Runaway (23 page)

And
it turns out the girl played catcher! I didn't recognize her at first because of all the equipment she was wearing, but when she flipped off her catcher's mask to go after a ball, I recognized her!

Guess what else? When she caught the ball, the pitcher shouted, “Way to go, Sammie!”

So I also know her name!

If she wants to cause me trouble, man, I am ready to rumble!

         

I am also ready for rain (I hope). I snagged a gardener's shovel off his trailer and used it to dig a nice wide trench clear around the house.

         

I still wish I had an umbrella.

         

I wonder if I can make it to the soup kitchen before it starts to rain….

         

6:20 p.m.

I am an idiot! Why did I have to try to make it to the soup kitchen? I should have just eaten at home! I was planning to tell that Sammie girl that I knew all about where she lived and that she'd better not go back on her word, but halfway to the soup kitchen the sky opened up and tried to DROWN me. I could not believe how fast and furious that water fell.

I shouldn't even have gone inside the soup kitchen, but I did. And by then I was hoping that that Sammie girl
wasn't
there, but she was.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

“Yeah,” I growled.

“I…I could get you some dry clothes,” she whispered.

“Don't even!” I told her. “I'm fine. It's just water.” Then I split.

My hair's still soaked, and my shoes are going to take forever to dry out. But I've stripped out of everything and I'm in dry clothes, in my sleeping bag. I'm still shivering, but I can feel myself warming up.

The rain's pounding on the roof. It's so loud, even through the tumbleweeds. But the good news is, the house is holding up. If it can make it through this downpour, it can make it though anything!

         

2:30 a.m.

It's still pouring. One wall of my house is soaked and the floor below it is starting to get wet.

I don't want to go outside and trench.

I don't want to get drenched again.

But I don't want to lose my house.

Please stop raining. Please, please, please stop raining!

         

4:50 a.m.

It's
still
raining. I finally went out and trenched. It was brutal. Windy. Cold. I could barely see what I was doing.

I tried putting up an extra Hefty sack, but it just blew away. I'm having real trouble warming up now. I'm cold down to my bones.

I wish I had put more Hefty sacks under the house. If my sleeping bag gets wet, I'm doomed.

I do think the trenching helped.

And at least the roof's not leaking.

         

5:05 a.m.

Here's a cheery thought:

The roof on the
Titanic
didn't leak, either.

         

5:25 a.m.

I am still so cold.

Half the floor is soaked.

I wish I knew which apartment that Sammie girl lived in. I wonder if she'd let me in if I showed up at her door….

         

Next day, 2:45 p.m.

Things are bad. The house is soggy in so many places. I've never thought of water as evil before, but right now I do. It stopped raining a few hours ago, so I'm airing out my wet clothes and the sleeping bag, but I don't think the house will dry today unless it gets some direct sun, and that's not looking too likely. It's still overcast. I don't think I can make it through another night like last night.

         

Midnight

I don't even know if I can talk about this.

I'm shaky and scared.

And I'm so tired.

So,
so
tired.

But I can't sleep. I feel like I'll never be able to sleep again.

So I'm going to write….

         

Where to start.

I guess with Martin.

I ran into town to get more Hefty sacks. I actually
paid
for them. I was in a hurry, and I wanted to save my house more than I wanted to save what little money I had left.

Maybe I was so preoccupied with getting back to my poor house that I didn't notice Martin following me. And when I saw him come out of the bushes, I should have run, but I didn't. I picked up my spear and shouted, “Get out of here, you creep!”

He sneered.

And laughed.

And moved closer.

“Get back!” I shouted.

He kept coming, and the look on his face made my stomach turn. Mr. Fisk flashed through my mind, and I couldn't help shaking.

“Nice place,” he said, still sneering. “Nice and secluded.”

That's when I noticed he was going toward the shovel. He was planning to use it to block my spear.

I had to move or lose.

Up from somewhere deep and dark, an awful noise came out of me. And when I charged, the memory of Mr. Fisk propelled me forward with a fury that I didn't even know I still had inside.

“LEAVE…ME…ALONE!” I shouted, but in an instant he'd twisted the spear out of my hands and thrown it aside, leaving me stunned and off balance.

He grabbed me, so I kicked him in the shin as hard as I could, which made him so mad he hurled me against some bushes.

“No!” I cried, scrambling to get on my feet as he came at me. I tried desperately to get away, but he caught me and held me, two wrists in one hand.

There was no mercy in him, I could see it.

There was no hope for me, I could feel it.

He was so much stronger than I was.

So much crueler.

Still, I squirmed and kicked frantically. I was so mad. So burning-up mad. How could he overpower me so easily? It was unfair! So maddeningly unfair.

All my struggling just made him laugh harder, and I could feel myself getting weaker. And inside I was panicking because I knew there was no way I could win.

Forget win. There was no way I could even get away.

Then all of a sudden it was like a bolt of lightning hit him. He made a bloodcurdling scream and just let go.

In the blink of an eye that Sammie girl was standing beside me, pointing the metal tip of the biggest, blackest umbrella I have ever seen right at Martin. “Get away from her,” she yelled at him. “Get away from her or I'll run you through!”

“There's
two
of you brats?” he cried, holding his back where she'd rammed him.

“Yeah, there's two of us!” I shouted. “Now leave us alone!”

He started to retreat but then turned back and grabbed my sleeping bag. And while we were struggling with him over that, he tripped on the trench and lost his balance, falling back…back…back…and landing on my house.

“No!” I screamed as the box collapsed, folding in all around him.

I couldn't bear to look, so I turned away, then crumbled to the ground and started to cry.

