Broken Promises (17 page)

“And don’t let no cops find you wandering around,” the girl added. “If they find out you’re lost, they gonna lock you momma up in jail for not taking care of you.”

“Really?” Clarissa asked.

“Uh huh,” the girl replied. “And they’ll put you in some home for children. It happened to my cousin.”

Clarissa nodded silently. There was no way she was going to get caught by the police and make her mother go to jail.

“Which way back to the school?” she asked.

The girl shook her head. “You is in trouble if you don’t even know that,” she said, but she pointed back down the street and gave her directions. “You go back to that corner there, see, and then you turn left. Then you walk three more blocks, turn right and cross the street and then go down that street two more blocks. You should see the playground. But don’t go back by the school. Those gangs hang out there after school and if they catch you, they gonna hurt you. So, you stay across the street from the school. And don’t go into no alleys because they is bad men in those alleys and they gonna hurt you too. Understand?”

Her heart thudding in her chest, Clarissa nodded. “Thank you,” she whispered, her mouth suddenly dry.

“I sure hope I see you in school tomorrow,” the girl said. “I sure hope you make it home.”

“Thank you,” Clarissa repeated. “Me too.”

By the time Clarissa had made it to the second turn, it was beginning to get a little dark. . She pulled her mittens out of her pockets and pulled them over her hands, as the wind picked up and the night air was colder.

“If I can make it back to the school, I’ll be fine,” she whispered to herself.

Following the girl’s directions, she felt her heart lift when she actually saw the playground about a block in the distance. She made it! She began to cross the street to head to the playground, when she saw the squad car turn the corner. Her heart dropped. She couldn’t let them find her, she didn’t want her mother to go to jail.

She looked around quickly, trying to decide where to hide and saw a narrow gangway between two tall apartment buildings. She rushed past a row of scraggy hedges, down a broken sidewalk and into the narrow passage.

A sour smell assailed her nose as soon as she got close to the area. It smelled like the alleyway behind their apartment, next to the bar. The ground beneath her shoes was sticky and wet, she felt her stomach turn. This place was gross.

She entered the tall and narrow gangway. It was like entering a dark cave. There were no lights, only a series of steps that led up to the back porches of the apartments. Large garbage cans sat next to the steps, trash scattered all around them. As she moved forward, a large piece of newspaper skittered across the ground. She stopped and stared; something big and brown slipped from underneath the paper into the shadows underneath the steps. She froze. There were rats in this place.

She stepped back and heard a rustling sound in the garbage can behind her. Jumping forward, she ran to the edge of the gangway and looked around. She couldn’t go into the gangway, there were too many rats. She peeked past the brick building and saw the police car slow down in front of the building. She ducked down, hidden by the scraggly bushes and the shadows of the building.

Waiting, her heart pounding, her breath coming out in tiny gasps that puffed out as white smoke in the cold air, she could hear the sound of rustling move even closer. She’d seen rat bites on some of the kids at school. Some of them even had to go to the hospital and get shots. She knew her mother couldn’t take her to a hospital. Could someone die of a rat bite?

Hearing the sound of a car moving up the street, she knew the police car had moved on. She started to stand up when she felt the thump of something hitting her backpack. She jumped forward, turning quickly, as a large rat fell to the ground at her feet. She gasped and clamped her hand over her mouth to stop herself from screaming out loud. Eyes wide in terror, she darted out from the gangway and ran up the street, away from the police car and away from the rats.

Finally, minutes later, she was out of breath and her lungs were aching from the exertion. She knew she was lost. Knew she had run away from the playground and away from the police. She looked around and found herself in front of a huge building that looked like a castle. Tall towers of stone with colored glass windows stood on either side of the large wooden doors. The steps up to the doors were white and bigger than any steps she had ever seen.

She looked up and down the street, what could she do now? She started to sit on the large steps, when the sound of an approaching car startled her.
The police!
she thought. Making her mind up quickly, she ran up the stairs to the heavy wooden door and, using all her weight, pushed it open.

