Perfected (Entangled Teen) (11 page)

The sound of the car’s motor drowned out my words.

“Crazy old woman,” the lady muttered, watching Ms. Harper pull out into traffic and speed away. “Well.” She shrugged. “I guess you can come inside. Follow me.”

Fourteen

E
ven though it was light outside, the inside of the woman’s apartment was dark and dingy. A little bit of light trickled in through a window above the couch that looked out onto the brick exterior of the building next door.

“You can sit down while I go talk to my husband about this,” the woman said, pointing to the couch.

I lowered myself down onto the scratchy brown fabric while the woman sauntered off into a back room, leaving me alone except for a brown striped cat that slunk over, rubbing its body against my legs. It meowed. I tried pushing it away with the tip of my foot.

I’d never been in a room like this before. Even our tiny rooms at the kennel didn’t feel like this, cluttered and dark, with a strange smell that radiated out of the furniture. In the corner near the television, a small folding table was stacked with empty bottles and food containers. A few had spilled onto the floor, but obviously nobody had thought to pick them up. On the other side of the room, a windowsill near the kitchen held a row of wilted-looking plants that stretched their gangly stems toward the window.

The whole place filled me with a hopeless sadness.

“You okay?”

I nodded, quickly wiping away a stray tear from my cheek. “Can you help me? I’m not really supposed to be here.”

In front of me, the woman stood with her hands on her hips.

“Well, no kidding! I just talked to Doug and he’s not so happy about that lady dropping you off like this. Usually things get planned out a little bit more. We don’t even have transport arranged and even if we did, we’re not just going to send one girl.”

“But I don’t even want to—”

As if she’d summoned him, the man stepped out of the back room, pulling a white tank top over his head. He stood in the doorway and folded his arm across his chest. “Did you ask her how much the lady sent with her?”

“God, Doug, I just walked back out here,” the woman said, clearly annoyed. “You think I had time to ask her anything yet? If you want to know then ask her yourself.”

He scratched his oversized stomach and ambled farther into the room. “How much money did she send with you?” he asked me.

My gaze darted between their faces. “Ms. Harper? She didn’t send me with any money.”

They turned and looked at each other.

Finally the man spoke. “We don’t take pets that haven’t been sponsored,” he said. “Usually it’s fifteen hundred dollars. That’ll get you to the Canadian border. But if you didn’t come with anything…” He shrugged. “We’re not one of those activists that do this for free. This is a business. We’re taking a risk here.”

“I can give you a little something to eat before you leave, but that’s all I can do for you,” the woman said. “I’m sorry. It’s not like we can afford to keep you here. If we helped you for free then we’d have to help everyone for free. How could we do that?” She folded her arms, waiting, as if she was expecting me to answer her question.

“I wouldn’t have come at all, but Ms. Harper took me,” I said. I could hear the panic boiling up in my voice. “Can’t you just help me get back to my owners?”

The man rolled his eyes. “Oh yeah. Let’s just call the police for you and arrange that.” He turned and walked back into the other room, not bothering to say good-bye.

The woman sighed, glancing over her shoulder in the direction of the room the man had disappeared into. “He’s right, you know. It’s not like you can just go back now. There’d be all sorts of problems for you. And not just with the police. I’ve heard stories about what happens when they catch a girl who tried to escape.” She shuddered.

My stomach dropped. “Did they send her through the door?”

“What door?”

A bit of bile rose in my throat. “The red one.”

She shook her head, clearly annoyed. “What I’m trying to tell you is that these rich people do
not
like it when their pets run away. They’ll make you pay.”

“But I didn’t run away,” I said.

She shrugged. “I’m not sure it makes a difference to them.” She paused. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll give you fifty dollars for your dress, okay? That way you’ll at least have a little something to get you going. And I guess I can give you the address of someone who might be able to help you pro bono, or whatever they call it.”

“Pro bono?”

“Yeah. We don’t usually work with those people. They’ve got a group that moves you people from safe house to safe house. It’s slow. They can’t get you out in one day like we do, but it won’t cost you. I can’t guarantee anything.”

I rubbed the soft fabric of my dress between my fingers. “But I don’t have anything else to wear,” I said. “This is all I have.”

“You’ll get eaten alive if you wear that out onto the streets.” She scoffed. “The police will pick you up in a second and if not them, it’ll be someone worse.”

She left me sitting on the couch and went back into the other room. It didn’t take her long to dig something up, and in a minute she came back with a pair of shorts and a T-shirt that she threw down next to me on the sofa. “Here. We keep stuff around the house for the pets we transfer. At least you’ll blend in a little bit better.”

