THE GOLD FISH: The Runaway (3.8)

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Joan was standing at the kitchen stove browning a pound of ground beef for dinner when the first crash from above reached her. She froze, wooden spoon held mid-stir, and cocked an ear, knowing full well that crashes were typically followed by something else. From the worst case help! and I hate you! to the best case I’m okay and nothing to worry about here. But in this case what Joan heard next was an unearthly scream, pounding footsteps, and a door slam.

“What the hell was that?!” yelled Joan over her shoulder, before turning off the burner and wagging an index finger at the Belle who played at her feet. “Don’t move, you hear me?”

The Belle nodded amiably in reply, quite content to continue banging her wooden spoon against a Tupperware bowl.

Joan ran into the living room where Karen sat reading a novel and picking her lips to her heart’s content. “Karen! Was that Barbie?”

No response.

“KAREN!” she repeated. “Was that Barbie?!

Karen finally looked up from her book. “What?”

“I said, was that your sister who screamed? Did she leave the house?!”

Karen returned to her book. “I don’t know. I guess.”

“Well where was she going?!”

“How should I know?” replied Karen without looking up.

Joan clapped her hands sharply. “KAREN ANN! Listen to ME!”

“Whaaaaat?!” Karen groaned, with no less annoyance than if she’d been made to walk a boulder up a very steep hill.

“What the heck is going on with your sister?”

Karen blinked. “Today?”

“Jesus Christ Almighty.” Why oh why, thought Joan, was it nearly impossible to hold a coherent conversation with a teenager. “Yes, today. Or yesterday. I don’t know!”

Karen closed her book with dramatic annoyance. “Well, she’s been sewing a lot lately. Or whaddya call it… embroidering? And she’s obsessed with making money. I know that.”

“For what?”

Karen shrugged, before returning to her book.

Joan clapped her hands again.

“Why is she obsessed with making money?”

A horrible thought then occurred to Joan. Teenagers across the country were smoking pot like there was no tomorrow. And dropping acid and throwing themselves off buildings. Stories about it were constantly in the news. “Is she doing DRUGS?!”

Karen snorted. “Miss Goody Two-Shoes?! “I seriously doubt it.” The thought made her chuckle, until one look from her mother shut her up. “Can I go back to my book now?”

“For the love of God…” With the heavy sigh of a mother clearly out of patience -- a sigh that, let’s face it, has been around since mothers cooked their dinners in a cave -- Joan gave up and marched back into the kitchen to tend to the Belle and her ground beef.

After all, Barbie hadn’t asked for help and clearly wasn’t in any danger. Like all kids, she’d be back when she got hungry enough.

:::

Barbie sat atop a picnic table shivering, arms clasped around herself for warmth. She was in the small wooded park across from the Kings Ridge Apartments. The park -- Barbie didn’t know if it had a name -- occupied the small sliver of land between Morven Road and Perring Parkway. Its two defining features were a set of rusty old swings and a tiny stream over which sat a petite wooden bridge. The bridge did have a name, however, albeit one only known to Barbie and Bridge. A few summers ago, they had dubbed it Crayfish Bridge on account of all the crayfish that lived in the stream underneath it. They had spent the entirety of one blissful day poking the translucent monsters out of their lairs with sticks. Of course, the only thing their poking had achieved were scurried moves to the next rock, so after that first day, the activity had lost much of its novelty. They never did it again, but Crayfish Bridge lived on.

The delights of crayfish-poking notwithstanding, the park was always deserted, which most likely had to do with the fact that the constant roar of traffic from Perring Parkway was deafening, making it impossible to have a conversation or even hear oneself think.

But as a solitary spot to plot her next move and wallow in self-pity, the park was perfect. And productive too. Barbie had come to a decision: she was going to run away.

Why shouldn’t she?! Clearly, no one loved her. Or cared about her.

Because if they did, they would pay attention to her. Hug her. Kiss her. Not steal her MONEY! Or at the very least, maybe come looking for her when she was MISSING!

But no. She’d been sitting on this picnic table for two hours already, and hadn’t seen, or heard, a soul. Her mother hadn’t even stood on the back porch and wailed her name like most mothers on Pitney Road did at dinnertime. So Barbie had to face the truth. No one had even noticed she was gone.

