Copyright © 2020 James Russell Stoakes
All rights reserved.
http://JamesStoakes.com
Robbie smiled at Sarah sitting on her scooter as he walked to his car. She looked away quickly when she realized she was staring at him. She envied him a little because he had four wheels under him. The rumor was that he had saved since he was thirteen to be able to buy a car when he got his license. The car was old, the paint was in bad condition, and it had a dent in one fender, but it was his, and it seemed to run well. He backed out of his space and waved to her as he drove away. Sarah waved back awkwardly. Any thoughts she had were interrupted by someone calling out.
“When are you going to get a real ride?” Mary yelled across the parking lot when she saw Sarah sitting on her scooter. The gaggle of girls around Mary giggled at her wit as they approached Mary’s bright yellow Mustang.
It was the same thing almost every day. “Soon,” Sarah yelled back tersely, “Not everyone has a dad that can afford to buy a new car for them. Some of us have to earn our own rides.”
Mary and her group all laughed. “My daddy loves me,” she said smugly.
This was the first time Sarah had actually responded to them all semester, and it caught them by surprise. Mary laughed a little less than the others as Sarah put her scooter in gear and moved closer to them.
“Hopefully, not more than the law allows,” Sarah directed towards Mary. “What are you laughing at, Debbie?” Sarah asked. “You don’t even have a scooter. You have to ride with Mary or take the bus. You may want to rethink who you hang out with, according to Mary, our dads don’t love us.” Sarah didn’t wait for a response and drove away as fast as her little scooter could go.
“Wait, what?” Mary asked before the incestuous insinuation was understood.
“Bitch!” Debbie and Marry said simultaneously as Sarah drove away. The other girls quietly laughed at her retort until Mary looked their way.
“Take the bus today,” Mary said to the three that had laughed. “Get in, Debbie,” she directed as she pressed her key fob and unlocked the doors.
Sarah tried to forget about Mary as she piloted her scooter. It wasn’t a bad ride, it could do 50mph and got over 60 miles per gallon of gas! The problem was that it was unpleasant to ride when it rained or, as she was starting to find out, when the weather turned cold.
For some reason, some of the other students that had cars seemed to look down on those who did not as if they were better than anyone else. Mary was worse than any of the others and belittled anyone without a car except for a few of her clingers, like Debbie.
The roar of an engine pulled Sarah back from her thoughts. The flash of yellow in the mirror told her all she needed to know about who it was. As the mustang passed, Sarah began to slow down just in case Mary did something stupid.
Debbie hung out the window with some water bottles and tried to splash them onto Sarah, but because Sarah had slowed down to a crawl, it was ineffectual. Infuriated that their plan didn’t work, Debbie screamed, “Freak!” at Sarah as Mary punched the gas, and they accelerated away.
“It’s hard to believe I ever liked either one of them,” Sarah said to herself as she brought the scooter back up to speed. Sarah used to be on the volleyball team with them, but she had given it up to work at the restaurant. Things changed after she decided not to play this year.
“We just can’t do it, Sarah!” Mrs. Mitchel said with a bit of exasperation in her voice.
“But it’s getting cold out, mom!” Sarah protested. “There will be snow before I can save enough for a car.”
Mrs. Mitchel stared at her and shook her head while Mr. Mitchel patiently spoke. “We have been over this, Sarah. With the bills we have and my current lack of employment, we cannot help you with your purchase. I’m sorry, but property taxes are due next month, and I’m very worried about having enough to pay those.” He sighed, “Maybe if I find a new job soon, we will be able to help, but not until we catch up. In the meantime, you will have to ride the bus or catch rides with friends or one of us.”
“Whatever,” Sarah said angrily, grabbing her helmet and gloves and turning to leave. “I’m going to be late to work,” she said, exiting the door quickly with her blonde hair streaming behind her.
Her parents watched her leave. They understood her frustration, and they really wished they could help her, but it was not possible at this time. “I wish she understood,” Mrs. Mitchel said.
“I think she does,” her husband responded. “It’s just not what she wants to hear.”
“Maybe,” she said. “I don’t know what to do with her.”
Sarah’s hands were already getting cold by the time she got her helmet on. She slid her gloves on before grabbing the cold handlebars of her scooter. The good news was, the motor always started, no matter how cold it was. Thinking about it, the scooter seemed to run better as it got colder outside. As she sat on the cold, hard seat, she wondered if her brother, Arron, had tuned it that way on purpose. She pressed the starter button and the motor turned over and begin to purr. She let the motor idle and warm for a few minutes exactly like Arron had told her when he gave the bike to her. While the motor idled, she steeled herself for the cold trip before putting it in gear and revving the engine a little to make it move.
