The Scamp by Jennifer Pashley

Author:Jennifer Pashley
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Tin House Books
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

fifteen

RAYELLE

I try to imagine who any of them might have been, before. A kid, abused by her dad, or her mom, even, running as fast as she could from the home that hurt her, and failed to protect her. A woman with a baby, living out in rural Indiana, with a husband who was rough on her, and not enough money to pay the bills each month. A woman misunderstood. A woman alone. A woman looking for company. For love. For recognition. I get it. I might have run too. And nearly did, more than once, in the middle of a blue-black night, leaving a screaming, colicky Summer in her rocker seat on the living room floor. I might have gotten in my car and just driven, crying, down a dark rural road toward something, who knew, that might have killed me. Might have left me in pieces on a riverbank, my head miles away, lodged in the water. Rinsed.

I think about their pictures, posed with babies, or beside a car. Alyssa’s teenage face, blue already, mottled in death.

And Florida. She might haunt me the most. Just the word, typed in the middle of the page. Not a picture left of her. Just the word. Florida.

She sounds to me like a dark-haired beauty, the kind of hula girl you put on the dash of your car, who swivels her hips and dances. Flowers in her hair. Nothing on her feet. Her belly curved like a little fairy’s.

On the way to Sugarwood Park, we hit a blank spot of straight, flat road where nothing goes past except one old wood-paneled station wagon. There’s no phone service, no radio stations. Just miles of hot white concrete.

How do you know when you’re on the right track? I ask Couper. With anything, I think. The girls, the story. Me.

I don’t, he says. I watch the sun come through the trees, dappling his face. I love so much the way his eyes crinkle in the light, the way his mouth curves up in a smile. The way his cheeks go slack when he’s sleeping. Sometimes, when I think about Eli, the guy I was with the longest, and the only guy I lived with, I can’t remember a thing about his face, his smile, the way he smelled.

Sometimes I have to just see when I get there, Couper says. It might be nothing.

I imagine an empty lot, a vacant field. And worse, no connections. Just a random scattering of dead girls.

What will we do then? I picture myself, dropped off at my mom’s, with no room for me anymore. No job waiting, my car towed. Couper pulling away, headed to another state, another case.

When my lungs constrict, I try laughing. Doesn’t that make you crazy? I say. It feels like we’re driving in slow motion, but I know he’s going sixty. On either side, ancient-looking trees, cows clustered in the shade, or near a low pond. Houses that are white turned gray, peeling to reveal

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.