Believe Like a Child (7 page)

As terrified as Alessa was of what she was about to do, she was relieved to be finally getting away from her uncle and her pathetic existence.

After Zoe had left for the bank, Alessa went into Rhonda’s bedroom. It was just as they had left it that awful night. The bed was unmade and the orange soda and cookies still sat on top of the dresser. Alessa experienced a deep sense of loss as she looked around and remembered how safe she had once felt in this very room. Now, it was like looking at a picture in a book. She longed for that same sense of security, but all that she could feel here now was pain.

Zoe returned before she had finished packing and handed her an envelope. Inside was 2,000 dollars—in cash.

“A place in the city will be expensive,” Zoe explained. “This should keep you going long enough to find a job. I called and made you a reservation for two nights at the Travelodge Motel in Philadelphia. It’s located on Race Street. Here’s the address. The reservation is under my name—Zoe. I will drop you off at the Norristown train station; you need to take the train to Thirtieth Street station and get a cab from there to the hotel. Tomorrow, you’ll have to find a more permanent place to stay. I only booked the hotel room for two nights. If they come looking for you, I don’t want them finding out that I have a room being charged to my credit card in the city, when I am living right here in my home.” Zoe paused for breath. “Here,” she said, “take Rhonda’s school identification so that you have something with you, in case they ask to see it at the Travelodge.” Zoe thrust the card into Alessa’s palm.

The two of them carried the large duffle bag Alessa had packed with some of Rhonda’s clothes out to Zoe’s car and placed it in the trunk. Alessa placed the envelope with the 2,000 dollars inside a small purse Rhonda had always used. When they got to the Norristown train station, Zoe helped Alessa up to the platform. The two turned to face each other and clung together in a long, final embrace, neither of them wanting to let go, both feeling, unreasonably, that if they held on long enough, Rhonda might reappear and join them.

They were both crying as Zoe turned to leave the platform.

Alessa called out, “I love you, Zoe. Thank you for everything!”

Zoe turned back and cupped the young girl’s face in her hands. “I love you too, honey. I am so very sorry for all that you have gone through with your uncle. I wish there was a way I could help you heal. You are a very special young woman. Great things are in store for you. I know it doesn’t seem like it now, but some day, you will know just how special you are. Promise me that you will always carry Rhonda in your heart.”

“I promise, Zoe,” Alessa said. “Rhonda will live in my heart forever.”

At that moment, the train entered the station and came to a stop. Alessa turned and boarded it, thinking how lucky she was to have known Zoe.

Chapter Eight

A
lessa arrived at the Travelodge Motel on Race Street on Saturday afternoon, completely worn out. It had been an exhausting morning and she knew the hardest task still lay ahead: finding a permanent place to live in the next day and a half. Outside the Travelodge, she noticed a crowd of men standing off to the side of the building next door. They all looked lost and lonely. Many wore shabby old clothes and were unshaven. She looked at the sign above the door outside which they waited: St. John’s Hospice. It was a shelter for homeless men and a soup kitchen. Alessa held her small purse closer against her body, worried that those men might try and snatch it from her and take all of her money.

As she passed them, though, it was evident that her presence hadn’t even registered with them. Relieved that she was invisible to these men, Alessa entered the Travelodge, one door down from the shelter. Once inside the lobby, she felt safe and couldn’t wait to get to her room and rest, before starting her search for an apartment. The woman behind the counter wore black pants, a white blouse and a black vest. The vest had food stains on the front that resembled baby vomit. The dark ring around the open collar of her white blouse turned Alessa’s stomach. The woman’s fingernails were painted, but the polish had begun to chip.

“What do you want?” she asked Alessa with a sneer.

“I have a reservation for Zoe.”

The woman grunted and blew her nose. Then she slowly moved down the counter to where the keys and paper work were kept. Reaching for a key, she turned to Alessa again. “You look a bit young. I’d like to make it clear that we don’t tolerate parties or prostitution at this lodge. You understand?”

“I understand. You don’t have to worry about me.”

The woman handed Alessa a key and pointed to a room only ten feet from where she was standing. Alessa unlocked the door and stepped inside. It wasn’t the greatest room she had seen, but it did look like it had been cleaned. The tub in the bathroom had mold around the edges, but overall, there was nothing about the place that Alessa couldn’t handle.

