Page 123 of Run Away With Me

In the end, it didn’t matter. I couldn’t sleep anyway.

I replayed the moment in the alley over and over again, trying to figure out if I could have done somethingdifferent – if Ishouldhave done something else that would have led to a different outcome, one where I wasn’t alone in a hotel room, back in a city I couldn’t stand.

I wondered where Brooke was now. Who she was with. We hadn’t been put on the same flight home – I knew that much. I wanted to know if she was thinking about me, too, wherever she was.

The next day I was taken to an ugly office building in Bitter Lake, a neighborhood north of my old home in Greenwood. The liaison – I hadn’t bothered to remember her name – dropped me off and promptly disappeared. I should have been mad at her about that, but I couldn’t find the energy.

I really had no idea what was going on, and everyone who worked here looked so busy, rushing from one room to another with laptops tucked under their arms. I was left in a waiting area with a couch and a TV showing the Food Network, and I curled up into a ball and tried to make myself invisible.

After a couple of hours, someone came over.

‘Jessie?’

I looked up at him. He was youngish, brown hair, glasses.

‘Sorry to keep you,’ he said. ‘Someone will be here to get you soon, okay?’

I nodded and turned my attention back to the TV. He didn’t say anything else, just rushed off to his next meeting.

It took another hour, and I didn’t move except to press my hand to my stomach to stop it growling. I’d caughtenough snippets of conversation to figure out this was an agency, for fostering, which worked with local Child Protective Services. Brooke wasn’t going to be somewhere like this. By now she’d be back with her family, and, underneath all the numbness, I was scared for her, and scared for what she might do. She might run away again, and if she did, I’d have no way of finding her. I had no idea how her parents would punish her for what we’d done. She could be in trouble, because of the gun. She could be still in Atlanta, waiting to be charged with all sorts of crimes. She could be back in Seattle, or in New York with Julianne, or anywhere in between. But I knew for sure she wouldn’t be somewhere like this.

My attention flitted between the TV and the main office opposite my waiting area as another woman came in, briefly spoke to someone, then sat down on the other end of my couch. I was expecting my mom to come and get me, even though I’d told Detective Beaufort and Claire I didn’t want that, so I thought she was likely another social worker here to ask me more questions.

‘Jessie? I’m Lena.’

I tried to assess her, but she wasn’t giving much away. On the one hand, she was wearing a long floral skirt and Birkenstocks, so she looked like someone’s hippy aunt. On the other, there was a sharpness in her eyes, behind her wire-framed glasses, that gave the impression she wouldn’t take any bullshit.

‘I foster young people. I’ve been told you don’t want to go back to your parents?’

I scrambled to sit up, straightening out of my slouch.

‘Seriously?’

She nodded and tucked her sandy-colored hair behind her ear. It was long and wavy, and the ends were dyed pale pink.

‘I was only called an hour ago, so I don’t know the whole situation. But you can come with me.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Please.’

‘Okay. Where’s your stuff?’

I shrugged, and she sighed.

‘Don’t worry. Let’s get out of here.’

I knew I would have to face my mom eventually, especially now that I was back in Seattle. I had no idea how she had reacted to what had happened. In the news report, they’d said she was distraught, but that was the kind of thing people said when kids went missing. It didn’t mean it was true.

Going with Lena was scary because I had no idea what would happen next, but that was nothing compared to the real fear I had of seeing my own mother again. Our relationship was complex and messy, and I was starting to build some real rage deep down inside me because she hadn’t seen what the Creep had been doing to me. I was running away all over again, and I was aware of the irony.

‘Are you hungry?’ Lena asked as we walked out of the building and to her car – a bright-yellow VW Beetle.

‘Yeah,’ I said.

‘Let’s grab something to eat, then. Any preferences?’

My mind flicked back to all the junk Brooke and I had eaten over the past couple of weeks, and my stomach, still feeling delicate from all the gut-deep fear, roiled.

‘Could we just get, like, a salad?’

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