Running the Risk (4 page)

“Do you need some money or something?” I asked.

“No, Doyle. Of course not. Everything is fine.” She did a little tidying act, almost as if she were looking at herself in the mirror. “What about you, do you need any money? Have you spent your allowance?”

Jeanette was tilting her head, giving me that let's-get-the-heck-out-of-here look. But I couldn't seem to make myself just walk away.

“No,” I said. “I've still got some left. Are you hungry?” I pointed toward the Chinese restaurant nearby.

“Well, yes. But we can't go in there.”

“Why not?”

“I'm not allowed in there.”

I wasn't sure I needed to hear the story. “Then I'll go in that store over there and get us something.”

“Okay,” she said. “I would love a cheese sandwich and a bag of chips.”

“Sure,” I said.

Jeanette walked with me into the store. I looked over my shoulder and saw Priscilla
sit down on her gym bag right there on the sidewalk.

“Let's just head back to school,” Jeanette said. “I'm better now.”

“Not yet,” I said. “She thinks I'm her son. I can't just leave her there.”

“Sean, are you crazy? You don't know anything about her. She could be dangerous.”

Somehow that word confirmed the fact I would go back to Priscilla. Not that I wanted her to be dangerous. I just knew I had to go back to her. All she wanted was a cheese sandwich and a bag of potato chips.

And a son. She desperately needed a son.

“Okay. I'm going to go back to school by myself. I don't like it here. Besides, I've got a test in chemistry this afternoon. If I miss it, I'm going to flunk the course.”

I was torn. I didn't like the idea of Jeanette walking back alone. “I'll walk you as far as the police station.” That was only three blocks away.

“No thanks,” she said coldly. And she left.

I paid for the sandwich and chips and went back outside. I watched Jeanette walking away and then I went to sit with Priscilla. I gave her the chips and the sandwich. She opened the sandwich and gave one half back to me.

“No thanks,” I said. “I ate.”

“Not junk food I hope,” she said, biting into the sandwich and then opening up the chips.

“Not junk food,” I said.

“That's good. You've always been a good boy, Doyle.”

“Sean,” I countered. “My name is Sean.”

“Of course it is. You can choose any nickname you want.”

I saw a tall young black man in a hoodie coming our way. He stopped right in front of us. “What's with you?” he asked me.

“She seemed hungry. I bought her some food.”

“And?” His voice was hostile. “What are you doing here?”

I stood up. I felt a tingle of adrenaline. This time it wasn't a good feeling. “She thinks
I'm her son,” I half whispered to him. We were looking at each other eye-to-eye now. He didn't blink. I was trying to remember something we studied in school about what it meant when someone didn't blink.

“Man,” he said. “This woman thinks
I'm
her son some days.”

“Doyle, right?”

He blinked and let out a little snort, something not quite a laugh. “Yeah, Doyle,” he said. And then he cupped his hand over his mouth and leaned a little toward me. “But Doyle's been dead for a long time. Long time.”

Priscilla seemed happy eating the sandwich and the chips. I gave her a smile. The black guy was reaching into his pocket for something. He was still looking at me in a hard way, sizing me up—my clothes, my hair. He was doing inventory.

“So?” I said, looking him in the eye.

“What do you mean?”

“So what's your, um, your analysis of me?”

“Analysis?” His eyes never left mine. Some kind of test. I noticed the hand was coming out of the pocket. “Gum?”

“What?”

“You want a piece of gum?” He was holding a pack of gum out to me.

“Sure.” I popped one from the pack and handed it back. Priscilla saw the gum and bobbed her head.

“Sure thing, Priscilla,” he said to her. “I bought it for you. Just finish your lunch first.” Then he turned back to me. “They put way too much sugar and too many chemicals into chewing gum,” the guy said.

“I bet they do,” I said.

“So what is it, Save Seniors Day at the high school or something? You on a dogooder field trip?”

I laughed. I could tell what he saw in me now. The analysis was complete.

