me? Will I breathe the air easier?
Will the scent of high desert
Nevada trump Texas prairie?
Will I come running back to Grandfather
or find solace in rediscovered family?
IT IS LATE AFTERNOON
By the time we actually hit the highway.
First, long, straight stretches of Interstate 10.
Through Arizona, New Mexico, into California.
North on I-15, to 395, north to Carson City.
More than seventeen hundred miles. Alone with
a stranger. Straight through, more than twenty-
four hours. The longest ride of my life, through
mostly unremarkable country. Flat grassland.
Dry desert as yet unkissed by winter’s
soft wet lips. At least it’s not ungodly hot
in December. When we get out to stretch,
it’s rather comfortably warm. At least it will be for
the first part of the trip. We hear there’s
a blizzard warning from Bishop, north.
Blizzard? I’ve never even seen snow, not
that I can remember at least. I’m excited.
Scared. Chilled through to the bone, and
we’re only two hundred miles toward cold.
IT TAKES THAT TWO HUNDRED MILES
And more of tedious small talk—school,
extracurricular crap or lack of it, friends
or lack of them—interwoven with long bouts
of silence, before I finally get up the nerve
to redirect the conversation away from me.
“What’s she like?” I ask, then add, “My mother.”
Trey thinks for a minute, reaches over,
turns down the radio. I wish I could tell
you. But I’m not sure I ever knew Kristina.
The real Kristina, that is. I saw traces
of her once in a while. That girl had
a heart. The Kristina I met was still
pretty, but not nearly as beautiful
as the pictures I saw of her when she
was younger, before she started …
“Started using meth? With you?
Grandfather told me about that.
He said you were different before too.”
His jaw clenches. Dad doesn’t know
everything. Kristina didn’t start using
with me. She already had a history.
He tells me about Albuquerque.
How she met a guy there who first
turned her on. Tells me about
partying with her father. Hiding it
from her mother and stepfather.
How she probably would have
kept right on smoking it up then
except, But then she got pregnant
and mostly quit until Hunter was—
“Wait. Hunter? I have a brother?”
I’ve always believed I was an only
child. Not sure why, in retrospect.
I’m sorry. I forgot you didn’t know.
You have three brothers and a sister.
But you’re the only one who’s mine. I—
“Stop. I have to think.” I turn up
the radio. Close my eyes. Dive into
the music as best I can. Ride the metal
current. None of this makes sense.
The only thing about myself I know
for sure is that I don’t know anything.
OFF-KILTER
Canted. Listing
to one side,
a rotting hull.
Nothing will ever
be the same in
my world—careful
order
twisted.
Tossed
into chaos.
I don’t even
know how to
feel about that.
Relieved?
Terrified?
Hopeful?
Suicidal?
How does
this define
(or redefine)
me?
WELL PAST MIDNIGHT
We stop for sleep in Las Cruces.
New Mexico is supposed to be
pretty. Maybe I’ll agree, come morning.
So far it looks like Arizona did
at night. Miles and miles of
dark emptiness. A starlit vacuum.
Trey pulls into a dive of a motel.
Hope the beds have clean
sheets. The room is claustrophobic.
And ice-cube cold. I flip on the heat, go
to pee in a closet-sized bathroom.
Trey’s going out for fast food, asks for
my order. I beg off. “Too tired to eat.
And I don’t feel so hot. You could
bring me some bottled water, though.”
I throw back the covers for inspection.
The sheets look okay, so I crawl
into bed. Tired. Real tired. So why does
it take forever to fall asleep? How do
I shut off my brain? What have
I done? What will tomorrow bring?
A THIN BEAM OF LIGHT
Ray guns my eyes, and I jump
up into early gray morning.
Where am I? I’m not alone.
Someone is snoring? Oh. Trey.
It all comes tidal waving back.
New Mexico. Cheesy motel room.
Cadillac outside the door. Smell.
What’s that smell? I glance around
the room, notice the Taco Bell
bag, and wrappers, gooey with
hot sauce and bean detritus.
Suddenly I seriously need to toss
what little is in my stomach. I run
to the bathroom. Heave until I hit
empty. Get up, rinse my mouth.
Wash my face. When I exit the room,
Trey is awake, sitting up in bed,
looking more curious than worried.
