The Girl in the White Van Read online

  Even I could tell her left wrist was broken. Three inches above her thumb was a bump, like someone had stuck an egg underneath her skin. “I need to get the bones lined up so I can splint it.” Sir began to rummage through my stuff. “And it will be better for everyone if she’s still unconscious when that happens.”

  From the nightstand, he took one of my three magazines, the October 2007 issue of Real Simple. Curling it in his hands, he gave it an experimental twist. Even though I had read every word on every page, my heart still sank when he set it on the bed next to the girl.

  Then he dug through the clothes in the drawer underneath the nightstand and plucked out my blue turtleneck. The turtleneck I had been wearing the day he took me. One of my last links to the time before. When he pulled the knife from the sheath on his belt, I bit my lip so I wouldn’t protest.

  He slid the knife inside the body of the turtleneck. Stretching the cloth tight with his other hand, he pulled until it dimpled and then split. Then he yanked the silver shine of the blade toward him, slicing the fabric. He moved the knife a few inches over and repeated the process. And again. And again. The turtleneck was being turned into strips. Finally he cut them all free.

  “Now hold her arm tight just below the elbow. And don’t let go even if she wakes up.”

  There was not enough room for both of us to be at the end of the bed, so I crawled around and behind the girl, trying not to jostle her. I looked down at her face. Aside from the scrape, her skin looked smooth and soft. Unmarked. It must be why he had taken her.

  Sir rolled her on her side so that my knees pressed against her back. At a nod from him, I wrapped my fingers around the middle of her arm.

  Taking her hand in both of his, he positioned himself so that her arm and body formed a line. Then he pulled.

  It was like she had been shocked by a downed power line. Her body stiffened and then immediately went slack again.

  He ran his fingers over the broken part of her arm. Most of the pronounced bump was gone, but it was still puffy. “I can’t cast it until the swelling goes down, and that’s going to take a few days.”

  He wrapped the magazine around her forearm, then had me hold it in place while he tied it off with strips of my turtleneck. Then he turned one of my cardigans into a sling, knotting the sleeves behind the girl’s neck. The whole time, she didn’t stir.

  Finally, he was finished. “Pull back the covers.” Picking her up, he squeezed between the bed and the wall and laid her down. After he straightened up, we both looked at her. Even in the dim light, her color looked bad to me, the smooth skin of her face pale and sweaty.

  “Is she going to be okay?”

  “She took a pretty hard hit to the head. I wouldn’t be surprised if she has a concussion. Just let her sleep.”

  Careful not to raise my gaze to his face, I risked a question. “Isn’t that bad, Sir? I thought you were supposed to keep someone awake if they had a concussion.” Would I get in trouble for talking back? But I most definitely did not want to wake up next to a dead girl.

  He sighed. “They used to think that, but it depends on the type of concussion—it’s complicated. Sleep is good. It will allow her brain to recover.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  He moved to the doorway. “When she does wake up, it’s going to be your job to teach her how to act. Your job to teach her the rules.” I was still silently digesting this when he demanded, “And what are the rules?” His hand moved to the butt of his Taser, as if to remind me how I had learned them.

  Quickly, before he could get mad, I blurted out, “Always call you Sir.” To be safe, I quickly added, “Sir.”

  “Don’t mumble,” he said. “Go on.”

  “Never look you in the eye.” Out of the corner of my own eye, I saw him nod. “Never talk back,” I continued. “Dress attractively. Keep things picked up. Don’t make noise.”

  “And?” he prompted.

  “Be grateful that you keep me—I mean us—alive. Sir.”

  He nodded again. “That’s right,” he said. “Good girl. It’s better that she learns them from you rather than the hard way, don’t you think?” As a reminder, he tapped the butt of the Taser again before dropping his hand.

  And then he left me alone with the girl. A girl like the one I had once been, ten months ago.

  MICHAEL DIAZ

  “Ms. Taylor?” I asked the plump thirty-ish woman shifting from foot to foot in the school office. When she nodded, I stuck out my hand.