She put her duffle bag on the dresser and lay down on the bed, stretching her thin frame across it. Her room had a window that peered out into the street, where she could still see the men lined up, waiting to be allowed into the shelter. Even with the window closed, the noise of the city was audible. It seemed as though the walls were made of cardboard. Alessa could hear people passing through the lobby and could clearly decipher their conversations. Still, she reveled in the fact that she was there, in that rundown place, instead of being at home with a bunch of old perverts. She fell asleep on the bed, the noise of people milling about outside her door and window making her feel as if she wasn’t all alone.

She woke up an hour later, completely disoriented. She could not recall where she was. Her heart pounded in her chest. Soon enough, however, the reality of her situation came flooding back to her and she felt paralyzed with fear. Pushing her apprehensions aside, she stepped out into the lobby and picked up the free copy of a local newspaper that lay on a battered wooden table off to the side of the reception area. She began to look through it and found a small listing of apartments for rent. New to the city, she turned to the woman behind the desk and asked for a map.

“Here,” the woman said, handing it to her, “that’ll be a dollar fifty.”

Alessa handed over the money and took the newspaper and the map back to her room.

She sat in the dimly lit room with its cream walls and scoured the section for apartment rentals. Most of them were well above 600 dollars a month. There was only one she thought she might be able to afford on Dauphin Street in North Philadelphia. The rent was 300 dollars and included utilities. She pulled out Rhonda’s cell phone and dialed the phone number listed.

A woman with a husky voice answered. “Hello?”

“Hi, my name is Alessa. I’m calling about the apartment you have for rent.”

“Yeah, whatta you want to know?”

“Is the apartment available? Can I come to see it?”

Clearly unimpressed, the woman asked, “Yeah, when do you want to come?”

“How about now? I’m on Race Street and I can be there within the hour,” Alessa said excitedly.

“Okay, I’ll be here. Knock on the front door.”

Alessa hung up, feeling hopeful. She quickly combed her hair and washed her face. Then she stepped out again. Rushing through the lobby, she noticed a woman in very high heels and a short denim skirt that was ripped to the tops of her thighs. The woman turned to eye Alessa before going back to talking to a short, heavy man who was staring at her almost completely exposed breasts. Alessa heard the woman behind the desk yell out, “What did I tell you? Get the fuck outta here! We don’t want any whores around!”

Alessa was out the lobby door before she could hear the woman in the mini skirt respond. She hailed a taxi and gave the driver the address.

He looked at her and asked, “Why do you want to go there?”

“I am going to see an apartment that I might be able to rent,” she said, full of energy.

“Whatever, kid.”

Within fifteen minutes, the taxi had turned onto Dauphin Street and pulled over a block later. The neighborhood was seedy. Alessa noticed that several of the houses were boarded up with plywood, while others appeared to be lived in. They were old row homes that stood three stories high. Trash lay piled on the streets and everywhere she looked, there were teenagers hanging out on corners. Alessa started to feel a little uneasy when the taxi driver turned to her for his fare. She asked him if he could wait for her and he agreed, but told her if she took longer than fifteen minutes, he would be gone.

The groups of teenagers were already staring at the taxi, watching to see who would get out. As she stepped out onto the curb and looked at the house that could be her new home, she caught sight of an old woman peering through a ripped curtain in the first-floor window. She climbed the four broken cement steps to the wooden porch which was rotting and felt like it was going to give way beneath her feet. Then she knocked softly on the door. She knew the woman had seen her arrive and now she quickly threw open the door.

“Hi, I’m Alessa. I called about the apartment,” Alessa told her cheerfully.

“I’m Lea, the owner and the landlady. Come on in. The apartment is on the second floor, third door to the left.”

Alessa went up to the next level of the house with the old woman trailing behind her. When she got to the third door, she noticed what was written in black marker on the wall next to it: Apartment 2C. The woman unlocked the door and Alessa stepped into a small room. About ten feet into the room, there was a kitchen sink mounted on the wall, with three cabinets hanging over it. To the right of the sink was a small refrigerator. Against the far wall stood a rectangular metal table flanked by two wooden chairs. Alessa’s stomach dropped when she stepped up to the sink and saw the filth inside it. There were half-empty soup cans and some water-logged Cheerios floating around the bottom in a quarter-inch of dirty brown water.

When she opened the refrigerator, the handle came off. The old woman told her it could be easily fixed. Food had spilled inside the refrigerator. There was something round and moldy on the top shelf. It smelled like the corpse of a small animal left there to die. A single naked light bulb hung from the middle of the ceiling, casting a glow around the room that resembled horror-movie lighting.

