I had been underneath the bridge a few times with my much wilder friend Amanda. She knew a few of the fringe kids that hung out with the shadies, scoring drugs—andother things.
Amanda was the kind of wild that was tolerated by her lovingly indulgent and permissive parents. She liked to play the part of crazy and out of control that was easily palatable when you had a comfortable bed to go home to at night.
She rebelled…just enough. She was bad…only slightly. And I had always been happy to tag along on her more rough and tumble adventures.
A few months ago she had briefly hung out with an older guy named Dez. With a buzz cut and tattoos on his arms, he was perfect in the I’m-trying-so-hard-to-be-hardcore kind of way.
I had no idea how she met him, only that he sold drugs to the street kids who made the rusty iron and broken rocks their home.
“My father wouldhatehim,” Amanda cooed one night as she dragged me with her to meet up with him.
And she was right. Dez—no last name— was in his mid-twenties with terrifyingly dead eyes and a smile that would make children run away. He treated Amanda forcefully and it was obvious no one really liked him.
“You’ll get eaten alive down here, sweet cheeks.” Dez had leered at me. I had straightened my shoulders and pretended that he was wrong. I then smoked the joint he offered, drank from the dirty glass bottle that was passed around the group of dejected, thrown away people, and made myself belong for the night.
But Dez had been right.
I didn’t have what it takes to make it outhere.
With the sky for a roof and grass for my bed. Watching my back with a paranoia that made me twitchy.
But being outherewas better than going home. I was convinced of it. And there was no way I could back down now that my decision had been made. Admitting I had been wrong seemed the worst possible thing.
Pride was a dangerous thing.
And it just might kill me.
I wrapped my arms around me, wishing I had thought of a better outfit to wear on my great escape. A tight fitting tank top and cut off shorts didn’t seem like the wisest attire if I didn’t want to get noticed by the wrong kind of people.
“You did it? You’re such a bad ass!” Amanda squealed. I pressed myself inside the tiny phone booth. I had used my last handful of change to call the only friend I had who wouldn’t tell me I was a total idiot.
“It’s like I’m a fucking ghost in that house. She won’t know I’ve even left,” I said shortly. And it was true. My mother didn’t do maternal. I was expected to conform to her life or not at all. She was strict when it didn’t matter. Disinterested when it did.
It had just been the two of us after my dad died when I was three. My mother was my only family. No doting grandparents or affable uncles. No cousins.
She had always been more of an older sister than a mother. I remembered as a child she’d feed me gummy bears for dinner and let me watch horror movies on school nights. She didn’t care about things like homework and dental checkups.
But she was also the one who took me to get a sundae at the Dairy Queen the first time I had my heart broken.
She wasn’t all bad, but she only loved if it was convenient.
And I had become inconvenient.
She had Adam now. Gorgeous, struggling musician, way-too-young-for-Mom Adam. A sixteen-year-old daughter didn’t really fit into the raging rock and roll lifestyle she had recently adopted.
When I ran away for the first time, I could admit it was for attention. I had hoped Mom would be frantic. I had fantasies of her notifying the police, putting up missing posters, appealing to the local media.
None of that had happened.
I had stayed away for a full twenty-four hours, sleeping on a park bench, before I ventured back only to find the house empty. Mom had never even come home from wherever she had disappeared to.
I ran away the second time after Mom decided to play super bitch and refused to let me go to the movies with Amanda. With Adam looking on in approval, she proceeded to rip me a new one about my “lack of responsibility” and how I needed to “help out more” if I ever wanted to go out again.
I was gone two days that time. I slept on Amanda’s floor until her dad realized I hadn’t gone home after the first night and all but threw me out on my backside. His loving indulgence clearly only included his daughter.
This time though, magic number three, I left with no delusions of a concerned mother. I didn’t expect her to scour the streets looking for me. I wasn’t trying to get attention. I wasn’t having a tantrum.
I was just tired of being invisible. I’d rather be on my own than living with the constant reminder that I was a non-entity in my own house.
