His Itinerant Soul

It was late, dark, and dreary when he found her. Besides the sound of the cold rain pelting his old, worn coat and the scratchy rasp of his breathing, the city was oddly quiet. Of course, he could make out the sound of taxis honking their horns and vehicles whizzing by on the outside of the alley, but all of that was just white noise to him now. He tore off his frayed gloves and fell to his knees before her.

She was pale, her dark hair falling in stringy strands across her cheeks, which wore no rosy color. He gently pressed his fingers to the hollow of her throat, pressing harder and harder when he felt nothing. The rain kept pelting his face, and he could not tell its acid droplets from his own salty tears, but he knew he was crying. No, he thought. No, this isn't happening. No. No! He took his hand from her neck, and cupped his face, rocking back and forth on the heels of his old sneakers. Peering through the cracks in his fingers, he looked at her again.

Her long eyelashes cast shadows over her hollow cheeks; the darkness of them matched the black color of her long, greasy hair. She was clad in stained sweat pants, a shirt many sizes too big, a brown raincoat which he remembered used to be a bright yellow, and slippers wrapped countless times in duct tape. She had been so beautiful. But no matter how much he looked at her face, he could not stop his eyes from looking at the empty bottle that had once been full of pills that lay in her lifeless hand. When did this start? She didn't deserve this. I didn't deserve this. He hit himself in the head.  Why did she do this to herself? Why?

"No, no," he moaned, stroking her hair. "Char, why? Why'd you do this? Why would you do this? No, no, no." All of the past came flying at him. He remembered their childhood together; telling ghost stories late at night in her tree house he had helped her dad build; the books they swapped as they read together in his room; doing every project in school together; walking in on their first day of high school with big eyes and a cat on their tongue, only to relive all of the details on the bus ride home together; that day in late spring junior year when he finally came out with the feelings he'd been holding in for so many years, that he loved her; one week later when, after steering clear of him for those long days, she told him she loved him too and they kissed; 7 months afterwards when she told him about her hate towards her older brother who had abused her for so many years, and that that was the cause of her bruises, not accidets; when he told her he was going to kill him, but she told him she just wanted to leave for a little bit, leave it all behind; when he told her they could run away together, and she agreed; that final night when they left letters for their families and spent their savings on a train from their life in Pennsylvania to a whole new one in New York. That's how they had ended up in the city.

At first it had been easy. They had bought fake ID's and lied about their high school education, and scored two jobs at McDonalds. Eliot found a group of runaways who said they had room for a couple more, and promised Charlotte that it would be safe for them to stay there until they saved up enough for a small apartment. They lived off of hotdog stands and water fountains, with the occasional visit to the homeless shelter when things got rough. They joked about making a sign that said, "If two teenagers from Pennsylvania can live in the big city, anyone can! -Charlotte Baker & Eliot Wood". But then the manager tried to make a feel for Charlotte, and Eliot started a fight. They both lost their jobs, and though they had gotten lucky the first time, they couldn't seem to find an opening anywhere.

As the money ran short, they started to lose some weight and black circles rose underneath their eyes. Their days were made up of wandering the streets stopping into every store they though they could maybe find a job at, and their nights were filled with sitting around a fire in the alley their new runaway friends welcomed them into. They created bonds with all of them. But one day, police officers found it and Eliot and Charlotte were lucky to get away. Charlotte broke down once they got far enough away, saying that she didn't want to go back to her brother, and that her father would be so disappointed.