Are There Any Good Guys Out There?

The disappointing reality I faced at seventeen.

After months of lying low, it was time to make a move. I went to Dorothy and said, “Kathleen and I are biking to town. Wanna come?”

“You know I do,” she said, “but…”

“No buts,” I said.

“I don’t want to get in trouble.”

“We’ll be more careful this time. And if we’re caught, my parents just scream idle threats, and eventually things die down. They can’t tie us up,” I said, to lighten things. “Not like our dog in the yard.”

“Your parents said if I ever lead you two astray again, they’ll kick me out.”

“They’re just bluffing,” I said, hoping it was true.

“I sure hope so. Because I don’t know where I’d ever go if your parents kicked me out,” Dorothy said, going into her room to change her clothes. “Or what I’d do.”

“Okay, okay. Let’s quit worrying and go have fun.”

“Okay,” Dorothy said, pulling on a clean top and following me down the stairs to go outside to where Kathleen waited.

“We’re just riding around the dirt roads,” I said to Mom, walking through the dining room where she and my grandmother sat, talking.

Mom said nothing other than, “Be careful.” Just what I’d counted on, my mother not wanting to create any kind of scene in front of her mother. She wanted her mother to believe that she had everything in our family under control.

We got on our bikes and beat it up the paved road to town.

Once in town, we walked our bikes up the street towards the park. On the way, we met a large-bellied police officer heading in our direction.

I hoped to glide right past the cop. But to my surprise, he stopped in front of us and said, “Hi, girls.” My heart raced. Why was he talking to us?

The cop smiled a big smile and asked, “Where’re you girls headed?”

“Up the street,” I said.

“Where’re you girls from?”

I hesitated, wondering if I should answer. Before I could, Dorothy said, “Oakland.”

The fifty-something officer squinted, thinking like most others where Oakland was. Dorothy pointed toward the other side of the harbour.

“You mean Indian Point?” he asked.

“No,” I said. “You drive through Oakland to get to Indian Point.”

“Oh,” he nodded.

“What’re your names?”

“Why you asking?” I stepped in front of Dorothy and Kathleen, closer to the officer.

“Curious, that’s all.”

“Do we have to tell you?” I asked. “Is it the law or something?”

Before he could answer, Dorothy said, “I’m Dorothy Zinck.”

I wanted to turn and slap her.

“Nice to meet you, Dorothy,” he said, reaching out around me to shake her hand. After shaking his hand. Dorothy blurted, “This is Kathleen and Barbara Ann Langille.”

Now I really wanted to slap her

“Oh,” he said. “You’re the girls I received a call about earlier today.”

A chill ran through me, but I remained calm. “What do you mean?”

“Your mother, Mrs. Sidney Langille, called. She’s very concerned about you girls.”

I couldn’t believe my mother called the police.

To my surprise, the cop didn’t drag us off to the police station. He continued chatting with us. And I decided it wise not treating him as the enemy, and turn the situation into our advantage.

“Why don’t you tell me your side of the story?” he asked.

So, I told it like it was, “My mother doesn’t allow us to do anything! She’s way too strict. She wants us to stay at home and do nothing. We just wanna be with our friends. But she makes a big deal out of everything!”

“I see.” He nodded.

“Like this.” I motioned to our bikes. “What’s the big deal about biking to town?”

He smiled. “She told me you’ve been meeting up with those fellas in the park.”

Unbelievable. Had she told him about the whole scene of my being taken to the hospital, about our drinking? “Is that a crime?” I asked.

“Only if you're drinking.” He eyed me and my sister.

“She’s our babysitter.” I pointed at Dorothy. “She’d never let us drink.”

“Well,” he rolled his eyes. “Your mother said that Dorothy leads you girls astray.”

My mouth hung open in shock. But I pulled myself together. “Are you going to arrest her?”

He smirked. Dorothy remained silent, like anything she said could be held against her.

“No,” the cop said. “I’m not arresting anyone. I’m asking you to go home and work this out with your mother.”

I almost busted out laughing. Even more unbelievable. “There’s no working it out with her.” Once again, I pointed to Dorothy. “She’s thirty. Not allowed to do anything! She can’t date. Can’t go to dances.”

“Well, do me a big favour,” he said. “Just go on home and give it another try.”

“She’s not the listening or understanding type,” I said. “There’s no trying it. There is no reasoning with her.”

Kathleen nodded, said, “She’s right. Mom won’t change her mind.”

“Just go on home, call it a day, so I don’t keep getting calls from her. Come back when your mother calms down.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “My mother will never calm down. You don’t know her like we do.”

“Well,” he said, “I don’t want her to keep calling and telling me you’re drinking with the boys,” he chuckled. “Just go on home.”

I sighed, knowing we had little choice. I didn’t see any point in pissing the officer off and making it worse for us. Agreeing, we turned our bikes around and headed out of town.

At home, we put our bikes in the barn and went into the house, expecting my mother’s angry face as a greeting. Instead, she greeted us like nothing had happened, making me almost doubt my reality… like I’d slipped in and out of a dream.

I wondered if my mother thought she’d found a solution to any future problems with us, a way of keeping us from the guys in the park? That if she couldn’t control us, the police could? Had she thought the cop scared us into coming back home?

So many questions. So few answers, as always. But this wouldn’t stop me. It made me even more determined to gain my freedom.

The next time the three of us biked to town, we sought the friendly cop we’d met weeks earlier, though it seemed weird wanting to find him instead of trying to avoid him.

