Free The Dream Where the Losers Go by Beth Goobie

by him. All last summer, she had sat staring through wired-over windows at a world in full bloom, and there had been no colors, the air without scent, absolutely still. Then San had visited, and placed Jigger’s photo in her hands, and the colors in his picture had been so intense, they had burned her fingers. Nobody knew, nobody knew how Jigger touched her. “Skey,” he whispered, and she came alive in her skin.
    When he dropped her off Wednesday after school, he parked half a block from the gate and watched until she passed through it and was out of sight. Then he started up the car, revving the engine heavily as he drove past the grounds. As the sound of the car faded, Skey felt it take some part of her with it, pulling her into the distance to be with him. Colors, sounds, feelings. Meaning . Slowly she approached the lockup’s side entrance, its heavy wood door so old, it looked as if it opened onto another century. Ringing thebell, she waited until a staff peered through the wired-over window. With a groan, the door opened onto the inside, with its set of stairs leading upward, past Administration on the first floor, Unit A on the second, Unit B on the third and Unit C on top of it all.
    After the outside light, the stairwell seemed dark. Silently Skey trudged up the stairs after the staff, listening to the sound of girls’ voices and the stereo coming from Unit A. At the next landing, she turned and followed the staff into the entrance hall that led into Unit B. Over her head, circles of light shone from implanted ceiling lamps. The first door in this short hall opened onto the Back Room, a small room into which a girl was placed if staff thought she couldn’t handle things on her own. If she went stark raving mad, a girl was taken over to the school and put into one of several padded rooms that were opposite the gym. Viv had already spent time in these rooms, but Skey had never seen the inside of any of them. Continuing along the hall, she passed the girls’ tub room and the door that opened onto the office. Here, the entrance hall ended and the unit’s open area began. All she had to do now was cross it without anyone noticing her, and disappear into her room.
    “Skey,” called a voice, and she turned toward the office to see a tall male silhouette standing in the brightly lit doorway. Skey blinked, trying to make out the face. It got so dark in this place that sometimes it was difficult to see the most basic things. Raising a hand, she traced the air in front of her face. Was there a carving here? If there was, would it tell her where she was, what she was supposed to be doing with her life, why ?
    “Ready for our meeting?” the voice continued heartily. “Your mother’s waiting.”
    Abruptly, the darkness faded and Skey saw her social worker, Larry Currie, standing in front of her, waving his usual cheerfulness like a flag. As always, it brought out a savage anger in her, made her want to punch her name right off his lips.
    “Yeah yeah,” she mumbled. So, it was time for the mother-daughter bonding thing, strengthening the family chains. Fortunately only her mother had decided to attend these meetings. Mr. Mitchell had declared himself too busy to attend his daughter’s improvement sessions.
    “Just a sec,” said Skey. “I have to dump my books.” Crossing the unit, she stepped into the moment of relief that was her room. Aloneness descended upon her and she stood staring out her window at the gray-wired sky and the slow-moving elm. Then a shuffle sounded behind her, and she turned to see Ann standing in the doorway. Skey nodded and she stepped in.
    “Pencil case,” said Skey.
    It was on the bed, out of the line of sight from the office. When two girls were in a bedroom, the door had to remain open at all times. Carefully, Ann removed the weed from Skey’s pencil case and slid it into her shirt pocket.
    “Don’t forget the matches,” said Skey.
    Without a word, Ann headed straight for the