I lifted up the cardboard just the tiniest bit, an inch maybe, and looked down at the street.
There was a man walking by. A big man with big broad shoulders and a blue work shirt, and I knew then that people would go by on their way to work because it was morning. Actually most people drive in this city, and not too many people walk or take the bus and walk from the bus stop—but here was one guy going by, so probably there would be others.
The reason I figured that mattered was because he was pretty much past us by the time I saw him.
But then I got scared that maybe nobody else would go by, so I wanted to catch him and ask him to make that call for us. But I didn’t know whether to wake the little girl up and take her with me or sneak out real quiet and go after the guy. I didn’t want to leave her alone, but I also wanted her to sleep as much as possible, because I know about little kids and I knew if she woke up and she still wasn’t back with her mommy she was going to get weepy. And how could I even blame her? And even if I did catch the guy and he did make the call for us, we’d still have to hide while we waited for the police to come, and a lot of crying could be a very bad thing for our situation.
So I was trying to decide, but I was getting all frozen up in the deciding, because the whole thing was just too stressful for me.
Finally I figured the guy was getting away, and nothing was more important than that phone call to the police, so I unwrapped myself from her real carefully, hoping she wouldn’t wake up.
And I got extra lucky, too, because she didn’t.
I ran down the hill to the street, and ran after the guy in the work shirt, and yelled real loud to try to stop him. But the thing is, I didn’t start yelling “Hey!” until I got down onto the sidewalk, because I didn’t want my yelling to wake the baby. Because if she woke up all alone in that hole and I wasn’t even there to comfort her, holy cow would she ever be scared. I figured she would scream bloody murder if that happened.
So I was yelling to this guy but he was already at the end of the block, and I felt this really desperate thing, this desperate feeling pulling me toward him, because he could make a phone call.
But then there was this other desperate thing pulling me back toward the hole, toward our hiding place, because I shouldn’t have left the little girl alone, not even for one second. And, let me tell you, it made me feel like I was being ripped apart right down the middle of me.
I got panicky then because he wasn’t hearing me, so I put all my panic into one great big shout.
“Hey!”
He stopped and turned around, but right away I wanted to run back up the hill in case I had woke the little girl and she was up there all alone. But I didn’t. I stuck it out for a second because we needed that phone call. We just desperately needed that phone call.
It was a lot of stress for me and I don’t think I’m built for that much stress. Or maybe nobody is, I don’t know.
I waved my arms to him and yelled, “Call the police! Please! I need the police to come here, because I found this baby. Call 9-1-1 and send them here, okay? Will you? Please?”
I know it doesn’t make sense after all that trying to be quiet, but it’s just what came out of me, because of all that panic.
He was all the way at the end of the block by then and I didn’t know if he heard me. I kept expecting him to come closer or give me some kind of sign to let me know if he heard me—if he understood what I needed him to do or not.
He just looked at me, though, like he wasn’t sure what to make of me, and like he thought I might be crazy. I know that sounds like a lot to be able to see from the end of the block, but let me tell you, things have a way of coming through. People have a lot of ways to show you what they think of you—if they think you’re worth paying attention to at all.
Then he just turned and walked away. And I had no idea if he’d heard me or even believed me, and no idea if he was going to make that call for me or not. But I just ran back up the hill because I had to, because I couldn’t leave that little girl alone any more than I already had. I shouldn’t even have left her alone that long and I knew it.
And I realized then how much I’d been really stupid to yell so loud about finding that baby, because I didn’t know where those boys were, and whether they could hear me.
But what was I supposed to do? There was no phone in that hole with us, and I had no way to make a call, and it didn’t look like Bodhi was coming back. If he could’ve come back, he would have—you know, already. But I couldn’t leave her alone to go find a phone, but I also couldn’t bring her out into the light with me because those boys could still be out looking.
Every idea I had just ran into a brick wall in my head, and I had no clue what to do, and the stress was too much for me. A sixteen-year-old kid is supposed to be worrying about stuff like tests at the end of the