  Despite her strong grip, Lorraine Taylor looked ready to fall apart. Dark circles weighted her light eyes. Her brown hair appeared uncombed. Her open coat revealed wrinkled blue scrubs. Tattoos covered her arms and even her hands and neck. A quick scan did not reveal any related to gangs or prison.

  Being a school resource officer did not mean that I was a glorified security guard, as some people thought. I was a sworn Portland police officer, covering the Wilson cluster: Wilson High, the two middle schools, and five elementaries that fed into it. With the younger kids, by and large it was the parents I needed to concern myself with. The older students got, the more likely it was that they were the ones getting into trouble. At Wilson, I dealt with theft, assaults, drugs, suicide attempts. Every now and then, even a student who might be thinking about shooting up the school.

  And then there were extracurriculars. Community meetings. Bike fairs. We were currently working on a talent show for all of Portland Public Schools. I did whatever I could to build relationships with students and parents.

  The irony was that I was close to so many kids. Just not my own son.

  But that was a problem for another day. And today a student was missing.

  “I need to talk to you about my daughter, Savannah,” Ms. Taylor began. “She never came—”

  I raised my hand, glancing meaningfully at the three students waiting in the office. They were all listening, and I knew they would be whispering about it as soon as they were back out in the hallways. Before lunch period, rumors about Savannah would be flying all over school. I motioned Ms. Taylor to follow me back to my tiny office.

  Once we were behind a closed door, I said, “I understand your daughter didn’t come home last night.” I’d never heard of Savannah Taylor before today, but Wilson was a big school. The secretary had told me that Savannah had transferred in from out of state and that so far, she was getting good grades. And that this was the first time she had missed school.

  “No, she didn’t come home.” Ms. Taylor blinked rapidly. “I was really hoping she might have come to school this morning, but when I called the office, they said she didn’t show up. I’m afraid she might have run away.”

  I pulled out my notebook, thinking about the many times I’d had this conversation with parents over the years. Give it a day, maybe two, and with luck, this would all be over and the girl would be home, not much worse for wear.

  But if it wasn’t, things would probably get worse for Savannah Taylor. Runaways had to sustain themselves, and typically they had no money or skills at doing so. She would need a place to sleep. She needed to eat. If Savannah had left without her school-supplied transit pass, she needed a way to get around. Even if she was currently couch-surfing at a friend’s, eventually she would be forced to go someplace else. Making her even more vulnerable to anyone who would want to take advantage of a teenage girl.

  “Has she done this before?” I asked.

  “Never.”

  A first-time runner. One who never skipped school. A smart girl, but maybe not the kind with street smarts.

  “Does she have a boyfriend or a girlfriend she might be staying with?” At this age, a lot of family arguments were about sex or sexual orientation.

  Ms. Taylor shook her head. “I don’t think she’s made a lot of friends here yet.”

  “Have you tried calling her?”

  “She left her phone behind. And I can’t see who she calls or texts or anything because it has a pass code and I don’t know it.” Sh
e paused, looked down at the tattoos on her knuckles. They read BABY DOLL. “I guess she had a fight with my boyfriend just before she left.”

  Left her phone. Fight with my boyfriend. My attention sharpened. Had we just gone from runaway to missing person? Or even from runaway to victim? “Were you not at home when this happened?”

  “I work swing shift, and Tim—that’s my boyfriend—he works days. I guess they had this … argument while I was at work.”

  “So Tim lives with you?”

  “Actually, we live with him. We moved here about seven months ago.”

  “Have he and Savannah argued before?”

  “This was the first time. They normally get along fine.” As she spoke, she looked away. Had Savannah left because she didn’t feel safe? Because it was in no sense “home”? Was she being abused?

  “What’s Tim’s last name? Where does he work?”

  “Hixon. And he works at Schillers Auto Repair.” She hesitated, then said in a rush, “Does all that really matter?”

  I kept on as if she hadn’t protested. “How about Savannah’s father? Could she be with him?”

