One Chapter

It was a terrible plan, I thought to myself as I thunked ketchup out of the glass bottle and onto my mother's old  wig.  This ketchup wouldn't fool  anyone and the only people who might actually stop would be the police, and what would I do with a stolen police car anyway? They probably had some secret cop trick to keep their cars from getting stolen and I'd just get caught again. That wouldn't suit me anymore than it would suit the court, which would be of the adult variety the next time I saw one, me having just turned eighteen a few weeks ago.

I was pretty sure I had some more trips to court in my future, but right now I had bigger problems, mainly getting out of town before one of Dobbie's thugs found me. About the only way I could afford to travel would be the bus and Dobbie knew that; someone would be watching the bus station, so that was out. Hitchhiking always makes me feel vulnerable and I hate feeling vulnerable, so I decided that stealing a car for my getaway would be a lot safer and easier than relying on the roadside kindness of strangers. 

Like most of my plans, it didn't start off  being terrible, it just wound up that way. I mean, stealing a car is a pretty sensible thing to do if you don't have one and you need one, but a lot of how sensible it is depends on how you steal it.  Mostly it's easier if you steal a car that doesn't have anyone else in it, but I wanted  a car that was already on the highway and that is where the canvas rucksack came in. In it , I had the wig, a bottle of ketchup, a couple packs of matches, a large Mason jar full of kerosene and about twenty pounds of  bloody pork bones that I stole from the renderer's barrel in the alley behind the butcher's shop. The mannequin wouldn't fit in the bag, so I had to un-peg the legs  and arms from the fake plastic torso and put them  in a cardboard box that wasn't so much heavy as it was awkward and difficult to walk through the woods with.  So you can see how my plan was heading towards terrible by this point.

Usually I did OK without a plan. Like how I got the mannequin. 

I was  killing time, feeling old and lost after my birthday, walking around town for the first time in years when  I stumbled across one of those new 'shopping malls' , which is like a fenceless prison compound with a cluster of  large single-story flat-topped buildings that are  surrounded by parking lots and divided into lots of cells, only they aren't really cells, they are stores and shops, with a big two-story  Montgomery Ward department store  looming over them all like a lopsided guard tower, except instead of guards it was full of girls my age who were there voluntarily.

I imagined those loser girls in their matching frocks,  getting paid a fifty cents an hour to sell lipstick and skin balms to saggy old ladies who couldn't look young again even if they had a time machine. It  made me want to shoplift but I wasn't wearing shoplifting clothes, just jeans and light blue t-shirt. I had no large pockets and no purse.

 I hate purses. If you ever see me with a purse, it's probably full of stolen clothes or stolen drugs. Or both. And I probably stole the purse too, which, if you think about it, is a hell of a lot better than buying one because the ones you buy don't come with all the neat stuff that the 'used' ones have inside- one time I found a loaded .22 in a bag I snatched from an old lady in downtown Cincinnati. I guess she thought the gun  would make her safer from people like me. But I hate guns so I traded it for mescaline. I hate mescaline too, but I didn't know that then.

So I walked around behind  the Montgomery Wards store  where a large loading dock faced a patch of woods. There weren't any people on the dock, but I saw a green-painted metal door standing open on the far end of the platform , so I hopped up and peeked in.  There was a large stockroom area on one side and on the other side a small hallway led to what looked like  a set of offices.  I heard voices coming from the office area but saw no one. Right inside the door was a folding metal chair where some counter-girl had dropped her blue sales smock across the back. I took it and put it on.  The red plastic name tag said 'Norma' in white stenciled letters, which I thought was funny since my name is Jean and people always told me I looked like Marilyn Monroe, which is nice thing if a woman tells you but not always so nice when a boy does. Mostly, boys say that to me because they want to make me  sticky. And I hate that, so I wear my hair plain and never touch makeup except when I'm stealing it or trying to look like someone that isn't me. 

I was tying the little string on the back of the ugly blue apron when two men in white shirts and thin black ties came out of one of the offices and walked right past me without seeming to notice I was there. After they passed, one of them- a flabby, pear-shaped man who was sweating  just from walking- turned around and looked at me.

"Break time is only five minutes, sweetheart. We don't pay you to stand around. Now get your pretty little behind out there and finish clearing section five. We need the old dolls off the floor. And no more wearing dungarees to  work", he finished.

Old dolls? I was curious so I followed the rude fat man  through the stockroom doors as he gestured towards a cluster of stripped-down female mannequins in the nearby corner. Old dolls.