Soon as we found him, I asked, “Could we talk to you about something?”

“Sure,” he said. “Come on up to the station.”

“Okay,” I said. “Lead the way.”

Dorothy, Kathleen, and I walked our bikes up the street behind him.

At the station, he held the door open, and we entered. “Would you like a tour?” he asked.

We looked from one to the other. Then decided it was best to take him up on the offer. “Sure,” I said.

We followed him from room to room. “Do you lock many people up?” I asked, standing before the holding cells.

“All the time,” he said, then chuckled, and I figured he was joking. “Want to step inside?” He opened the cell door.

“I don’t want to,” Dorothy said, stepping back.

Kathleen moved back as well. I didn’t move.

“I won’t lock you up,” he said.

I pulled Dorothy and Kathleen inside with me.

He closed the door and pretended like he would lock it, then grinned and swung the door wide open. “Come on, girls,” he said, “Let’s go to my office, see what you’d like to discuss.”

He made himself comfortable behind his desk, rocking back in his chair, his hands folded on his belly. “So,” he said, “what’s on your minds?”

“We want to leave home,” I blurted.

“Okay,” he said, “I see. Now let me ask. “How old are you all again?”

“Dorothy’s thirty. I’m seventeen,” I said. “Kathleen’s fifteen.”

“I see,” he said. “Let me explain. Right now, you and Dorothy can leave. But until Kathleen turns sixteen, your parents can have her brought back. Once she’s sixteen, your mother can call all she likes. But until then, it’s not wise for her to leave.”

I nodded, not happy with the answer, but it was as I’d expected.

“Look girls, I can see you’re disappointed.” He leaned closer, his hands on the desk, smiling at us. “We can talk more. You can tell me more about your troubles. See if I can help you.”

Though he seemed so nice. So friendly. So willing to help. I didn’t like his hungry eyes, or his heavy breathing. He wasn’t as we first thought. We couldn’t trust him. I feared we’d let a dangerous genie out of a bottle.

Once again, we told him about the difficulties with my mother and our struggle for freedom.

“Have you been with those fellas in the park?”

“Yes,” I said, hoping he didn’t intend to bad-mouth them.

“Look girls, you don’t need to hang out with those losers.”

“They’re not losers,” I said. “Just misunderstood.”

“You need a real man. One with something to offer you. A man to take care of you.”

I swallowed hard, hoping he wasn’t hinting at himself as the man we should be looking for. He was almost the age of my father. But I played it cool, not wanting him aware of how nervous his talk made me, how nervous he probably made Dorothy and Kathleen, and how they were depending on me to get us out of this sticky situation.

“And where would we find one?” I asked in a soft voice, tilting my head to the side, playing innocent.

His grin widened. He leaned closer over his desk, almost watering at the mouth like the Big Bad Wolf.

“You?” Dorothy asked. I was shocked she’d spoken.

“Exactly,” he answered. “Those young fellas don’t know how to treat you right.” He turned his gaze to her. “You need a man with experience. A man who knows what to do.” He smiled. “How to treat a woman.”

I swallowed my shock, my disgust, disillusioned that a man in uniform would talk in such a way. Wasn’t he supposed to protect us? Uphold the law? It all seemed so confusing, so wrong.

Maybe I hadn’t heard him right, maybe I had misunderstood, yet another part of me understood exactly what I’d heard… and fear ran through me… who in the hell are we supposed to trust?

He asked what I wanted to do when I finished school. I told him I wanted to be an artist.

He laughed a little too hard. “You won’t make any money or be famous until after you’re dead. Isn’t there anything else you want to do?” His tone suggested the answer rested with my body. It was in the way his eyes travelled over my breasts. Down to that part, all men wanted.

I felt so trapped.

We sure as hell couldn’t tell our mother or our father about what he was saying. One, we weren’t supposed to be in town. Two, who would believe our story? Who wouldn’t believe a man everyone trusted? Who would believe three bad girls who hadn’t listened to their mother?

I was no fool; I played along with the game that needed playing. But inside, rage filled me, like a wild wind. Rage caused by such disappointment. I hated the way things were. Hated we had no one to trust. And how everything always came back to sex.

Was sex all men thought about?

I gauged the distance to the door, deciding I could make it out before he could twist himself around his desk. My reflexes faster than his.

Once we gathered the information we needed, Kathleen, Dorothy and I said our goodbyes, letting him know we had to hurry home before our mother noticed us missing.

“Sure, girls, sure.” He escorted us outside. “Don’t want you getting in any trouble,” he said. “Come back any time, girls,”

We hopped on our bikes. I couldn’t wait to peddle home.

On the ride back, we didn’t talk about the awkward situation with him, but focused on continuing forward with our plan to leave.

From that day on, we avoided the town cop. If we saw him on one street, we dodged up another one. If we ended up meeting him and he stopped to talk, we made excuses for why we couldn’t accept his kind offer of going back to the station.

Dorothy and I faced a tough decision: go without Kathleen or wait until she was old enough to join us.

Kathleen’s tears made it so hard. I imagined how I’d feel if I was the one being left behind. “We should wait,” I said to Dorothy.

“We could still go,” Dorothy sounded so anxious. “You and I could go. We could get a place, find jobs. Have everything ready for her to join us.”

“No,” Kathleen busted out crying.

Back and forth we went until we decided we would wait another six months, and as soon as Kathleen turned sixteen, the three of would leave together and our parents couldn’t stop us.

We finally had a plan.

The story I hoped my mother hadn’t told the cop about.