The Fourteen Day Soul Detox (8 page)

“Want this?” I asked.

He took the little pink hair band, and
gave me a big grin.

I gathered up Sarah’s hair and
tied it back. “Want me to do Kay’s too?” I asked as
I could see he was struggling.

“Thanks, I’m still not that
good at all this girl stuff.”

“No problem.” I collected
her hair up in a high bun. When I was done, she grinned up at me,
touching her hair like it was delicate and might break.

“Well, see you Monday, probably?”
I said.

He grinned, “Or maybe sooner.”

“Maybe
so
,” I said,
with a flirtatious grin, “It’s a small town.”

“Alright then,” he said,
his eyes glowing and grin growing even bigger, “Maybe so.”

When we turned off the street Sarah’s
school sat on and onto another residential street, I pressed the
button for the CD player to start working.

“
Oh, Buffalo Gals will ye come
out tonight, come out tonight,
come out
tonight. Buffalo Gals, won't you come out tonight,
and dance by de light of de moon?
”
Sarah and I sang at the top of our lungs along with the kids’
CD. We kept singing, and I saw the seat next to me bump forward every
couple notes as Sarah kicked it.

“
I
danced with a gal with a hole in her stockin',
And her heel kept
a-knockin', and her toes kept a-rockin'
,
”
Sarah sang in a low, masculine sounding voice which was an amazing
impression of the singer from the CD.

“Wow, that’s really good,”
I said, looking back into the rear view mirror at her. I squinted
into the mirror. “Sarah, are you wearing your seatbelt?”

“I’m wearing it!” she
shouted. I glanced over my shoulder, just to be sure, but she was
wearing it.

“Sorry, I just needed to be
sure,” I said turning back to the road.

“Shit!” I screamed.

A woman was in the road. Time slowed
down as she turned to me while I drove straight at her.

My foot slammed down onto my brake
pedal.

Her brown ponytail flew back and her
eyes widened in shock.

The car skidded toward her. A loud
screech and a pungent smell of burnt tire overwhelmed my senses.

My back locked up as the car jerked to
a stop, my body slammed forward into the steering wheel.

The woman had her hands out toward my
car, as if she would have been able to stop it. Her fingers were only
a couple inches from my hood. Her tight running suit expanded with
her labored breaths. Her jaw hung open, giving her pretty young face
an even younger expression.

Shifting into park, I heaved out a
breath.

“
A frog he would a wooing go,
m-m, m-m. Whether his mother would let him or no, m-m, m-m
,
”
the song played on my speaker until I used shaky fingers to turn it
off.

The woman straightened up, hand going
to her mouth.

I rolled down my window. “I am so
sorry! Are you okay?” I called out to her.

“Oh my god,” she said under
her breath. “I thought I was going to die.”

“I’m so sorry,” I
repeated. “I should have been paying better attention. Are you
okay?”

She nodded, though I saw that her arms
were trembling. With quick steps, she jogged to the other side of the
road. She turned back to me, staring for a minute. “Thank you…
for stopping in time. Be more careful next time, okay?”

“I… I will. I’m so
sorry,” I said.

She nodded, walking at first but then
jogging away down the sidewalk.

A loud honk made me jump and woke me
from staring after the girl.

I looked back at Sarah. “Baby,
are you okay? Are you hurt?”

“I want a glass of milk,”
she said.

The car behind me honked again. Taking
a deep steadying breath, I shifted the car back into drive. I drove
five miles under the speed limit all the way home, never once letting
my concentration waver from the road.

My hand shook as I shifted into park
after pulling into my assigned parking spot. I heard Sarah’s
seatbelt click off and a moment later she climbed over the central
divider.

“Mom, I want some milk. Can we
watch the artistic women’s beam final from the North Greenwich
arena at the London Olympics?” she asked.

“Yeah, angel,” I said in a
whisper.

Opening the car door, I let her out
behind me. We walked down the path that led to our little duplex. My
neighbor Clarke stepped out of his apartment as we approached. A big
hairy head appeared over the small fence that ran around the front of
his apartment.

“Buster!” Sarah said,
moving toward the sheep dog.

Glancing over at Clarke, I pulled her
away and in front of me. “Not right now, angel,” I
whispered.

