Rabbit Ears Read online

  “Easy, kid,” Jim says to you. “She’s fine. Marcos is taking good care of her. He’s known her for a long time.”

  Michelle lowers herself back onto the bed, and Marcos turns his attention to his own arm, showing no interest in you. Jim grasps your elbow. Hard.

  “Let’s grab a coffee,” he says. “We’ll talk.”

  You pull away from him and take two steps toward the bed. “No. I can’t leave her. It’s my fault she’s …”

  “She doesn’t need you right now, honey. Can’t you see how happy she is?”

  You look down at her, lying across the bed now, head rolled to one side. Happy doesn’t seem like the right word, but clearly she has done this before. And she was eager to bring you downtown because she wanted this. She wants to get high. She wants to escape her life. Well, you understand that. Though you’ll never do what she’s doing, no matter how much you want to forget.

  You turn and look at Jim now and the word pimp leaps into your mind. Pimps and drugs go together, right? If you leave Michelle alone now, will men rape her? Is Jim going to take you somewhere all on your own where men can give him money for you? You feel frightened but also curiously detached at the thought. Kind of floaty. The instinct to protect Michelle is strong. The horror at what Michelle is doing is real. But the nervousness that clung to you all the way downtown on the bus is gone.

  You smile. “Let’s go!” you say to Jim.

  The street is still filled with a milling-around crowd that confuses you. Jim keeps you close, though. He doesn’t march off ahead like Michelle did. He turns in at a pair of windowless doors, pushes one open and stands aside to let you pass. The light inside is dim, but warm; the space is big and mostly empty. A woman calls hello from behind the bar. Two guys look up from a long table, a jug of beer between them.

  Once you are seated, Jim leans back in his rickety plastic chair and signals to the waitress.

  You squirm in your seat, breathing the smell of stale cigarettes and spilled beer, staring at the stained table. When you glance up, Jim’s eyes are on you, and you look back down. He is nothing like any man you have ever met before. Not even … but you nix that thought quick.

  The waitress runs a dirty cloth over the table and plunks down a jug and two big hard-plastic cups. Jim pours and drinks.

  At last he speaks, slow, with a drawl. “So, did the girl bring you or did you bring her?”

  You open your mouth. “I …”

  He waits a moment, then says, “Not much of a talker, are you.”

  Your mouth snaps shut. You look at him, proving him right.

  The answer to his question sits in your mind, heavy and sticky. You brought her and the reason for that is … The reason for that is …

  Without planning it, you say, “My dad died.”

  He looks at you, brows raised. “Your dad died.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’re telling me that because …?”

  “I don’t know. I guess I’m just really messed up.”

  Jim smiles briefly.

  “Well,” he says as he lifts his glass to his mouth, “I can help you out, if you want.”

  Your eyes stay on his face, trying to read it, to figure out what kind of help he is offering you. The same kind of help he gives Michelle, most likely. That isn’t what you came here for. Is it?

  The door to the bar opens and bodies and voices swirl in together. “Hey, Jim.”

  “Hey, kiddo.”

  “I’ve told you not to call me that. Who’s this you’ve got here?”

  The woman speaking is young and pretty. That’s what you see first. Her hair is curly black and she has lots of it—it’s kind of like yours. Her skin isn’t far off your colour either, but everything else about her is different: her dress, skin-tight; her makeup and nails, perfect. She has broken away from her group to speak to Jim, and now she turns her attention on you.

  “I’m, uh, I’m Kaya,” you say, hating the catch in your voice. Here is somebody female who knows how to live in this world. You can’t imagine this woman living in a nasty hotel room like Jim’s, or knuckling under to a guy like him either.

  “I’m Sarah,” she says, pulling out a chair.

  “Hey!” one of the women in the group calls out. She’s tall, skinny, teetering on heels, gesturing broadly with long arms. “You’re with us, Blackie.”

  You tense, but Sarah seems relaxed.

  “Hang on to yourself,” she calls back, grinning at her friend before she turns again to you.

