Chasing Tail Lights Page 20

  "You can't trust anybody but your own, remember that," she says, dropping the remote in front of her while pointing her finger at me. I look at those thick calloused hands reaching out, not to comfort me, but to confront me. I sometimes wonder if her ears are calloused over as well.

  "But Mama," I counter.

  "No buts about it. I might have messed up with Robert, but I was a kid myself. His father was no good. Just like your daddy was no good, dying on me like that. But Ryan's father, well, that was a real man." She's slurring her mean words, and there's nothing left in the house but the two of us.

  "Oh my God!" I grab the remote from the chair and mute the noise. "I finally understand it."

  "Understand what?" Mama says, as she sinks deep into the chair and vainly looks for the remote so the melodramatic antics of reality TV can drown me out.

  "Is that why you love Ryan so much and the rest of us so little?" I say, anger balling into my fists. "Because you think if you love Ryan more than us that his dad will come back."

  She doesn't say a word because you can't fight the whole truth with half lies.

  "He beat you, he left you, and you still want him back!" My words are making me sick.

  "You shut up or else," she snaps back, then coughs loudly.

  I shout at her, like I should have shouted years ago. "You have nothing! How can you hate yourself so much?"

  Her eyes flash red-hot anger at me, but she knows that I see the truth. I don't know anyone who hates themselves as much as my own mother—except for me.

  "Go to bed," Mama replies. Her lack of denial is louder and stronger than any words.

  "I'm in my bed!" I shout, throwing the remote at her feet. She clicks back on the TV.

  "Why do you think you can sleep out here?" she shouts at me over the blaring TV.

  "Why don't you ask Ryan that?" I say, then pull a pillow over my face, shutting out the noise from the television show. She turns away from me, just like that woman on the bus, and falls asleep in front of the television. I look at my mother with a strange mixture of pity and anger. Mama's never quit, but she's never won: she just survives. She lives by believing her lies.

  31

  april 11, senior year

  "Let's run away."

  Terrell and I are sitting in a corner booth at Angelo's. Over greasy fries and weak coffee, I found more courage I never knew that I had, but his silence makes my stomach churn and my runner's legs yearn to explode. No more small steps or slow laps; it's time for a long jump.

  "What do you mean?" he finally says, his voice buried in the mix of Angelo's normal late-night clatter. "Christy, come on, we're just getting started. I mean, we haven't even—"

  I push my hand across the table. Our fingers intertwine, like our lives, but not our bodies. It started with an innocent kiss and there it remains. "You and me, let's run away together."

  He scratches his forehead with his free hand. "Where is this coming from?" I don't blame him for his bewilderment, but he shouldn't blame me for my desperation. As school gets closer to ending and home gets harder with Ryan's caged rage, my need to escape reemerges.

  "You need to save me," I say strongly, digging my fingers deeper into his hand.

  "I don't know what you're talking about," he answers. The confusion evident in his voice. He sees me at work, sometimes at night, but he's never ever seen inside my home or my dark heart.

  I pull my hand away, ball it up, and cover my mouth so I don't scream at what's unsaid.

  "Christy, I'm sorry," Terrell says, leaning toward me, but I won't let him touch me now.

  "You're sorry for even knowing me," I say to him in a shouting whisper.

  "No, it's not that," he says, but I only hear what he doesn't say: Christy, I love you.

  "You hate me!" I harshly tell his soft eyes as my legs spring into action.

  "Wait!" he says, but I'm out the door like a robber making a clean getaway. Yet as soon as I hit the parking lot, standing on the cracked concrete under the buzzing, bright yellow neon lights and amid the rusted-out cars, empty Styrofoam cups, and discarded food, I realize there's nowhere to run. I stagger over and stand next to the pay phone, without anyone to call.

  "Christy, I'm sorry," I hear Terrell yell from a distance. I know what he wants, but I can't give him what isn't mine. I should have just stayed invisible.

  "Leave me alone!" I shout at him, but the roar of the busy street swallows my words.