 

They weren't nearly as heavy as a real person, so I picked one up and carried it back into the stockroom, out through the open door,  across the loading dock and into the woods behind the store, where I hid it until it got dark outside and we came to pick it up in Dobbie's car.  That was back when Dobbie and I were still friends, like maybe two weeks ago.  So that's how I got the store dummy.

The ketchup was an unnaturally bright red  against the blond wig and the whole mess didn't look very convincing on the mannequin. Fake blood on fake hair on fake body. I guessed maybe that it would work for my purposes, although I chickened out when it came to dumping the red sauce on my own blonde hair, which I had tried to grow long but was now hacked off , messily and unevenly just above my shoulders. I had done it myself earlier that morning and I'd been in a hurry at the time so  it looked pretty bad, even compared to what we got at Watertown Home for Girls.

I wish I'd thought to bring the scissors with me. I wasn't really in the mood for cutting myself but what I was planning on doing was pretty crazy and cutting someone else would  make things even more exciting. A lot better than this ketchup could ever hope to be, that's for sure.

When I was  in the Watertown Home I had to spend some of my afternoons talking to adults who asked a lot of questions, most of which weren't really about what I had done and why I was there. Except they were about that, it was  just that the questions were in disguise, sorta.

Like, sometimes the questions would really be pictures instead of questions and at first it seemed like all the answers I gave were the wrong ones. I don't think it was fair, it isn't my fault that they kept showing me ink-blobs that looked like my parents burning and screaming in a pool of bloody fire. I don't know where they found those pictures but it kinda shows that even though I was the inmate,  the so-called doctors were really the sick ones. After what I'd done and been through, you'd think they'd show me pictures of flowers and butterflies, not horrible blobs like the ones they had put on the table in front of me. No wonder I have nightmares.

I don't really remember deciding to do it, or even doing it really, but one day the docs came to my ward and  they asked me how long I planned on staying quiet. It seemed like a familiar question, I think maybe they asked me the same thing every day but I wasn't really paying attention so I'm not sure.

"Long enough", I answered. I don't know why I said that, but they seemed pleased and told me it was a breakthrough because I hadn't spoken for six months. I hadn't? That surprised me.

 Like I said, I don't really recall being quiet for so long but after my breakthrough I decided to tell the doctors that their pictures looked like butterflies and flowers and they called that a breakthrough too.  

Before long, one of them confided to me that I'd been recommended for EST- which is like being electrocuted to make you stop being crazy-  but since I was having so many breakthroughs, they'd decided to postpone that indefinitely. There were a lot of people on the outside, she told me,  who thought EST was a bad idea and that it messed up people's brains and if I was lucky, it would be banned before my turn came and the postponement wouldn't matter anyway. The way she said it made me feel like she was one of those people on the outside, and that I should be relieved that she thought EST was a bad idea. It turned out that she was right and by the time I turned 18, the docs had pretty much stopped using it, although the table they used was still there, waiting threateningly in the scary basement room that no one I knew could ever quite remember being in, no matter how many times they were taken there.

Bus

 What should I tell you about first? The worst thing or the best thing?

Maybe the worst thing about riding the bus is having to pass through the security checkpoints. They are just like what you see in the airport, only slightly smaller. You wouldn't think that a metal detector and x-ray gate would fit into a  bus but they do. The bus itself is much larger on the inside than it is on the outside,which is a good thing because the streets here are narrow and the passengers here are not.

Really, the worst thing about the on-board security checkpoint is what happens when a busload of sweaty grown-ups takes turns removing their shoes in an enclosed space. But you get used to that and it's only for a couple months of the summer that it gets really bad. So that isn't the worst thing about the bus.

You can go barefoot if you want to, but the last time I did, I stepped in gum. So consider yourself warned about going barefoot on the bus.

Most of the things about the bus aren't the best things or the worst things. They are just bus things. Things like the grey plastic handles hanging from the long silver bars running the length of the bus. The handles  are there for standing people to hold on to but I never use them.

If I have to stand on the bus, I pretend that I'm standing on a skateboard and keep my balance by shifting my weight slightly back and forth as the bus moves. Sometimes I will pretend like I am getting ready to fall but I never really fall. One time I ran into an old lady and she fell down but I didn't. So when I say I never fell down on the bus I'm not being a liar.

Once when I was younger , I put the head of my favorite doll through one of those handles and let it dangle. I told my cousin that my doll had killed itself on account of how ugly my cousin was. I thought it was funny but I wound up riding a different bus for a couple of years after that and I didn't think that that was funny at all because I really didn't like the places where that bus went.

By the time I started riding this bus again I was almost too old to play with dolls.