I picked them up and turned them over in my hands. They looked a little bit like clothes that Ruby might wear, except the fabric wasn’t nearly as nice. I was pretty sure the shorts used to be blue jeans before someone cut off the legs right below the pockets. They were a little dirty, but I guessed they would fit me. The shirt, pink with a sparkly heart stitched onto the chest, was close enough to my size, too.

“Is there somewhere I can change?” My voice caught, threatening tears.

She pointed to a little bathroom off the kitchen.

“I’ll fix you a sandwich,” she called after me as I shut the door.

The clothes fit fine, but as I stared at myself in the grimy mirror over the bathroom sink, I couldn’t fight the nausea that flooded my stomach. I fell to my knees in front of the toilet, breathing fast and hard, and fingered the pendant that hung around my neck. It was my only link to my life at the congressman’s house. Why couldn’t these people just use the numbers etched into the back? That’s what they were there for, in case I got lost. The congressman would come and get me. And if he didn’t, Penn would.

But then I imagined the look on their faces when they found out I’d been taken, the way the congressman’s eyes would narrow and Penn’s jaw would clench. What if they blamed me? Maybe it
was
my fault. If I hadn’t run off, none of this would have happened.

A darker thought started to form in the back of my mind. What if I went back and the congressman chose to send me back to the kennel and pick out a new pet, one that would stay where it was supposed to stay? He’d done it before, hadn’t he? I wasn’t sick, but I’d most definitely misbehaved.

“They look like they fit okay,” the woman said when I walked back out of the bathroom. She handed me a sandwich wrapped up in a paper towel, eyeing the new clothes before she took the dress from me. She stroked her hand over the soft fabric, then led me to the door.

“Do you think it would be possible for me to stay a little bit longer?” I asked. The apartment might have been dark and uninviting, but where else was I supposed to go?

She shook her head. “You’ve got to understand, we’re just barely making it. We aren’t like those rich people. We don’t have a couple thousand to throw away on you.”

“I won’t take anything,” I said. “I promise I won’t be any trouble. You won’t even know I’m here.”

The woman snorted and opened the door. “Yeah, you pets are a real piece of cake to have around.”

“Please,” I tried again.

Her lips clenched into a straight line. “Listen, we’re the good guys, but there’s only so much we can do. Try calling the number I gave you. I’m sure they’ll be able to do something for you.” She gave me one last shrug before closing the door behind me.

B
y midafternoon it was so hot outside that it was difficult to breathe. I sat in a little park down the street from the apartment where Ms. Harper had dropped me off, unsure about where to go. In my pocket I had a wad of cash that the woman had pushed reluctantly into my hand before I left her house, and a rumpled piece of paper with the numbers to the other safe house.

But the numbers and letters on the little scrap of paper meant about as much to me as the ones on the pendant around my neck. I rubbed the necklace between my fingers and sat in the shade of a tall tree near an abandoned playground. It reminded me a little bit of the park Ruby took me to once, except the swings that hung from the swing set were mostly broken and the slide was boarded off at the top.

It was a sad park. The grass was patchy, with large chunks of dirt that showed through, so that I sat mostly on the dry compact ground. There weren’t any flowers, only a row of woodchips bordering the chain-link fence that ran the length of the yard. How could one patch of land be so drastically different from another? This soil couldn’t be that different from the soil at the congressman’s house. The same sun shone down on them both. The same rain wet the ground. So why did it feel as though I’d walked into a different world, one in which all the beauty had been sucked dry?

My stomach rumbled. I’d eaten the sandwich the woman had given to me hours ago. The sticky brown paste in the center had stuck to the top of my mouth, but it had been tasty and I wished I’d saved some of it instead of eating it all at once.

Across the street, a restaurant let off a delicious smell whenever the door opened. For the past half hour I’d watched as people came out with white bags full of food.

Maybe it was courage that drove me, or maybe it was just hunger, but finally I got up and crossed the street. Inside the restaurant, the smell was both intoxicating and sickening, oily and rich. I followed the line of people up to the front where a girl in a yellow shirt and a matching hat stood behind a counter taking people’s money.

“What can I get you?” she asked.

I rested my hands on the counter. “Do you have anything with lentils?”

The girl raised one eyebrow. “Are you trying to be funny?”

“How about leeks?”

She shook her head, looking at me like I was an idiot. “It’s fast food.” She pointed to the sign above her head. “Read the menu.”

I scanned the sign, flustered. Some of the letters looked familiar. Ruby and I had gotten all the way to the end of the alphabet with uppercase letters, but I didn’t know what to do with them when they were put together.

“Listen, if you’re not ready to order yet, do you mind moving off to the side? There’s a huge line behind you.”

