipstick and boys. And that’s good. I would rather talk about those things than how Finn has started showing me off like a new car to his junkie pals whenever I pass apartment 21.
“Do you want to come over after school? Mom can drop you off at work later, if you want.” Paige’s voice is soft, meek. She’s trying her hardest.
“Okay.” I won’t see her again until the end of the day. I’m in AP everything. She’s not. I squeeze her arm. “Have a good first day.”
—
Carol Alexander is a perfect, grown-up version of Paige. They both have sleek brown hair that falls in layers around their faces. Small, slightly pointed, upper-class noses. Big blue eyes without the slightest hint of redness. Both wear clothes my minimum-wage checkout girl job could never afford.
Carol doesn’t work. Paige’s brothers are in middle school now, but Carol is still a stay-at-home mom. That’s something Paige and I have in common. I have a stay-at-home mom too.
We pull up in front of No Limit Foods. In my lap, I have the dinner Carol packed for me in neat little containers inside a shopping bag from another grocery store. A nice store. One with a serve-yourself olive bar and samples on the weekends.
I may be dirt poor and live where the water doesn’t get hot three days a week, but the nice people from the government give Mom and me food stamps. I’m not starving. No one would look at me and think that.
“It was so nice to see you, Kayla.” Perfect smile showing perfectly white teeth. I don’t know if the kid-glove treatment Carol’s been giving me today is the normal one or an extra-special one because of the attacked girl.
She watches a scruffy customer exit No Limit. She turns back to me with the perfect smile still emblazoned on her face. “One of my friends mentioned the other day that her husband’s office was looking for someone to do general office work after school. I’m sure they would love to have you. Paige could drive you home in the evenings.” She leaves the next part unspoken: It pays more.
“Thanks, but I really love No Limit. I’ve been here almost two years now. On my anniversary day, they’re going to throw me a party.”
Carol nods, but there’s no way she believes my super-chipper lie.
No one actually likes working at No Limit. But I got this job on my own. I’m proud of that.
I open the car door. Before I can get out, Carol catches my arm. “You can come over anytime. Anytime, day or night. Just ring the doorbell. Or call. Someone will come get you.”
I imagine her wrapped in her pink satin robe, sitting in her white BMW in front of Bluebird Estates in the middle of the night. I know she means well. And I’m grateful that people care about me, really, I am.
“Thanks.” I smile my big Clairmont Explorers Dance Team smile at her.
On my way to the break room, I pass Elton. He’s a regular. He appeared out of nowhere a couple of months ago and has been coming in every day since. I think he lives in his car—an old station wagon filled to the brim with odds and ends—that found its way to the corner of the parking lot. Albert grumbles about having it towed, but until someone complains, it’s not really his problem.
Fingers splayed and wiggling, Elton’s short arms stretch to reach for a box of cereal on the top shelf.
“Let me get that,” I say, and reach up easily for it. A tuft of his wild hair blows in the stream of my breath. He’s small for a full-grown man. His shirt is untucked. He uses a plain black cane when he walks, but I don’t think he’s old. He could be thirty-five or sixty. There’s an agelessness about his disheveled appearance and his hyperaware eyes.
He takes the cereal box. For a second, I think I see emotion flash across his face. Something big, something dark. But then it’s gone. Blank. He nods.
I spread the containers of Carol’s dinner out on the break room table. Some of the checkers and baggers aren’t as lucky as I am. The food will be gone before my first break.
I switch registers at eight p.m. Albert likes the night crew to work squished together at registers one, two, and three. He says it’s safer that way. Sure. Whatever helps you sleep at night, Albert.
At register two, the closed sign is up and the light is off, but still someone waits in line.
He rips the cor
ner off a bag of M&M’s.
“I’m not quite open yet,” I say, and fumble the money tray into the register.
“That’s okay. I don’t want to buy anything.”
I raise an eyebrow at the M&M’s in his hand. He salutes me with them. “Like I said before, my name’s Jordan.”
I don’t say anything. His watching me makes my hands shake. I can’t get the money tray to latch into the back of the drawer.
“And I’m Kayla,” he says in a falsetto voice.
