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Beverly now understood that Gary was doing the same thing with Tommie that he’d done with her. He pretended to be someone other than who he really was. He pretended to be an ideal, loving father. But Tommie grew older and sometimes dropped a sharp toy that Gary would step on, or there would be puddles on the bathroom floor after Tommie took a bath. The anger inside Gary could hibernate, but it couldn’t rest forever, and as Tommie aged, Gary saw increasing imperfections in his son. He recognized elements of Beverly in Tommie’s personality. He became again the man he truly was. Beverly knew all about the stern voice and occasional shouts; what she hadn’t expected were the bruises she began to find on Tommie’s thighs and arms. As if Gary had squeezed too hard, or maybe even pinched his son.
She hadn’t wanted to believe that Gary could do something like that. When Beverly did something wrong, Gary would tell her that she’d done it on purpose. But Tommie was just a little kid, and Gary had to understand that toddlers made mistakes, right? That nothing Tommie did that angered his father was done on purpose? Beverly went to the library, but the information she found wasn’t much help. Oh, she’d read it all. Books, articles, tips from law enforcement, theories of psychologists and psychiatrists, and the reality was mixed. Sometimes an abusive husband also became abusive to his children, and sometimes he didn’t.
But the strange bruises…
There was also the fact that Tommie had changed from a laughing, smiling, and outgoing toddler to the quiet, introspective little boy she now knew. Tommie never admitted anything, but Beverly started to see fear in Tommie’s expression when Gary’s car pulled into the driveway after work. She saw a forced enthusiasm when Gary prodded his son to kick the ball around the yard. She also remembered how Tommie had fallen when he was learning to ride a bike a few months earlier. The training wheels should have kept him upright, but they hadn’t, and Tommie cried in her arms with skinned knees and elbows while Gary ranted about how uncoordinated his son was. She remembered how, over time, Gary showed less interest in Tommie; she remembered how he began to treat Tommie more like property than simply a child to love. She remembered how Gary told her that she was spoiling Tommie and that he would grow up to be a mama’s boy. She recalled that on Tommie’s first day of kindergarten, Gary hadn’t seemed to care about anything other than the fact that his eggs were overcooked at breakfast.
And the strange, unexplainable bruises…
Gary might be Tommie’s father, but Beverly was his mother. She had carried him and delivered him. She’d breastfed him, and she was the one who had held him in her arms night after night until he finally learned to sleep more than a few hours at a stretch. She changed his diapers and cooked his meals and made sure he got his vaccinations and brought him to the doctor when his fever was so high that she’d been worried he might get brain damage. She helped him learn to dress himself and gave him baths and loved every minute of all those things, reveling in Tommie’s innocence and continuing development, even as Gary continued his endless cycles of abuse with her, always in the hours after Tommie went to sleep.
In the end, she told herself, she’d had no choice but to do what she had. Law enforcement was out; going back home was out. Anything associated with her previous life was out. She had to disappear, and leaving Tommie behind was inconceivable. If she wasn’t around, on whom would Gary vent his anger?
She knew. In her soul, she knew exactly what would happen to Tommie, so when she made her plan to run, it was always for both of them, even if it meant that Tommie had to leave his friends and toys and pretty much everything else behind, so they could begin an entirely new life.
Despite the lateness of the hour, Beverly wasn’t tired. She was bubbling with steady, nervous energy—probably because she’d been thinking about Gary—so she left the rocker and returned to the kitchen. Spying the cans of yellow paint and primer, she felt her spirits lift in spite of her memories. The kitchen would be so cheerful when she was finished. She turned on the radio, keeping the volume low so Tommie wouldn’t wake up, but the music began to work its magic, drowning out her previous thoughts.
Now, with the world black beyond the windows, she remembered Tommie’s smile while catching tadpoles and let herself believe that everything was going to be okay. Yes, there were challenges, but everyone had those, and people needed to learn to not sweat the small stuff, right? For the present she had food and shelter and safety and anonymity, Tommie was in school, and she’d figure out what to do about the money. She was smart and capable, and there was always someone who needed cleaning or cooking or babysitting or someone to read to them because their eyesight had declined with age. And Tommie would adapt. Even if he hadn’t mentioned any new friends yet, he’d meet a boy or a girl in his class soon enough and they’d play at recess, because that’s what little kids did. Little kids weren’t caught up in who was who or what someone did or even if they wore the same clothes day after day. Kids just wanted to play. And Peg?
She laughed aloud at how silly she’d been as she exited the store, laughed that the idea had taken root at all. Not that she’d let her guard down, of course. Gary would have gotten the word out through government channels by now, distributing a suspect report or most-wanted listing, but it wasn’t as though he could personally speak to every police officer or sheriff in the country. For the time being, she was just a name and an unfamiliar photo on a poster hanging on the wall of the post office or in some email inbox, along with images of terrorists or white supremacists or bank robbers. In a world where crime was rampant and people did awful things every single day, it simply wasn’t possible for anyone in law enforcement to keep up with individual names and faces and descriptions from everywhere in the country. It was hard enough trying to keep up with the bad things that happened locally.