She thought about Arron as she drove to work. He had purchased a real beater to replace the scooter. She remembered how he smiled when she made a comment about it.
“I can keep it running,” Arron had told Sarah with confidence. “I’ll make it last as long as I need to.”
He was off to college now, and as far as she knew, he was still driving it. “I still don’t know why he was so proud of that beater,” she said to herself shaking her head as she drove.
Seeing the restaurant up ahead brought her back to her own situation. She didn’t look forward to dealing with her boss, Kevin. He could be a real dick sometimes, and she was convinced he did not like her for some reason. He was always so cross with her compared to the other employees and was never happy with what she accomplished. Lately, he had been cutting her hours back, and she was lucky to get two shifts a week, and that was not helping her savings rate any.
“Uhg!” Sarah said under her breath as she turned the corner and spotted him. Kevin was out back, waiting for her. He took a long drag on his cigarette and watched her park her scooter.
“You’re late,” he said, as he stamped out his cigarette on the pavement and went inside.
“You’re an ass,” she said to herself, but not until after the door had completely closed.
It was just after 3pm when she clocked in; the grinding noise the clock made before spitting her card back at her sounded louder than it typically did.
Sarah was still putting her stuff in her locker when Kevin looked into the employee room, “You’re on dishes today,” he said to her and disappeared.
Sarah normally hated dishes, but the hot water was going to feel good on her hands today. She wasn’t prepared for the mountain of dishes that waited for her when she entered the kitchen. “What the hell?” she said as she put on her apron and nitrile gloves.
“Eric didn’t make it in this morning, Kevin said upon hearing her. “He won’t be in tomorrow either, or the next day. I’ve had enough of his shit, so I fired him,” Kevin said, walking through the kitchen. He clearly wanted everyone to know Eric’s fate.
Sarah began running the dirty dishes through the machine. The dishes had to be rinsed and loaded on the rack before the racks could be rolled into the enclosed area where they were steamed clean. When they were done being steamed, they had to be unloaded onto storage racks. She kept the machine rocking as best she could, but there were times when the steamer was not running because she could not keep up with loading and unloading.
“What seems to be the problem in here?” Kevin asked.
“What do you mean?” Sarah said, looking at the diminishing pile of dishes.
Kevin frowned. “I expected you to be done by now!” he said loudly.
Sarah was surprised to hear his exclamation. “I’m going as fast as one person can go on this job,” she said back.
“Watch your tone,” Kevin warned her.
“No, Kevin. Your expectations are too high!” she said. “I’ve been going as fast as I can! I actually thought it was going well today. Why are you harassing me today?”
“Enough!” Kevin said suddenly. It had been gnawing at him for some time. This girl reminded him so much of his own mother it was uncanny. The way she spoke, the way she reacted to him, her mannerisms, all reminded him of her. “This isn’t working for me. I’m going to have to let you go.”
“What!” Sarah said with a nervous laugh, surprised, “You’re firing me?” she asked to confirm.
“That’s correct, Sarah,” Kevin said resolutely. “Punch out, get out. I’ll mail you your last check.”
Sarah stared at him for a moment while trying to decide whether he was serious or not. He was, she decided, and she began taking off her apron. She let it fall to the floor as she walked to the time clock without looking back. Her gloves hit the garbage can as she brusquely entered the employee room, and she clocked out. Her coat was on before she made it to the door. Other employees looked on as she made her exit, but no one said anything for fear of causing Kevin to focus on them.
Sarah let the heavy metal door slam behind her as she left. The tears she was fighting back were a mixture of sadness and anger and frustration. Before she knew what she was doing, she was geared up and riding down the road. She wasn’t heading home though, that was a conversation she was not prepared to have. “I need to change the direction my life is going in!” she yelled at herself.
Sarah turned onto a road she had never ridden before. It was lined with oak trees, and the sun was setting before her in the clear sky ahead. It was comforting, and she followed the westbound road until the sun dipped below the horizon, and her headlight could be seen on the pavement. The oaks cleared, and the road sliced through open fields and gentle hills as she continued on. The full moon cast enough light to see quite a distance on the open plain, and it was mesmerizing.
It was at the top of one of these hills that Sarah felt the growing breeze catch the side of her scooter and push her sideways unexpectedly. “Nothing to worry about,” she said to herself, slowing to turn around. “It’s time to go home,” she said out loud. It was then that she noticed that she had failed to realize that her hands were getting numb, and they felt a bit stiff on the controls. She was having a hard time gripping the bars and holding the accelerator.
