Jacinda Cross

[Jacinda]

2021

The room was typical for a motel. AC unit under window with cheap stiff curtain, now pulled open. The floors were the fake wood vynal that cleaned up easy and kept odors to a minimum, the bed surprisingly comfortable with full pillows. Jacinda was propped up on one, remote in her hand idly flipping channels.

So many shows she didn't recognize. Or that she wasn't allowed to watch. One caught her eye for a moment- Law and Order:SVU- and she watched for a little while. But she was nervous, eyeing the door, putting the volume down. Regan hated that show. Told her how terrible it was. He was not joking around either. He was as deadly serious as she'd ever seen him. It made her curious but afraid.

Finally, her fear of being caught made her turn it off. They were just outside after all. The occasional sounds of them outside working could be heard easily.

Julie had also propped herself up so her tablet rested against her legs as she did whatever she was doing. Jacinda had asked her if she wanted to watch anything and she had waved her off. Oh well. Only now, she seemed frustrated, muttering under her breath.

"You ok? What are you playing?"
The girl's dark brown eyes to meet hers and she sighed.

"It's this dumb puzzle game I'm playing with a friend. There are matchsticks that make up the numbers of a math equation. Like this,"
she showed her. 5+9=9.

Jacinda smirked. "That's not true."


The girl rolled her eyes and smiled. "No duh. So you can only move one match from one place to another and make it true. So for this one..."
Jacinda saw immediately.

"...Take the one match from the top first 9 and put it on the second 9. Then it is 5+3=8."


The girl looked at her and smiled. "Yeah. This one was easy. But they get really hard because you keep seeing what's there instead of what might be. It's not the math. It's finding the pattern."


Jacinda got up and sat on the edge of the bed to look. "Yeah, what's not there is just as important. Ok. Show me the one you're working on."
She'd always liked puzzles. You could just think and stare and after a while, you started to see things....things you hadn't noticed, things that were missing, things that shouldn't be there. Sometimes, she even had the sense that she saw things through someone else's eyes at those moments.

Anyway, the girl brought it up. 23+26=61. Jacinda looked at it for a moment. The move needed to be economical, which meant the answer had to be close. One move. And then she saw it and smiled.

"You see it, right?


The girl looked at her surprised. "What? Nuh uh!!! You didn't figure it out that fast."


Her smile became a grin. "You start simple and work out. The right side has fewer sticks. So start there. What could we remove that changes the number?....See? From the 6. Now it's 51. So...we have our stick....where can we put it to make a new number?"


Julie looked and then saw. "The 6 in 26. It's 28....Ha! So 23+28=51! Nice! Thank you"
And then she put put her hand palm up to Jacinda. She stared at it absently? The girl looked at her, raising an eyebrow. "Uhhh....hello? High five?"


Jacinda smiled sheepishly and tried to laugh it off. "Oh yeah...sorry. Not thinking."
She put her palm up and then waited. The girl looked at her and then laughed and slapped her palms against Jacinda's.

"You're funny."
she said as she started on her tablet.

Jacinda watched. "So do you just do work and play on your tablet?"
That was pretty much all she did. Regan was pretty strict with the thing. Said it was for her protection.

She didn't really look up. "Mostly. And music. Movies. Social media. The internet. Stuff like that."
Jacinda thought about it.

"We listen to music. David Bowie. Supertramp. George Harrison."
Julie wrinkled her nose.

"That's like ancient history. My grandpa listens to that stuff."
Jacinda felt a little taken aback. Her temper started to rise. This little girl was making her feel like she was handicapped or something.

"I know modern stuff,"
she said irritatedly standing up and moving back to her bed. And then she had to cast her memory back, trying to think of something. A name. A tune. Something came back, from when she listened to the radio with her dad. "Katy.....Perry. She's big."
Come to think of it, though, she wasn't sure, now. It had been like 8 years.

The girl lit up her face all smiling. "Oh my god, I love her! My sister used to play her all the time."
And then she seemed to smile at the memory.

Jacinda felt a stab of.....she wasn't sure what. "Are you and your sister close?"


"Yeah. She always looks out for me. Helps me when mom gets too much. And when I was little she would let me hang out with her and practice putting makeup on me. She wants to be a cosmetologist. You wanna know something...?"


Jacinda sat down on her own bed and said "Sure."
She really did wanna know.

"Laci, that's my sister, she wanted to try out for the cheerleading squad. And so she practiced and practiced a routine to Katy Perry. Over and over again. And I got to help. I even learned it. I wanna try out now that I'm older but mom still says I'm too young. You wanna see?"