And now it was dark and she was cold.

Oh why hadn’t she planned more carefully? Been better prepared? Brought a sweater with her. Some food? A flashlight? Money!

Okay, she knew why she hadn’t brought money -- thanks to her rotten father, she had NONE! -- but she had seen enough cartoons to know that when you took to the open road, you rolled up a few things in a red bandana, tied it to a stick, and threw it over your shoulder. Even if you were only going to live out the rest of your days in a dismal park two minutes from your house. But in her eagerness to get away from her terrible family (the Belle excepted, of course), she had forgotten to bring anything.

And now she had to face the truth. She would have to go home.

But before she did, was it possible, she thought, to last until, say, midnight to make them sorry? Would that be enough time for anyone in the family to miss her? To make them reconsider their lack of, well, their lack of… consideration?

Out of the darkness, a match was struck and flared into flame, startling Barbie and chasing these thoughts from her head. But she relaxed the minute she saw, illuminated in the glow, the kind face of Mr. Charles.

He set fire to the tightly packed tobacco in the bowl of his pipe and puffed, before shaking out the match and addressing Barbie.

“Mind if I join you?”

Barbie shook her head.

Mr. Charles ambled over, pulling Trixie on a leash behind him, and hauled himself up on the table’s bench. He puffed a few more times on his pipe, his short legs dangling in the air, before he finally ventured, "wanna tell me what’s going on, Red?”

Tears suddenly sprang unbidden to Barbie’s eyes. Tears that she was usually so good about keeping in, but just now, could not be stopped. “Nothing’s wrong,” she choked.

Mr. Charles turned his head towards her and nodded towards her wet cheeks. “That why you got horse piss running down your face?”

Barbie swiped the wetness away with the back of her hand. “I’m not crying,” she said defiantly.

After all, hadn’t she been told since she was a baby to “stop crying” or her mother or father would “give her something to cry about.” At this point in her life, she didn’t even need to hear the words to stop herself. But right about now, that seemed impossible.

Mr. Charles dug into his pocket, retrieved a folded handkerchief, and handed it over.

Barbie took it gratefully, but didn’t use it. Just twisted it in her hands, before throwing back her head and howling at the sky. “I don’t know WHAT I’M DOING.”

Mr. Charles started to laugh, but checked himself. “Welcome to the club, kid.”

“Nothing is the way it’s supposed to be!”

“Say’s who?”

“Says me!”

Mr. Charles took a deep breath. “I learned long ago, Red, that expectations can be… well, expectations can be a little dangerous. The sad fact is that, in life, nothing is guaranteed. And expectations can often lead to… disappointments. Like the hippies say, maybe it’s better to…” he waved his thick hand in demonstration “go with the flow.”

“So why try to do ANYTHING?”

“Because maybe it’s the trying and the doing that’s important.”

Barbie shook her head, refusing to be comforted. “But not everyone TRIES! Not everyone DOES!”

Mr. Charles’ eyes softened with affection. “You try, Red. And that’s all you need to worry about it.”

Barbie considered these words while Mr. Charles re-lit his pipe. Yes, she tried. It felt like she tried hard all the time. But she still messed things up. When she thought about it, though, maybe she could try harder. To be a better kid. A better friend. A better person.

As Barbie pondered these big and difficult thoughts, Mr. Charles sat beside her, offering his silent, comforting companionship. Which when he thought about it, was just about all he could offer. It simply wouldn’t do, wouldn’t do at all, for him to say anything that might cast aspersions on Joan and Don’s parenting skills. Because again, what the hell did he know?

So he just sat with her. Two small people finding solace together in the big empty night.

Until finally, he spoke up. “You gonna live?”

Barbie sighed. “I guess.”

“Alright,” said Mr. Charles, sliding off the bench and onto his feet. “Let’s get you home. It’s colder than a witch’s tit.” He held out his hand to Barbie, who took it gratefully.

“C’mon Trixie. Lead the way.”

And Trixie complied, followed by Mr. Charles and Barbie, who walked hand-in-hand all the way home, kicking at the autumn leaves as they went.

Next → Habits and Horrors (3.9)