  "No, damn it, no!" he says, grabbing my heaving shoulders.

  "Leave me alone!" I shout again, but he tries to hold me tighter. His arms surround me, but don't soothe me because I'm trapped in my self-made cage. If I let him fuck me, then he'll know and he'll want nothing to do with me. If I don't let him fuck me, then he'll want nothing to do with me. I'm crying, but the tears wash away nothing, instead bringing salt to my wounds.

  "Talk to me!" he says, throwing his hands up in the air and stepping closer to me.

  "I hate you!" I shout at him, for it is the emotion easiest to swallow and wallow in.

  "Grow up!" he snaps. It's the first time I've heard ugly impatient anger in his voice.

  "I have!" I shout back at him, my fingers turned to fists beating against my legs, like I was trying to kick-start them. "I hate you, Terrell, I wish I never met you! I hate you!"

  "I'm sorry you feel that way, but it's not me you hate," he says pointing a finger at me.

  I take off running away from Terrell, from myself. But he should be the one running away from someone as fucked up, fucked over, and unfuckable as me.

  I'm ten feet down Franklin Avenue, when I hear his voice yell out, "Christy, don't do this!"

  I keep my head down, not just to hide my tears, but to avoid eye contact. Sooner or later he's going to find out, sooner or later he's going to look into my eyes and know.

  "Where are you going to go?" he asks, and I can't answer, because there is no place for me to go. My legs want to run, and thanks to Ms. Chapman, I'm learning to run faster than ever, but all I see is myself running in circles.

  "I don't know, Terrell, I don't know," I shout at him from inches away, sounding more like a frustrated four-year-old than a soon-to-be high school graduate.

  He comes closer to me, putting his hand gently on my shoulder. My instinct for so long was to shake and cringe when a hand pressed against my body, then it changed to not feeling anything at all. Every time Terrell touches me, I get the warm tingling of a human touch. "Christy, I can't run away with you," he says, pulling me closer.

  "Why not?" I ask, wanting so much for him to give me some reason to believe.

  "I didn't want this to happen like this," he says softly. "You know, you're the first real girlfriend I've had because I knew it would come to this. I knew I would need to decide."

  "Decide what?"

  "Between staying here or going away to college," he speaks a slow, simple truth. "Love's great, but it's a chain. It pulls you places you know you shouldn't go."

  "Like a chain," I repeat and realize, like Brutus, I've run out into traffic only to be hit.

  "So I can't stay here with you and I can't run away with you," he says softly, kissing the top of my head. "But that doesn't mean I'm going to let you run away from me now, like this."

  "I can't do this. I'm so tired. I just want to quit," I say through clenched teeth, holding him tighter still. I bury my face in his broad shoulders, trying to steal his strength. I know now more than ever that I can't go on like this for even one more day or sleepless night. I need to find the courage to either live or kill myself. I can't live in between any longer.

  32

  april 28, senior year

  "I quit."

  I say the words the best I can through heavy breathing. I'm bent over, my hands on my knees, and happy that I don't have to look Ms. Chapman in the eye. Everybody else on the track team has hit the showers, but I've stayed behind, and not just because I have no desire to be surrounded by naked finely toned athletic female bodies
, while I hide myself in a towel.

  "Christy, are you sure you want to do this?" Ms. Chapman asks very firmly.

  "Yes, I can't do this. It's too hard," I say, my lungs working overtime, no doubt in part from keeping the contents of my stomach inside. "I want to quit this team!"

  "Fine!" she shouts at me, then reaches her hand toward me. "Give me your uniform."

  My eyes go wide and my knees buckle. "Now?"

  "Now! I don't have room on this team or in my life for quitters," she says, coming closer and not giving me an inch to breathe or squirm out of this desperate attempt for acceptance. All she needed to do was say the words that I wanted: "Christy, don't do that, the team needs you."

  "But Ms. Chapman, I—" I start.

  "Wear this," she takes off her warm-up jacket, taking the keys out first. She stands in front of me as I slip off the uniform, then cover myself with her jacket.

