Sketches (3 page)

If he arrested me they'd call my mother, and then I'd have to go home. My right hand slipped up the sleeve of my left arm. My fingers rubbed against the slight ridges that crisscrossed my arm. Somehow it felt almost reassuring—

“Shouldn't she be arrested for trying to extort money, too?” the man asked.

“Sir, I think that—” the officer began.

“I'm just so glad you believe my story,” the man said, interrupting.

“I didn't say that,” the officer replied sharply.

I did a double take. He was staring at the man with
that same hard, cold glare he'd aimed at me. He didn't believe what he was saying—he knew it wasn't true.

“Are you calling me a liar?” the man demanded of the officer.

“I'm not calling you anything.”

“I'm a taxpayer!
I pay your salary
and I demand to know your name and badge number!”

“You want my badge and name, do you?” the officer asked.

“Immediately!”

The cop chuckled. “You'll get both of those,” the officer said. “They'll be on your arrest report for solicitation.”

The man's eyes got as big as saucers.

“Solicitation
of a minor
,” the policeman added.

“But I wasn't doing—”

“Yes you were!” the officer snapped, cutting him off. “And if you argue with me any more I might just find something else to charge you with.”

The man looked as though he was about to say something else, but he shut his mouth instead. He looked so terrified that I almost felt sorry for him— almost.

“I've been on the streets a long time,” the officer said. “And I
ain't
no idiot.” He paused. “Now, we have two choices.” He paused again. “I can write this up . . . or we can all just walk away.”

“I can leave?” The guy must have been scared, because now he sounded like he couldn't believe his ears.

The officer nodded. “I'll even walk you to the subway to make sure you get on your way
safely
.”

Walk
him
to the subway? Was this guy joking?

“Thank you so much, officer, thank you. I'll do that right now, I'll leave, I'll go, I promise!”

“And since you're going, we won't need to continue our conversation about what you could be charged with, and how that might play out in court, and with your family, and in the newspapers, and on the evening news, and with your employer. Understand?”

“I understand . . . thank you, thank you,” the man sputtered.

The officer turned to face me.

“And you, beat it, or I'll arrest you for begging and prostitution.”

“Prostitution? I would never—”

“Don't you go lying to me too. You live on the street, you end up hooking, sooner or later. Now, I'm walking this guy to the subway platform to make sure he gets on his way. If you're still here when I get back, you can
count
on being arrested. You understand?”

I nodded my head dumbly. Everything just kept turning around so fast it felt like my head was spinning!

“And I don't want to see you around here
ever
again,” he said. “Matter of fact, if I see you hanging
around the streets—my
streets
—being arrested will be the least of your worries . . . if you know what I'm saying. So beat it!”

The cop spun back around and he and the man started for the subway entrance. I staggered away a few feet and then stopped. The two twenty-dollar bills were still there in the dirt beside the sidewalk.

“Dana, are you all right?” Brent and Ashley were right there. I guessed they'd been waiting for the officer to clear out.

“We've got to get out of here, before the cop comes back,” I stammered. I burst into tears.

Brent threw his arms around me and I felt protected and safe.

“That . . . that . . . freaking pervert . . . did you see him?”

“Was he the guy with the cop?”

I nodded. “He wanted to give me money . . . money for . . . forty dollars . . . it's there,” I said, turning around and pointing to the ground.

Ashley rushed over and grabbed the two bills from the ground. “Here,” she said, offering them to me.

“I don't want his money!” I yelled.

“Take it easy,” Brent said. “We
do
want his money.” Ashley handed him the bills.

“We have to leave,” I said. “We have to get out of here before the cop gets back or he'll arrest me.” I struggled free and Brent released his grip.

“Come on, let's get out of here,” Ashley said. She walked away, and I started to follow, until I realized she was leading us toward the alley the man had pointed at.

“I don't want to go that way,” I said as I stopped in my tracks.

