I can do this. I have to do it. I can’t go back. He’ll kill me for this.
That’s what gives me the courage to leave the bathroom and go back outside, where there are a few people waiting under a metal shelter at the corner. I join them, standing as still as I can, even though I’m all jittery and anxious inside. They don’t know what I did. Nobody knows. I’m just like one of them.
Maybe one of them is a murderer, too. Maybe I need to not think about things like that.
I’m shaking so hard my teeth chatter by the time the bus pulls up. It is a stroke of good luck when the man in front of me unfolds three-dollar bills and feeds them into the machine next to the driver. I do the same thing and try not to cheer or look too relieved as I find an untaken seat. I did it. I’m actually sitting on the bus with strangers. A tiny bit of the tightness in my chest loosens when we start moving. I’m free. At last.
Now what? Now, I figure out what happens next. I guess I just have to find someplace cheap to stay, right? But where? I don’t even have a phone to look things up. I could find a library and hope they have computers to use, but I don’t know where to start looking for the nearest branch. I might as well be an alien who just landed on a new planet. I’m that clueless. Helpless. This is how Dad raised me to be.
But I’ve gotten this far. Hope warms my chest, even if it doesn’t do anything to calm my frantically racing heart. I can figure this out. I can figure anything out.
The bus stops and starts. People get on and off. The number of passengers thins out by the time we leave the impossible density of the city and head to a more suburban area. Well, maybe not quite suburban. Industrial? We pass a strip mall, a gas station, a motel.
A motel!
I get up and pull the cord to signal the driver to stop, the way I saw so many other people do. The bus keeps rolling until we reach the next stop, meaning I have to walk a little ways back toward the bright, neon-lit sign.Vacancy.I head straight for it and hope. All I can do is hope.
It’s pretty grim-looking, really, not that I can afford to be picky right now. The concrete around it is cracked and broken, littered with glittering bits of glass and cigarette butts. They tell a story, along with the condition of the few cars parked in front of rooms—one of them has a door that doesn’t match the rest of the car’s color. Another has a trash bag where one of the windows should be.
This is probably the kind of place where people mind their own business, and that’s all that matters now. Well, it would be nice if the room was clean, but I’m not asking for much more than that. There’s a sign readingOfficewith an arrow pointing to the door of a glass-walled room closest to the road. Pulling in a deep breath that smells like diesel fumes and cigarettes, I push open the swinging door and step inside.
The girl behind the desk looks me up and down. We could be the same age, or close to it. She looks bored and barely stifles a yawn as I approach the desk. The soles of my shoes stick to the floor once or twice along the way. “You need a room?” she asks.
“I do. How much?”
“How many nights?”
Hell, I have no idea. My bladder feels really heavy all of a sudden. “I’m not sure. I just need a room.”
“Well, it’s fifty-five bucks a night.”
I can handle that for a few days, I guess. I’ll have to figure out a way to get food, but there’s a vending machine in here with chips and other snacks. If worse comes to worst, I could survive.
“I need to see some ID,” she adds, finally sitting up straight now that we’re doing business.
Oh, my god. It’s like everything is against me. “I…”
She arches an eyebrow behind a pair of red-rimmed glasses. “Yeah?”
“I kind of left in a hurry.” That’s the truth, anyway. “I didn’t bring it with me. But I do have cash,” I add before she can tell me to get lost.
“Then it’s ninety-five a night.”
Son of a bitch. I guess there’s nothing I can do. Even one night, just one night of sitting back and thinking things over where nobody knows who I am. “Okay. That’s fine.” I pull out five twenties and hand them over and get a five-dollar bill and a room key in return.
“Don’t want any trouble around here,” she warns, though even then, she sounds kind of bored. Like it’s what she has to say, but she doesn’t actually care.
“I won’t be any trouble.” I hope not, anyway. I hope I don’t have to stay here for long, even if I don’t have the first clue where to go next.
I’ll worry about it later. For now, I take my key, printed with the number five, and head down to the room. I hold my breath while I’m unlocking the door, hoping for the best.
It’s actually not terrible. A little dingy. The carpet is worn flat, the dresser is chipped, with one of the drawers sitting crooked. The faded floral wallpaper is hanging loose at two of the ceilingcorners. But the bathroom is clean, and there are no bugs or anything. Things could be a lot worse.
And for the first time in all my life, I’m free. On the run? Yes. A murderer? Sure. But I’m on my own. Nobody’s telling me what to do. Nobody is locking me away. I’m on my own, and though I’m ecstatic about that, fear and loneliness are creeping up on me like fast-spreading mold.
I’m free, but also more alone than ever.
22