  “Last I heard, he was living in Texas. Savannah hasn’t had any contact with him since she was two.” She grimaced as if her mouth tasted sour. “And she knows that he’s never paid child support.”

  “Is there any chance she could be suicidal?” New in town, no friends that the mom could name, father figures she couldn’t trust—it wouldn’t be a complete shock.

  “No. Never.” But Ms. Taylor’s breath shook.

  “Tell me more about what happened,” I said.

  “After she and Tim had their … argument, my daughter went to her kung fu class, but she never came back. And I know she was there, because I talked to the instructor this morning.”

  I blinked. “Kung fu? Is this the class taught by Sifu Terry?” Daniel loved Sifu Terry. He was always talking about him and about what they had learned in class. Some of the moves Daniel showed me were ones I’d tried to teach him before, but of course it wasn’t as interesting when your own dad was the instructor.

  Her eyes widened. “How do you know about that school?”

  “Because my son Daniel takes classes there, too.”

  Her eyes went to the nameplate on my desk and then back to my face. “You’re Daniel Diaz’s father?”

  “Yes.” Something inside me went still. Waiting. Waiting for the rest of it.

  “Sifu told me that he left while they were still mopping the floor.”

  “While who was?”

  “My daughter and your son. Savannah and Daniel. The last time anyone saw her, she was with Daniel.”

  JENNY DOWD

  I got up to use the bathroom. The girl didn’t even stir. That worried me. But when I leaned over her, her breathing was even.

  In the hallway, the light falling through the translucent vent cover let me know it was late morning. Without a phone, clock, or watch, it was so hard to keep track of time. Every day I made a tick mark on a paper napkin hidden in the back of a cupboard. But since I wasn’t sure when I’d started it, I didn’t really know what day of the week it was. Maybe even what month.

  After I flushed the toilet, I did what I no longer allowed myself to do.

  I turned on the bathroom light and looked at my face.

  Or what was left of it.

  I did not let myself blink. I made myself see it. Every inch of red that still showed the marks of being stitched together.

  My face was no longer a bloody, open horror.

  It was worse.

  I looked like a monster. Sir had taken out the stitches, but my skin was still angry, crimson and swollen, meeting in some places, gaping in others.

  My bottom lip had a hole in it now. The ripped edges of my torn left nostril had also refused to knit together. I whistled when I breathed, and I drooled all the time. A barely healed gash ran from the edge of my lower eyelid nearly to my chin. A bit higher, and I would have lost my eye.

  When my face started to burn, I realized I was crying, salty tears slowly leaking from my eyes. With a piece of toilet paper, I dabbed at them as lightly as I could. The pain still made me wince. Then I flipped the switch down and left. Since it was daytime, I decided it was okay to turn on the light in the bedroom. I wanted to look at her, check to see if she was okay.

  Lying on her side, curled around her broken arm in its makeshift splint, the girl still didn’t stir. Sir had said to let her sleep, that that would help her heal, but wasn’t there a point when it was too long?

  I sat back down on the edge of the bed. The girl’s scraped-up face was slack, her mouth open. She was so still. Could she be dead? A fist squeezed my heart. Holding my breath, I leaned closer. Her chest was definitely moving. Her hair was dark like mine, but wavier. It smelled so sweet, like apples. I had run out of shampoo months ago, and Sir hadn’t brought any more.

  Even though I was only an inch away from her face, her breath kept the same rhythm and she didn’t move.

  With trembling fingers, I reached out and gently cupped her left hand, the injured one. She still didn’t flinch or react in any way. Her fingers were the same color and temperature as mine. I released her hand. It stayed limp.

  After all these lonely months, here was this girl, plopped down in the middle of my bedroom. It felt like she filled up every square inch of space. She was an alien who had crash-landed on planet Jenny. Even asleep, she changed everything. Someone else to look at. Someone else to talk to, at least once she woke up.

  What would she think when she saw me? Would she scream? Throw up? The first time I saw myself in a mirror, I had gotten sick. Vomited so hard some of the stitches had ripped free.