“We can go any way you want. Let's just not stay around here,” Brent said. “Come on.” He grabbed me by the arm and led me off in another direction, away from both the subway and the alley.

“Looking on the bright side, at least we have enough money now to get a really good meal and a couple of packs of smokes, maybe some entertainment,” Brent said.

“What do you mean by ‘entertainment'?” I asked.

“Maybe something to get high . . . a nickel bag, maybe,” Brent explained. “We have the money for it,” he said, holding the two twenties aloft.

“That's
my
money!” I said, and I grabbed it from him.

“I thought you didn't want it . . . ?” Ashley questioned.

“I don't . . . I mean, I didn't . . . but now that we have it, I know what we should do with it,” I answered.

“What do you want to do?” Brent asked.

“I don't want to sleep in some abandoned building tonight. I don't want to sleep in a squat. I want us to get a room for the night. Someplace with a bed and a bathroom and a shower. Someplace where I can wash my hair.”

“A shower would be nice,” Ashley agreed. She turned to Brent. “Do you know any place we can get a room for the night for forty bucks?”

“I know a place where we can get a room for twenty-five.”

“Twenty-five? Are you sure?” I asked.

“It's not exactly the Holiday Inn,” he said. “It's on the Lakeshore strip. I know the guy who works nights on the desk.”

“Is it a nice room?” I asked.

“It's a twenty-five-dollar room,” he said. “But it's a lot nicer than any of the places we've stayed in for the last few weeks. And we'll still have money left over for at least cigarettes, and maybe something else.”

“As long as we have some money left over after we eat,” I said.

“I'd rather have smokes than food,” Brent commented.

“Smoking is disgusting,” I said.

“Yes, Mother.”

“I don't know why anybody would smoke.”

“I'm trying to impress my peer group,” Brent joked, and despite my tears I started to laugh.

“Just my luck, I get to hang out with the only runaway in the world who doesn't smoke,” Brent said, shaking his head.

“How about you just shut up and lead us to the motel.”

CHAPTER TWO

BRENT OPENED THE MOTEL ROOM DOOR
with a flourish. He stepped inside and flicked on an overhead light. The room was tiny, and even with the light from the single bulb it looked dingy and dark. We followed him in.

“It smells,” Ashley said.

It did have a strange odour—sort of like musty, damp mothballs.

“I'll open a window.” I threw back the curtains to reveal a dumpster sitting in the parking spot directly across from us. Nice view. And it turned out the windows were nailed shut. Then again, what was I expecting for twenty-five bucks? Besides, it was better than the place where we stayed the night before—an abandoned house with boarded-up windows. We'd climbed in through a hole where a panel was busted out in the back door. Actually, come to think of it, the two places smelled about the same.

I looked around the room. There was a dresser, a TV, and two twin-sized beds separated by a little nightstand. There was paint peeling from the walls, a big yellow water stain on the ceiling, and the furniture looked shabby, like stuff that the Salvation Army might have thrown out. A few weeks before I wouldn't even have dreamed of ever setting foot in a place like this. Now I couldn't wait to put my head down on that stained bed cover.

Brent walked around the beds and opened another door. He hit the lights to reveal a bathroom.

“So, what do you think?” he said, gesturing grandly around him.

“It's a lot better than sleeping under a bridge or in some squat,” Ashley commented. “Dana?”

“It doesn't look that bad,” I said, trying to convince myself and Ashley and spare Brent's feelings at the same time.

“How come we could get this place for twenty-five bucks when the sign outside says thirty-nine, ninety-nine?” Ashley asked.

“That's the price for the regular people, you know, like tourists.”

“Tourists?” I laughed. “Do you really think tourists would stay in a place like this?”

“Maybe really poor tourists,” Brent joked. “Either way, I know the guy at the desk, and if his boss isn't
around and there are rooms empty he lets people like us stay here.”

“And if his boss
is
around?” I asked.

