Fall on Me

a short story of survival on the streets

[Warning: Contains non-graphic subject matter regarding young girls forced to live on the street.]

I expected magic in the city.

My whole life I did, thinking it would be different than where I grew up in the country, the farmlands, where there never seemed to be much more than bad memories, pain, loss.

I’ve always had my foolish dreams, and my ridiculous hopes from all my book reading, so when I meet some people just getting by like us, I get them to bring us with them to the city, I, thirteen, in pain, tired and scared, and Dora, my sweet 8-year-old sister/cousin/daughter. We were starving, and I had been selling myself, just letting boys do whatever they wanted to me for money or food, so trusting strangers and hoping for magic didn’t seem such a crazy thing anymore.

Moving now isn’t like moving was back when Dora was just four and I was nine, going to our first foster home, when we hoped to live in a great dollhouse together. Times after that, when people took us, there wasn’t so much hoping and dreaming, just a lot of wishing it wouldn’t be worse. This time we go to unknown, maybe scary, city neighborhoods, in a beat-up Chevy van, full of our junk, and me and Dora, Jimmy and Frank, and the girls that work for them.

Dora and I just stare out the window all the way, because we don’t know Jimmy, Frank, and the girls well. And the girls look at me like I’m not gonna earn enough or that I’m gonna steal Jimmy’s or Franks’ hearts because they say I’m way too pretty. Anyway, both Jimmy and Frank never said I was pretty, and when they tried me out they said, aside from all the crying, I was just OK to work for them. So we’re in, and this means we can get away from the bad stuff we’ve been through.

The country turns to strip malls and then to dirty city streets. In the city, people seem always in motion, seem dangerous, just seeing them all moving on the street. I’m not used to so many people. And they’re loud, different, I can’t read their bodies, that hidden language that shows me stuff when they don’t speak, even with their eyes. But I am vigilant, see everything, everyone, cement, bricks, glass, filthy streets, fist and boot, gun and knife, indifferent eyes, some hungry eyes, crazy eyes.

I look for the magic, like in the movies, and in some of the books that I can still kind of remember that happened in cities. I don’t see it. Maybe people like us don’t get to see the magic. Or maybe you have to be rich to see the magic. I just settle for not starving.

Dora clings to me in the car. “Relax, Dor, please. We’re here. Give me the key Jimmy gave us.” We get our own room now. Special. Jimmy tells me I’m special because I’m young, and I look even younger, like I’m maybe 11, and some men are probably going to like that. I don’t like to think about it.

We all go up the stairs, and through the dark halls, even the girls are quiet, nervous but excited. Jimmy and Frank will bring up the stuff, but we don’t have much compared to everyone else, just our little travel bag and my books. Jimmy says he’ll get clothes for us, and towels and toothbrushes, tomorrow.

There’s nothing in our room but a rickety bed and an inch of dust, and we’ve got nothing. Nobody lives here or has lived here for a while. If I didn’t have all my memories, I wouldn’t have anything to fill up this place. I think back on sharing a room with Dora when she was just a baby, a room bigger than this one with a few pictures and stuffed animals and a dresser and things.

I slept on the floor on a nice little mattress, and she had an old but pretty crib. Her real momma didn’t do anything at all, so I had to take care of Dora right from when she was born. I was just maybe five or six when I taught her to walk, her first awkward steps in the kitchen. I was too small and weak to catch her well, but I’d let her fall on me, even hard. Not so different, even now. Her momma is long dead, but I love Dora like she’s my daughter, and I keep her safe.

Doesn’t take too long to settle into life here. The neighborhood rhythm is tidal, and kinda of predictable, but I still don’t always understand it. I dread the days and fear the nights for a while. Normal people adjust and find their place, but I struggle, always looking through the wrong lenses to see the danger to us. I swallow my fears and take the abuse, but I shower Dora with love and keep her happy.

I even try to engrave a danger map in her mind. “Never there or there, not ever… and stay clear of the boys, the men. And never, never, never go anywhere without me.”

She doesn’t listen always. Good for her. Maybe she’s gonna be stronger than me, smarter than me. She’s gonna learn a tidal rhythm in a way I can’t… and learn to walk the city fearlessly.

Jimmy promised Dora could get an education, that they’d put her in the local school, and that she wouldn’t have to do what I do. One of the older girls can pretend to be her momma. I don’t think it’s going to happen, and they don’t really mean it. I don’t want her to have a life like mine — having to be with men and all that — so I already taught her to read and write. I hide my fears and my nightmares, but I awaken some nights, fear-drenched, in her arms while she cries and strokes my hair and tells me how pretty I am.

It’s been a few months to get settled, to start having enough food and stuff. The nights are long because of the men, and Dora has to hide in the closet the whole time, deep in the back with the knife I found. I feel bad that she’s had to hear me get hurt bad so often. Jimmy’s not always paying attention those times when they beat me and throw me around the room.

