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Chapter Seventeen
"You're not really Sawyer's mom, are you?" Cherri's question gutted me. My worried eyes shot from the door of the bus back to the teenage girl and I winced.
"No, Cherri, I'm not his mother. Your boyfriend was being hurtful toward me to score a point against my boyfriend."
"He's not my boyfriend. I'm not allowed to call him that. He says it cramps his style." Hurt flashed in her big blue eyes before she shook her head as she'd suddenly remembered something. "Oh, and I didn't think you were. You don't look old enough to be Sawyer's mom." Lucifer, take me now.
"How long have you been with, uh, Wiggy?" I felt stupid even saying his nickname.
"Five …" Her large innocent eyes looked up into her head. "No …" She counted on her fingers. "Six …" she replied, then quietly checked her fingers again. "Yeah, six days. It is Monday, right? Gosh, it's so easy to lose track of time on this bus."
"Where are you from?"
"Iowa, ma'am, but my mom is originally from Mississippi." If I had been degraded by the mom comment toward me, I struggled even more with the fact she was so obviously underdeveloped physically, emotionally, and in every other way, I could think of. What's more, I was seriously perturbed by how vulnerable she had made herself by climbing onto a bus with four grown men in the first place.
"Do your parents know where you are?" She shrugged and lifted her pizza to her mouth. "You do have parents, right?"
"It's just me and my mom, but she don't mind 'cause she's workin' at the diner all hours of the day and night. I'm eighteen, so I can come and go as I please these days. Besides, I ain't never been on no vacation or a fancy bus like this before. I ain't never been on a bus with a fridge crammed packed full of food and beer."
"But she know’s where you are?" I persisted again.
"Guess not. Heck, I don't know where I am, except I'm on a two-story bus."
"Cherri, won't your parents be worried about you?"
Shrugging again, she stopped chewing, considered my question and I held my breath as I waited for her reply. "I guess," she admitted, quietly as she shrugged a shoulder and finished chewing what she had in her mouth.
"Haven't you called them?" I asked. Concern tightened my chest for her family because I thought how worried they'd be, had they not known where she'd gone. Then I figured if they saw Wiggy, they'd worry more knowing where she'd been when they caught up to her.
"Wiggy said best not, 'cause they'd likely want me home."
"How long have you known Wiggy?"
My question caused more confusion when she rolled her eyes and looked at me like my brain cells were the ones at fault. "Six days, as I said already."
"You really should call and let them know that you're …" I hesitated because I was going to say safe, but I wasn't all that sure after having met Wiggy that she was here.
"But where is here?" she asked, popping her skinny shoulder again as I pulled out my cell and glanced over toward the bus door.
"You're in Minnesota," I informed her, and she instantly clapped her hands together, a wide beaming smile on her face.
"Yes!" she exclaimed. "I always wanted to come to Minnesota. I have cousins here."
Passing her my cell, I prompted her to get in touch with someone. "Call your parents, let them know you're okay."
"My mom will be mad," she informed me, looking scared and vigorously shaking her head.
"Trust me, I'm a mom. She'll be too relieved to know you are alive and well to be angry."
"You think?" she asked nervously, her hand reluctant to take my phone.
"Yes, do it," I urged her. "You know their number?"
"Yeah, it's the diner, so it's an easy one to remember."
"Then get on it."
"What do I say? I mean, it's been six days?" She asked as if she'd only realized they would want to know where she'd been.