I snap my head around. He laughs and points to the plastic name tag pinned above the giant abdomen pocket of my red No Limit Foods apron.
Finally, the tray catches. I close the drawer and enter my code. He’s still watching me.
“Can I help you with something?”
A woman with a cranky toddler rolls her overflowing basket into line behind him. He leans over the belt. “You see that McDonald’s?” He points to the one and only McDonald’s in the parking lot. “I’m going to have a cup of coffee over there. Maybe during your break you’d like to join me?”
“I—I can’t.” He’s starting to creep me out.
“Let me guess, cream and two packets of sugar? Probably decaf because it’s late and you’ll need your beauty sleep?” That smug smile is back.
“I have to help this customer.” I motion behind him. The toddler gnaws on a frozen dinner box. The mother’s eyes skip between us, like she’s pondering whom to murder first—the checkout girl or the guy flirting with her.
M&M’s guy—Jordan—slaps his hand down. “For the candy,” he says.
Not that I care, but I think I’ve made him mad. I cringe and wait until he’s all the way out in the parking lot before I glance down.
A crisp hundred-dollar bill glitters on the worn conveyor belt.
—
The smell of French fries slams into my nose when I rip open the door of McDonald’s. I have $98.71 wadded up in my hand. I’m not his charity case. And I’m certainly not some kind of pay-in-advance hooker. He can keep his money.
He sits at a table in the corner, reading a newspaper. A cup of coffee steams across from him. He sees me and folds the paper in half.
I stomp over, open my hand, and let the sweaty money fall all over the table. “Your change.”
He points to the coffee. “Decaf. Cream. Two packets of sugar. I took the lid off so it wouldn’t be too hot when you got here.”
I’m going to turn on my heels and walk out of here. I’m going to show this jerk I’m not whoever he thinks I am.
He smiles. Now it’s all pure and happy, like he’s a different person from before. He nudges the coffee toward me. Before I can think about it, I pull out the chair, and I sit.
It’s exactly how I would have ordered my coffee.
He places his hands on the table where I can see them. “Let’s start over again. I’m not an asshole. I just wanted to get your attention. I’m Jordan.” He reaches his right hand out professionally. I tentatively shake it. It’s warm, soft with the right amount of grip to show that he doesn’t have to prove anything to anyone.
“Kayla,” I say without his confidence.
He laughs. “How nice to hear it in your own voice.”
I eye the coffee. I don’t know a thing about this guy.
He must see it on my face. “You’re probably wondering if I’m a serial killer or something. I’m not. I’m Jordan Bloom. I’m nineteen. I take community college classes online. I moved here from Florida a few months ago.” I still don’t touch the coffee. “And apparently, I’m not good at making friends.” An honest, awkward grin floats over his lips. “But you seem like someone I would like to be friends with.”
I’m still on guard, but part of me relaxes. I’ve had guys at the store hit on me before. But this feels different. There’s something electric in the way he looks at me. I feel charged like static making my hair stand on end.
He reaches into his pocket and places something on the table. “I saw this and thought of you.”
“Um, thanks,” I say, and lean forward to examine the stubby brown acorn on the table. It still has a hint of dirt on it, like he just picked it up off the ground.
He smiles sheepishly, and a piece of hair falls over his eyes. “I saw your oak leaf.”
“My oak leaf?”
“The one you have taped to the side of the register. It seemed like it was important to you.”
My oak leaf. It’s been there so long I’d forgotten about it. It’s a leaf from the huge tree on the side of Marie’s house. We collected it and carefully ironed it between two pieces of wax paper for a project in second grade. I found it again when I was packing for Bluebird Estates. It became something else to me then. A piece of home, my real home.
I can’t believe he noticed that. Maybe he is different from the other creeps who hang around No Limit Foods. He waits for my reaction. “Thanks,” I say again, and rub the acorn between my fingers.
“Acorns are also symbols of potential. There’s a giant tree inside there. I guess I was kind of hoping”—he looks down and blushes—“that maybe when you looked at the acorn you would think about that—about the potential of the person who gave it to you.”
I don’t mean to, but I laugh. Not at him exactly. More at how cute his red face and downturned eyes are.
He glances up at me. The smile is still there. “That sounded stupid, didn’t it? This whole night went better in my head.”