“No point in even showing up. He'd just call the cops. He thinks he's running a class place.”

Ashley laughed. “If he thinks this is class, then he either has to take more medication or stop the medication he's on, because that's just delusional thinking.”

“Delusional or not, his boss will be working here tomorrow morning and he won't want to see us, so we'll have to get out of here early.”

“How early is early?” Ashley asked.

“Like around seven.”

“Great,” she said shaking her head. “This will be the first real bed I've slept in for weeks and I don't get to sleep in.”

“Does your friend tell his boss that he's rented out these rooms?” I asked.

“Now you're catching on,” he said, and smiled. “I think the money stays in his pocket, but what do I care? He's doing us a favour.”

“If he was really doing us a favour he wouldn't charge us at all,” Ashley pointed out.

“Yeah, like that's going to happen, somebody giving somebody something for nothing. Everything and everybody has a price,” Brent said.

A month ago I think I might have disagreed with him. Now I wasn't so sure.

“Speaking of price, just how much money do we have left?” Brent asked.

“Let's put all our money together and count it,” Ashley suggested.

Everybody emptied out their pockets, digging out the coins and bills buried in there.

“I've got seventeen dollars and twenty-eight cents,” Brent said, smoothing out the bills on top of the bed and heaping the coins up with it. Of course his total included the change from the forty bucks after he'd paid for the room.

“Here's mine,” Ashley added. “I've got six dollars and twenty-five . . . fifty . . . seventy-eight cents.” She dropped it onto the bed on top of Brent's money. “How about you, Dana?”

“I've got around nine dollars and one subway ticket,” I said as I deposited my money onto the bed as well.

“A subway ticket?” Ashley asked. “Were you really planning on actually going home?”

“Somebody gave it to me. What was I supposed to say? ‘Sorry, I'm really begging for money and I don't want to take the subway'? We must have enough money for supper.”

“And cigarettes,” Ashley added.

I shook my head. “We'd do a lot better if we didn't waste so much money on cigarettes.”

“Buying cigarettes isn't a waste,” Brent said.

“It's worse than a waste. Smoking can kill you!”

Ashley laughed. “I'm still alive, and I've been smoking since I was eleven.”

“Eleven . . . you're joking, right?”

She shook her head. “I can't get over the fact that you don't smoke.”

Brent was sorting the money into bills and coins.

“We have a grand total of thirty-two dollars and eighty-five cents. Take some out for burgers and fries at Mickey-Dee's—oh, hey, maybe we should get the Happy Meal, kids, so we can get the toy!—and we'll still have enough left over to get us all a coffee to start tomorrow off and pick up some cigarettes.”

“If we didn't buy cigarettes then we'd have enough for breakfast tomorrow, too,” I said.

“You've got a point there,” Brent agreed. “Let's put it to a vote. All those in favour of buying cigarettes raise your hand.”

Both Brent's and Ashley's hands shot up in the air. This was one vote that I knew I could never win.

“Fine,” I said. “You two can have your cigarettes. But it only seems fair that I should get something as well.”

“What did you have in mind?” Brent asked.

“I get the shower first.”

“You got no argument from me,” Brent said.

“Me neither,” Ashley agreed.

“Would
milady
care for me to run her bath for her?” Brent asked, trying his best to sound like an English butler.

“I don't want a bath. I want a shower. A long, hot shower.”

“I get the shower next,” Ashley said.

“In that case, maybe I should take the money and go out and get our food and bring it back here,” Brent suggested as he reached down to scoop up the money.

“And you
are
going to get food, right?” Ashley asked.

I turned to face her. What did she mean by that?

“Of course,” Brent said. He looked sheepish.

I wanted to ask, but I didn't. All I wanted was a shower.

“How about you get me a Big Mac meal,” Ashley said.

“Same for me, but hold the pickles,” I said.

“We'll make it three,” he said as he stuffed the money in his pocket. “I'll be back soon, so don't take too long in the shower.”