The Dark Light of Day Read Online Free PDF Page A

job once, but over time had forgotten how to keep doing so.
    The concern went away just as quickly as it had arrived. “Are you certain you don’t want to save me some time and trouble in this heat and just pack a bag now?”
    I shook my head.
    “Okay, then. I will be back, Miss Ford,” she assured me. She opened the car door and maneuvered herself behind the steering wheel of her much-too-small-for-her-body-mass silver Prius before pulling off down the road, in the direction of the corner store and motel.
    I ran back into the house before the dust kicked up by her tires could settle. I opened my closet and pulled clothes from their hangers, opening drawers, and shoving as much stuff as I could into my backpack. It wouldn’t take her long to verify that no one knew this fictional Aunt Priscilla. I had to get the hell out of here before she came back and dragged me to yet another foster home.
    Paid childcare, without the care. To me, that was what foster care really was. It funded drug habits and paid rents.
    There was no way in hell I was going back in.
    My experiences in the system varied between sharing a room with a boy who skinned cats—who I was convinced would suffocate me in my sleep—to listening to Greg, the older boy who slept in the bottom bunk of our four bunk room, angrily masturbating every night and cursing his parents when he came.
    Then there was Sophie, the only friend I had ever made in foster care. She was small and quiet with dark hair and large brown eyes. Her skin always looked naturally tanned. She looked like a doll, from what I heard about them, anyway. I’d never actually owned one myself. Sophie shared the same vacant, hopeless look as I had. Her family history and her upbringing weren’t all that different from my own.
    I recognized a kindred spirit in her.
    One morning I’d found her naked on the couch, her eyes lifeless and unfocused. Bruises marred every inch of her little twelve-year-old body. Her once-olive skin was transparent. I could see all of her blue veins beneath the surface. Her wrists were bound behind her back with a long dirty sock, a needle sat in an ashtray beside her. Blood dripped from the tip and pooled in the bottom of the clear glass. Dick and Denise, our foster parents, used her as their entertainment for the previous evening. They’d doped her with drugs bought with the money given to them by the state for her care before using her as a toy for their sadistic sex games.
    They probably didn’t even know she was dead until later that day.
    By that time, I was long gone.
    That was the first time I ran away from a foster home. It certainly wasn’t the last.
    After throwing my feet into my old scuffed cowboy boots and checking for the knife I kept clipped on the inside of the right one, I secured the straps of my backpack onto my shoulders and ran into Nan’s room to grab her charm bracelet off her nightstand. I nabbed my weed from the coffee table and slipped out the back sliding glass doors.
    I made a run for the beach.
    ***
    It would probably be a while before Miss Thornton gave up on me and moved her attention to other, more worthy degenerates. Until then, I figured it would be best if I stayed away from home for at least a few days. My plan was simple: keep a low profile, and become invisible. I had a few bucks, but I knew it wouldn’t last long. I had planned on selling some of Nan’s lesser-beloved items, but that would have to wait until the coast was clear.
    I decided to drop by Bubba’s Bar just before closing to see if they’d consider hiring me to sweep floors or wait tables. I highly doubted that Miss Thornton would look for me at a bar on a Monday night.
    After Bubba’s my focus would have to be trying to find a spot to crash for a few nights. A hotel was out of the question. It was the peak of summer, and all the rooms in town were sure to be booked by the flock of tourists. One night in any of them would have cost more than ten times the twenty