  And I start to cry.

  "Winners never quit, and quitters never win," she says as she jiggles her keys in front of her, like somebody teasing a dog with a bone. "Are you going to be a loser all your life, Christy, is that what you want? I know you have it in you to be a winner, but you've got to bring it out."

  "I'm not a loser," I say the words, as if I almost believe them sometimes.

  "You say that, but you don't act that way," she says. "Don't write a check with your mouth that you can't cash."

  "What do you mean?"

  "You don't think you're a loser by quitting?" she says, but never gives me a chance to answer. "You want to be on this team or not?"

  I nod. "Yes."

  "You want this uniform back?" She holds the dull gray track uniform in front of her.

  "Please," I say, pleading for a place somewhere.

  "Don't be so damn passive, get angry, Christy! Fight back, like you did with Seth!"

  "I want my uniform back!"

  "Catch me then!" she says, turning on her heel, then running toward the parking lot. She takes off running, her legs are a blur, almost impossible to see through my bleary and teary eyes. I take a deep breath and chase after her.

  "Get in!" Ms. Chapman shouts at me as she opens the door to her dark blue Jeep Cherokee. I do as I'm told and climb in next to her.

  "Where are we going?" I ask, but she doesn't answer. She takes a left out of the parking lot, merges quickly on 1-69, under the bridge, then exits onto 1-475, headed toward the north end.

  She's not talking, and I'm taking in the scenery, or lack thereof. Some of my daddy's family still live north, but Mama doesn't want much to do with them. The north end is where Ryan likes to spend his time, and where most of his buds are from.

  "You like your history class?" Ms. Chapman asks, breaking the silence as we exit the expressway and drive down Coldwater Road. It is like my neighborhood times ten: vacant houses, and on every corner a party store selling lottery tickets, liquor, and the belief in luck. The main distraction and attraction is a vacant lot, filled with empty bottles, hunks of concrete, and the memory of a huge auto factory that no longer exists.

  "Sure," I say, confused and a little bit afraid as to why she's brought me here. I'm trapped in this ride through a city of ruins.

  "Let me show you my history, Christy," she says, taking a sharp right turn. If the main road was run down, this neighborhood is almost zombie-movie scary. We drive down a street where every other house looks abandoned or burned out. "Here's where I grew up."

  The yard is overgrown with weeds, the windows broken, and gang graffiti is painted in black on the side of the pink house. Like many of the houses on the street, it's deserted.

  "One-twenty-seven Mott Avenue," she says, and it sounds like she wants to cry. We pause for just a moment, then drive down the street, if you can call it that. There are more potholes than pavement. We drive down another street filled with young children playing outside. There are fewer vacant houses; in fact, some are active with SUVs or Hemis buzzing around like vultures. We drive for a while, finally passing by a vacant school. You can barely see the name through the weeds.

  "That's Beecher High School," Ms. Chapman says, sadness in her voice. "It's closed down now. Just like the Buick factory and most everything else around here."

  I just nod, since no words come to mind.

  "If I would have quit track, I'd be living in a house like one-twenty-seven Mott," she says.

  "Just because you quit track?" I ask as she pulls away from the house.

  "Because I quit," she says. "Sports gave my life a center, a reason to believe. I had a coach who showed me that vision and gave me that center. You need that center too."

  We pass more pay day loans and party stores. The stores have familiar "WIC and EBT Accepted Here" signs displayed in the windows next to ads for lottery tickets, beer, and cigarettes.

  "I'm not going to tell you all the stuff the school counselors do," she says. "I'm not going to kid you, tell you that you have lots of choices, because I've been there, Christy. If you're poor, you don't have a lot of choices, but that doesn't mean you have to make bad ones."

  "I know," I say, wondering why I couldn't have chosen to go out for track my tenth-grade year and learned these hard lessons from Ms. Chapman then.

