“It’s my fault.”
He stiffened against me. “Don’t you say that.”
Shuffling noises started in the bedroom. I clutched to Gabriel, my fingers gripping at the ribbed undershirt he’d worn underneath. Now that I had someone with me, I was desperate to hold on to him.
My mother was dialing on the phone again. Beeps sounded as she pressed the buttons.
Gabriel and I waited, listening. I was so sure she’d heard him and called the police.
My mother was up, shuffling around the bedroom, sounding like she was marching between the window and her bed. She started talking like she was leaving a message. “I have been trying to reach you all day. I know you’re there. Did you think you could run off? Did you think I wouldn’t figure out what you’ve done to me?” Her tone rose. “I don’t care. I know you’ve left money. What I don’t want is her. She’s your responsibility, not mine. She stole money to buy a cell phone and now she’s sleeping with boys. She’ll poison Marie. She’s just like her mother.”
A rattle swept through me, causing me to miss whatever she said next.
She’s just like her mother.
The meaning behind it caused a wash of color to slosh over my eyes. My breath filtered out of me and I couldn’t figure out how to get more, and part of me didn’t want to. My body slumped against Gabriel. The courage I’d managed to collect, to hold myself together through this crazy ordeal, was taken away with one short sentence.
She continued on the phone. “If you want to leave me, fine. I’ll take the house. Thanks,” she spat into the phone, “for being so thoughtful as to leave us what we needed. Now come back and get her or I swear I’ll call the police and I’ll tell them exactly who she is. I’ll give you until nine. I know you have other important things to do.”
There was a click as she hung up the phone. The television volume was turned up, the murmur of news reporter voices filled the air.
I stared after the light under the door.
She’s just like her mother. … I’ll tell them exactly who she is.
“Who am I?” I whispered, the words floating away from me.
Gabriel’s arms shifted around me, but it was like he wasn’t there at all. Not his sweet scent, not his caring whispers to calm down, not his gentle caresses at my back could break through as I felt myself slipping down, drowning in a single question that forced me under.
The connection was made in my head, but the connection didn’t seem real. It was like I was looking at someone else, some other girl’s truth was revealed and I was watching, sorry for her, sadden she had to learn it, desperate to know just as much as she wanted to know.
The mother I thought was mine, wasn’t. Was my father? Who was Sang?
I was a secret, secret enough that the police would be interested if they found out. Was that why I was in the closet? All I’d ever known was them, my mother, or the person I thought was my mother, getting ill when I was nine. There was my sister and I who used to play together, and eventually we drifted apart, but were we still sisters? Our father came home on occasion and never talked to us. He disappeared so often.
The years of stress and worry when the punishments started confused me now. The way she never allowed me to have friends, to warn me about going out to get raped or killed… what was that? She warned me about bad guys. I’d always thought maybe it was misguided attempts to keep me safe from harm. I thought it was wrong what she was doing, but some small portion of me understood. She feared for me. I sympathized. I didn’t like it, but I was her daughter, and children listened to their parents.
But was it really keeping me safe? Or was it keeping me a secret? If I’d gotten into trouble and had gotten raped or kidnapped, the police would find me or find out the truth. If I had been allowed to have friends like normal kids, maybe this secret would have been exposed. So why send me to school?
Then it hit me. Because home school students are examined closer by the board. If I was registered in public school, I was just a number. Unnoticed.
She controlled me through fear. If someone became my friend and looked too closely, would they see the truth in me? Would they be able to see who I was, even though all this time, I never knew?
Who am I?
“Sang,” Gabriel cooed to me under his breath in the dark. “Sang,” he whispered, calling me back. “Trouble. Sweetheart. Sang. Don’t. Don’t slip away.” He sniffed.
I felt a droplet meeting my forehead.
Gabriel was crying.
“I need you,” he whispered. “Come back to me. I need you.”
It was like when North shook me after the nightmare, and I felt myself rising to the surface and waking. My lungs opened up. I gasped, choking on the air, discovering I could breathe again. Gabriel’s tears met mine on my cheeks. Trailing together.