“Sorry,” I say. “I think I might have
caught Grandfather’s flu bug.”
Hope that’s all you caught,
he says, half smiling. Puking,
first thing when you wake up?
Sounds like morning sickness to me.
Morning sickness? Oh my God.
Is that why I’ve felt so lousy lately?
He could be right. Pregnant?
Why does the idea shock me?
Can’t admit it, though. Not to him.
Righteous indignation swells. Who
the hell is he to even suggest it?
Trey Shepherd has never been
anything but the sperm donor
whose semen maybe jump-started
me. I shake my head. “Can’t be that.
What? You don’t believe me?”
The tone of my voice warns him
off. He shrugs. Goes to pee. I fall
back into bed. What have I done?
And what will Bryce do when he knows?
Summer
LABELS
Hate ’em. Mostly, I guess,
because I’ve worn one label
or another pretty much forever.
Loser.
Because when I was little,
Grandma Jean and Grandpa
Carl couldn’t afford the cutest
clothes or designer backpacks.
Loner.
Because foster kids don’t make
and keep friends. Might as well
brand their foreheads: FK.
For foster kid. Or freak.
Stoner.
Because even if you don’t get
stoned, hanging out with stoners
makes you feel like you belong.
Somewhere. Anywhere.
Stuck-up.
Because when you close yourself
off from questions, erect walls
around pain, unlocking the gate
to let someone in is
unthinkable.
Fuckup.
Because it’s easier to let others
believe you have no plans. No
dreams. No future. Nothing
worth taking away from you.
AND NOW A NEW LABEL
Probably the worst one ever
affixed to me. Not because
of the word. Because of what
it means. To me. To Kyle.
To our tentative today and even
shakier tomorrows, despite
how good it is to be together
again. Despite how good it feels
to be sitting here, close to him,
skin to skin, absorbing his heat
by osmosis. Inhaling the scent
of him. Tasting the salt of him,
whenever we chance taking the time
to kiss. Time being of the essence.
Driving south. Looking over our
shoulders, back at Fresno.
Holding the speed limit, wanting
to go faster but not daring.
He, doing this to be with me, despite
my brand-new label: runaway.
SNEAKING OUT
To meet him was harder than
I expected. Not because of Tanya
and Walter. Because of Simone,
who, for some unfathomable reason,
decided she wanted to bond after all.
That day, after I talked to Kyle,
started planning a little AWOL jaunt,
Simone softened. She had drawn
my name for our gift exchange.
Hope you like what I got you.
This was after a fabulous
beans-and-hot-dogs dinner.
We were in our fart-fragranced
bedroom, listening to the radio.
Simone is a huge hip-hop fan.
Can’t stand the stuff myself,
but I wasn’t going to argue.
All I could think about was Kyle
and how to escape the house
to meet him the next day.
Out of the blue, Simone
decided to open up. You want
to hear about my brother?
The creepy voyeur in me did.
But I kept my mouth closed.
Simone started to talk, anyway.
He was really my stepbrother,
and it started when I was eight….
It wasn’t a pretty story, but
I couldn’t not listen to the sordid
details of late-night visits.
Bad touch. Very bad touch.
Threats to keep her quiet.
And when it all became too
much and she told, anyway,
her stepmother called her
a liar. And her father, who
was totally not going to disrupt
his new marriage, refused
to believe his own daughter.
It took a trusted teacher to
call in the authorities. Proof
wasn’t difficult to come by.
Yet it was Simone whose life
was disrupted. Simone who
had to move out of her home,
into foster care. Simone whose
childhood was stolen. Innocence
eroded into nightmare. All because
of very bad touch. Love, corrupted.
NOT EXACTLY A NEW STORY
But it was Simone’s story, and once
she shared it, she felt more than
connected to me. She felt chained.
Like if I left her sight, her secrets
might go with me. Like once she gave
them away, they weren’t hers anymore?
Not like I wanted them. Not like I asked
for the responsibility of keeping them.
I’ve got enough secrets of my own.
One of which was on his way to me
from Bakersfield. And I really needed
the opportunity to head out the door
undetected. I had a couple of choices.
Confide. Or hide. I didn’t really think
we had bonded close enough to tell
her about Kyle, his impending arrival.