I don’t realize that I’ve picked up the cup and taken a sip of coffee until it’s running hot down my throat. I set the cup down and roll the acorn around my palm. Jordan’s eyes shine. Potential.
A soft sizzle fills the space between us. I maintain eye contact until I feel the blush rise on my checks too.
The screech of a chair on the floor brings me back to reality. Back to my No Limit Foods apron. My heart sinks. I can’t do this. This isn’t me. There’s too much at stake for me to get distracted by this guy.
I stand up. “I have to go. My break’s almost over, and my boss is an asshole.” I attempt a good-natured chuckle, but it comes out sounding high pitched and fake.
“It was nice meeting you, Kayla.”
I nod in acknowledgment and walk casually outside. Then I run until I swoosh through the doors of No Limit.
The acorn’s still in my hand. I put it in my pocket and feel it brushing against my leg for the rest of my shift.
—
It’s late. Too late for a good girl to be walking home alone in the dark.
There’s a man standing on the edge of the No Limit parking lot. He has a scraggly, patchy beard; long matted hair; and dirty sagging jeans. Maybe he’s homeless or maybe he’s too strung out to remember where he lives. When I pass by, the stench of alcohol and urine wafts off him. I don’t flinch. It’s nothing I haven’t smelled before. He does a one, two, three shuffle with his feet, like he’s dancing the cha-cha with an imaginary partner.
I pull the hood of my raincoat farther down over my forehead. Before I step onto the sidewalk, I look over my shoulder to see if he’s following me. He isn’t. That’s good. I’m too poor to afford a luxury like fear.
My paranoia doesn’t subside as I walk down Bluebird Lane. Jordan freaked me out with how he made me feel. One moment I was hating his obnoxious behavior, and the next I was drinking coffee, like I was on a date.
I can’t do that. Too much is riding on me always doing exactly the right thing. I have to get good grades. I have to participate in extracurricular activities. I have to work. I have to get a scholarship, go to college, and get out of here. I can’t risk everything because a guy made me feel special for a brief moment. That’s what happened to Mom.
I turn around. No one is there. Still, I feel like I’m being followed.
Up the street in front of me, two cars facing opposite directions stop in the middle of the road. One is a beat-up black Camaro with a Florida license plate. Its driver hangs his arm out the window. Tattoos that I can’t make o
ut dance and swirl up it.
Busted. The other driver’s a narc. His car is old and beat-up too, but there’s something about it that tries too hard to appear inconspicuous. Most of us around here could spot him a mile away.
The drivers slap hands over the asphalt. The narc pulls away and rolls toward me. I feel the disapproving, clinical examination of his gaze as he passes.
I make the rest of the walk with my eyes glued to the cement. Tonight, Bluebird Estates is quiet. The front lobby door is locked. Finn is inside apartment 21 sleeping it off. I make it to apartment 26 safe and sound.
The next girl isn’t so lucky. It happens at Sandhill Manor, the pretentious name for the dump a couple miles away. The news says she was alone, asleep in her apartment. He broke in, dragged her out, and left her crumpled in a back staircase. She didn’t make it.
I’m just grateful it wasn’t me.
“You need to come. Rosie adores you. You’ll break her heart if you don’t show up.” Mom wraps a bunch of blue hydrangeas in decorative green paper. My head lies on the kitchen table. The wood cools my cheek.
I’ve been going to the restaurant with Happy on the days when Mom has to work late. It’s either that or hang out with Teddy. He doesn’t think I should have to come home to an empty house. At C&J’s, Rosie won’t leave me alone. Every time she asks for hug. Every time I refuse.
“No,” I whisper. I already have a heart. I have to keep it alive, and beating, and safely inside my body. The kid’s heart isn’t my responsibility.
Mom holds up the flowers. “What do you think?”
My head lifts up, but my neck isn’t strong enough to keep it there. It flops back to the table. “Five-year-olds don’t want flowers for their birthdays.”
“I got Rosie a doll. These are for Connie.”
“Who’s Connie?” I can’t handle any more peripheral people in my life.
“Connie. Connie and Juan Morales. C&J’s?”
The Truth Beneath the Lies Page 3