What had she been thinking?
“I’m just making sure we’re safe,” she whispered.
She wished again that she’d brought more clothes for her and Tommie. In her closet…No, she corrected herself. It wasn’t her closet, not anymore. In her old closet, she had a beautiful pair of Christian Louboutin pumps, with gorgeous red soles, the kind that celebrities wore at fancy galas or movie premieres. Gary had bought them for her birthday, and it was one of the few gifts she’d received without violence precipitating it. She’d never owned another pair like them. She probably could have squeezed them into her backpack, and maybe she should have. It might have been nice to slip them on every now and then, just to stare at them, like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz with those ruby slippers, but then again, not really. It wasn’t exactly the same, now that she thought about it, because the last thing she wanted was to return to the life she’d lived before. This was her new home, and she was standing in her new kitchen.
“And tomorrow the walls will be yellow,” she whispered.
They needed another cleaning, though, so grabbing the same rag she’d used earlier, she began scrubbing again, taking her time, making sure the primer would stick. Cleaning and scrubbing, while the music sometimes made her feel like dancing. She could already imagine how pretty the kitchen would look when morning sunlight filtered through the windows.
It was late by the time she finished. Really late. For some people, it might even be considered morning, and because Beverly wanted to make sure she heard Tommie when he woke up, she lay down on the couch in the living room. Somehow she dozed off, like her brain simply decided to shut down, but she was awake even before she heard Tommie coming down the steps.
Gone was the relief from the night before. She didn’t feel like she had after waking from the dream about the pirate or even when her mind had begun tumbling after Peg mentioned that she looked familiar. Rather, there was a low-level sense of dread, like an unpleasant hum, one that hinted she’d missed something important in her escape.
Gary would have found her identification and phone in the house, signaling her intent to stay off the grid. Without ID, she wouldn’t be able to fly anywhere, so Gary’s first stops would be the train and bus stations. She’d already known that, though, which were the reasons for her precautions. She’d also known there were a dozen buses headed in different directions that morning, and Gary would learn that, too, but since he had no idea when she’d left, she would be more difficult to trace. What would Gary do next?
He’d speak with the ticket sellers, but what would he learn? No one would remember a mother and son. No one would remember a long-haired blonde. After that, he’d probably start interviewing the bus drivers, but with so many possibilities that weekend, it would take time. He might, however, eventually stumble across her driver, but what would he learn? Again, no mother and son traveling together. He would also learn that the driver had been replaced with another and that no mother and son had either arrived at a destination or departed together. Even if either driver had seen her and Tommie sitting together by glancing in the rearview mirror—doubtful, since Tommie was so small—would the second driver remember exactly where and when they’d gotten off? Who could possibly remember such a thing, especially after the passage of time, with so many stops, with so many people getting on and off every step of the way? It would be akin to remembering a random face in a passing crowd.
She was safe, she decided, because she’d been careful. She was safe because she’d thought of everything, because she’d known exactly how Gary would conduct his search. And yet she could still feel the anxiety, inching upward inside her like bubbles rising through water, and when the realization suddenly came to her, it felt as though Gary himself had punched her in the stomach.
Cameras, she thought.
Oh God.
What if the bus stations had cameras?
In the morning, I went for a run beneath a cloudless Florida sky. The air was thick with humidity, and by the time I hit the beach, I had to strip off my shirt and use it as a makeshift bandanna to keep the sweat from pouring into my eyes.
I ran in the hard-packed sand near the water’s edge, passing by Bobby T’s and a string of motels and hotels, including the Don, before turning around and making my way back to my place. I wrung out my shirt, shorts, and socks before hopping in the shower to cool off. Afterward, all clothes went into the washer, and only after two cups of coffee did I feel ready to start the day.
Picking up my guitar, I spent the next couple of hours tweaking the song I’d sung for Morgan, thinking again that it was close but not exactly right and feeling that there was something special there, if only I could find it. As I continued to tinker, however, my thoughts kept returning to the question of whether I would ever see Morgan again.
I had lunch, went for a walk on the beach, then continued trying different variations on the song until it was time for me to leave for Bobby T’s. Because it was Sunday, I didn’t expect much of a crowd, but when I got there, every table was already filled. Scanning the audience, I noted that Morgan and her friends weren’t there, and I did my best to ignore a pang of disappointment.
I played the first set—a mix of crowd favorites and my own songs—then rolled into the next set, and then the third, before I started taking requests. By the halfway point in the show, the crowd had grown. It wasn’t quite the size of the Friday-night crowd, but there were a number of people standing, and more people continued to wander in from the beach.
With fifteen minutes to go, Morgan and her friends showed up. Somehow, despite the size of the crowd, they were able to find seats. I caught Morgan’s eye, and she gave a little wave. When I had a single song left to play, I cleared my throat.