“Something like that,” I said.

“Monroe,” he said. “My name's Monroe.”

“I'm Sean. Does Priscilla live on the street?”

“Sometimes. Not all the time. She has a place she can stay at the women's shelter down the street. But she likes to wander.”

“Isn't it dangerous?”

“Well, the alternative is they send her to an institution where they use restraints to keep her there.”

“That would suck.”

He nodded. “She'd die there and that would solve the problem of Priscilla.”

I didn't exactly like the way he put that. Especially with her sitting so close.

“What I mean is it would solve the problem as far as the city was concerned.”

“Do people on the street here give her a hard time?”

“Some do. And then some of us try to look out for her. Some of us she calls Doyle, some of us she calls by other rude names.”

“But she likes you?”

“I buy her gum and play straight into the corporate agenda that is ruining our health.” Monroe was smiling now. Guess I'd passed some kind of test. He popped a couple of pieces of gum out of the wrapper and handed
them to Priscilla. She scooped them up and dropped them into her mouth.

That's when I noticed some other young guys coming our way. Four of them, looking like they just walked out of a rap video. Two of them were black and two of them were white. They stopped, and one of them poked Monroe on the arm. “Hanging out with old ladies again, Monroe,” the guy said, looking at Priscilla and then at me. “We should introduce you to some younger women.” He had obviously worked on his badass attitude.

“We all have our own versions of working the streets,” Monroe said. “What's the word with you boys?”

I let them size me up. Seemed like a lot of analysis was going on in this neighborhood.

“Not much,” was the answer.

I decided to play it low-key. I turned and smiled at Priscilla. Clearly she didn't see the four street kids as much of a threat. Then I looked at Monroe's friends—if they were friends. They were tough-looking, for sure. Dressed for the job. All attitude and bad posture. Not much older than me. I gave them
a cool once-over and could feel the bad vibe but chose not to let it bother me.

“Sean,” Monroe said, “this is Keeg, Vicente, Robert and J.L.” Keeg was the one who'd poked Monroe. The other black guy was Vicente. They both met my eye. That wasn't the case for Robert and J.L., who just looked away as if I didn't matter.

I nodded at them but then spoke to Monroe. “Should I walk her back to the shelter?”

“Not a bad idea,” Monroe said. He pointed up the street. “Three blocks that way and one block over on Prince Street. But she'll go only if she's ready to go.” Then he turned to Priscilla.

“Priscilla, would you like this gentleman to walk you back home?”

She was looking up at the sky now. “It looks like it might rain,” she said. The sun was shining brightly and there wasn't a cloud in the sky.

“Would you like me to walk you home?” I repeated the question.

She offered me her arm. “That would be lovely,” she said.

Monroe smiled and looked down at the sidewalk. Keeg decided to spit on that same parcel of concrete. The others just stood there smirking.

“Good-bye, Doyle,” she said to Monroe. “Be careful and have fun with your friends.”

We turned and began to walk slowly toward the shelter. “I think I should take a nap when we get there,” she said. “Do you think that is a good idea, Doyle?” Now I was back to being Doyle.

“I think that's a great idea. Did you like the sandwich?”

“I don't remember,” she said, puzzled. “Do you think it will rain?”

“It might,” I said as I guided her across the street. The light was green, but it went to yellow and then red, our crossing was so slow. Some idiot in an old Honda honked the horn at us, and I flashed the driver a dirty look. As soon as we were out of his way, he gunned the engine, shouted “Get off the street, Grandma!” and then sped away, leaving a trail of foul exhaust.

It was a slow hike to the women's shelter, and we had to stop several times along the way for Priscilla to rest and get her bearings. Sometimes she'd suddenly look at me with fear in her eyes and I'd try to calm her down. The only thing that worked was repeating “It's okay. It's me, Doyle. I'm walking you home.”

People walking by would stare at her, and some would stare at both of us. They probably thought we were both crazy, homeless and wandering the streets instead
of being confined to an institution where they thought we should be.

