Lost Girl: Part 1
Authors: Elodie Short
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is coincidental.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without the permission in writing from the author, Elodie Short.
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All Rights Reserved
Copyright © 2015 Elodie Short
Version 1.0
LOST GIRL
Part 1
Table of Contents
“Bye Herbert,” I say while placing thick lettuce leaf in my rabbit’s cage, “I’ll be back soon. Maybe even with some nice juicy Dandelions if I can find some for you.” He sniffs my fingers for a second in reply, but I’m sure I’ll be forgotten as soon as he attacks the lettuce.
I check my laptop bag one last time to make sure I’ve got everything I need, before zipping it up and swinging the strap over my shoulder. Walking out of my front door, I lock it behind me and stuff the key in a side pocket of my bag.
I walk down the open gallery to the staircase and let the warm breeze flow through my hair. Then take the two flights of stairs down and step out of the building.
It hasn't been such a nice day in a very long time. I take a deep breath and close my eyes for a few seconds, letting the hot early afternoon sun warm up my skin. My mom must have known I would always relish in the summer sun, it’s probably why she named me after it.
I’m going to take advantage of every ray I can, by sitting on my bench near the park. I’ve started calling it my bench shortly after I moved here, since I'm the only one to ever use it, apart from the old man with his cane and dog. He sometimes has a quick rest before moving on, but never bothers me while I’m working.
Walking up to the bench, I smile at the sound of the children in the park laughing and shrieking. For some reason, those kids are great background noise while I'm working. I can't imagine them screaming and running around me all day long, that'll do my head in. Having them this far away, is close enough.
***
Turning the last corner, I can see the bench, but stop in my tracks when I see a girl, sitting in the spot I usually have all to myself. I can hear the girl lightly sobbing, and see her shoulders jerk up and down. Slowly I walk over to her and as soon as she hears me, her head snaps up in a swift move and she looks at me, terrified.
“Hi,” I approach her with a quiet voice, “are you lost?”
She shakes her head at me.
“Why are you so upset,” I ask. Placing my bag on the ground next to the bench I carefully sit down next to her.
She looks at me with big eyes and in a tiny voice she says “they said ‘pay up or we will take Anna away from you’, so I ran away.”
“Who is Anna?”
She looks at me, still with those big eyes, and points at her chest. “Me,” she whispers before clasping her face in her hands again with a big sob.
A shiver runs through us both at the same time, but where mine stops as a shiver, thinking this must just be some boys in the park, hers turns into a violent shake.
“Are you cold? Or maybe scared?” I ask, not knowing what else to say.
“Both,” she replies with clattering teeth.
I open up my bag to pull out a sweater, “here, put this on, it might take the shivers away.”
She looks up at me, seemingly unsure of what she should do.
“It's okay, you can wear it for a little while,” I encourage her.
She reaches out her hand to take the sweater, and a shy little smile creeps on to her face.
“Now, tell me what happened. Were some boys in the park mean to you?”
“No.”
“Then what happened to make you so upset?”
“I told you, they said they would take me away. I don’t want them to take me away.”
“Who did?” I ask. I look in all directions, but I don’t see anyone nearby looking over at us.
“Well.. I’m not sure. I was in my room at home when I heard the men. I think they are friends of Mama. She has a lot of friends. Different friends most days, sometimes the same... I think I have seen today's friends before, I recognised their voices. But they were mean today. They shouted and said she needs to pay up or they will take Anna. I only know one Anna, and that is me,” she lets out a little sob again and with a deep sigh she carries on, “so I climbed out of my window and ran away.”
I don't know what to say, this is slightly bigger than a spat with kids in the park. A little shocked by what she said, I just sit here for a moment to collect my thoughts.
“So what are you going to do now? You can't stay here forever.”
She shrugs, “don't know.. I just had to run away.”
“Do you know anyone else that could help you?”
“I have a big brother.”
“That’s good, is he much bigger? Does he live somewhere else?” I ask, hoping she can go to him, “or is he just a little bigger than you?”
“He is a lot bigger,” she smiles proudly as she talks about him, “he’s even bigger than you. He lives with Mama and me.”
And just like that she took all the hope away again. I can't bring her back home now, what if these men are still there? I know a child's imagination can go crazy, but what if this happened for real. She wouldn't be here for no reason and the fear in her eyes is definitely real. What if these threats aren't just threats?
“But he is not there now, he is working,” she says, pulling me out of my thoughts, back to the conversation.
“Sorry, who isn't where now?”
“My brother, you asked me where he lives, but he’s not there now.”
I sit back for a minute and stare ahead of me while I let everything sink in.