  “We don’t need another hang-about,” the woman in the group says, scowling now. She slings herself onto a chair and leans in to her companions. You can’t hear what she says after that.

  Jim puts his hand on your back, and Sarah looks down her nose at him.

  “How long have you known Jim here?” she asks you.

  You look at your watch, and she laughs. “Hands off, Jim,” she says, her voice light, playful. “She’s just a kid.”

  You straighten. “I am not. I’m … I’m …” But you can’t bring yourself to lie to her. You are just a kid.

  “See ya, Jim,” Sarah says, and to you, “Come on, uh … what did you say your name was?”

  “Kaya.”

  “Come on, Kaya.”

  You’re happy to blow off Jim, but you balk at joining the others at their table.

  “It’s all right,” Sarah says. “They won’t bite.” She laughs. “Right, guys? At least, they won’t draw blood.”

  The scowler lets her eyes pass over you—scratchy, her gaze feels, while it lasts, which is only for a moment. Neither of the others looks up. You have to force yourself to sit.

  After that, they ignore you for a while, and you start to relax and enjoy the energy. Cigarette smoke, raunchy jokes (really raunchy jokes), laughter, all of it swirls around you, warm and somehow comforting. You sip at a glass of beer and study them, one at a time. One is wearing worn-out sweats and runners with a T-shirt knotted at her waist; one is wearing boots with stiletto heels and a short skirt over bare legs and a low-cut top with ruffles around the neck. The scowler is wearing skinny jeans with those heels and a baggy tank top, her tattered leather jacket slung over her chair-back. Then there’s Sarah in her stretchy dress.

  Are they high? You have no clue. You don’t think so. Are they prostitutes? You don’t know that either, but you guess that the stilettos mean they are. Well, maybe not the one in the sweats.

  As the glasses empty, the scowler turns her attention back to you. “So what’s up with the kid?” she says to Sarah. “Is she your new little trainee? You going to raise her up? Be her grand protector?”

  “Shut up, can’t you?” Sarah says, looking sideways across the room at Jim, who moved tables when you abandoned him, joining the pair of guys who looked up when you entered the bar. “I was just getting her away from him. You know he chews them up and spits them out.”

  “He got me up and running,” the woman with the ruffled blouse says. “And look at me.”

  You do, and you can’t tell if she is being sarcastic or dead serious. She doesn’t look great. She looks worn out. Worn through.

  “He’s no worse than anyone else,” she adds.

  The knotted T-shirt woman speaks then, but so quietly that all of you could have missed it if her words hadn’t fallen into a moment of quiet between songs. “What about your Charlie?” That’s what she says.

  Sarah stands, pushing back her chair so fast it almost clatters to the floor. Jim and his friends look up, obviously eager for some drama, but “Fuck you” is all Sarah says as she grabs her coat and strides for the door. “Fuck you.” She has to turn back when she’s halfway there. “What’s the matter with you, kid? Are you going to stay with them?” Then she’s gone and you have to run to catch her in the morning drizzle.

  “I’m worried about my friend,” you say as you half jog along at her side down Hastings. “I left her in a hotel room with this young guy, Marcos. A friend of Jim’s. She was shooting
up.”

  Sarah stops. “Jesus,” she says. “Well, that’s what happens in Jim’s hotel room. That’s what happens in a lot of hotel rooms. That and other stuff.” She stands still then, sheltering herself from the rain under an overhang, and asks you a few questions. At last she starts walking again, and you go back to jogging along at her side.

  “I’m not sure if you can help her right this minute, Kaya,” she says. “It sounds like she knows what she’s doing. She took you there, right?”

  You nod, thinking about that, about people leading other people into danger. Today wasn’t the first time someone did that to you.

  For a moment you are angry with Michelle, and it feels kind of good, this cloak of anger. But Michelle was perfectly safe at school just this morning, far from drugs and needles and all the other nameless dangers. You knew that she had been in trouble downtown. And you used that knowledge to get what you wanted. You might as well have walked right up to her at school and jabbed a needle into her yourself.