A shiver ran down her spine, and an alarm went off in her head. Once she was stopped, Sarah shook off her gloves and attempted to warm her hands on the side of the engine, but the wind kept pulling the warmth away. Stuffing her hands inside her jacket didn’t work, that was caused her to lose heat out of the open zipper. That’s when she noticed her feet were starting to get cold too, and she cursed the sky. The moon was beginning to be obscured by the gathering clouds that had blown in. “Great!” she exclaimed.
She looked at the odometer and tried to remember what it said earlier in the day. “I’m about thirty miles from home right now,” she said, gathering her wits. She looked around the landscape in the diminishing moonlight, about a mile away in one of the fields, near a pond, was a group of houses nestled into some healthy-looking hardwood trees. She didn’t see any lights on, but she hoped that someone in there would at least let her warm her hands and feet before attempting to ride back.
Getting her gloves back in place was harder than it should have been. She knew it was a risk to be relying on strangers, but she had screwed up, and it was a greater risk to try to ride back to town with her hands not working as well as they should. Sarah, having made up her mind, piloted the scooter a bit farther along the road to the sign that read “Oak Hollow Retreat.” The closed sign underneath it hung by one hook and swayed oddly in the wind. She drove down the long dirt drive towards the homes. The deep drainage ditches on either side of the wide driveway swallowed the light from her scooter and were full of ominous shadows, and she began to second guess her decision.
The scooter seemed to grow louder as it approached the buildings, and the exhaust note reverberated back at her. Halfway around the circular courtyard between the buildings, Sarah cut the ignition off and set the scooter on its stand.
Several small flakes of snow landed on her seat before she could remove her helmet. Sighing, see her breath, “Great,” she said as she looked around. There still were no lights on in any of the homes around her. Her fingers were starting to tingle, and it put some urgency in her actions. She moved to the closest doorway and rapped on the glass to get the attention of anyone inside. When no one came, she tried the door and found it locked.
At the next door, she didn’t even try to knock, she tried the doorknob, and again, it was locked. The next was also locked, the wind was biting at her, and she was beginning to feel desperate as she tried the fourth. The knob turned, and she quickly let herself in to escape the wind. Sarah was surprised at how hard she was breathing once she was inside. It was dark, and she vigorously rubbed her hands together for a moment, before searching for a light switch.
Relief flooded through her as the light switch clicked, and the room flooded with light. It was still cold in the room. Sarah could not see her breath, but it was clear that there was no heat in the home. Near the phone, in a hanging basket, there were a few letters with the name Alice White. “Somebody obviously lives here,” she thought as she peeked into the refrigerator. “I wonder where they are?” There was very little to see; a partial loaf of bread, an inch of milk in a half-gallon container, some cheese, and some bologna.
Closing the door, Sarah picked up the phone and dialed her own home phone. The answering machine picked up, and Sarah’s mom’s recorded voice played back happily, “I’m sorry we are unable to make it to the phone right now. Please leave a message at the tone.” Beeeep.
“Hey, Mom,” she began. “I went to my friend Alice’s house after work, and it has started to snow, so I’m going to stay here tonight. I’ll see you in the morning,” she finished speaking and hung up.
In the next room, Sarah could see a pile of blankets on a chair that the light from the kitchen illuminated. Turning off the light, Sarah grabbed a blanket off of the pile and laid down on the sofa to warm up. As she dozed off, she hoped that the owners of the home would be understanding if they came in while she was asleep.
The light was on in the kitchen when she woke to a noise. She wanted to get up and say “hi” to her son, but it was so cozy under the blankets that she stayed still. “He’s been so grumpy lately,” Alice thought to herself. “He probably wouldn’t want to talk to me anyway. Just drop the groceries off and go, that’s his pattern lately.”
Remaining still, Alice listened as the refrigerator door opened and then closed. She was perplexed when she heard a female voice talking, presumably, on the phone.
“Hey, Mom,” the voice said. “I went to my friend Alice’s house after work, and it has started to snow, so I’m going to stay here tonight. I’ll see you in the morning,”
“Friend?” Alice thought suddenly a bit excited and then realizing the voice was far too young to be Cynthia. “Cynthia’s mom has been gone for a long time,” she thought. “Who is in the kitchen?” she wondered.
The light clicked off, and a young girl entered the room. She grabbed one of the many blankets off of Alice and laid down on the sofa. Alice watched as the girl’s eyes slowly closed as she fell asleep.
“I don’t know you,” Alice said quietly to the sleeping girl. She stared for a while before feeling sleepy again. “It will be nice to have someone to talk to in the morning,” she thought to herself as she snuggled in and dozed off.