“You know Anna, you sound very mature, how old are you?”
“I am five and a half,” she replies proudly, “how old are you?”
“Twenty-one.”
“Oh! Almost as old as Rick!” she exclaims.
“Who is Rick?” I ask, a little confused again.
“My big brother,” she grins.
“How old is Rick?”
“He’s twenty-two.”
“Okay, and where is Rick now?”
She shrugs, “what time is it?”
I roll up my sleeve to look at my watch, “it’s just after two.”
“That means he is still at the market.”
“Does he work there?”
“Yes, he works at the market during the day, and he works at the bar in the evening.”
“He works day and night?” I ask with a gasp.
“Mhm,” she nods. “He leaves really early. I always try to be awake before he leaves, but sometimes he is already gone I wake up, and he comes home very, very late, when I’m asleep.”
I sit back again and think for a while, I can’t really dump her on her brother while he’s working and she seems okay now. I wonder if maybe I could bring her back home.
“Do you think it would be okay if I come home with you? Meet your mama and make sure you are safe?”
She smiles up at me, “yes please.”
“Where do you live, Anna?”
“I don’t know what it’s called, but Rick always calls it ‘this dump’,” she lets out a little giggle while she says it, as if it’s something she’s not meant to say. “It’s where all the trailers are.”
“That is on the other side of town!” I gasp again. “How did you get all the way over here?”
“I've been to the park a few times with Rick. All the kids are always happy here and I wanted to be happy and not scared, so I came here,” she replies in a matter-of-fact tone.
That really tugs on my heart strings, a little girl should feel safe at home. I reach down to pick my bag back up from the ground and fling it over my shoulder again. “Come on, I’ll bring you home.”
“What's your name?” she asks as she jumps off the bench.
“Summer.”
“Summer,” she mulls this over for a second, “I like the summer. I like the sunshine. People are always happier when the sun shines.”
“Why weren’t you in the park with the other children?” I ask her as we start on our way.
“I was,” she says looking at her feet, “I was on the swings, but all the other children were looking at me all weird ‘cause I was crying. So I sat on the bench instead and watched them play.”
It’s taken us almost an hour and a half to walk to the trailer park. On the way Anna kept stopping to pick flowers, to look at the buildings and she had to stroke every cat and dog that crossed our path.
At the first home, on the edge of the park, I shriek and jump up as two bulldogs suddenly come charging towards the chain link fence and start barking and growling viciously.
Anna bursts out laughing, “I should have warned you about them, they always do that.”
“Great, just what you need as a welcome home.” I let out a sigh as my heart rate slowly returns to normal.
I look to my right and see both dogs staring at us with their top lips pulled up to display a dangerous set of teeth. They move with us step by step as we walk past, a growl still emanating from their throats, dribble slowly dripping down their chin.
I grab Anna’s hand and start walking a little bit faster.
In front of the third home, I have to step over two used needles that are discarded on the road, from inside the home I can hear swearing.
By the time we walk past the seventh mobile home, my nerves are on edge. No child should grow up around here. I can hear yelling and swearing all around us now, I even heard glass shatter loudly after hearing someone used the f-word way too many times in one sentence.
Suddenly Anna abruptly stops moving.
“What's wrong?” I ask, after bumping into her.
She points at a shiny black BMW, looking very much out of place in an area like this, “that car was there when I climbed out of the window and left.”
“So, that’s your home?” I ask, looking at the house the car’s parked in front of.
She just nods, and then slowly starts moving towards it.
There's a metal chain-linked fence around the garden, just like many of the other homes here, giving off a feeling of small individual prisons. The lawn is overgrown with grass and weeds, rusty garden chairs and old weather damaged toys are discarded all over the place.
Once we reach the gate, she cautiously opens it. It screeches loudly, and a siren of barks goes off all around us.
She looks terrified as we walk up the narrow path, so I carefully lay a hand on her shoulder. “It's okay, I’ll make sure nothing will happen to you,” I whisper to her.
Anna's hand trembles as she reaches for the door handle.
“Wait. Go stand behind me,” I tell her, reaching for her arm to stop her. And she quickly does.
I can feel my pulse racing as the door handle moves down underneath my palm. I open it inch by inch and as soon as it's far enough opened to have a peek inside I quickly glance in. I’m looking directly into the kitchen. All the lights are on, but no-one seems to be inside. Opening the door fully I step inside. The kitchen smells of stale tobacco, alcohol and burnt toast.
Looking at the kitchen table confirms it, the ashtray is overflowing with a mountain of cigarette butts, some even lying on the table, and there are almost a dozen beer cans lined along the window.
