Free Call Me Home by Megan Kruse Page A

see him in town, they’ll kill him.”
    I looked at my mother and at the woman. “That’s where I want to live,” I said. It said it loud.
    â€œSmart girl,” the voice said.
    Try not to think of the times when things were not what they seemed: when your mother carried in a bowl of yellow pears that had been eaten to lace by insects, and how you watched her from the kitchen window as she cried, wondering at her despair. Or the long week she stayed in bed and no one said why. You knocked and knocked, but your brother led you away. He fed you whatever you wanted, straight from the cupboards. Don’t think of these things. Let them be over or they will break your heart.
    It was as if I went to sleep and woke up in a dry and brittle country, and I was older, with a different name, and I had no brother. The dreams started, that my father was coming for us. On those nights I practiced everything I knew. To truly disappear, you must change everything. Forget your habits. Choose a different life. Understand that who you have been is gone and will never comeback. I said it to myself over and over: My name is Lena Harris, I am thirteen years old, I’ve lived with my mother, right here, since the day I was born.

Jackson
    Silver, Idaho, 2010
    THE CREW BOSS WANTED TO SEE HIM. SLOW HONEY DELIVERED the message to Jackson from the window of his pickup, just as Jackson had pulled up to the sawhorse to start in again, slowly splitting the beams the way he’d been taught. Shit, Jackson thought. He’d spent the whole afternoon praying he didn’t fuck up, and now he’d fucked it up anyway. It had something to do with the night at the bar – he could feel it in his gut. What had he said – something about shoes. Too much innuendo for that crowd, that’s for sure. He might as well have just told them he’d sucked cock for cash – that he’d do it for free! – and then let the chips fall. This was much worse, to have to answer for something he’d only insinuated. Where next? Who did he even know? Back to Portland? Back to Washington? His father in his armchair, the TV dinners he must be eating now. The new girlfriend he’d be fucking on the terrible worn mattresses.
    He put all of the tools away, stacked the wood he’d been about to work with in a neat pile. Everything in its place. “You want a ride?” Honey asked.
    To where? “Where’s he at?” Jackson asked.
    â€œEast side,” Honey said. It was worse than he thought. He was going to the rich side of town to be fired.
    â€œYeah.”
    Honey drove him in Riley’s pickup, which made him think that maybe Honey wasn’t as slow as they said, to be allowed to drive that shiny, expensive car. Everything’s relative, sure, but Honey seemed just fine.
    â€œLots of metals out here,” Honey said. He hauled metal from the sites to Kellogg on his own trailer. It saved Jackson and the rest some of the work, and Honey made enough to live on, selling the bulk for a few cents on the pound, dragging a magnet to separate the pure weight from what was more valuable – aluminum, copper.
    â€œYou make good money?” Jackson asked.
    â€œSure.”
    There was a long silence; Honey moved the truck around deep potholes, steering it expertly with one hand.
    â€œFriend of mine,” Honey said, “put siding on his whole house. Corrugated metal. Didn’t spend a dime.”
    â€œWow,” Jackson said. Maybe he could haul junk with Honey when they kicked him off the crew. “Hey, do you know what he wants me for?”
    â€œNah.” Honey bumped the truck over the potholes. “Bet yer scared, huh?”
    â€œWhat did I say, Honey?” Jackson asked. Scrubby branches squeaked the windows. “Did I do anything really stupid?”
    â€œWhat do you mean?” Honey asked, and Jackson began to understand why everyone called him Slow.
    â€œI’m