Jacinda smiled, her eyes twinkling. The girl seemed to want an audience and she felt good to be one. She pulled up something on her tablet and cast it to the TV. It was some sporting event. "This is the halftime from the 2015 super bowl Katy Perry. You remember this, right?"


Julie got up and started.

The video started and Jacinda was torn, watching the performance on the screen and Julie's. She seemed to do pretty well. Not as polished and certainly she was a child in comparison. But where Katy Perry was confident and relaxed, Julie just gave off a beautiful fun energetic youth and silliness. She danced around with the remote as her microphone, sliding around the floors in her socks. And the songs....She had remembered Katy Perry's name but she had not remembered the music. Each song- and they seemed so short she wished they went on longer- was powerful and then fun and goofy. She liked the dancing sharks and trees, the candy canes.

She was surprised to see a black woman with her, dancing around doing some odd talking over the music. She knew that a lot of people mixed races like that, being friends and all. And she knew better than to say the N-word. Regan did all the time, but her parents had been clear on that. Still, it was odd. But she didn't say anything. She knew it would ruin the mood.

By the end she was clapping and tapping her foot, almost wanting to get up and join her. It ended. She clapped in applause."Good job!!! Great job. Show that to your mom. Maybe she'll let you. Or your dad."


Julie got back on her bed, a little out of breath. "Maybe. She says I have to be at least 14. And I have to wait until I am 16 to date. Dad says that too."


Jacinda got quiet. She knew what dating was. But she never thought of there being a limit. Hesitantly she asked, "Are there any boys you like? Like right now?"


Julie smiled as if she had a secret. "There is one boy. Lee McDaniels. He's soooo cute. Here... "
She took her tablet and brought up another app. All kinds of faces and pictures of people. "There....Isn't he dreamy?
Her voice dropped low. "He's 13. Almost in high school. And he said he liked me. He even.....he kissed me. On the cheek once, by the racketball courts. Just a quick one. And then he ran away."
She seemed lost in the memory.

Jacinda could only stare at the picture. It was just a boy. Cute, sure. He'd be handsome when he grew up. But he was just a boy. She didn't understand and so just smiled softly. Like before, she didn't want to ruin things. She touched the tablet. "What is this anyway. Is this email?"


The girl opened her eyes wide and then narrowed them. "Are you making fun of me? This is Facebook. Hah! You are making fun of me,"
as Jacinda smiled, as if it all had been a joke. She leaned back and started messing with the app. "Here. Give me your email so I can friend you."


Jacinda thought fast, figuring out quickly what she meant. "I don't have one. I mean I did but not anymore."


Julie shrugged. "That's no biggie. Sign up for another. Here, use this site."
She said gesturing to Jacinda's tablet. Jacinda handed it to her, trying to figure out how to explain that it was restricted. "Huh!! Stupid child proofing always comes on. Let me see...."
She fooled with it for a few minutes. "There. I backed your pics and stuff to my cloud and did a reset. You can get a new email and passcode too. Careful with your tablet though. Those locks are annoying."


Jacinda looked at her tablet in awe. That was it? Unlocked now? What would she do with it? She followed the directions and soon it was all set up. She declined the social media for now though. She wasn't sure what Regan was gonna say about all this anyway. She had a sinking feeling she knew.

"Since you don' t have a music app, here's one. And I'm gonna make you a playlist you like. Tell me those bands or songs again?"


The girl worked, all the while Jacinda starting to feel nervous or even scared. This was a lot. Too much. She knew she felt free earlier that day, with the run. But now....she could almost feel Regan looming behind her. And part of her was afraid. But there was a part of her that was angry. A little bit. Some of those lyrics she heard played through her mind. Still, she was mostly afraid.

Enough that she jumped when the door opened and Regan came in wiping greasy hands on a rag. He looked at her and then Julie, his eyes seeming to linger on her before heading to the bathroom. Had he gotten an alert about the tablet? Had he heard them?

Jacinda whispered thank you and took the tablet, held it to her protectively. Regan came back into the room. "Jacinda, can you come with me? I want to get something eat at the restaurant next door."


She stood, legs like weights, stomach churning. He knew. All she could do was follow. He turned to Julie
"Sweetie, your daddy will be back in in a moment. Just you relax darlin." She heard the sweetie and darlin and they didn't register.

The door closed and they walked silently across the lot. Adam was no where to be seen. It was quiet, too quiet. Every bad possibility was crossing her mind. When Regan spoke, she jumped. It was a whisper. "I need to tell you somethin, Jacinda. That girl Julie's in trouble. I think her daddys hurtin her.....I think....I think we should rescue her."


Edited by Jacinda, Jul 2 2018, 10:07 PM.