When we wake up most mornings, I like to show Dora if the sky is mother-of-pearl beautiful, the clouds bubbly and sun-lit from behind, or if it’s rosey reds and pinks with wispy clouds. I guess that’s like showing her a little magic. And I love the view through our tiny, broken window, though it’s even better from the back steps. Today all I can see is hopelessness.

Jimmy told me last night the police are looking hard for us. Dora must have blabbed our names. Life shouldn’t always be this hard. We should be allowed mistakes, but we’re not. Nope. Not us. But I made a big one. It’s my fault.

“Oh, you make me so insane!” I say to her, furious in that moment, that moment between when she told me and when I worried it was all over for us. You’re not my mother, she’ll say next.

“You’re not my momma,” she yells, her face red, burning, angry.

I don’t know why I get upset, but it hurts me when she says it, every time it hurts. Stupid. I’m the only mother she’ll have. She’s the only baby I’ll have. The doctor says I’m broken inside now. Figured that out when he patched me up last time. It’s OK because Dora is all I ever needed, though I guess Dora and I aren’t good at life. And we’re dead now, I’m certain.

I sit on the back steps of our building, where I can see everything, anything. Frank’s watching us, like usual, from the back fence, smoking a cigarette, while Dora stomps around cussing and kicking dirt, just starin’ at me like I’m one of the mean ones like I never did nothing for her… like I don’t love her anymore. Like I don’t give up everything for her.

“We gotta go, Dor. Can’t stay now. Police have our names. and they’ll take us to jail Jimmy says.”

I hold back my tears, no time to cry. I’m the one almost fourteen, not her. She’s just a kid, just eight, and she cries, then says, “Sorry, Annie.”

She looks at me all hopeful and sad, and I know what she wants, so I sing “Evermore” for her, soft and sweet, just the way she likes it. She snuggles in close, with her head on my shoulder, but I still sing loud enough for Frank to hear. He’s not so bad to me now that he knows I sing nice.

“I wanna be pretty like you, Annie, and sing pretty like you too.” She kisses me on the cheek, and I need to stop singing to let the tears come.

“Let’s go,” I say.

I stuff all our things into my backpack, and I put our food in a couple of shopping bags, I’m sad because this was such a good place, even had a shower, strong doors with locks, and a good light for reading books. I almost finished Romeo and Juliet, and Dora laughed at the funny words when I read aloud.

It was better than our foster homes where the men tried to get us. They almost got Dora that one time . . . but I don’t like thinking about that. Jimmy doesn’t want to lose us, but he’s scared to have us around, so he has a hiding place for us to go for a while. He’ll sneak food to us if he can.

“What does my momma say,” I ask Dora. “She here now? What does she say?”

Dora shrugs, “She loves us, Annie. Says we’re gonna be OK.” I wish I could see her too.

We sit quietly for a little bit while I wait for Jimmy. “I miss Uncle Red …, I mean poppa,” Dora says.

“Me too,” I say. Closest we ever had to happiness. He was Dora’s poppa and like a poppa to me. Used to yell for me, yell and yell and yell, only to turn and see me, a little wide-eyed girl, sitting, arms around my knees, looking up at him, blue eyes, staring at him full of smiles and quiet giggles.

“Stop sneaking up on me!” he’d laugh. Then the Chase. The Capture. The Tickles.

Dora’s momma wasn’t quite so nice at all, mean, and drunk most of the time. I’d take all her beatings again if we could just have Uncle Redback. If they weren’t both dead from the car accident.

“Come on, Dora. We gotta go. Can’t wait on Jimmy.”

“Why do the police wanna hurt us?”

“Well, we did some bad things, stealing and stuff, and we ran away from foster care, and I have been paid to do some bad stuff because we needed to have money and food. And you remember how we got away from the last place. So Jimmy says they’ll put us away a long time.”

“I wish you didn’t hafta do that stuff, Annie,” Dora says quietly.

“Me too. OK, I’ll just be a doctor or lawyer instead,” I answer angrily.

“Don’t make fun of me, Annie.”

“I’m sorry, Dora, it’s just that I wish it could be better for us. I’m doing what I can.”

“Yeah, Annie. It’s just… that I love you, and …. I love you, is all.” She smiles at me tearfully.

Jimmy gives me a piece of paper with an address and names and says it’s time for us to go. He threatens to find us if we “get lost”. We sneak out the side door of the building, and through the alley that has lots of stuff to hide behind. I’m terrified and I hold Dora’s hand too tight, but she doesn’t complain about it. There’s gotta be a place Jesus wants us to go. I don’t want to go where Jimmy says.

“You brought our Jesus, right?” I ask Dora. It’s a stupid thing, an old action figure I drew a beard on. I just thought that Jesus would forgive us for wanting to see him, and we pray to him every night…. maybe not with the prettiest words or the right ones, but I also sing to him the sweetest songs I know, to make him happy.