For the first time, I thought I knew what it felt like to be a street person. And it made me angry. But I didn't show that anger to Priscilla. The only thing that worked with Priscilla was gentleness. And I was more than a little surprised that I had that in me.

The Highfield Women's Shelter was an ugly three-story brick building on Prince Street. There was no sign out front. The door was locked. I rang the bell.

A large well-dressed woman answered the door. She had big muscular arms and looked like she lifted weights and was into bodybuilding. She smiled at Priscilla but glowered at me.

“Welcome back, Priscilla. How was your walkabout?”

“I'm rather tired, dear. And I think it's about to rain.” She took a step inside and I started to follow her.

The woman stopped me. “Sorry, you can't come in here,” she said to me rudely.

“I'd just like to get her settled in.”

“You're not allowed. No men are allowed in here. It's the rule.” I could tell by the tone of her voice that she either created the rule or totally approved of it.

“But I'm just trying to...”

“I know, you're just trying to help. Well, that's great. Thanks for bringing Priscilla back. She'll be fine.”

Priscilla had let go of my arm and was inside now. She seemed calm enough. “Goodbye, Doyle,” she said.

“Bye.”

The woman stood there glaring at me, waiting for me to turn and leave. Why such hostility? I wondered.

“Is she going to be all right?” I asked.

“As well as can be expected.”

“But is she going to wander off again?”

“Yes. We can't stop her.”

“Can't or don't want to?” I asked, feeling a little defensive now.

“We do the best we can. She has no one. This is her life. You can't put people in cages.” And with that the door closed in my face.
I met up with Jeanette as school was letting out. She seemed much calmer now but didn't seem all that thrilled to see me.

“Feeling better?” I asked.

“Yes, I took a couple of pills—Ativan. For the anxiety. Don't worry, they were prescribed. It makes school seem so much more enjoyable.” There was an edge to her voice.

“I'm sorry about this morning.”

“You shouldn't have made me walk back alone. You're not the person I thought you were. I guess I was wrong.”

“I thought I should try to help that woman.”

“I had another panic attack on the way back to school. That's why I had to take the Ativan. It was all your fault.”

“Sorry.”

“Do you have anything to drink at your house?” she asked.

“You mean like booze?”

“Of course. Something with alcohol.”

“Maybe. My mother keeps a few bottles of wine around. Why? You want to come over to my house?”

“Yes.”

“I thought you were angry at me.”

“I am,” she said and then stopped in her tracks. She walked closer to me and stood on her tiptoes and kissed me hard on the mouth. It made me dizzy. “So there.”

But it was a weird kiss. As she was kissing me, she ground her teeth against mine. There was something forced about it. Something not quite right. But I liked it anyway.

My mother had a collection of about twelve wine bottles, I discovered. More than I had thought. There were four bottles of the same red French wine. I opened one of them, hoping she might not notice. Jeanette wanted to drink from the bottle, but I found a couple of glasses. And we headed to the rec room in the basement. If red wine was going to be spilled, I figured it would be safer down there than on our beige living-room carpet.

And sure enough, there was spillage. Jeanette's pills mixed with a little wine were
probably a bad combination. I cut her off after two glasses.

“You're so protective,” she said, her voice a little slurred. “I like that part. But you're also so, hmm, well, so
responsible
. What's with that?”

“It's the way I am, I guess.” I took only small sips of the wine. It made my tongue feel funny. I wasn't much of a wine drinker.

“My parents would like you,” she said with more than a little sarcasm in her voice.

“And that's bad, right?”

“That's very bad. Would your parents like me?”

With the top button of her blouse now unbuttoned and the drunk look on her face, the answer to that question was an easy one. But I didn't answer it.

“Well,” she said, taking the last sip from her glass, “what do we do now?”

I didn't know what to do. I realized that here was a very attractive girl I could take advantage of, but the other part of my brain was screaming that I wanted her out of my house and safely in her own home.