Fourth Interlude

Carrie Ann Womack edged her way closer to the Hispanic man. She was traveling alone, but didn’t want to look like she was alone. The middle-aged man appeared to be by himself, too. Carrie didn’t know what she would do if a plump wife and a pack of children suddenly appeared from the bus stop restroom.

She had thought about taking a Greyhound before, but it was different today. Today, she had courage. She bought two tickets from the Asheville station to New York City. Either the clerk believed her when she said her dad and her were going to visit his sister or the clerk didn’t really care. Somehow, she thought he would’ve cared if she had said she was an unaccompanied minor. Adults had the funniest ideas about what eleven-year-olds could and couldn’t do.

Carrie wasn’t old enough to travel all the way by herself, but she was going to, whether Greyhound said she could or not. She wasn’t supposed to have to deal with abusive adults at her age, but that hadn’t stopped the drunken slob who used to be her dad. He was still passed out when she left for school that morning. Carrie had looted his wallet and discovered he had just gotten paid the day before. He didn’t keep jobs long enough for her to figure out the pay schedule, but luck was with her. She took it all instead of the usual five she sneaked when he wasn’t looking, then doubled back to her room to add a change of clothes to her backpack. If her luck held, she’d be in the Big Apple by morning.

Carrie corrected herself: it wasn’t luck. Her knight had come to her last night in her dreams. He hadn’t been clad in shining armor, but in teddy bear fur. She couldn’t hear what he was saying, but she knew why he had come: he was going to save her from the monster. That’s what knights did. Every girl dreamed of a knight coming to her rescue, but she really had one. Of course, most girls she knew didn’t really need rescuing.

It had been all right before Mom died. But the onset of her puberty, his growing alcoholism, and their mutual grief had twisted her dad into an evil dragon. She wanted to kill him, but that was a knight’s job. Carrie’s job was to run, to get away. Her knight would find her in New York.

She had seen TV shows about New York. They took care of kids there. They had detectives who investigated crimes about kids and lots of social workers who knew how to do their job. They’d put her with child services and the caseworker would believe her when she said her dad hit her. She didn’t think the police in New York could arrest her dad in North Carolina, but she knew they wouldn’t send her back. She would be safe with a foster family until her knight came to her. If she was really lucky, she wouldn’t even need him when he did show up. She could take care of herself. Still, she would love him. He was a knight, after all, and his visitation had given her the confidence she needed to escape.

The bus came and Carrie walked on at the heels of the man she had temporarily adopted. The driver took their tickets, but didn’t say anything. Carrie took a seat by herself on the row behind the pretend father. The rest of the day was spent studying the map she had purchased at the bus station and staring out the window. Carrie had escaped from the monster and was making her way to the fabled City of the North.

It wasn’t marked on her map or on any of the road signs, but Carrie Ann Womack was heading straight to hell. It would be four years, six months, and two days before she would find herself sliding into an IHOP booth across from her predestined knight.