He furrowed his brow and scribbled a few notes on the form. Handed me back my credit card and a room key. An actual metal key, like in the old days.
“You and your daughters enjoy your stay,” he said.
And we lugged everything outside again.
As we tromped through the dirt to our room, Molly said, “He thought we were a family!” Her voice sounded breathy and excited. As though something miraculous had happened.
“It’s a logical assumption. I’m old enough to have a daughter your age.”
“Yeah. You are. I actually think my mother is a couple of years younger than you. She had me when she was nineteen.”
I winced at the thought. It might be hard to explain why. Or maybe it didn’t need explaining. I don’t know.
“If I’d had my way,” I said, “I’d have had kids when I was in my early twenties.”
“Kids? As in more than one?”
“Yeah. I wanted two.”
“So if you’d had your way you’d have a kid just about my age now.”
“Pretty much,” I said. “Yeah.”
“Why didn’t you?”
Then we had to lug all those bags up a flight of outdoor stairs. It ticked me off. Because the place was nearly empty. So why couldn’t he have given us a room on the ground floor? At least, I think that’s what was ticking me off. Could have been more than one thorn sticking into my side right about then.
“Kind of a long story,” I said as we climbed.
But it wasn’t, really. It was a short one. David didn’t want them. Somehow it was easier to call it a long story rather than admit the truth: it was a story I didn’t particularly want to tell again.
We arrived at the landing, puffing. Or I was puffing, anyway. Etta began to wake up on Molly’s shoulder. I knew it would be hard to get her to sleep that night because she’d napped so much in the car.
I stuck the key in the door. Swung it open into a plain but acceptable room. It had two beds, at least.
“I have a question for you,” I said. “Why did you even tell your mother? I mean, if you knew how she felt about things like that.”
“Long story,” she said.
While we dumped the bags onto one of the beds, I wondered: Was it really long? Or, like my story, simply one she preferred not to tell?
Molly took a thirty-five-minute shower. I know. I timed it.
I’m not sure why I cared. It wasn’t my water, and it wasn’t my gas heating it. For the money I’d paid for the room, she might as well get some value back for the dollars.
Etta was sitting on the bedspread near my hip. Playing with one of the toys I’d brought from home. The one that let her point a big red arrow at different barnyard animals. And then, when she pulled the string, the toy would play a recording of a quack or a moo or a neigh.
I took my phone off the bedside table and checked the bars of reception. I was getting plenty. So I opened the browser. Started typing into the search bar.
“LGBT homeless . . .” Before I could type the word “youth,” the browser suggested it for me.
I clicked. Read the first couple of sentences of a Wikipedia article, which was displayed in the phone equivalent of a sidebar.
“Research shows that a disproportionate number of homeless youth in the United States identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender, or LGBT. Researchers suggest that this is primarily a result of hostility or abuse from the young people’s families leading to eviction or running away.”
I didn’t click through. Instead I read a few more of the search results.
The title of the fourth article down was “LGBT Youth Are 120% More Likely To Be Homeless Than Straight . . .” It cut off there. And yes, the capitalization was wrong. So I thought maybe it was a fringe publication. I looked under the link of the title to see who had published it.
It was Newsweek.
“What’re you doing?” Molly’s voice asked. From very close by.
Her tone was casual, but it still startled me.
She was standing at the end of the bed wrapped in a bright-white motel towel. Her hair was clean and wet, and looked curly and a little bit red. It had red highlights. Somehow that red had been hidden under the filth.
“Oh, nothing,” I said. “Just killing time. Put your clothes on and we’ll walk over to that little mall and get you something else to wear. That way you can wash one set and wear the other while you’re doing it. And we’ll get you a toothbrush and a hairbrush. And then we need something to eat.”
“Thank you,” she said. “That’s very nice of you.” But her mind seemed miles away. “I’m scared about seeing my mother tomorrow. Is it okay to say that to you? Because it really feels like a problem and I don’t know how to make it not a problem but I thought talking about it might help. Because we’ll get there tomorrow if we’re already past Las Vegas, and so now it all seems really real and really close, and so now I’m getting scared about it, because what if she slams the door in my face?”
“I wasn’t thinking of sending you to the door. Actually. I’ve been thinking about it. And I thought I’d go. Talk to her in advance. If she’s not open to the idea of seeing you, then you never have to face her. We won’t even give her a chance to say something terrible.”
“Thank you,” she said again. “That’s a really good idea. You know how I know it’s a really good idea? Because a second ago I wasn’t even hungry, but then you said that and now all of a sudden I’m starved. Let’s go. I can carry the baby. Let’s eat first and shop
