Free Run by Francine Pascal Page A

hundred and fifty bucks. Not bad. What the hell was she going to do with it?
    When she looked up, Gaia noticed she had stopped right in front of St. Joseph's Church. That couldn't be a coincidence. She stuffed the money and wallet back into her pocket and ducked inside the church.
    The place was perfectly quiet. There was no one in sight, and the sunlight streaming through the stained-glass windows revealed dancing particles of dust. Gaia found herself thinking how weird it was that all churches always smelled the same. Not that she'd been to very many -- just enough to know they all had that same damp, smoky smell.
    As Gaia wandered down the carpeted center aisle, she wondered how many times "Amen" and "Please, God" had been whispered in there. She got the feeling that if she listened carefully enough, she might hear the echoes.
    It occurred to Gaia that if the kidnappers were still watching her closely, a deserted church would be the perfect place for them to attack. Gaia wished they would. It would be nice to get this over with. Kick some ass, find out where Sam was, get him, and then go the hell home. She was tired of this already.
    There was an alcove toward the front of the church with a brass stand in it. On the stand were rows upon rows of stubby white candles in little glass holders, some red, some blue. Gaia smirked. Religious
and
patriotic.
    Gaia knew what the candles were for. One night when she'd first moved in with George and Ella, she'd stayed up late, unable to sleep, and watched a rerun of
West Side Story
on TV. Natalie Wood, as Maria, had a little setup like this one with the candles and everything, right in her apartment. She was lighting candles and saying prayers.
    Gaia went to the alcove and found what she was looking for -- a worn wooden box with Donations painted painstakingly across the front. Gaia was pretty sure she was supposed to make a contribution before lighting a prayer candle. Someone had to pay for all that wax. Fine with her. She stuffed Frank's money into the box. She figured that $350 bought her the right to start a bonfire. But she wasn't exactly good with prayers. She wasn't even entirely sure of what religion she was supposed to practice. Her family was one big melting pot.
    Next to the candles there were a bunch of skinny sticks, like extralong toothpicks, sticking out of a little pot of sand. The ends on some of them were charred.
    Okay, I get it, she thought. You use a lit candle to light the stick, then use the stick to light your own candle.
    She picked up one of the long, fragile sticks. Should she or shouldn't she?
    Part of her felt like a serious hypocrite. But a bigger part of her felt she needed help from wherever she could get it.
    She breathed in the church smell and thought about Sam. He didn't deserve this. No one deserved this. It was all her fault.
    Then she poked the stick into the flame of one of the burning candles. What prayer went with that one? she wondered. Had it been bigger than hers? Had it been answered?
    She held the stick over an unlit candle and for a moment just watched the flame dance. Then, in spite of her $350 donation, she slammed the burning end of the stick into the sand and got out of there.
    It wasn't that she didn't want to pray for Sam. She just wasn't sure how.

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    GAIA RAN ALL THE WAY HOME, hoping at every turn that she'd be stopped by another crazed fake homeless man with a note. No such luck.
    She was ready to scream with frustration when she rounded the corner onto Perry Street and caught a glimpse of George and Ella's front stoop. There was a package. Time for a sprint. It seemed like forever before the box was in her hands, but the card had her name on it. And since she didn't belong to the Jam of the Month club or anything, she was pretty sure it was from her friendly neighborhood kidnapper.
    She let herself inside (still no Ella, thank God) and took the stairs to her room in threes. After slamming her bedroom door and