The inside of the building was dimly lit, with only the soft light of candles and dimmed recessed lighting illuminating the large room before her. She walked forward, her shoes clicking against the polished wood floor. The air smelled a little funny, like wax and ...something spicy. Row after row of long pews filled the room and at the very front was a white marble altar with a large crucifix hanging high on the wall behind it.

Not a castle, a church
, she thought, although she couldn’t remember any of the churches in Freeport being this big or fancy.

She stopped about halfway to the altar, slipped into a pew and sat on the padded upholstery. She looked up at the face on the crucifix and then around at all of the statues and paintings of the saints. They all seemed to be staring at her, waiting for something.

“I’m lost,” she whispered. “God, will you please help me?”

A door at the back of the altar opened and a dark-robed priest entered the chapel.

Will he help me?
Clarissa wondered.
Or will he call the police?

He moved across the altar silently, meaningfully, to the pulpit. Once there he searched it and pulled out a manila folder. He didn’t seem to notice her, so she sat silently and just watched him. She felt safe in the church, safe and warm. Her feet were tingling because they weren’t cold anymore. She looked at the padded bench. If she could just lay down for a minute and rest, then she was sure she’d feel better.

Slipping her backpack off, she placed it next to her on the pew and laid down, using her backpack as a pillow. She yawned deeply as the warmth from the room seeped into her tired and cold body. Just a few minutes, she thought sleepily, and then she would walk the rest of the way home.

Clarissa felt someone shaking her shoulder, trying to wake her up. “Is it morning already?” she muttered.

“Ah, no, tikna, it is just evening,” a man’s accented voice replied.

Immediately waking, Clarissa gasped in surprise and tried to dart away. The man had dark hair, an olive complexion and thick stubble on his cheeks and chin. He was wearing a brightly colored button-down shirt under a canvas jacket and a kerchief tied around his neck. When he smiled two gold teeth glistened in the candlelight of the church.

She tried to move back, but the man held on to her shoulder. “There is no need to be afraid, chavvi,” he said. “Mami Nadja, you know her, yes?”

Clarissa nodded mutely.

He nodded and smiled. “She send me,” he said, nodding his head as he explained. “She say ‘Meri, you go find Clarissa and help her go home’, so I come to kahngeri, church, and I find you sleeping.”

“How did Mami know I was here?” she asked, her eyes wide in wonder.

“Ah, she is…Drabarni…she speaks with angels,” he said. “They tell her you need help to go home. No? Is that right?”

“Yes, I was praying for angels to help me,” she admitted. “My daddy used to say that angels were always watching out for us.”

“Your daddy, he is a smart man,” Meri said.

Sighing, Clarissa looked down at the pew. “My daddy’s dead,” she said.

“Ah, tikna, I am sorry,” he said. “I too lost my father when I was little. It is hard for a child to grow up without a father.”

A tear escaped Clarissa’s eye, but she quickly wiped it away. “It’s hard for my mommy,” she said, taking a deep breath. “Daddy used to take care of lots of things for her. Now she just has me.”

Meri sat down on the pew and met Clarissa’s eyes. “And sometimes, it is hard, no, to be the strong one?” he asked, “and not just the little girl?”

She climbed up on the pew and sat down too, her feet dangling several inches off the floor. She looked at the crucifix hanging in the front of the church for a moment and finally turned towards Meri. “Are you an angel?” she asked.

Meri’s smiled broadened and his laughter echoed in the empty cathedral. “No, tikna, an angel I am not,” he said. “I am a traveler.”

“Traveler?” she asked.

“Um, I am a gypsy,” he said.

“Like the Hunchback of Notre Dame?” she asked with a smile.

He nodded. “Yes, like that.”

“Is Mami a gypsy too?”

Meri smiled. “Yes, she is Drabarni, she sees things and tells us what to do,” he explained.

“Like a mom?” Clarissa wondered.

Laughing, Meri reached over and patted Clarissa’s head. “You are very wise,” he said. “Yes, like a mom. She is the mother to our Rom family.”

He picked up her backpack and handed it to her. “And now, tikna, it is time for us to walk to your home,” he said. “It is night, but not too late. If we hurry, your mother will not know of your adventure.”

