It’s a deer in the weeds at the side of the road, or maybe a golden lab? Something that makes sense of all that yellow in the late-afternoon sun. Too late, my brain trips over the bright blue shirt, and I’m already down the highway when I take my foot off the gas.
A child.
A farm kid, taking a rest on the way home from town?
Except there is no town, not for miles. I drive this stretch every day, from Freedom to the Save 4 in Shalersville and back: cows and corn, combines deep in a field, farm houses with gravel driveways long as roads. Not even a church to break up all the nothing.
How is she out here alone, not even a bike or a dog?
I pull the car sharp to the right and then crank it left and circle back, because that’s what you do when it’s a kid. A little blonde girl, could be anyone’s, could be mine.
Could be lost. Could be trying to hitch.
Could’a been hit.
I pull onto the shoulder next to her, facing traffic, and roll the window down. “Sweetie?”
Sweetie’s head rears up from the grass, and then she scrambles to her feet.
Not hit.
Or not so you could see it: no blood. All her parts in place.
But Sweetie’s a mess, her shorts damp, something greasy smeared across the belly of her t-shirt. Tear streaks, runny nose. Bad haircut, bangs running catawampus from a side-part. Looks about 8, but could be a runty 9, even 10.
Pretty thing, though. Eyes like blueberries, like her dirty shirt.
I lean out the window so she can see I’m not scary. “Sweetie,” I say. “You okay?”
Sweetie draws her head back, mouth twitching like she’s about to talk.
But she doesn’t.
I’ve got pork and milk and ice cream in the backseat, and I’m already late to start supper, but I can’t help it. If my kid were out here on the side of the road, I’d want me to get my butt out of my car to help.
Before someone gets theirs out of theirs, to hurt.
I open the door to swing my foot to the ground, and Sweetie waves her arms. “No!” she says. “I don’t want you!”
Not gonna lie: this stings a little, especially after the stuff with Marcus last night. But Sweetie doesn’t know that. She’s just upset.
I try again. “Where’s your folks, Sweetie? Want me to run you home?”
“I live here,” Sweetie says, after a minute. She jerks her thumb at the field behind her. “That’s my corn.”
I try not to laugh. She’s a weird little thing.
I put my hand to my head and pretend to look around, but I know this road. “Okay,” I say, “so where’s your house?”
“I have to go now,” Sweetie says, and she turns around and marches straight into a ditch. Her arms fly up when she falls in, and I jump right out of my car.
“Wait!” I yell. “I’m coming!” I’d changed out of my work shoes at the end of my shift, and now my Candies throw me off balance, one ankle turning in, trying to sprain itself.
Sweetie climbs out the other side of the ditch and turns to face me, even filthier now. There’s grass in her bad haircut, dirt or maybe a cut on her chin. Her eyes are wild.
She’s scared of something, and she thinks it’s me.
“My dad has a gun,” she says.
I can’t help it: I laugh. She’s like a feral kitten, full of hiss.
“Oh my goodness! I’m not gonna hurt you,” I say. I’m on the near side of the ditch by now, teetering in my heels, and I stretch out my hand to her.
I’ll take her home and clean her up. Cut her bangs straight. Fix her some pork chops followed by ice cream. I got the good kind, Neopolitan, thick stripes of pink and white and brown.
“Fuck off, fuckbrain!” Sweetie says. Then she sprints into the cornfield, leaving me with a new word I’ll use later tonight on Marcus, if he tells me again he’s not ready, we’re not ready, kids are so much goddamn work.
But they’re worth it, fuckbrain, I’ll say.
Too late, I won’t yet say.
But I am.
Two weeks today. Boobs feeling bruised when I sling them into my bra.
Sweetie’s hair blends in with the cornsilk, but her shirt doesn’t. I see her moving a few rows in, flash of blue flash of blue flash of blue.
I get in my car when she reaches the end of a row, knowing she’s not coming out if I don’t leave. I detasseled from middle school to graduation, and I know the feel of it in there: the bugs; the corn sweat; the stalks closing in.
I rev the engine a tick, just to let her know I’m going. I get about a mile away before I turn around and creep back.
A station wagon’s already there, back passenger door swinging shut.
In the driver’s seat, a woman bows her head on the steering wheel. It doesn’t take a genius to guess she’s crying. In the back seat window is a boy looking as much like Sweetie as a little boy could. Nothing happens for a while, until someone reaches over from the passenger side and touches the driver’s shoulder, and she lifts her head and starts the car.
When I get home, Marcus tells me I’m late.
“I am,” I say.
For a minute—just a minute—I think: but there’s still time.
“You hungry?” I ask.
He is, of course. He’s always hungry.
The grocery bag splits open when I set it on the counter, spilling out the milk, the pork, the carton of ice cream drooling pink and white, but mostly brown.