  "Look at me, Christy," she says. I turn to face her and she smiles. A huge happy smile a million miles away from the angry look she was wearing moments ago. "You can't quit. If you quit, you'll end up here before you're twenty and be dead or wish you were by the time you're twenty-five. This might be my past, but it could be your future. Is that what you want?"

  I shake my head, vigorously.

  "It is too easy to quit," she says. "Do the hard thing."

  I rub the back of my calves, thinking how hard track is; how hard life is.

  "That's what I did," Ms. Chapman says. "I wanted to quit track every day. But I didn't. I stuck it out, and it was the right thing."

  "And that's what you want me to do," I say.

  "Yes, but not because I said so," she says, as we make our way back toward the freeway and to Southwestern, I assume. "Do it because it is the hard thing."

  "I try, I try really hard," I say, thinking of how hard I work at practice. "My legs just—"

  "You're not listening," she says as she pulls the car to the side of the road, then turns to face me. "Listen, Christy, running isn't about your legs."

  She taps her fingers on my knees, but her touch doesn't bother me for once.

  "It is about this."

  She pokes me in the middle of my chest: hard enough to notice but not to hurt.

  "It is about this," she says.

  She points first to her own head, then taps mine just above my left ear.

  "Running is about disciplining your mind. Get your mind right, your legs will follow."

  I want to tell her that for all the lessons she's been teaching, during the past eight years, I've learned some on my own, and they contradict what she's saying. I've learned the survival skill of splitting my body from my mind.

  "Think about Mott Avenue. Think about this life," she says, pulling my uniform from the backseat and handing it back to me. "Run like you're escaping from there. One day, you'll have something real to run to, but for now, let me give you something to run away from. Run as if you were running for your life, because in some ways you are."

  33

  early evening, may 5,

  senior year

  "I finally quit my job!"

  "What did your dad say?" Anne and I are on the bridge, just taking in the twilight hours. With school almost over, and Tommy and Terrell in our lives, our time together is also in twilight.

  "He's not talking to me," she says, as she pulls off her pink-polka-dot welder's cap and lets the wind blow back her hair. "And I don't even care."

  "So, why did you finally quit your job?" I ask her.

  She turns her back to me, and just looks down at the cars going by. "No reason."

  "Anne, come on, what's going on?" I ask her again, but it's mo
re a habit than a need.

  "Look, you can't tell Tommy about this. I don't want him to get in trouble again," she says after a silent pause filled with loud traffic noise. "God, I wish we had some weed!"

  "Sure, whatever," I tell her, happy that she and Tommy are still together. Anne says she's playing chicken with her father about Tommy, and she's not going to be the one to blink.

  "My boss, you know I've told you about him," she says, each word very deliberate.

  "Little dick." I can't help but giggle when I say it.

  "It's not funny, not funny at all," she says, as she sits down. She puts her cap back on so the wire mesh doesn't press against her head. I sit down across from her, my long legs stretched out before me. "I'm going to tell you something, but you have to promise not to tell anyone."

  "I promise," I say with the confidence of a school career filled with secret keeping.

  "Last night, my boss and I were the last two closing out and he—" Anne says, then pauses.

  "He what?" I ask, the roar of the cars below us sounding like an angry chorus.

  "I'd just come back from clearing tables, and I had one of those big trays in my hands," Anne says, twirling her straight hair in between two fingers. Her voice sounds nervous, scared, and tense. "He told me that I needed to tuck in my shirt, it was hanging out in front."

  "And?"

  "I looked down and saw he was right. So I got ready to set the tray down, but he said—"

  "Yes?"

  "He said, let me do it." Anne's voice choked back tears.

  "What do you mean?"

  "He took his hand and tucked my shirt into my pants, then he left his hand there."

  A semi rumbles underneath, shaking the bridge. "Anne, what did you do?"

  "He pushed his hand deeper and harder into me, and he was smiling, asking me if I liked it, and then I screamed no really loud," Anne says, measuring each word. "And then I dropped the tray I was carrying. Plates, cups, and glasses crashed to the floor. It was so loud."