Clarke put an elbow on the fence,
leaning over. His sport’s jersey was so white it reflected the
sunlight. “Hey Jamie, hey Sarah,” he called out.

“Hey Clarke,” I said waving
while I pushed Sarah toward our door.

“Hey Jamie, were you putting up
pictures earlier or something?” The grin Clarke gave me made me
cringe a little. He ran his hand over the short stubble over his
strong jaw, his eyes glinting with amusement.

“Um, no,” I said, turning
away but narrowing my eyes in thought.

“By the front door,” he
said.

I felt my face go hot and heard Clarke
start laughing.

“Now that’s a noise I won’t
complain about,” he said.

“Come on Sarah,” I said in
a low voice, again pushing her toward the house.

“Oh come on, Jamie, don’t
be like that. I was just joking,” he said, still chuckling. He
raised a beer and took a long drink. He pulled down the beer,
pointing it at me. “I love that my neighbors are so…

happy. You ever need
help putting up pictures, just knock on my door. I’d be happy
to be… neighborly.”

“No thanks,” I said as I
managed to unlock my front door and push it open.

Locking both my bottom and my top lock,
I turned away from the door and squeezed my eyes shut tight.

“Mom, can we watch the artistic
women’s beam final from the North Greenwich arena at the London
Olympics?”

“Yeah, sweetheart,” I said.
Grabbing my laptop from the living room, I set it on the table and
pulled up my YouTube Olympics playlist. Scrolling down, I selected
the 2012 artistic bar final.

After pouring Sarah a glass of milk, I
grabbed my phone and walked out of the room.

I sat on my bed and dialed Susan.

“Hey bitch,” she answered
on the second ring.

“Hey,” I said, before
swallowing.

“What’s the matter?”
she asked.

“I almost hit a kid with my car.
I mean, she wasn’t really a kid, but young. I don’t think
I should be driving. I don’t know what’s wrong with me,”
My voice was thick with the tears that started pouring down my face.

“I bet I can guess if you let
me,” she said.

“Please do,” I said while
wiping the tears from my face. “Unless you’re going to
tell me I’m losing my mind, because then I don’t want to
know.”

“When’s the last time you
ate anything?” she asked.

Putting my head in my hands, I started
sniffling. “Oh, crap,” I said.

“Love, your brain needs calories
to function, go make yourself a fucking sandwich then call me back.”

“Okay,” I said, hanging up.

Walking back into the kitchen, I looked
into fridge scanning the contents. It was full of veggies and fruit,
and ingredients to all our favorite dishes, but in the end, I grabbed
a frozen meal out of the freezer.

“Want a snack, angel?” I
asked Sarah.

“Apples and peanut butter,”
she said.

“I’m waiting for another
word, a polite word,” I told her as I poked holes in the
plastic cover on the frozen enchilada plate.

“Apples and peanut butter…
please!” she said the last word with enthusiasm.

I laughed to myself as I dialed the
front office on my phone. Holding the phone to my ear with one hand,
I grabbed out an apple and held it under cold faucet water it with
the other hand.

The dial tone rang three times before I
heard a woman pick up. “Sunset Estates, this is Denise,”
she said.

“Hi Denise, is Richard there?”
I asked. Using my shoulder to hold my phone to my ear, I grabbed out
a cutting board and knife.

“Sorry, he’s gone for the
weekend. Can I take a message?” she asked.

“Um, I guess. This is Jamie Scott
in apartment thirty-six B. Richard said he was looking into finding
another apartment in the complex for my daughter and me to switch
over to.”

“Sorry, that really is something
you’ll have to speak to Richard about,” she said. “I’ll
definitely leave a message for him if you want, though.”

“Yes, please do. Will you say
it’s pretty urgent? I already told him why,” I said.

“I will, and that’s Jamie
Scott in…?”

“Thirty-six B,” I said.

“Got it, Jamie. You have a good
weekend,” she said.

“Thanks, you too,” I said,
setting the phone back down.

I cut up the apple, putting a small
dollop of peanut butter on the plate. When I set the plate in front
of Sarah, she said, “More peanut butter.”

“Nope,” I said, grabbing an
apple slice and dipping it in the peanut butter.

