Freedom.
She puffed on the joint, sucked in the smoke, and opened the small fridge she’d found in a dumpster and repaired and cleaned up. She pulled out a Budweiser, popped the top, and drank her fill, the beer irritating her busted lip. She pressed the cold can against it and then her oblique. Broken-Jawed Bitch really packed a wallop.
But there she was that night, charging to freedom, not knowing where she was going. Not caring about that in the least. After all those years. Then there had been Joe Atkins, looming up in her field of vision like the big, bad boogeyman. Only she was bigger and badder than Joe would ever be. He was a gnat to be squashed.
She lifted the beer can until it was upside down and she finished it off, wiped her chin, and pinched the joint out, saving the rest for later. She breathed in the reefer-scented smoke drifting in the air, like lines of miniature cumulus in her room, with the added benefit of making her high.
Yes, there had been Joe. And then he had been there no more.
Squashed. Freedom.
She lay back on the mattress, kicked her flip-flops off, and wriggled her long toes.
She had cash, she had a single credit card that she used very sparingly, she had a place to live, wheels to go to other places. She had jobs that she did, crap that she pulled. Not all legal, but so what? Nothing done to her had been legal.
Survival. She fell asleep thinking only of that. Just like pretty much every other night.
It didn’t make her feel worse and it didn’t make her feel better. But at least it made Cain feel something.
Hallelujah, you survived it all, El. Now go to sleep and get ready for tomorrow.
Just in case it comes.
CHAPTER
10
HER PHONE ALARM DINGED AT SIX A.M., and Cain rolled over and yawned. She sat up and opened the window to get out the final dregs of any lingering pot smoke. But she wasn’t too worried. While they had random drug testing at her first place of work today, they used a blood test. A blood test could only detect THC, the component in pot that made you feel high, for about three hours after use. A saliva test could do it for between twenty-four and seventy-two hours. A urine test could nail you for up to thirty days after use. Hence, many employers used saliva or more likely a blood test as their testing tool. Otherwise, they’d test their way right out of business because they’d have no bodies to do the work.
That was the dirty little secret of the crap work world where millions labored every day. And the savviness of addicts who needed a job.
She opened her fridge, cracked three eggs into a glass, and drank it down raw. She had seen this done in an old movie about a down-and-out boxer named Rocky. Protein, apparently, which helped your body recover and build. Which was good, Cain thought, because it tasted like shit and had the texture of snot.
She changed into the outfit she had fought in—blood, sweat, and all—covered that with a hoodie and sweatpants, and slipped on a pair of worn sneakers. Then she left her place, padlocking the door on the other side. She ran for miles, her breath forming visible clouds with every exhale. Winter was coming with speed. But she would be snug in her little place, hopefully.
She liked to run, and her long legs and frame were built for eating up massive quantities of ground. Cain had been running her whole life. Sometimes for real, other times just in her mind, especially when she’d been locked up all those years. She would jog in place and let her imagination take her to any place other than the one she was in. The things she did in her mind to keep going, it was some wicked shit. Taught her stuff. Demonstrated that your mind could get you through anything. Anything. Because it had done so for her.
Psalm of my life: If you can’t live in the world you have, make one up.
She stopped at five different “tents and boxes” and handed out cash from her prize money at each one. These were not boozers or druggies, at least not mostly. They would use the money for food and other necessaries, because they all had young kids living with them in their distress.
“Thank you,” said one young mom, who was white but looked brown with the sun and the dirt. Cain could relate. This was the “tan” of homelessness. It was unlike any other skin tanning ever, Cain knew. It fried your brain as well as your outside. It never really came off you because you worried every minute it could happen again. It was like you were a fugitive for life and your only crime was bad luck or bad choices. When the rich and powerful made a mistake their lawyers and PR folks took care of it.
Cain waved the woman’s thanks off and kept running. The next family was black, the next one after that, too. The next ones spoke Spanglish and shivered in the chill. The next family, she couldn’t really tell what they were, not that it mattered. They were breathing, they were human. They look like me in that way. That was enough. Boxes were meant to house stuff, not put people in. Not until they’re dead, anyway. Most people looked at them and felt either sorry or disgusted, or both. Not Cain. She just saw folks who needed some help.
At the end she had given away over half her winnings.
She knew what the term “Good Samaritan” meant, but only because of the Bible reading. But that was not why she was doing it. She did it because today she had money and today they didn’t, but needed it. Keep it simple was Cain’s motto. When you thought too hard about it, you tended to want to keep what you had and dare others to try to take it.
She got back to her place and completed her daily workout with pushups, floor dips, chin-ups on a bar wedged in a doorway, lots of ab and core work with a medicine ball, and exercises with a kettle-bell she’d gotten for a buck from a gym going out of business. Then bodyweight lunges and squats and calisthenics followed by shadow boxing; she finished with some heavy-duty stretching.
The strong and vigilant don’t always survive, but it damn sure improves your chances.
She showered in cold water because that was all there was. She had started her period late last night. She had had her first period at age eleven while she was with the Atkinses. She thought she was dying when the cramps came and the blood dripped from down there. She had begged Desiree to help her. The woman had laughed and thrown her a roll of paper towels, telling her that it would come every month, like clockwork. She had added, “They sell stuff for it, but the paper towels will do for you. It’s not like you’re going anywhere. So deal with it.”
And Cain had dealt with it using the paper towels. Until Wanda Atkins had explained to Cain what was really going on, and given her boxes of tampons. That had been an eye opener. She remembered asking Wanda if boys had periods, too.
“No,” she had said. “Good thing, because they couldn’t handle it.”