Behind me, the line of people stared at me impatiently. A man near the front of the line shook his head and grumbled.

“I’m sorry,” I muttered, moving out of the way.

Everywhere I turned there was writing—on the green signs posted at the street corners, in large block letters above the stores, even on the scraps of newspaper that blew down the sidewalk. Everywhere. The letters taunted me. Even the scrap of paper in my pocket with the new address seemed to tease me.

I ran back toward the park, but halfway across the street a car horn blared. “Get out of the road,” a man shouted from his car window.

On the sidewalk I bumped into a man pushing a cart. He swerved out of the way. “Hey, watch where you’re going, crazy bitch.”

I ducked underneath the slide. The rusted metal frame bit into my back as I tucked my knees against my chest, but at least I was hidden. I never wanted to go out there again. It felt like something was breaking inside my chest and I laid my head against my knees, trying to remember how to breathe.

Fifteen

B
y the time the sun had set and the park was dark, I’d almost forgotten about the empty nagging in my stomach. I’d spent the day with my face pressed against the cool dirt underneath the slide, watching birds peck at the patches of grass and listening to the rush of the city around me.

I wanted to be home, back in the big four-poster bed with its mounds of pillows and clean white sheets. I didn’t care about Collin or the congressman’s argument with his wife or what Ms. Harper had said about being free. Their words were empty. I sat up and rubbed the dirt from the side of my face. I didn’t care about freedom. That’s not what I wanted. I just wanted Penn to look at me again under the silver moon while we danced, to take my hand in his and walk me through his magical garden once again. I wanted to share more of his beautiful music and give him mine in return. I wanted another chance to learn what it was to be kissed.

I was sick of feeling sorry for myself. I had spent the last ten hours being angry at Ms. Harper for taking me away, but I hadn’t done anything to make things better.

I climbed out from underneath the slide and glanced around the dark playground. On a bench by the fence, a couple sat holding hands and talking quietly. The placement of their bodies, so comfortably close to one another, made my limbs tingle. The thought of never feeling the heat of Penn’s body near mine made my heart ache.

Out on the street the flashing blue and red lights of a patrol car pulled up alongside the park and I froze. What if the woman at the apartment had been right about the police? I scanned the park, looking for an exit besides the one next to the fence where the patrol car sat, but there was no other way out. Without drawing too much attention to myself, I walked quickly back to my spot underneath the slide and crouched low against the smooth ground.

My heart hammered uncontrollably as I strained to listen. Across the park, the soft mumble of voices droned in and out with the sound of traffic driving by. It was probably just the couple on the bench, I told myself. They were probably saying how much they loved each other. But the thought did little to console me.

I grasped my knees tight against my chest. My breath was ragged in my throat, so loud and gasping that the officers could probably hear it from the other end of the park. As I covered my mouth with a hand to try to quiet myself, the beam of a flashlight cut across the lawn in front of me. It bumped over the uneven grass and slid through the gangly bushes that grew along the edge of the fence, illuminating old food wrappers and soda cans.

“Check the playground,” a deep voice called from the other side of the park.

“There’s nobody here, Phil,” the man holding the flashlight said. “They’ve probably got us running around for nothing. Those microchips aren’t the best technology. We could be off by a hundred yards.”

“I don’t care what you think about the technology. I said check the playground,” the deep voice said. “There’s a bunch of rich folks that are going to throw a fit if we don’t find her.”

A pair of heavy boots crunched closer and a light swept across the ground at my feet. I drew my legs in closer, tried to make myself a ball, as small as I could possibly be, but it was too late. The light moved up my legs, shining like the sun directly into my eyes.

“Holy crap. She’s here. I found her.”

T
he lights in the police station were cold and unforgiving. I sat in a chair by Officer Robert’s desk, waiting. I’d already been waiting for hours. I guess that’s what you did when they brought you in to the police station.

But the officers were kind. It didn’t take me long to realize that they weren’t the ones I should be afraid of. If I could have stayed with them indefinitely then maybe things would be all right. It was after the congressman arrived that I needed to worry about.

I pulled a blanket tighter around my shoulders. It was cold in the police station, even though it had been so hot outside, even this late at night, and Officer Roberts had seen the way I sat shivering in the chair and had gotten me a blanket from the back room. It was thick and scratchy, but warm. I pulled it over my legs.

“You don’t think it’s weird?” Officer Roberts said to his partner. “It feels wrong giving her back, you know? Like, I’m supposed to be protecting her.”

“It’s a property dispute case,” his partner said.

Officer Roberts shrugged. “I know, but I don’t like it. I’ve heard people talking about it, but I guess I never really thought about it before. She’s the first one I’ve seen in person.”