Best to run away in the brightness of day, to just act normal like we’re walking over to see a friend, and we pretend to laugh and talk about things. But I’m a little lost already, not as smart as I need to be. I’m growing up but no closer to finding a way for us, more frightened than enlightened, I guess. I know I have no power, even over me. I feel less than human, unimportant, most days, feel barely alive sometimes if I think too much. I’m just trying to keep Dora safe.

I give up on any kind of search for sense, for answers, for happiness. We have to survive to have any of that. Anyway, it often seems there’s not much truth in truth, and, of course, there’s no truth in lies, and there’s no room for any dreams anymore.

The wind blows us today, forcing our hair to dance, and Dora laughs at how crazy our hair looks now. I listen carefully to the city, the traffic, the bus doors hiss, the voices all around, movement, never stopping. Gotta find a place away from the busy streets, away from the apartment buildings and shops by the time it starts getting dark.

We have to settle on a quiet alley, not too disgusting, and with a fence with a kid-sized hole in it at the end. Good for escaping. The policeman must have seen us on the street, and he followed us into the alley.

“Girls, girls,” he calls to us. “Annie, Dora?” I can hear him quietly talk to the radio on his shoulder.

We keep walking. “What do we do, Annie?” Dora whispered.

I turn us around and pull out my knife from my belt.

“Just stay there!” I call out. “We’re just leaving. I’m Susan and this is Beth. Going to Grandma’s house.”

“Ok. Ok.” He says. “Susan and Beth. I’m Officer Madison.” He steps a little closer and I raise up my knife. “Let me walk you to your Grandma’s house, OK? It’s not very safe around here, girls.”

“Annie, he seems nice,” Dora whispers.

“Of course he does. Jimmy warned us about that. We’re criminals and he can even shoot us if he wants to.” I become angry, knowing that we don’t have much time, and he keeps moving slowly toward us, holding his hands up and out. I keep us slowly backing up to the end of the alley.

“No! You’re not going to take us!!” I hold my knife to my own neck. I don’t remember anything after that, until I woke up later, behind a shed in the yard of a house in a small neighborhood. Dora is holding me, crying, and stroking my hair.

“Annie,” she says, “Annie. Annie, talk to me.” Dora and I are both breathing hard, and she’s crying harder than I’ve ever seen. “You said you were gonna kill me and then kill yourself. I don’t want you to kill us Annie. I’d rather be killed by somebody else. I don’t care if the police kill us. Just not you, Annie. I love you. He let us go. He just let us go. He let us go. Didn’t want you to kill us.”

I look at the knife, still clenched in my hand. Has my blood on it. There’s blood on my clothes, too. Gasping, I turn to look at Dora and I cry uncontrollably. There’s no blood on her except for mine, and I’m not bleeding no more on my neck and arm.

I hug her and say, “I’m sorry, Dora. I’m sorry. I promise I’ll never hurt you or hurt me.” I throw away the knife and ask to hold Jesus.

“Your momma says that you could sing if you want to, Annie.” Maybe it’s just Dora who wants me to sing, not Momma, but that’s OK too.

We rest in the cool dirt and grass, sitting with our backs against the shed, hidden from the house in the front, and I sing to my sister and to Jesus and to my momma that I can’t see. The sweet songs are for my momma, and pretty songs for Jesus, and for Dora I sing Yellow Submarine because she likes to sing along. I sing louder and louder, not really thinking anymore, so when Officer Madison comes to kill us, I just tell Dora to close her eyes and I hold her tight in my arms and close my eyes too. Maybe it won’t be so bad because Jesus is with us and because I’m singing.

We wait for a while, and then lots of arms reach out to us gently, trying to pull us apart, but I hold tight, and soon the arms pick us both up together. We keep our eyes closed tight and I just keep singing through my tears, even when they talk to us, even when they ask me to stop.

I only stop when Dora whispers, “Annie, Annie, it’s all right.”

I open my eyes, and we’re in a house on a soft couch, and people are looking at us. They’re smiling at us, so it seems OK, and they give us some juice and some sandwiches to eat. And I see a man who Dora kind of remembers, so I’m happy for Dora. I start to cry because I’m gonna miss her. I guess I’ll just have to go back to Jimmy if they don’t arrest me or kill me.

The man comes over to us, quietly, gently. “I know you loved your dad, your Uncle Red … my brother. Something went wrong and you got put in foster care. I’ve been looking for you two for over a year and a half. Would you want to come home with me and my wife and little kids?” He has tears in his eyes and a gentle smile on his face. I remember that face so well on Uncle Red.

Dora nods and smiles, and I cry more. “I’m not going to jail?” I ask.

“No. Of course not, sweetie. Can I sit with you two?” We make space for him to sit between us, and I don’t feel like crying anymore.

Maybe this is Magic.

The original draft was published at https://vocal.media, no longer there.

Check out companion stories here on Medium called Finding Ways and Gardeners of the Heart.