Maybe the worst thing about the bus is the passengers. Well, not all of them, really. Just one in particular.  I call him Pinky because he always wears a pink shirt and his fat face is always pink and plus I don't know his real name. One time he asked me if I had a boyfriend and then he tried to tell me his name a bunch of times and now whenever he talks to me all I can hear is the sound of me screaming. Only I'm not really screaming out loud where other people can hear, I'm just screaming into my own ears. Like yelling in reverse.

I try not to talk to Pinky but  sometimes when the bus is crowded I wind up sitting next to him and  then sometimes he talks and  I start having trouble hearing anything except the sound of my ears screaming. I bet I'd hate his voice if I could hear it,  I bet he talks to me the same way he talks to pets and babies, all soft and stupid-like.

I know that I could get Pinky in trouble if I lied and told the driver that Pinky touched me , but that would mean getting back on the other bus, the one where an endless parade of grown-ups asks you to repeat the same horrible things over and over again and asking you if you are sure until inside the only thing you are sure about is that on the outside you will say anything at all if it will get them to stop asking you if you are sure about what you are saying. I really don't want to go back on that bus.

Really, if Pinky knew about the other bus he'd be afraid of me. He wouldn't talk to me like he talks to pets and babies if he knew about the bus I used to ride. But I haven't told him about it. Or anyone else.

There used to be an old lady passenger that I called the Book Lady because she always had a book with her. The Book Lady was nice to me and I liked her. She didn't act surprised the way most grown-ups do when I told her how many books I've read and she didn't keep asking me if I'm sure when I told her how old I was. I liked her because she never made me repeat what I said the way a lot of other grown-ups do. The Book Lady is the best thing about riding the bus except for that she doesn't ride it anymore so  maybe she isn't the best thing even though I do miss her a lot.

Another thing about the bus is the music. Sometimes when there aren't many people on the bus, someone will be wearing headphones and I can hear the song they are listening to. If I try real hard I can even hear the words of the song and try to sing along inside my head where no one can hear. But when it is crowded and lots of people are wearing headphones, all of the different songs get all mixed up with each other and with all of the other noises going in and out of people's heads until it all gets into a giant roar that is sort of like the screaming that Pinky gives me. But not as bad somehow.

My cousin thinks the worst thing about riding the bus are the bars on the outside of the windows. He says there's no reason we need to be in a cage and that being in a cage is the worst thing that can happen to a free man. Whenever he says that , I remind him that he isn't old enough to be a man and that we'd be free as soon as the bus arrives. Arrives where? he will ask. Whenever he asks me this , I tell him I don't know. Because I don't know.

That's the worst part about riding the bus.

Don't Explain

My job requires me to review job applications. In the near future, it is likely that I will be directly or indirectly responsible for hiring large numbers of staff. For years-years!- I have been unable to find a livable job; suddenly I not only have a job, but my job is to help create jobs, albeit temporary ones.

Anyway, a lot of folks seem to be looking for work these days, so I'd like to offer some advice on what not to write on one's resume or application.

- You might not want to mention that you have been fired from three jobs in three years because of "personality conflicts". That sort of work-history is not what we, as "team- builders", are looking for.

- We don't care who's fault it was or who started it. The Court decided that and we cannot overturn or overlook your "guilty" verdicts.

- Under Have you ever been convicted of a felony?, do not write: "Will explain at interview."

I have to note here- I have three Federal convictions on my record, I gave the honest details on my application and I got hired in the first round of staffing, so the standard isn't all that high- if I can pass an FBI screen, I imagine most people can. In fact, I was working this same job when I got arrested nearly a decade ago- I didn't get in trouble at work, just in court.

Nonetheless, many applicants tend to be far too informative, apologetic or confessional when it comes to their criminal records:

- Permutations on the phrase : "I have learned my lesson" are very common on applications. I have used that very phrase myself- once to the Judge and several times to my Probation Officer.
In each case, I was lying. Seeing it on a job application causes me to have second thoughts.

- If you have had articles published in a local paper, you don't need to include clippings. Really.

- If you note that you have outstanding warrants against you in several neighboring states, writing "can explain in person" will not help you with the FBI background check. Are you sure that you want the FBI to have your home address? You might have some explainin' to do.

- Your boyfriend's cocaine habit is not such a good thing to bring up when explaining why you got busted for writing bad checks. I'm glad to hear you learned your lesson, though.

- I didn't know you could claim "religious exemption" from drug-screening, but here it is, pencilled in...this job doesn't require drug screens though.

- The Lord Jesus Christ might perhaps be your Savior, but He is not an acceptable job reference. Acceptable Job references might include things such as giving and taking away, plagues of boils and extreme fishing. In any case, being crazy does not eliminate you from consideration. See you soon!