“Her name was Kaylee.”
After that day at the courts, Sam hadn’t told me any more things about Anniston. I kind of thought that might be the last of it, like maybe it was a one-time thing. Now I feel a mix of nervousness and pride. Nervousness because does he have other awful things to tell me? But pride because, well, he’s choosing me. For some reason, he trusts me.
“I met her at the mall with my friend Tony.”
Tony? Who’s Tony?
“Tony and his mom would go to the mall each Saturday and sometimes Rusty would let me go.”
A girlfriend. A friend. Trips to the mall. In some of the articles I read, it sounded like he had some freedom. But all I can think about is that man hitting him in the nose. The man who pulled a gun on him. How did he get from that place to this other place?
Sam continues, like this is just a normal thing to talk about. “Rusty gave me money for food and art supplies or whatever. And that’s where I met Kaylee, at this supply shop. She was buying paints. She had this dyed red hair and all these piercings. I thought she was really pretty. Tony thought she was too goth, but I thought she was perfect.”
I look over at him and he has this peaceful grin on his face. “She gave me this funny look when she saw me in the shop. I looked lame to her, she told me later. I had on these khakis, I guess they were baggy and dorky. And this cap I always wore. That Rusty made me wear when I went out. Anyway, she came right up to me. She was bold—I liked that. She asked me what I drew, and I told her I wasn’t very good yet, and she said she was taking an art class at the community college and I should take it. Rusty wouldn’t let me, I knew. But I got her number.”
“Back up a second. Who’s Tony?” I ask, even though I’m still trying to process Kaylee.
“Tony was my friend. He lived upstairs in the same complex, with his mom. They moved there a year after . . . after I got there.”
“Are you . . . I mean, do you talk to them? To Tony? Kaylee?”
“Mom doesn’t want me to have any contact.” Sam gets all solemn-looking then. He sits down on a bench and kind of stares off. I sit down next to him. “I asked Mom if I could have a cell phone, but she says not yet—that’s why I always have to call you from the landline. She thinks I’ll try and get in touch with them. But I never got to explain anything. I never got to say good-bye.”
“Wow,” I say, wondering what they felt when they learned the truth about Sam. Shock, I’m sure. Maybe some guilt. All this time they’d known a kidnapped kid. I want to ask him why he didn’t tell them anything. Why he didn’t ask for their help. Sam’s dumping out pieces from a puzzle box and I’m scrambling to pick them up and put them together.
“I bet my mom’s here,” Sam says. “We should get going.”
When we round a corner, I see the GameTime store. The place we were riding our bikes to that day. I hadn’t made that connection till now. But Sam keeps walking.
===
Once we get to Sam’s house, I think we’re going to play video games or something, but Sam says, “I thought I’d try and draw you today. Is that okay?”
“Okay,” I say, thinking that sounds kind of boring. And also kind of weird. Why does he want to draw me?
Sam grabs his sketch pad from his room and, since it’s not that cold today, we go outside to the backyard.
“So I just sit here?” I ask.
“Basically,” he says. “Look off to the side a little. But we can talk. I can talk and draw at the same time. I’m talented like that,” he says, winking, then looking back down at the sketch pad.
I sit there as he starts using his charcoal pencil to go to work. It makes me feel kind of awkward the way he stares at me so much. I know he has to, to look at my features and all, but still, it feels invasive. To break the silence, I say, “You never told me how your dad’s visit went.”
He doesn’t respond at first, but he furrows his brow. “It was fine. No big deal.”
He continues sketching, and I sit there, watching him watch me. If he gets to look at me so closely, then I figure I can do the same. Even though we’re the same age, I notice that Sam looks older. He doesn’t show it off, but I can tell he has strong arms. And he has bits of stubble sprouting on his chin. If I shaved now it would only cut away peach fuzz. I notice, too, little nicks in his face—one on his lip, one on his eyebrow. Where those piercings were. Gone now.
He stops drawing, stares over at me, then looks away, toward the shrubs that line the back of the yard. I worry that I did something to upset him—did he notice me studying him? When he starts drawing again, I’m relieved. “I learned to draw from the TV,” he says. “When Rusty left for work each day, he’d turn the channel to PBS. ‘This is educational. Watch it. Don’t change the channel, or I’ll know,’” Sam says, deepening his voice to imitate Rusty. “I was so dumb. There was no way he’d know if I flipped the channel. But by then I believed everything he told me.”
By then. How much time had passed by then? What had happened to Sam by then?
“There was always some drawing show on later in the day, after Sesame Street. This guy with curly hair and a mustache would stand in front of an easel and draw and show you how to do it, step-by-step. He was no Picasso. But I got hooked. The idea that you could create something out of nothing. Just take a blank piece of paper and do anything. When Rusty got home that night, I was nervous but I asked him anyway, I asked for paper. To draw, I told him. I told him about the show. I think he was a little suspicious at first. But he gave me a pencil and a few sheets of notebook paper, and that’s what started it all. I mean, it was a way to fill time. A way to stop thinking about . . .” But he stops. “My hand’s getting a little tired. You mind if we go inside?” he asks.
Inside, Mrs. Manderson has made cookies, and we start wolfing these down. Sam’s aunt is there, too, and she makes a big production out of meeting me. “I’m so glad Sam has such a nice friend,” she says, embarrassing both of us, I guess, because we don’t look at each other.
“Can we watch TV, Mom?”
“Okay, but not too loud. Earl is napping.”
We sit on the couch and flip channels—past football, past infomercials, shows about fixing up houses, cooking shows, till we get to a movie.
“Oh, I love this,” Sam says.
On screen I see that tall actress with the funny name. She’s with some guys dressed like soldiers and carrying big machine guns, walking down through a dark and abandoned-looking base.
“What is it?”
“Aliens. It’s awesome. And the first one, Alien, is great, too. We’ll have to watch that sometime.”