My home. My dream. My life.

It was over.

Ruined.

         

Somehow Sammie chased Martin off, then sat next to me and put her arm around me. “I'm so sorry,” she whispered. “I'm so, so sorry.”

“What am I going to do?” I gasped. “What am I going to
do
?”

After a minute she took my hand and pulled me to my feet. “You're going to come with me,” she said. “I have an idea.”

I guess I could have refused to go with her, but I didn't. I followed her, and inside I felt strangely relieved.

Relieved to actually believe I could trust her.

We didn't say much to each other as we walked into town. She seemed to be thinking really hard about something, and frankly, I was too exhausted to talk.

I was surprised when we passed by her apartment building, because I'd thought that's where we were going. I almost said something about knowing she lived there, but I didn't. I just followed her as she jaywalked across the street and led me to a
dog
kennel.

At least that's what I thought it was at first. It was really a dog-grooming shop with an apartment upstairs, and after a few minutes of Sammie leaning on the buzzer, a wiry woman answered the door. She was wearing a bathrobe and slippers.

In a daze I followed them to the upstairs apartment. Another woman was doing dishes at the sink. Who were these people? Why had Sammie brought me here? Wouldn't they just call social services?

Sammie introduced us. The wiry one was Vera, the younger one was Meg.

Sammie explained that I'd had a really bad time in foster homes. She told them that I'd been living down by the riverbed. She told them about my refrigerator box. Her words became a blur of sound. I just sat there scared and shaky.

The women didn't say much, but the faces they pulled? No one had to spell it out: They didn't want anything to do with me.

Then Meg started pacing around, talking about friends of theirs who have foster children. “They're saints!” she said. “Their house is spotless and their children are happy!”

Sammie jumped up and said, “Maybe it's like dog kennels. You know, some of them are good and clean and others, well, dogs come out with kennel cough and fleas, smelling like pee!”

We all stared at her.

She shrugged and said, “Maybe Holly just happened to get stuck in some rotten, uh, kennels.”

Meg and Vera seemed to think this was an extreme comparison, but there was something about it that I really liked. And I didn't want to even go there, but I couldn't help really liking
her.

But then the older one (Vera) asked me what happened to my parents and how old I was, so I did what I always do:

I lied.

I told them that I didn't even remember my parents and that I was fifteen.

Why bother with the truth? I could tell that they were trying to figure out how to avoid having me stay with them, even for one night. No sense getting into the truth. No sense at all.

But Vera leveled a look at me and said, “The truth, dear. If we're going to talk about this, you need to tell us the truth.”

It was the way she said it, I think. So calm and wise and
kind.

And then I remembered what I'd thought after I'd escaped Walt and Valerie:

I should have wagged.

I should have begged.

I should have
tried.

My chin started quivering, and before I knew what I was saying, I blurted, “I'm only twelve!” Then I started sobbing.

When my mom died, I felt like I was lost in a giant black forest. I'd never cried so hard in my life. I don't think there's a pain in this world as awful as that one. Still, I was crying like I had that day. After all I'd been through to break free, to be free, to make it on my own, I'd still failed.

“Please,” I choked out. “I don't know who to turn to. I need someone I can trust. Please don't call social services. Just let me stay here for one night.” My throat ached from being pinched so tight, but I whispered it again, anyway. “I'm not a bad person. I've just been through some really bad times.”

Through a blur of tears, I saw a tiny poodle jump into my lap. It was soft and light and so sweet, stretching up to lick tears from my cheeks, my eyes, my nose.

My chin quivered terribly as I smiled at it and whispered, “Hi there.”

“That's Lucy,” Vera said. “Or Miss Lucille, when she's being naughty.”

I wrapped her in my arms and whispered, “Hi, Lucy. Thank you.”

Lucy wagged her little tail and licked some more tears from my cheek, which made me laugh and cry at the same time.

Vera and Meg excused themselves to have a private meeting in a back room, and when they returned they told me I could stay the night. They also promised that they wouldn't call social services behind my back, and said that we would talk more in the morning.

I hope I can trust them, but if not I've already decided I'm going to run.

Pouring rain or not, I'll run.

For tonight, though, I'm warm and safe, in my own little room, in my own little bed. There are patchwork quilts hanging on the walls, and one on the bed. They give the room such a cozy feeling, but best of all, Lucy's asleep beside me in bed.

She is so sweet.

So, so sweet.

And I am so, so tired….

         

Sunday, November 21
^st

I can't believe I've been here five days already. The time has gone by so fast! There's so much to write about, but I'll start with Meg and Vera. (Meg is Vera's daughter, by the way.) They seem so ordinary, but they're not. They have this quiet strength about them, which I really like. They work hard, but they don't complain, and they may have laid down some strict rules for me, but they're so kind about it that I don't mind following them.

I love the way they talk to dogs in the shop. “Come here, baby. That's my girl.” “Uh-uh-uh, you rascal, none of that in here!” They wash and dry and shear and style dogs, and they treat every single one of them like a long-lost friend.

I love helping them in the shop, which they let me do after I get home from school.

That's right,
school.
Can you believe it? I'm already enrolled in the bullfrog school. It all happened so quick, and I was really nervous at first, but I have Sammy (that's how she spells it) in homeroom and she's been helping me a lot. She showed me around and introduced me to her friends, and they invited me to sit at their lunch table. I don't say much. I mostly just listen to them talk about softball, but I'm really grateful that they include me.

The schoolwork's kind of hard. Especially math. But Vera and Meg have promised to get me tutoring if I have trouble catching up. “You can do this, Holly,” Meg told me. “And we're going to help you any way we can.”