Paris: The Memoir(35)

Every time I heard a car coming, I jumped the guardrail and hid in a ditch or behind some bushes.

It was late afternoon. The sun disappeared behind the ridge. I was cold and scared, but I was on fire with adrenaline. I felt like I was in a movie. This was some James Bond shit! Sticking close to the road, hiding from approaching vehicles, I ran for what seemed like a long time. I don’t know how far. Eventually, I saw a bright yard light through the trees and followed the glow to a small parking lot outside a roadside travel place—like a combination restaurant and gas station. By the side of the building, there was a pay phone.

Oh, God. Thank you.

Remember pay phones? Do pay phones even exist anymore? Thinking about how grateful and relieved I was to see that grimy outdoor phone bolted to a pole—it makes me want to buy one and install it in my foyer.

Using a trick all club kids know, I lifted the receiver and toggled the flippy thing underneath until an operator came on.

“Operator,” she said. “Do you require assistance?”

“Yes! I need to make a collect call to—” Fuck. I didn’t know who to call. My parents might not listen. Gram Cracker was too far away to do anything. “I need to call Kyle Richards.”

I gave her my aunt’s phone number.

The operator asked, “Who should I say is calling?”

“Star,” I said.

Kyle answered and accepted the charges. “Paris, honey—”

“Kyle, you have to save me. Please. And don’t tell Mom. Just come and get me, Kyle. Please. Please, hurry. This place is fucked up. The people are crazy abusive, and Mom doesn’t—”

“What do you mean by abusive? Did one of the other kids hit you?”

“No, it’s not—please. I’ll tell you when you get here. You have to come right now. Please. I need you to get me out of here.”

“Where are you?” she asked, and I told her the address listed on a card next to an ad for a taxi service.

“Okay, just wait there,” said Kyle. “Don’t go anywhere.”

I went behind the building and scrunched down in the weeds. After a little while, a police car rolled into the parking lot.

“Have you seen a blond girl?” the cop asked someone coming out of the restaurant.

Shit. Shit. Think. Think. Think. Hide.

A door on the back of the run-down building was blocked open, probably venting heat from the kitchen, and there was a narrow stairway just inside. As soon as the cop went away, I crept up the stairs and went behind some boxes of Christmas decorations and things where there was a kind of crawl space over the rafters. I scrunched into the shadows and waited, looking down on the restaurant below me, inhaling the smell of fried chicken and potatoes, letting the music move through me. I didn’t know until that moment that it was possible to be physically hungry for both food and music, but I was.

Hours went by. Cops came and went. The enforcers from CEDU came and went. The bartender shrugged. “Nope. Haven’t seen her.”

Perched on a narrow board, I forced myself to stay awake so I wouldn’t fall. That was the hardest part. I was so tired. Kyle was coming from LA. It would take a while, but she was coming, and we would drive fast, away from this shithole place to a town with a McDonald’s. The waitress went back and forth, serving burgers and soup of the day. Oh, God, I was so hungry. Eventually, she chased the last of the late drinkers from the bar, set chairs up on the tables, and mopped the floor, chatting with the cook as he cleaned the kitchen.

They turned out the lights and left.

Fuck my life.

Now Kyle would have no way to get in. She was probably outside right now. I stretched my cramped legs and crept down the stairs. I pressed my ear to the door. Nothing. I opened it a crack and peeked out at the silent parking lot. Moths flittered around the lightbulb above the phone booth. I went to the pay phone and called Kyle again. She accepted the charges, and I was like, “Kyle, where are you? Did you call the police?”

“No,” she said. “No, of course not.”

A heavy hand clamped around my neck. I tried to hold on to the phone, but the enforcer lifted me off the ground and threw me into the SUV. They drove back to the school, which was actually only two or three miles away. I guess I was running in circles part of the time.

People were still at the Propheet thing, looking like a bunch of red-eyed zombies. Weaselmug looked like this was the happiest moment of her life. She hauled me up in front of everyone and said, “Well, look who it is!”

I didn’t even see the back of her hand coming at me. Next thing I knew I was down on the ground. An enforcer hauled me up, and they just went crazy on me, hitting and choking me, and shrieking at everybody to look what happens. And everybody looked. Their eyes were as big as soccer balls. A lot of them were crying. No doubt, this was an intense thing to witness, and I suppose that was the whole point. That’s why they didn’t need barbed wire or steel bars or iron doors. There was something a lot stronger keeping people inside.

They had horror stories about dead kids in the woods.

They had everyone teed up to tell on everyone else.

They had the people who love you fooled.

Aunt Kyle was in her twenties when this happened. Not much older than me. We’ve never talked about it, but looking at it from her perspective at the time, how would she not call my mom? Her big sister. My parents did what you’re supposed to do when your kid disappears; they called the police. I was angry when I was younger, but the more I learn about how hideously clever CEDU sales tactics were, the more compassion I feel for my family. At every step, they genuinely believed they were doing the right thing for me.