She slipped the backpack over her shoulders and smiled up at him. “Thank you,” she said. “I was very lost.”

He nodded. “Come, I will show you the way.”

They exited the church and walked together down the city street in the twilight. The streetlights glowed and most of the small Mom and Pop stores had ‘Closed” signs hanging from their doors. However, the taverns on the corners were open and the sounds and smells spilled onto the street. Clarissa was grateful Meri was walking with her.

“How did you come to be lost?” Meri asked.

She glanced up at him, then looked straight ahead. “It’s a secret,” she said. “I can’t tell you.”

He nodded slowly and they walked a little further. Pausing at a corner, they watched for cars and then quickly hurried to the other side. “Secrets can be heavy to carry,” he said, after a few minutes had passed in silence. “Especially when you are so small. Can you not share a little with me?”

She looked up at him again, and then shook her head.

He watched a bus pass by and looked out into the distance. “Ah, well then, it must be an important secret.”

She continued to walk, sighed and didn’t respond. Her legs were aching and she was feeling cold again. All she wanted was to be home.

“And so, does your mother let you walk home from school alone?”

“No,” she replied quickly. “She thinks Mrs. Gunderson is watching me.”

Meri stopped walking for a moment and put his hand on her shoulder once again, turning her to face him. “Gunderson? She is vaffadi mush, a very bad person. Why does your mother allow this?”

Clarissa studied his face for a moment, he reminded her of her father when he was worried about something. She felt that she could trust him. “She doesn’t know,” she explained confidentially. “I don’t tell her because she would worry.”

“It is a parent’s job to worry,” he said. “It is not the child’s job to worry.”

He just doesn’t understand,
she thought.
Daddy and I took care of mommy
.

“My mother is very sick,” she finally said. “She is worried about so many things. I didn’t want her to worry about me.”

Meri rested his hand on her head. “But, tikna, you are the most important thing to worry about,” he said. “She would not want you to be with a bad person.”

“Well, I’m not anymore,” she said. “So she doesn’t have to worry.”

She began walking again, looking everywhere but at Meri. He followed her, a few steps behind, amazed at the independence and courage of the little girl. He knew the neighborhood and he knew how Mrs. Gunderson and those like her acted, and he could probably guess what had happened. “So, they take your babysitting money and say you no tell your mother, or they hurt her, yes?”

Wide-eyed, Clarissa turned to him. “You can’t say that to anyone,” she cried, her eyes filling with tears. “They will kill my mother, they told me.”

“I will tell no one,” he promised, squatting down in front of her. “These are evil people and they will do as they say. You are right to be afraid. But, you let them know you are under the protection of the Rom and they no longer will bother you.”

“Why are they afraid of you?” she asked.

“Ah, because the gypsies have magic,” he said with a grin. “And they no understand us, but they fear us.”

“I’m not afraid of you,” she said.

He laughed. “Because you have a shining soul,” he said. “And Mami, she says angels do watch over you.”

She nodded. “That must be my daddy,” she explained matter-of-factly. “He’s an angel now.”

He reached out and stroked her cheek and nodded. “Yes, I am sure your daddy is watching over you too. Come now, we have one more stop before we go to your home.”

A few blocks later they stopped at a playground Clarissa recognized. “I know this place,” she said. “We are close to my house.”

He nodded. “Yes, very close,” he said. “But first, you learn your walk tomorrow.”

Guiding her to the sandbox, he picked up a long stick. He drew a box in the sand. “This is your school,” he said, drawing another long line perpendicular to the school. “And this is the road you must travel when you walk home. You know this road, yes? It is the road the bus travels on.”

Then he drew various businesses she would recognize on her walk and which ones were safe places to go in and ask for help. “You are part of us now,” he said. “And we are here to watch over you and help you. These places, the Roma are here. You tell them Mami is your friend and they will help you.”

She nodded. “It doesn’t seem so far, like this,” she said.

“It is not far,” he replied, “if you know the direction to take.”

He pulled a paper bag out of his pocket. “And this, this is from Drina, my wife,” he said. “Meat pies. Very good. One for you, one for your mother. You eat them for dinner.”