I turn to Anna, and am just about to say that I don't think anyone’s inside, when I hear a loud moan coming from my left. I snap my head in the direction of the sound and take a defensive stance in front of Anna, but all I see are two closed doors.
Listening closer I hear panting and more moaning. Then I hear not one, but two male voices.
“We're not staying here,” I whisper, turning to Anna. Quickly I back out of the house and quietly close the door behind me.
I grab her hand and start rushing her down the path away from her house, not wanting to stay here any longer than necessary. This whole place is making me feel uncomfortable.
“What time does Rick finish at the market?” I ask as I drag her onto the road without closing the gate behind us.
“I don’t know.”
“Okay,” I look at my watch, it’s nearly four now and I know the market normal closes around this time. “Lets try anyway. Maybe we can still find him there.”
As we walk back out of the trailer park she grabs for my hand and I can feel her stiffen a bit. I look down at her, and then follow the direction of her gaze. There are two men talking in the shadows of one of the gardens. One of the men clearly has a gun strapped to the belt of his jeans. She is tugging on my hand a little, trying to make me walk faster, but it's hard to take my eyes off the gun.
They must have noticed me staring, because they both turn to me. When they take one step towards us, I finally start walking faster, dragging Anna with me.
Once we get back to the main road, I take a few deep breaths and let my body relax a little.
***
“Are you happy living here?” I ask Anna.
She just shakes her head and looks sad, “I want to play outside most days, but there are always scary looking people around. I recognise most people that live here, so they are okay. But there are a lot of scary looking strangers around here every day.”
“What do you do all day? Do you go to school?”
“No, but Rick is teaching me lots of things. He is teaching me how to read, and he bought me lots of books. And I like colouring. Sometimes he will bring me new colouring books from the market. And some days when I don't feel like reading or colouring, I go to visit Tracey. She has a TV and I like to go watch cartoons sometimes. Rick told me we had a TV once and even a DVD player, but Mama sold them.”
She is really opening up now, but all her answers just leave me with more questions.
“You said Rick works all day. When does he have time to teach you?”
“Oh, he doesn’t work every day,” she says as she smiles up at me, “some days he doesn’t work at the market, so he is home in the morning and the afternoon, and sometimes he doesn’t work at the bar, so he is home in the evenings. And sometimes I get up really early so I can see him and talk to him before he leaves.
“But I like Mondays best. He’s home all day on Mondays, and that's the day when he normally teaches me things that he says other children will learn in school. I wish I could go to school too with the other children.”
“What about Tracey?” I ask her. “Doesn’t she go to school either?”
She looks at me and bursts out laughing, “Tracey is old, like Mama.”
“Oh, are there no kids of your age around here who you can play with?”
She shakes her head, “that's why I want to go to school. I always have fun with other children whenever Rick takes me to the park. Brody is the only one here close to my age, but he is already eleven and he says I'm a baby, so he doesn't want to play with me.”
***
Once we finally arrive at the market most people have already cleared out their stalls. There are only a few people left, still chatting to neighbouring stallholders while they pack away what little they have left out of their goods.
“Do you know which stall is Rick’s?”
“Not really,” she shakes her head, looking down the road, “but it is somewhere down the middle.”
“Okay, come on then,” I say, taking her hand again.
We walk up and down the road with no sight of her brother. All of the stalls half way down the road, where Anna thought Rick’s stall was, are empty.
“Shall we carry on to the bar?” I ask, looking down to Anna.
“Mhm,” she nods, “but Rick always says I’m not allowed in there.”
“It’s okay, we’ll figure something out when we get there. Do you know the name of the bar?”
“I don't know what the bar is called, but I know where it is. Rick showed me once,” she says, looking proud every time she mentions her big brother, “he said that when I am old enough I can come in and he will serve me my first drink.” Holding me by my hand she starts off leading us deeper into the city centre and I follow.
Through the city we pass some fast food places and a few swanky restaurants. The delicious smells floating out through their open doors and windows are making my belly rumble and I realise I haven't eaten since breakfast.
“Are you hungry?” I ask Anna and she nods back at me.
“Do you want a burger?” I ask, stopping in front of one of the fast food places.
She looks at me eagerly, “I haven't had a burger for a long time. I think the last time was when Tracey had a barbeque and she made me one.”
Inside I order us two burgers, two drinks and a portion of fries to share.
Anna tucks in like a hungry beast. It's almost like she hasn't eaten in days.
“That was very nice,” she says as she slurps up the last of her drink, “thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” I say giving her a big smile, “you looked like you needed it.”
“Mmhmm,” she replies in a long nod, “I did.”
