Peachfuzz called Kitty from jail.
“What? Where?
What happened?” Kitty said. She was standing in the kitchen. Her mother sat at
the table drinking hot Ovaltine and pretending to read a Woman’s Day magazine she’d brought over for Kitty.
Kitty moved into
the next room and shut the door, knowing her mother would be monumentally
pissed by this simple, isolating action of ensuring privacy. Her mother didn’t
like to be excluded from anything. She would act insulted.
Kitty said, “So
you’re in jail. What do you expect me to do about it?”
Peachfuzz was
crying and Kitty wished she could slap her through the phone. What a terrible
time for this shit. Terrible.
Peachfuzz’s
sentences were punctuated with hitching, breathless sobs: “Can you come get
me?...Huhn-huh...Please? Get me out
of here! Huhn-huh...Can you? Please?”
“Okay, calm
down.”
“...Huhn-huh...”
“What were you
arrested for?”
“They said I was
publicly intoxicated and resisted arrest... Huhn-huh.
But I wasn’t. I didn’t.”
“So what do you want me to do?” Kitty asked again.
“Can you come and
bail me out? Can you bail me out and take me home?”
“How much is
bail?”
“A thousand.”
“Dollars?”
“No, Spanish
doubloons.”
“Do you really want to be a wise-ass right
now? Do you really want to test my patience at this critical juncture?”
“Sorry, Kitty.
But I’m scared!”
“Calm down, Peach.
Anyway, I don’t have that kind of cash. I’m sorry...”
“But you haaaaaaaave to get me out of HERE!”
Peachfuzz screamed and Kitty pulled the phone away from her ear.
“Okay, okay,
relax. Jesus. I’ll do the best I can. Where are you?”
“Woonsocket. At
the police station.”
“Woonsocket. Were
you dancing last night?”
“Just get me out,
Kitty!”
“Okay. Sit
tight.” She hung up the phone, went back into the kitchen.
Her mother raised
her gaze from the magazine and looked at Kitty with a knowing smile on her
sideways, stroke-mouth.
“Whull what issit
nis tine?”
“Um. Mom? Could I
borrow five hundred dollars? It’s kind of an emergency.”
Her mom’s smug
smile turned into a lopsided grin.
Oh shit.
Later that afternoon, Kitty walked Peachfuzz out of the
police station. She was still crying and hanging onto Kitty as if unable to
stand on her own. Seeing her this way humbled Kitty’s heart. Peachfuzz’s hair
was oily and flat, her makeup smudged and streaked. Her bottom lip was swollen
and a scrape on her chin had dried to a tough, rust-colored scab. Her T-shirt
was torn in several places, the knees of her jeans spotted with dark, ground-in
dirt.
What the hell had
happened to her?
“What the hell
happened to you?”
Peachfuzz had
curled up in the backseat. “I can’t ride up front now,” she’d insisted. Her
knees were pulled up to her chest, her eyes closed. She’d finally stopped
crying, but sucked up a sniffle every couple of minutes. Her guilt and shame
were a third presence in the car.
“I don’t want to
talk about it,” she said.
“Peach, I just
spent a thousand dollars on your ass. Do you know what I had to do to get that
money? I won’t go into it but it was a lot. I think you at least owe me an
explanation.”
“Where’d you get
the money?”
“I drained my savings
account for some - so long rent money - and borrowed the rest from my mother.”
“Oh shit. Your
mother...”
“Yeah. I know.
See?”
“Thanks, Kitty.
I’ll pay you back. I promise.”
“Damn straight
you will. But first you’re gonna tell me what the fuck happened to you last
night.”
“I feel sick.”
“Peachfuzz. Spill
it.”
Peachfuzz
whooshed out a long, weighted sigh. “One of the customers tried to rape me.”
“What? Where?”
“At the Pink
Lady. In the parking lot.”
“You got into his
car?”
“...”
“I said, you got into his car?”
“Yeah, but...”
“So you were
turning tricks again. You got into a strange man’s car and he attacked you.”
“Well, yeah but
no...”
“But nothing.
What did I tell you? Didn’t I say how dangerous that was? To do that? You know
how many psychos hang out at that place?”
“Yeah, but he
wasn’t a stranger. He was one of the regulars. Ray. He seemed like such a nice
guy. Just a sweet, lonely guy.”
“You know what? If
I’d known you got busted for turning tricks I never would have bailed you out.”
Peachfuzz started
sobbing again.
“Oh shut up.”