  The quilt had fallen away from the top half of her body. Her green, short-sleeve T-shirt read MO DUK PAI. I said the words out loud. I said everything out loud now, just to have someone to talk to. Occasionally I recorded myself singing and then played it back and sang the harmony. Somehow these things made me feel less alone. When a faint frown creased her face, I realized I needed to remember how I had behaved out in the world. I went into the living area. Sir had left the backpack on the couch, so it must be hers. I looked inside. There wasn’t much. A wallet, a big library book about that kung fu guy Bruce Lee, and a black cloth sash that I figured must have something to do with the book.

  The wallet held three dollars. A little pocket that fastened with a snap held two quarters and a nickel. In the slots for cards, there were just three: a library card, a driver’s license, and a student ID for Wilson High. Her name was Savannah Taylor, and she was a sophomore.

  Maybe it was a good thing Savannah was still asleep. Now that I saw the RV through her eyes, it seemed cluttered and not all that clean. Some of it I couldn’t help, like the stains on the carpet and built-in chairs. But I could at least straighten up.

  Trying to be as quiet as possible, I started putting away the clothes I had washed earlier in the kitchen sink, even though they weren’t quite dry. To make things neater, I put things into piles. Then I balled up a paper towel, wet it in the kitchen sink, and began to swipe at the cobwebs in the corners.

  When I first realized that I was stuck here forever, stuck in a space I could cross in nine paces, I almost went crazy. The silence lay heavy in my ears. No one to talk to, nothing to look at. My friends, my family, the freedom to go anyplace in my car—all of it had been taken away as if it had never been. It was like living in a cave, with only my sounds to fill the space. I talked and sang to myself, but it didn’t make any difference. I was all alone, my thoughts pawing at me, day after day, night after night.

  I slept as much as possible. It helped me escape the pain of my face. And it made it so that I could return to the outside world, even just in my dreams. Time folded in on itself and then stretched out endlessly. A day could be the same as an hour, or an hour the same as a day.

  Some days I felt nothing but small. Others I felt enormous, the RV shrinking around me. I couldn’t tur
n without knocking over something. Whenever Sir came by, I would tremble with fear. But it was also a strange relief to know that I was not alone in the world.

  When Savannah woke up, she would have to deal with the same reality I had so many months ago. But at least she wouldn’t have to deal with it alone.

  DANIEL DIAZ

  I had never been summoned out of class to go to the office before. What was even weirder was that once I got there, the school secretary said my dad needed to talk to me.

  My dad and me had kind of an unspoken agreement. At school, we acted like I wasn’t his kid and he wasn’t my dad.

  A dark-haired lady with lots of tattoos was sitting in the waiting area. I didn’t know her, but something about her was familiar. She seemed to be staring at me, but maybe that was because by now I was also looking at her, trying to place where I’d seen those blue eyes before.

  I knocked once on the door to my dad’s small office, then pushed it open. Maybe no one else would have noticed, but his normal poker face was showing cracks. It was in the way his eyes turned down at the corners, how he pressed his lips together. Something was definitely wrong.

  I stopped in the doorway. I wasn’t going to take another step until he told me what was up. “Did something happen to Mom?” My voice broke, but I didn’t care. “Or Orlando?” Orlando was my younger brother.

  “What? No!” Dad sounded impatient. “They’re both fine.” He blew air through pursed lips. “Just come in and close the door behind you.”

  I did, but I didn’t sit down. “What’s up?” I still couldn’t read the emotion leaking out of him. Was he mad? Scared? And what did it have to do with me? I couldn’t think of anything I’d done wrong.

  “Just sit down, Daniel.” His tone was impatient. “Sit down and tell me what you did last night.”

  “Last night? I went to kung fu, came home, took a shower, had dinner, ate some ice cream, did my homework. Then I played video games and went to bed.” Dad had been at a community meeting, so he hadn’t been home for much if any of that. Having a dad who was a cop meant he might not be there for a kung fu tournament, a birthday party, or even Christmas morning. Ironically, we saw each other more at school than we did at home.