I was awake now. My own need for answers had to wait. He was breaking down. I needed to be there for him.
It was the only thing that pulled me from the depths. I needed to protect my family, the only people that I knew wanted me. My father abandoned me. The person I thought of as my mother didn’t want me, wanted to shove me off on someone who had already let go. Marie reveled in this for an unknown reason.
Gabriel, Kota, this tender family that had sought me out, they were still in danger. Because of me.
“Meanie. Gabriel,” I gasped, as I tried to stop shaking. My fingers found the back of his head, intertwining into the longer parts of his hair. I pressed my cheek to his. How did he know? How did he know I needed to feel needed? “Gabriel.”
His lips traced my ear as he whispered. “We have to go. I’ll take you with me. I promise. This doesn’t matter. None of it matters. You’re my Trouble. Let’s go. If we run...”
I stiffened against him. “Do you have your phone?”
He sighed. “Yes.”
“Text Kota,” I said, my mind formulating, calculating. I couldn’t worry about myself right now. I had to protect Gabriel. I had to protect them all. “We need to make final plans.”
Father
Gabriel needed more convincing, but I promised I wouldn’t leave until it happened. Gabriel used his phone, and we masked the light of it with our bodies so it wouldn’t be noticed. He sent texts to Kota.
Gabriel: I have Sang. She can’t leave until her father gets here.
Kota: Get her out of there.
Gabriel: Mrs. Sorenson has the phone, ready to call the police.
Kota: We’re ready for that.
Gabriel: She’s not her real mother. She wants to dump Sang on her father and can’t reach him. She’s promising to call the police and tell them who she really is if he doesn’t show up by nine.
Kota: Gabe, pick Sang up and walk her out of there. That’s an order.
Gabriel closed his eyes against the light. I could see the strain in his eyes. Kota was the boss. He had to obey.
I shook my head at him. “Try again,” I said softly. This was our only shot to avoid the chaos that would ensue. I knew I needed to trust them, but maybe Kota didn’t understand.
Gabriel: Sang won’t leave. She wants you to find her father. I’m with her in the closet. Her mother’s giving him time to come back and take her. It’ll avoid the police if he can show up. Sang wants you to find him.
Moments passed. Gabriel’s hand on my waist gripped and regripped me. His shirt fell over my butt, covering my private parts until he started gripping me. He was so focused, I w
asn’t sure if he noticed but it made me feel strange to be exposed and next to him. I was too scared to move to draw attention to it. In the dark, I wasn’t sure if he would see it anyway.
I pleaded in the dark to the phone, hoping Kota would understand. I was safe right now. Leaving meant I wouldn’t be. If my father could just come back for a minute, he might be the only one who could straighten this out.
The phone buzzed to life.
Kota: 8.
I stared at Gabriel’s phone screen. “What does it mean?”
“It means we have until eight,” he whispered. “If your father doesn’t show up by eight, I’m to take you out of here.”
“Will he help? Will he try to reach him?” I asked.
Gabriel’s face broke into a grin. “You’re forgetting who we are.”
We had time. I relaxed into Gabriel. It might be okay after all. If anyone could find my father, the boys could. I was sure if they could just talk to him, they’d get him to come back. I just didn’t want the police called. This was all my mistake. They didn’t need to get into that kind of problem with me. Not if it could be prevented.
Gabriel promised Kota if anything changed we would let them know or he’d take me out of here. There was nothing for us to do but to count the time. We had four hours to sit around.
With the drone of the television, it was harder to figure out the location of my mother. I wasn’t even sure if Marie was home for a while. On occasion I heard creaking upstairs and wondered if it was Marie or just the house settling.
Gabriel held me in his lap, occasionally shifting to find some comfort. Eventually, he pulled me with him until his back was against the wall, my body against him as he stretched out his legs. I fell off of his lap, my bare butt landing on the floor next to him. I stuffed his shirt down around my hips.
Gabriel sucked in a breath, pushing my legs off of him. “Turn around.”
My heart thundered again. “Where?”
He motioned. “Just look at the wall, will you?”