Alessa stepped through the door that stood between the refrigerator and the kitchen table, into a small bedroom with a single bed. The mattress was worn and stained. The walls were painted gray. Across from the bed was a four-drawer dresser standing against the wall. The bedroom floor was linoleum throughout and looked like it hadn’t been cleaned since the house was built. A curtain strung between two nails hung over another doorway off the bedroom. When Alessa walked through, she saw a toilet that had rings of black inside and a tub that was overrun by mold and mildew.

The apartment was a slum, an absolutely disgusting mess, but Alessa figured it was the best she could do for 300 dollars a month.

She turned to Lea. “It’s kind of dirty and it needs some work.”

The old woman was defiant. “Listen,” she said, “it doesn’t look like you’re in a position to be too picky. Either you want it or you don’t. If you want it, I need 900 dollars. That’s 300 for security, 300 for last month’s rent and 300 for first month’s rent. Let me know what you want to do.”

Alessa stared at Lea and realized that she was not as old as she had first assumed. She stood five foot tall and had a rounded body. She was missing several teeth and those that had survived were rotting. Alessa could smell the stench of her breath, even from three feet away. Lea’s housecoat was stained with food and on her feet were old, ripped slippers. Alessa suddenly remembered Rhonda and a smile hovered on her lips as she thought of the things her friend would have said about Lea’s appearance. She could hear her say, “Look at that old bat. She hasn’t seen a toothbrush since she finished teething and the bitch needs a hot bath, new clothes and an attitude adjustment.” It reminded Alessa how much she missed her friend.

Lea left her standing in the dingy apartment. It was barely an apartment at all and certainly not a place you would call home. As Alessa stood in the center of the kitchen, she felt a chill pass through her. This was where she would live now. The inside of her apartment was almost scarier than what she had seen out on the street. She was certain, however, that this could be no worse than the house of horrors she had fled.

Alessa would have to leave the Travelodge in the morning. She needed a place to go to and it looked like this was it. It was the only apartment she could afford. She figured if it didn’t work out, she could look for a new place later. Besides, even this shit-hole was costing her 900 dollars just to move in. She knew now that anything nicer would not be affordable. She had less than 1,100 dollars to live on, until she found a job. She would move in the next day and start looking for a job on Monday morning.

She went down to Lea’s apartment and knocked on her door. The old lady opened the door and asked, “You decide?”

“Yes, I’ll take it. I need to move in tomorrow, though.”

“Fine with me, honey,” Lea replied. “I need 900 hundred in cash now. I don’t want any pets. And no boyfriends here. You pay each month, as you go. If you don’t pay one month, you’ll find your stuff on the sidewalk. I don’t take any shit and I don’t put up with a lot of noise. Another thing: the streets are crawling with hoodlums. Don’t bring any of them in here. You got it?”

“I got it,” Alessa answered politely.

When she stepped off the broken-down porch and into the sunlight, a feeling of relief surged through her. She noticed that the taxi driver hadn’t waited. Panic began to rise in her as she started looking up and down the eight- hundred block of Daulphin Street.

Lea opened her window and rasped, “The bus stop is at the end of the block on Fifth. A bus should be there in five minutes. So you better get moving. It’ll take you back into the city. Mind your business and they will leave you alone.”

Alessa thought:
who will leave me alone?

As she started down the street, she saw exactly whom Lea had been referring to. There were eight teenagers standing at the stop. They were laughing and pushing each other. As she got closer, she noticed they were all teenage boys. There was one middle-aged woman sitting on the bench off to the side. They all lapsed into silence as she approached and her heart started racing at the memory of Lea’s last words of advice. When she got to the bus stop, Alessa stood facing the street and tried not to make eye contact with the boys.

From behind her, she could hear them, though.

One of the boys yelled, “Look what we got here: pork, the other white meat.”

The crowd started laughing. Alessa was vulnerable and she knew it. She looked over at the woman sitting on the bench. Then she walked slowly toward her and sat down beside her, assuming that her proximity to the woman would spare her further attention from the boys.

The moment she sat down, the woman looked at her and said, “If you looking for protection from me, honey, you’ve come to the wrong place. I don’t get involved. I leave them alone and they leave me alone.”

Alessa didn’t acknowledge the woman. She sat there quietly and slipped into the special space in her head, the silent place she had discovered when she was seven years old. It was how she coped. She had been using that place all through her life and she was happy that it now belonged to her. After all, it was there that she had learned to separate mind and soul from body. It was there that she had become resilient and emerged a survivor. A few minutes later, the Septa bus pulled to a stop and Alessa got on, but only after the boys had done so.