Safety Behind Colored Glasses

          “Well, SCREW YOU! You’re a bunch of corporate pigs anyway,” Maddie screamed as she threw her McDonald’s visor at the pimply teenage manager.
          She slammed the door to the office and flipped off the kid who made fun of her. On the way through the lobby, she grabbed onto the hand of her friend Sara, and dragged her out the double doors.
          “Maddie, what are you doing?” Sara whined, “I need this job.”
          “Come on, Sara, they are poisoning the nuggets with Ritalin. This place sucks. Let’s go down to Alkai Beach and contemplate the end of the world.”
          “I’m going back inside before the manager sees. I’m sorry, but you know I have to help my mom with rent. I’ll call you later. Maybe we can go out,” Sara said as she opened the door and straightened her uniform.
          “Whatever.”
          Maddie walked around the corner just in time to see a bum, slumped against the side of the building, lean over and puke on the sidewalk.
          “Classic,” she whispered to herself as she ripped off her McDonald’s polo, exposing her Sex Pistols tee-shirt beneath.
          “Hey. Hey girlie, you got any change?” The old man croaked at her, his hand still wrapped around a greasy paper sack shaped like a MD 20/20 bottle, puke glistening in his long, gnarled beard.
          Maddie ignored him as long as she could while waiting for her bus.
          “Come on, pretty girl,” he growled as he swirled down another shot.
          “Listen old man—I’ll scream if you say another word. There’s a cop right there. See him? Now, shut up and leave me alone!”
          Maddie stormed down the block to the underground bus station. The cool air swept her hair back as she rode the escalator down to the platform where about thirty people waited for the bus to the Central District of Seattle. She decided to walk to the next stop and ride the buses to think for a while.

*          *          *

The week before, she had met a street kid in the University District in Seattle. Usually those kids were loud with laughter, throwing snide comments like knives, but not this one. The boy looked about fourteen. His pants were layered in grease as if he worked in a garage, and he wore mirror tinted ski goggles. This kid didn’t say anything when Maddie strolled over and sat cross-legged next to him on the cement, under the awning of the gyro place.
          “Those x-ray goggles or something?” Maddie asked, poking the inside of his armpit.
          “Yoo-hoo?”
          The boy’s arms swiveled around to block her extended hand from touching him again, and spun Maddie around until her face grated into the sidewalk and her arms were pinned at the small of her back. For a moment she lay paralyzed.
          “What the hell. . . Get off of me you psycho!”
          She tried to kick him, but the scrawny boy was strong or at least he knew how to hold someone down.
          “Who are you?” His voice scratched.
          All of Maddie’s anger over being bested drained onto the concrete. Suddenly, she just felt tired.
          “I won’t touch you if you let me up. Please?”
          Maddie told herself she needed to stop talking to the crazies on the street. In a way, she supposed she was just looking for her father. The last time she saw him, he was standing in front of an empty building staring at the ground. She tried to shake him awake, but he just stood there. He couldn’t even lift his head. If she understood insanity, she thought, maybe she wouldn’t catch schizophrenia like her dad.
          “Who are you?” The boy repeated as he let her up slowly, still holding onto her forearm with a tight grip.
          Maddie looked out and saw that no one even seemed to notice the skirmish between them. People in the city tended to ignore trouble. Her eyes swung down to her arm, and she noticed the kid’s hands. Through his skin, she could see the blood vibrating in his veins. He squeezed her arm tight again, enough to make her look up.
          “Sorry, kid, I didn’t mean to scare you. I just wanted to talk to someone new. My name is Maddie. You don’t look like you belong here. Are you lost?” She asked in her most motherly voice.
          “I don’t know. I woke up here. Where am I?” The kid muttered.
The lines of his face morphed into lines of fear.
          “There was a man yesterday; he gave me a ride and a sandwich. I took a nap in his lap while he was driving. He petted my head like my mom used to…”
The boy’s body started heaving like he was going to cry.
          “The man said he would help me find her, but then I remembered, I remember...”
Suddenly the hand that held her captive wove through her arms, and he laid his head on her chest.
          “It’s gonna be okay, kid. Where do you live?” Maddie asked.
          “I live at a hospital; there are a lot of nice people there. We play games and take walks. That’s how I got lost, on a walk. I had to go pee. The nurse lady told me to wait, but I couldn’t. Then they were gone.”
          It took her a couple of minutes of talking before Maddie figured out that somebody had picked him up near the state hospital at Medical Lake. She held her anger in. The guy that picked him up sounded like a total creep. Normally she didn’t associate with the law, but the kid needed help she couldn’t give him. It wasn’t like he could be her pet. He had witnessed the murder of his folks; his name was John.

*          *          *

          After about an hour of riding the bus through town, she got off at the SeaTac airport. Maddie liked to watch the people, trying to guess where they were going, and what their lives were like. Near the Alaskan Airlines check-in, there was an area with couches. On one of them sat a little blond-haired girl about five, with her hands folded in her lap. She stared at Maddie, and Maddie grinned back at her. The mother, dressed in a business suit, looked over and whispered something to the child. The girl turned away, embarrassed. Mattie’s smile melted, and she cursed to herself. As she stood up and walked away, she heard the little girl ask her mom, “But why is she wearing skiing glasses?”

Heather Java is earning her AA degree from WVC this spring and moving on to Central Washington University. We consider her a career student. She considers herself a Renaissance woman, but hates math and cheese.