Free Planet Lolita by Charles Foran

I’m tired of confessing.”
    “No one’s asking you to confess.”
    “It was just sex.”
    “It’s never just sex.”
    “For some of us, it is. Flirting. Fucking. Having a little fun.”
    “You’re a child.”
    “I’m a full-grown man. Believe you me.”
    She sobbed, a tight, almost gagging sound, as though she had tried to keep it in.
    “I hate this,” he said. “I wish we didn’t keep having this conversation.”
    “We can stop soon.”
    “You mean that?”
    “You
want
that?”
    The silence lasted for so long I thought they were going to get divorced right then and there. But Dad said instead, “You’ve kept the phone messages?”
    “I’m a lawyer. Of course I’ve kept the messages.”
    “If it comes to it …”
    “Right. And although I understand nothing about how things work in Asia, I can certainly attest to how helpful the legal authorities in most countries are in stopping human trafficking and prostitution. They’ll be of great assistance. Or, at least the ones not using the girls themselves will be.”
    “I’ll ask around. I will.”
    “Promise?”
    “Sure.”
    “I cannot fathom why they’re being so aggressive. It’s not like we aren’t holding up our end of the bargain. Between SARS, and this mess, Sarah is virtually a prisoner in the apartment. And you know,” she said, “I’ve never fully trusted Gloria as a helper. As a bodyguard, which we’re asking her to be now, I trust her even less.”
    For some reason, he agreed with her terrible words. “I learned things about how she cared for Xixi during the last outbreak that pretty much confirm your worries. She may not be fit for the job.”
    “You mean in Stanley?”
    He must have nodded.
    “Who told you?”
    “Xixi. Though she didn’t realize it.”
    Never would I say anything to get Gloria in trouble. Never!
    “They’re almost too close,” Mom said. “It’s like Sarah needs her. She shouldn’t—she has plenty of friends.”
    To swallow my own sound, I covered my mouth with first one hand, and then both.
    “Maybe not as many as you think,” he said.
    “There’s Kimberley and Chelsea and Miriam and, I don’t know, a half-dozen Britneys and Courtneys at that school. It’s like an
American Idol
episode, with Asian faces.”
    “Or post-American faces.”
    “Whatever that means,” she said, not unfriendly.
    “A lot of those girls haven’t been around—or maybe available—lately. Especially since school closed.”
    “Nonsense. They live on Skype and Tumblr and Facebook. They’re never unavailable. We should be too.”
    “What?”
    “On Facebook.
Her
Facebook. Checking to make sure she isn’t doing … well, I don’t know what,” she said quietly.
    By her tone, I could tell Dad had rejected her idea with a look, or a shake of his head. What a relief. If they demanded to see my Facebook, “Finding Mary” would never happen.
    “I think she’s lonely,” he said. “As well as a bit of a loner.”
    “Sarah is the most beautiful girl in her grade, Jacob. Loneliness could not possibly be a problem for her.”
    He sipped vodka. “You’re too busy at work,” he finally said. “
We’re
too busy.”
    “Excuse me?”
    “She needs Gloria right now. That’s all I’m saying.”
    “And what if she has another episode with only the amah present? She might, you know, given her reluctance to take her medication. And suppose the seizures grow more frequent, and stronger, as Alex Wilson suggested that they could? How will Gloria handle Sarah then? I cannot hold these multiple anxieties in my mind and still think straight.”
    Cicada noise—not music, noise—abruptly swelled, enough to flood my ears the way a Black Rain levels all sounds into a sustained thrum, the equivalent, I decided during one storm, of theloneliness, or maybe aloneness, of being alive but still trapped in the womb.
    “We could try having sex,” he said. “It used to relieve the stress.”
    She sobbed again, this time letting it