Scott Wittenburg - See Tom Run

She smiled wanly. “No, it’s fine. There’s really not a whole lot to say other than I was adopted as a baby and that I’ve been in several foster homes throughout my life. That’s about all there is to it.”

“How long have you been on your own?” he asked, recalling that she lived alone in her own apartment.

“Oh, about six months.”

“Do your foster parents live nearby-I mean in Ohio?”

“If you’re referring to my last ones, yes. In Cleveland.”

“You keep in touch with them?”

“Not really. Listen, Tom. I appreciate your interest in my past but I’d prefer not to say anymore about it. No offense, but I really don’t think I can do it. Not now, anyway. Maybe later, I don’t know. Do you understand?”

Tom was angry with himself-he realized that he’d pushed her too hard much too soon. He should have taken more time with her.

“Sure, I understand. I’m sorry, Erin. I won’t pry anymore.”

She held his eyes for a moment and said, “I didn’t think you were prying, Tom. It’s just that, I don’t know, my past has not been the kind that anyone would be proud of. In fact, it has been horrible and disgusting. I don’t want you to think badly of me. I’m afraid that if you knew about my life, you… you wouldn’t like me anymore!”

Tom’s was stunned. She couldn’t be any further from the truth.

“That’s ridiculous, Erin! I don’t care what you’ve done or not done before-it won’t change how I feel about you now. I really like you. A lot. And I care about you a lot. Nothing you could do or say would ever make me think any differently of you.”

She smiled sweetly. “You really mean that?”

“Of course I do.”

“I think that’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me,” she said, her eyes welling up again.

“Well, I just want you to know that it’s true,” Tom said, offering his hand to her.

She took his hand in hers and squeezed. She breathed a long sigh of resignation, as if she were about to shed a great weight off her shoulders. “My life has been so, so pathetic! You are not going to like what I’m about to tell you.”

“Try me,” he said encouragingly.

Erin sighed deeply. “Well, I guess I’ll start at the beginning. My first memories of growing up were in Youngstown. My first foster parents were very nice to me and it wasn’t until I was older, seven years old to be exact, that they let me know that they weren’t my natural parents. That crushed me.”

“Why would they tell you that in the first place, especially at that young age?”

“Because they could no longer afford to raise me, that’s why. My foster dad had lost his job and my mother had just been a part time waitress. They tried to make ends meet but simply couldn’t-Youngstown had fallen on some hard economic times. So they had to send me back to the adoption agency.”

Tom was speechless. Surely her foster parents could have tried harder to make it work instead of taking that route. He bit his tongue, though.

“So what happened then?”

“I was adopted by another family. They had a couple of other kids, too, so it was sort of neat. At first, anyway.”

“What do you mean, ‘at first?’”

“Let’s just say that my new father was-well, he molested me.”

Jesus! Tom thought. How much worse could this get?

“Oh Erin, I’m so sorry to hear that,” was all he could say.

“It went on for three years. Finally, he got caught. By my foster mother. I was out of that place in a flash.”

“You had never told anyone before?” Tom asked, bewildered.

“No, are you kidding? He told me he would kill me if I told anyone, and I believed him!”

Tom was speechless. All he could think of was this poor orphaned girl who had first been rejected by one family only to be relocated to another one with a parent that was supposed to be raising her molesting her. How in Christ’s name could anyone be that cruel?

Erin said, “I know what you’re probably thinking now: oh poor little Erin. But don’t think that way, Tom. It wasn’t the end of the world and I don’t need your sympathy. I probably deserved what I got

…”

“That is an absurd thing to say, Erin! No child deserves to be abused, period. I can’t believe you would even think like that.”

“You could never understand, Tom. No one can. I felt lucky just having a roof over my head and living a fairly normal life instead of being forced to live in some awful orphanage. I can’t begin to describe what goes on in orphanages but trust me, it’s worse than you could ever imagine.”

“All I know is that I hope they punished the bastard who did that to you. What ever became of him?”

“I don’t know-I never heard any more about it. I had to go back to the orphanage after that, which was in Cleveland, until someone else adopted me again.”

“And how long was that?”

“Too long. I started picking up some pretty bad habits at the orphanage.”

“Like?”

“Stealing. Smoking cigarettes. Lying. Drinking. Should I go on?”

“I’ve got the idea. Go on,” Tom said, feeling sick in the pit of his stomach. He had a feeling of what was coming next.

“By the time my most recent foster parents adopted me, I was a teenager. And they were very good people. The only problem was, I didn’t realize that at the time.”

“How’s that?”

“Oh, I put them through so much hell! I was a horrible kid-I hated school, got into fights, drank and smoked much of the time. I even got into shoplifting just for the thrill of it! And my parents tried so hard to get me under control. But it was useless. I was useless…

“I eventually fell in with a pretty bad bunch of kids, to say the least. We skipped school all the time, went out to the lake and got high instead of going to classes. Basically, I was an incorrigible delinquent. By the time I was a sophomore, my high school career was all but over before it had really begun.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I got suspended twice and almost got expelled altogether. Yeah, I was that bad! But before I could totally screw up at school, Kyle came along to save me.”

Tom noted the sarcasm in her voice. She continued.

“I was partying with some friends one night when I met Kyle. He seemed like this really cool dude because he dressed so weird and was from New York, which we all thought was about as awesome as you could get! We got high together and talked about all kinds of stuff and I just went crazy over him. He really seemed to like me, too.

“He told me all about New York, and how he had his own movie production company in Manhattan. I was impressed and asked him how old he was. He told me he was twenty-three and had graduated from N.Y.U. with a degree in film the year before. Then he told me that I should go back to New York with him-that I could be a model or an actress if I was willing to work hard enough. He said I had a great look and that he had all kinds of connections. He told me that the industry was always looking for cute young girls like me.

“I was of course floored by all of this! I mean, New York City-a model or an actress- me? I basically asked him when we could leave and if now was too soon!”

Tom imagined the scenario Erin had just described: wayward teenage girl, potential school dropout at age fifteen or sixteen and seasoned partier who had zero self esteem being confronted by Mr. Big City Shit, dressed hip and years older, with his own “movie production company” in Manhattan at age twenty-three, ready to make a star out a vulnerable young girl whose life already seemed like a dead-end street

…

Could Erin have fallen for a character like Kyle any easier?

“So that night, literally, I went home, told my folks I was going to bed, then packed up and snuck out my window without them even hearing me. Then I left with Kyle to the city.”