  The anger slithers away, and your skin twitches at the shame that clings to you in its place.

  As you walk, you snuggle into your coat and wonder how Sarah can stand her bare legs and thin fitted jacket in the cold damp. She doesn’t look as gorgeous in broad daylight, you notice. Her clothes are a bit worn, a couple of sores show through her makeup, and her eyes are kind of dull. But her energy, her friendliness, trumps all that stuff. She seems to know everyone, or just says hello whether she knows them or not. You’re not sure which, but it doesn’t matter.

  People say hello back, but Sarah never stops and she never introduces you to anyone.

  You look and you don’t look, not wanting to see the dirt, the misery, or, even worse, the fact that all that dirt and misery is attached to human beings. What are you doing here?

  Then Sarah slows down. You are approaching a corner. PRINCESS AVENUE, the sign says. A corner store. And on the other side of Princess, the Union Gospel Mission down the block, and closer, two little grey houses, a matched set.

  “This is where I get off,” she says, pointing at the closest of the houses. “And this is where you get on.”

  You look at her, puzzled, and she grins. “On a bus, that is!” She seems awfully pleased at her own cleverness.

  “But …” You aren’t sure what to say, how to argue. “I … I just got here.”

  “That, Kaya, is the very best time to leave. Trust me,” she says. Then, “I’m kind of busy here, actually.”

  She doesn’t invite you into her house. She doesn’t take you somewhere to talk. She doesn’t tell you to come back sometime. She just ushers you toward the bus stop. You swallow thick hurt and take a step away from her.

  “All right,” you say, defeated. “I’ll catch a bus.”

  “Do you have some money?”

  You nod, even though all you have is a handful of coins in your pocket.

  She pulls a crumpled ten-dollar bill from her minuscule purse. “Here,” she says. “Get yourself a burger or a slice. And use the change to catch a bus home.” She looks hard at you, almost glaring, and goes on. “Listen, Kaya,” she says, “don’t come back, okay?”

  “Goodbye,” you say, hating how tiny your voice is.

  She looks into your eyes, and, almost as an afterthought, points again at the little house, its front step overgrown, its front windows boarded up. “If you ever need me, knock at the back door. Ask for Blackie.” A pause, her eyes locked on yours. “Well, off you go, then.” And she turns away.

  Obediently you start walking back the way you came. When you look back, a few doors down, Sarah is gone. If only she had invited you in.

  A bus is coming, but you ignore it. You don’t have the right change anyway.

  After an absence of an hour or so, Michelle is back in your head. She seemed to trust Marcos, but from what Sarah said, you know that she thought she was rescuing you from Jim. And what does that say about Jim’s young friend?

  It takes forever to find the building again. Your stomach grows demanding at a certain point and you pick up a couple of Chinese pork buns. You walk extra fast as you pass the hotel where Sarah found you with Jim. You don’t want to run into him, or any of those women. Your stomach churns at the thought of facing the scowler all on your own.

  Then you have to find the right bus stop—the one where you and Michelle got off—and stand and remember. This way. No. That way. People look at you. One or two try to speak to you. But you put on your shell, the same one that’s been working pretty well for you at school since Michelle rescued you from those girls—until Diana showed up, that is—a small self-assured smile, almost eye contact, but not quite, as if you have something important to do. A longish stride. Arms relaxed. Just past the first corner you have to stand again, retrace your steps. After a long search, you see the dusty plants and you are sure, though it’s amazing how many dusty plastic plants you have had to examine before you find the right ones.

  You stand and gaze at the buzzers. Five of them, grimy; the spots for names, empty. What should you do? Press them all? Your finger hovers, but before you commit, feet clatter down the stairs and Marcos himself barrels out the door almost right into your arms.

  You move around him and stick your foot in the door before it swings shut. “Marcos,” you say.

  He looks at you, and you find yourself staring at his eyes; his pupils have disappeared. You resist the temptation to say Anybody home? and after a moment you see a glimmer of recognition.

  “You’re her friend,” he says slowly.

  “Yes,” you say. “I need to get her now. We need to go.”

