Five Years before the Accident
JANUARY 1978
Six months after Jude sent Violet to the Big House, on the coldest day of the year, she and Kat crept from their cots in their adjacent homes and met on Rodman Street. They carried with them two changes of socks and underwear, five dollars each, and the knowledge that they were pretty, which they knew meant something, if not absolutely everything.
Jude had allowed herself to think of Violet but only for predetermined, allotted amounts of time: ten minutes one day, five the next, then maybe two or three, and back up to ten. She knew, no matter how hard she tried, she would never trim the time to seconds. It would never be nothing.
Reject and release, Jude told herself, but for once the tenet had no effect.
They began to walk, taking turns blocking each other from the wind. Although 30th Street Station was a short distance from King Bash’s and Mr. Ronald’s houses, they had never been inside. It seemed an extension of the city, a transfer of the outside bustle and grit into a grand and vast old building, with soaring windows and gilded columns and intricate chandeliers that let Jude imagine, just for a moment, that they’d escaped to a royal palace instead of a train station.
They passed rank bodies sprawled across benches and a janitor pushing a broom and men with briefcases eager to be somewhere else. A large square monitor dominated the center of the station, broadcasting schedules for arriving and departing trains. Jude scanned the space. Amid a few boarded-up kiosks, she spotted a Puffs ’n Stuff bagel shop, an arcade filled with pinball machines, a bowling alley by the north terminal, and a waiting room called “The Chapel” for people in charge of transporting urns to their final destination.
“We stay right here,” Jude said. “We have food, a bathroom, entertainment, heat. There are people coming and going—we could meet someone who has a job for us.”
“Won’t they kick us out?”
“We’ll blend in. We’ll move around. We’ll become part of the background and no one will notice us at all.”
“What if someone from The Plan comes looking for us?”
“King Bash and the RonDon have more important things to worry about,” Jude said, but silently she shared Kat’s concern.
For one week, it was nearly ideal. Travelers came and went, running to terminals, kissing goodbye, high heels clacking, cigarette smoke trailing behind. A surprising number of people dropped money from their pockets and hands. They reverted to their old eating habits from The Plan, stretching a single bagel into three meals. One night Jude allowed Kat to play a Star Wars pinball machine; she lost, but it was worth it to see her sister forget, for one moment, where she was and why. They performed dramatic readings of Inquirer reports about President Carter and the oil crisis. They washed themselves at the sink. They soaked their underwear and hung it to dry over bathroom stalls.
They watched the space turn itself out at night, the commuters exiting and the homeless coming in, men and women and sometimes children, sprawling across benches and huddling in corners. They learned the unspoken rules: Do not touch anyone’s stuff. It is legal to carry a machete if it is not hidden. Don’t believe anyone who says they have your back. Three napkins make a decent maxi pad. Beware of people swinging tube socks filled with padlocks. It’s only illegal if you get caught. They slept the way they did when they were young, foot to head, their bodies knitted together.
One night Jude made her way to the bathroom, where, reflected in the mirror, she saw a familiar face from the past: Cindy, the girl who had tattooed THE PLAN along her arm, who extolled the delights of living at the Big House, who told Jude she was free as a bird, free with nothing left to lose. She had the same choppy black hair but somehow seemed less glamorous than Jude remembered, like one of Verona’s antique spoons left out to tarnish. She was taking turns applying lipstick and sucking on a joint, and she stopped doing both things when her eyes found Jude’s.
“You remember me,” Cindy said. She seemed flattered. “I’m supposed to be looking for you.”
“Whose idea was this?” Jude asked. “Who sent you?” She took a step backward.
Cindy slammed her palm against the sink and laughed for half a minute; Jude counted the seconds.
“Please don’t laugh,” she said. “I’m serious.”
“Relax, kid, I’m no narc. You can run away all you want. Like I give a shit. Just don’t come running back and say that I let you go.”
Jude exhaled and let herself lean against the grimy wall. She was tired, so tired.
Cindy took another long drag of her joint, and then held it out to Jude. She blew fancy curlicues of smoke, aiming them at the ceiling. “Want a toke?”
“No, thank you,” Jude said. “But can I ask you a question?”
“Go.”
“Have you seen Violet at the Big House? Violet, King Bash’s niece? She got there six months ago.”
“Of course I’ve seen her,” Cindy said. She tossed the stub of her joint into the trash. “It was a whole big thing when she came.”
Jude closed her eyes, trying to imagine pretty things—a rainbow, a garden, a non-feral dog, perfectly groomed. She had to ask. She was terrified to ask. “What is she doing there?”
Through the clouds of smoke she focused hard on Cindy’s frosted pink lips. They parted, closed, and parted again, as though the channel kept changing inside Cindy’s mind. “Don’t worry,” Cindy said. “She’s free. Free as a bird, just like the rest of us.”
Jude watched Cindy exit back onto 30th Street, the hard wind pushing her home.
I think Violet is okay, Jude thought. And what I think, is.
That tenet, too, had lost its power.
Before daybreak on the thirteenth night, as they slept, Jude sensed a shadow creeping over them. The shadow smelled like sulfur and drooled on her forehead. She shook Kat awake, and Kat bolted upright. Her head connected with the shadow’s chin. It reared up and roared, and when they began to run the shadow changed into the shape of a very large and fast man, whose spittle-flecked mouth shouted filthy things about what he would like to do to them.
Jude ran so fast she knocked the wind out of her own chest: down 29th Street, up 28th, her sister wheezing and huffing and crying, Jude pulling at her hand, “Come on, Kat, come on.” The shadow man’s footsteps came harder and closer. He shouted his disgusting fantasies and breathed his hoarse and horrible breath. They zigged and zagged and backtracked. Jude thought she might vomit up her own heart. From just behind her came a terrible splat sound and a gasp, and she turned to find Kat flat on her chest. She looked past at her sister to see the shadow man closing the distance. She planted her legs and imagined herself as a tiny, mighty forklift and yanked Kat to her feet.
Again they ran. Under the glow of the streetlamps the asphalt looked like diamonds. The slap of their feet against the pavement morphed into the slap of skin against skin. They heard moans and grunts. They turned to see a pinwheel of arms and legs spinning and kicking. The shadow man bent over, the shadow man fell to his knees, the shadow man collapsed flat against the ground. The pinwheel went still, assessing her work, and then strolled to the corner. The streetlight revealed a familiar face.
“Jackie?” they asked in unison.
She looked so different than she had standing on the stage at The Plan’s meetings, welcoming them all, encouraging them to give shape and color to their thoughts. Her long blond hair had been sheared nearly to her scalp and she seemed twice her normal size—not taller or heavier but thicker, the terrain of her body marked with sinewy muscle. Jude couldn’t help herself; she scanned the street for Violet, hoping she’d come with her mother.
“Yes,” Jackie said, “but I’m not that person anymore. My name is Ceridwen, but you can call me Wen.”