“Hey, Mommy, that’s not
yours,” she said.

“But it’s so delicious, I
just can’t help myself,” I said, tickling her side and
making her giggle.

Taking the tray out of the microwave, I
pulled away the plastic and ducked back from the cloud of hot steam
that poured up.

I sat down beside Sarah just as the
Romanian competitor fell off the bar. I draped my arm around her back
as I ate.

“She’ll have to tighten up
her whole routine,” Sarah said, right before the announcer said
the same words.

“I think she was very brave to
keep going,” I said to Sarah. “It’s important to
just keep going, keep fighting.”

“And I’ll tell you that is
not an easy skill,” Sarah said, exactly in sync with the
announcer.

“It’s funny, the ones that
look easy are always the hardest,” I said between bites.

When Sarah’s favorite American
competitor took the beam, I reached to my laptop to skip forward.

“No!” Sarah yelled.

“You hate it when Gaby slips,”
I told her.

“I like to be sad,” Sarah
said.

“What?” I said, sitting
back in my chair.

“I like to be sad,” she
repeated.

I paused, then said, “Um, okay.”
Letting the recording go, I stared at Sarah as she watched her
favorite gymnast take the beam and slip in one of her landings.

Sarah screamed at the laptop.

Immediately, there was a banging from
the wall that connected our apartment to Clarke’s.

I paused the video on the computer.
“Angel, quiet, okay? Or I’m turning the laptop off. Let’s
watch another competition, not the finals for a little while.”
I skipped to another video.

Wandering into my living room, I took a
seat on my overstuffed couch. When I closed my eyes, vivid images ran
through my mind. First, I saw the mist parting around Sarah as she
ran away from me and the bus. Then Aiden’s braids bounced in
every direction as he held Sarah’s hand and jumped on the
trampoline. Whitney’s long black lashes came together and
separated as she glared down at my wedding ring. Cameron smiled over
his shoulder at me as he shook his hips. My sister’s red
fingernails made small circles at her temples. The pink blossoms blew
in all directions around my body. Chris’s eyes squinted with a
smile as he and Margret belted out my pop song. Mitch looked out of
the shop’s window as if he was perfectly content. The girl in
the road’s hands reached to stop my car. Sarah, smiling with
her little dimples showing when she said, ‘I like to be sad.’

A knock sounded at my door and I got up
to answer. When I opened the door, Susan, Beza and Aiden stood
outside, smiling at me. “Happy birthday,” they said in
unison.

“I need to change my whole life,”
I said.

Beza and Susan shared a look.

“Well, let’s get inside
then,” Beza said.

I stepped back but Aiden ran up to hug
me. “Hey, Aunt Jamie. Where’s Sarah?” he said.

“Hey cutie, she’s in the
kitchen,” I said, moving aside so he could run past me.

As we stepped back into my living room,
Beza asked, “Have you packed up Sarah yet?”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

Susan stepped in front of me, so close
her pregnant belly almost touched me. “Okay, this is how this
is going to go.” She paused to grab up her long blonde hair,
tying it into a knot on the top of her head. “Bee is going to
take the kids to have a sleep over at our place. I am going to stay
here with you, and we’re going to figure out your life.”

“No, we don’t have to
tonight,” I said.

“Yes we do,” Susan said.

I turned to Beza. “I feel bad,
our plans—”

“Are not as important as this,
Jamie,” Beza said. “Anyway, it will be nice to have some
special time with Sarah.”

“Wow, you guys are so intense
about this,” I said.

“We’ve just been waiting
for you to wake up for a while, and we’re ready,” Susan
put an arm on my shoulder. Then she lifted one of her legs backward
and grabbed her ankle with her hand.

“Susan, I thought you were going
to hug me, but you’re just using me as a stretching pole?”
I rolled my eyes.

“I am f-u-c-k-i-n-g
uncomfortable,” she said.

“That spelling words out thing
isn’t going to work for much longer,” Beza said, pointing
at Susan and pursing her lips. “I’m going to go pack a
bag for Sarah.” She turned, heading to Sarah’s room.

“Stay right there,” Susan
said as she walked over to my other side, stretching her opposite
leg.