I wanted to hold that close. Thank God
I still had the “you don’t want to come
in the bathroom now” excuse going on.
Eventually she tired of shadowing me.
Stuck her nose in a book, kept it there.
I HAD MY CELL
With me, set on vibrate,
so no one but me would
know when it rang. I hid
out in the bathroom for
more than an hour, expecting
the buzz against my thigh.
I had almost given up by
the time it came. When
it finally did, it made me
jump. Good thing I was
only pretending to need
the toilet. I spoke in a low
whisper, hoping Simone
had, indeed, vacated the
hallway outside the door.
“Where are you?” It came
out a serpentlike hiss.
He was down the block.
Luckily, Walter was at
his day job. Tanya and
the sisters were crashing
around in the kitchen,
baking cookies. Leaving
was a piece of cake.
NOW I SWEAR
I didn’t have running in mind
as I slipped outside, sprinted
along the sidewalk to where
Kyle had parked. It still was
not my goal when I jerked open
the pickup door, bounded
into Kyle’s arms. Hadn’t even
considered the idea when I buried
my face into his chest, inhaled
his well-loved scent, turned up
my eyes, begging him to kiss me.
But when our lips met, starved,
something stirred. And when
his skin flowed like a warm tide
whipped up, crazy. And when
our bodies linked, woven in
heated rise and fall, every tatter
of loneliness dissipated into
the ether of memory. And then
he said, Oh my God, I love you
so much. I can’t be without you
ever again. Come with me,
Summer. Let’s get out of here.
NOT MUCH TIME
To think it over. Still,
my first reaction was, “I can’t.”
Yes, you can, he said. I need
you. Don’t you understand?
I sat up. Glanced around.
No sign of bear nor blonde.
“We can’t just go. I love you,
Kyle, I really do, but …”
If you really love me, you’ll say
okay. He reached out, grabbed
my face, turned it so I had to
look into his eyes. Okay?
I started to protest. But then
I remembered something Dad
had told me not long before
Shreeveport took me away.
We were on the porch, and as
usual, he was smoking. I watched
a narrow stream of smoke lift
into the cold morning. Rarely
before had the idea of separation
stung so much. I guess because
of the relative closeness we had
lately discovered. Finally I asked,
“If you could do anything over, take
something back, what would it be?”
He thought for a minute or two,
and when he finally spoke, his
answer surprised me. I guess
I would have tried harder to
convince your mother to stay
after she got out of prison.
I loved he
r enough to hope she
might fall back in love with me.
We were together for a while.
You were like two or something.
I would have done anything for her.
Maybe I didn’t let her know that.
I should have fought harder to keep
her. I’ll never love anyone else.
NOTHING TO LOSE
Unless I stayed. I think I surprised
both of us when I said, “Okay.”
I started to open the door.
Kyle stopped me, with a hand
on my arm. Where are you going?
“I have to get my stuff. Everything
I own is in there.” Not that it
amounted to a whole lot.
No. We have to go right now.
We’ll get you whatever you need.
He was right. Going back inside
would have been a mistake.
I settled into the seat. “Let’s go then.”
His eyes lit with excitement.
I love you. He kissed me sweetly.
Started the truck. Our adventure—
and neither of us had any idea
exactly what kind of adventure
it was or will be—had begun.
I only hope it means no regrets.
AS WE DROVE AWAY
I’m almost positive I saw Simone
glance out the bedroom window.
Not sure if she noticed me or not,
and can only hope she didn’t run
and tell right away if she did. Would
she have had the presence of mind
to take down the license plate?
Would she have seen the happiness
written all over my face and kept it
to herself? I feel sorry that she gave
me her secrets now. Sorry she won’t
have someone to whisper to in the night.
But you can’t get attached to anyone
in a foster home. I learned that lesson
a long time ago. Get close, get hurt.
She might as well learn that too.
LESS THAN A HALF HOUR
Away from Fresno, the weight
of our hasty decision hits me.
“Any idea where we’re going?”
Deceptively simple question.
Kyle sighs heavily. Nope. I was
kind of hoping you might have
an idea. Any place you’ve
always wanted to see?
I slide my hand into his. “Lots.”
It is kind of exciting, just picking
a place and aiming for it. Except,
“What do you think they’ll do?”
He shrugs. Depends on if they