Simultaneously, they turned to stare in my direction.

“She kind of reminds me of my niece.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Officer Roberts said. “She’s in eighth grade. Tell me there’s not something wrong about this whole thing.”

Just then the doors on the other side of the station swung open and the congressman strode in. He was dressed in one of his expensive gray suits, but underneath the luxurious clothes was a haggard man. His eyes were rimmed in red and a bit of stubble grew along his jaw.

“You must be Mr. Kimball,” Officer Roberts said, walking across the room to shake his hand.

The congressman held out his hand. “
Congressman
Kimball. It’s nice to meet you.”

Officer Roberts caught the correction. “Yes, Congressman. If you’ll follow me, we’ve got your…” He paused, obviously deciding how to word it. “We’ve got Ella right back here.”

“Thank God,” the congressman said, coming to a stop in front of me. He shook his head. “I still don’t get how she got down here. It’s over a five-hour drive from New Canaan. Has she told you anything?”

“She hasn’t spoken since we picked her up,” the officer said. “There’s a lot of fanatics all worked up about that law, though. Probably one of them got wind you had a pet and thought they’d try to set her free. We’ll let you know if we find out anything. We’ve got officers following up on a few leads. It’s just a good thing she had the microchip, otherwise you might not have gotten her back.”

Microchip? I frowned at the word. The only things I had with me were the clothes on my back that the lady at the safe house had given me. There was no way she would have given me something that the police could have used to find me.

The congressman frowned, shaking his head at the same time. “Yes, well, apparently they come in handy,” he said, before he turned back to me. “Come on, love. Let’s get you home.”

He pulled me to my feet and held me close to his side.

The congressman hardly spoke during the ride home. For five hours we sat in silence as he stared out the window, clutching the wheel so tight between his hands that his knuckles turned white. Every so often he’d glance in my direction before he turned back to the road.

It wasn’t until we pulled into the driveway, the gravel crunching familiarly under the tires, that he finally turned to me.

“You need to tell me who it was. Was it that man from the catering company?”

I shook my head, afraid that if I opened my mouth, I would start to cry.

The congressman sighed. “You didn’t want to run away, did you?”

“No.” My voice cracked and the tears that I’d been saving during the long drive home spilled out. “I didn’t want to leave. I begged her not to take me, but she said it was for the best.”

“Shh, it’s all right. It’s all right. You don’t need to cry,” the congressman said, stroking my hair. I leaned my head against his shoulder until my tears stopped falling. His hand was warm and heavy on my back. Maybe he wasn’t mad at me. Maybe if I told him who had taken me he wouldn’t send me back to the kennel.

I hiccupped once and took one last shuddering breath before I looked back up into his eyes. “It was Ms. Harper,” I said.

The congressman’s jaw tightened and he nodded once, but he didn’t yell at me. “We’ll worry about her later. Right now I just want to get you out of these terrible clothes.”

The house was completely quiet as we came inside. I knew it was still the middle of the night, but for some reason I’d imagined people waiting up for us. I’d expected Ruby to come running for me, arms open wide.

The congressman led me back to my room. I’d only been gone for a little more than a day, but somehow I’d expected everything to look different.

“Hurry and get into some pajamas,” the congressman said. “I’ll wait right here until you’re done.”

He sat down tiredly on the couch and I quickly grabbed a nightgown from the closet. As much as I wanted to take a long hot shower, I didn’t want to keep the congressman waiting. He’d already done so much for me. Obviously he wanted to see me safely to bed before he left.

I quickly changed out of the dirty clothes. I didn’t know what to do with them. Rosa would probably throw them away, but it felt wrong to stick them in the garbage. I folded them, thinking I could just set them in a pile on the counter and Rosa could do whatever she wanted with them. In the pocket was the piece of paper that the woman had given me, crinkled. I fished it out, suddenly worried about what Rosa would say if she found it. I scanned the bathroom for a place to hide it, finally tucking it behind the mirror before I washed my face.

The congressman smiled at me as I emerged from the bathroom. “That’s better,” he said. “You’re back to yourself.”

I sighed, moving toward the mound of blankets on the bed, knowing just how wonderful it would feel to sink down into them. He was right. This was the girl I was supposed to be. Even if I didn’t feel the way I knew I should.

My heavy eyelids could barely stay open as I lowered my head into the soft pillow. The congressman sat down next to me, resting his heavy hand on my shoulder. It felt as if it was holding me down, keeping me from floating away.

I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer.

“There you go,” he whispered as I began to drift to sleep. “Safe in bed. I won’t ever let anyone take you from me again.”