Olivia, the previous year – early on day one
Olivia Michelle Elge is a seventeen-year-old senior at Elkton High School in downtown Elmira, New York. Her bright blue eyes and shoulder length blond hair hint at her Scandinavian heritage, but it is her tall, full-bodied figure, suggestive of another ethnic contribution, that attracts most of the attention from the members of the opposite sex. Her mother, Rosaria (nee: Cavalucci), is a single parent who works the night shift at the Corning Glass Works in the nearby town that bears the name of its economic benefactor. Driving the eighty-four-mile roundtrip to work, five nights a week, is a small price to pay for the comfort of knowing that Olivia and her younger brother, Frankie, each will be able to finish high school and perhaps even attend college.
Olivia, however, has other plans in mind on this crisp November day. Rather than catch the bus that will deposit her safely in front of her school, she has mapped out a different journey. Ever since her first period, she has been planning a way to pursue her goal of becoming the next big runway fashion model. Only her best friend, Linda, has any knowledge of her intentions, and the two have sworn an oath of secrecy, not to be broken under pain of death.
She dresses quickly in a pair of jeans and a green pullover sweater, laces up her tan, waterproof Dunham boots, and reaches under the bed to retrieve the nylon knapsack she packed neatly the night before with jeans and sweatshirts—and a stash of sexy undergarments (mail-ordered and shipped to Linda’s address). She carefully re-examines her makeup and hair, and then satisfied as to her appearance, slips quietly downstairs to the kitchen. Her mother and brother are fast asleep, as she hastily re-heats the pot of coffee left standing on the stovetop since the day before. While the coffee warms, she spreads peanut butter and jelly on slices of bread, slaps pairs together, and slips them into zip-lock bags, to be secreted in a zippered pocket on the outside of her knapsack.
She scribbles a note to her mother (adding words of love for her brother) and tapes it to the refrigerator door. A few tears moisten the corners of her eyes, but she wipes them away with the back of her hand, takes a deep breath, and continues her preparations for leaving.
Over the last year, Olivia has squirreled away every penny she has earned working part-time at the supermarket and from occasional babysitting jobs. Now, the sum total of nine-hundred and forty-five dollars occupies a “secret” compartment in her faux Louis Vuitton handbag. To her adolescent way of thinking, it is a veritable fortune. She intends to hitchhike her way to New York City and then take a subway to Brooklyn, where she can rent a room at the Greenpoint YMCA. She had hoped to stay at the famous McBurney “Y” in Manhattan, but her Internet research into its rates has convinced her that she’d be better off at the lesser-known residence. She figures it will only be a matter of days before she finds a job waiting tables in Manhattan. And, after that, perhaps a few more weeks or, at most, months, before she’ll be “discovered.”
After nervously gnawing on a day-old bagel and some cream cheese, washed down with a cup of the warmed-up coffee, Olivia Elge slips on her bright red, goose down Northface jacket. She takes one last look over her shoulder at her home, and quietly makes her way out the front door. She is at once excited and scared to death. But, one thing is for certain. There is no turning back.