  “I don’t think …” he begins, glancing back up the stairs, his eyes flicking nervously.

  That’s all you need to send you into the building. “I’ll just get her myself,” you call over your shoulder as you dash up the stairs. Maybe he’ll go away. Maybe she’s in there all by herself. Maybe. This isn’t safe, you think. You should call the police. Or Michelle’s mother. Her foster mother, that is. And you wonder for a moment what she has been through in her life. Anyway, you’re not calling anyone. You’re going in.

  Marcos rattles up the stairs after you, but you get to the room before he does and the handle turns when you try it. You push it open and stand in the doorway, adjusting to the dim light. The room looks much as it did earlier, except that a second figure is in the bed, making a hump in the quilts. You don’t have to look to be pretty sure it’s Jim, snoring away. Michelle, on the other side of the bed, is kind of propped up against the wall. Marcos stops behind you.

  “You can’t be here,” he says slowly, quietly so as not to disturb the hump.

  You ignore him and step forward. Michelle is awake, you realize, as you see her head shift, her gaze lift, peer out. “I’m here,” you whisper, hoping she will hear, hoping Jim will not.

  At the bottom of the bed, you stop, lean forward, grab a foot. “Let’s go, Michelle,” you say. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Slowly, slowly, she loosens herself from a quilt and wriggles your way. You turn your eyes away when you realize she has no clothes on her bottom half, and scrabble around on the floor for her pants. You get her onto her feet and into her pants and turn toward the door. Marcos is long gone. The heap on the bed shifts once and you both freeze, but all that emerges is a snorty snore.

  Nobody stops you on the stairs, on the street, at the bus stop. Your left arm tight around Michelle’s waist, you jam coins into the slot on the bus until one then two transfers pop out at you.

  “Get a move on,” the driver says. “There’s people on this bus with somewhere to go.”

  Your head rears up and you sneer, but Michelle tugs at you. “Just get the tickets,” she says.

  So you do, relief at the sound of her voice washing away your anger. The two of you teeter to the back, giggling as you bump into people, grabbing at each other and the backs of seats for balance. You swing into the best seat, the one at the rear, nothing but bus behind you. Michell
e has the window, and you sit back a bit and look at her. Is she all right?

  She smiles kind of shyly. Her eyes look funny, like Marcos’s but more so. She seems swirly, mushy, somehow. But she leans into your shoulder and you feel the contact all the way through you. It’s real, meant. You manage a bit of a lean back.

  “Thanks for coming to get me,” she says.

  “I couldn’t just leave you there,” you say, remembering that you did exactly that and that you even considered going home without her. You look her over again. “Are you all right?” you ask. “That man, Jim, was there.” You pause. “In the bed.” You want to add, and you were naked. But you can’t say those words. “Do you … do you need to go to the hospital?”

  She leans back as you speak, her eyes sliding shut, her head lolling.

  A man looks at her from the sideways seats and rage crackles through your forearms and into your fingertips. You tighten all the muscles in your face, flare your nostrils and give him your best sneer, even better than the one you were lining up for the bus driver. Then you turn, reach out and give Michelle a shake. She moans quietly, shakes her head and sinks deeper into her druggy’s sleep.

  She sleeps the rest of the way, while your thoughts grind your brain down to a pulp. The light is fading by the time you steer her off the bus. You see her to her door, even wait while she walks through it. After that, you are all alone with yourself.

  Your own house is only three blocks away. You wander down Eleventh and turn at the corner, one foot in front of the other. It would be nice to get home where it’s warm. Your bed is there, unmade perhaps, but clean and sheeted. The fridge is there. The TV is there.

  And Mom and Beth. Looking at you, thinking about you, worrying about you. You stop and look back the way you came, toward that bus stop. You think of Sarah. Her straight back. Her strong shoulders. Yes, she told you to go home, but if home is supposed to be so great, why doesn’t she go to hers? She’s obviously sorted out a way to live downtown and keep a spring in her step. If you told her … If you explained …

  Your transfer is still good.