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“It was fine,” I hear myself say. “But weird.”
I was taken before we had any kind of serious discussion about boys I liked and after… well, I just didn’t want to talk about guys at all. Or think about them.
But I have wanted to talk to someone about last night. I just didn’t know it.
“Weird how?” Mom asks with a worried edge in her tone.
“He asked me to remember him as he is,” I go on, since there’s no way I can tell my mom all about the other stuff we talked about. The being dead inside stuff. “And I said I would. But I have no idea what it means. Or how to do that.”
My mom looks shocked and confused for a second, but then smiles.
“Is he going somewhere?”
I shrug. “I don’t know.”
It’s the truth, but not the whole truth because I have my suspicions. He’s probably going off to fight in this war they all keep talking about. And the thought of that kept me up all night as much as anything else did. What if he doesn’t come back? I didn’t think I cared so much, but I guess I do.
“He’s going through something, I think,” I add. “But he didn’t tell me what.”
“Well, did you ask him?” The mischievousness in my mom’s voice isn’t something I expected to hear there. Nor see the smile in her eyes.
“Kind of, but he didn’t have a very good explanation.”
“Who is he? Have I met him?” she asks. It’s so weird seeing her so excited to be talking about this.
“It’s Ruin,” I say. “You know, the guy who called the ambulance for you guys when…”
I can’t really say the rest, the lump in my throat is too hard and painful whenever I think about almost losing them. Those assholes took so much from me, and they almost took my parents too.
It was all I could think about while Veronica and I were being carted away. I was sure my parents were dead, and I was ready to kill the first asshole biker I got the chance to. I’m still kind of sorry I didn’t get the chance to.
“Ahh,” my mom says and her eyes aren’t smiling anymore. They’re haunted now. “He seems like a nice man.”
“Yeah,” I say and leave it at that.
She pulls into the uncovered part of the mall’s parking lot. I don’t say anything and neither does she. Talking about the shooting, or me being taken, always has the same effect. An icy, dread-filled veil drops and there’s no lifting it. You just have to ignore it and wait for it to dissipate on its own. This outing will just be forced now, because we tried to talk about stuff we can’t handle talking about.
Weird as it was, I miss my mom’s excited questions about what she probably saw as a potential boyfriend. Now I have no idea what she’s thinking. Her limp seems more pronounced as we walk towards the mall.
“What’s this?” she suddenly exclaims and makes a beeline for a stand in the shade by the main entrance. There’s pictures of kittens and cats everywhere around the broadly smiling young woman in charge of the stand.
“Are you two cat lovers?” she asks in an over-excited voice.
“We sure are,” my mom answers in an equally excited voice.
It’s kind of the truth. Although our cat Bootsie died while I was held captive the first time and we haven’t had another since. My mom’s been trying to convince me I should get a kitten, but I have a hard enough time taking care of myself these days.
“Are you from a shelter?” Mom asks.
The woman shakes her head and holds out a leaflet. “We’re actually a non-profit organization that specializes in taking care of stray and feral cats. We’re called Happy Paws, maybe you’ve heard of us?”
We both shake our heads because she’s waiting for an answer.
“Thousands of stray cats are living on the streets, and just around here the problem has grown exponentially in the last couple of years.”
“Because of all the gentrification going on, no doubt,” I say. “People come from the city, get a house and a cat, but then just leave them behind when they get tired of country living.”
“That’s a large part of the problem,” the woman says, her smile not quite so bright anymore. “But people refusing to neuter and spay their pets is an even bigger one. One cat can give birth to 300 kittens in her lifetime. Multiply that by a thousand, or even a hundred and it becomes a huge problem.”
