Freedom’s Child

Rebekah sniffs it. “I’m not allowed to drink,” she says to the glass. “Drinking is against God.” She doesn’t even realize that it’s illegal to drink before twenty-one years of age; the subject was just never brought up at home.

“Naw, sweetie pie, you ain’t gotta worry ’bout that.” He sits close to her in the booth so that she has to move over. “Fact is, God sent me here to look out for ya. A prophecy, ya know?” It isn’t uncommon to hear such talk around Goshen.

She smells the alcohol on his breath and shifts in discomfort but listens anyway. “You’re a prophet?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he says with an incomplete smile. “Our Savior told me that you’d be here, ’n that I needed to com’n getcha outta here and help ya turn from yer evil ways and turn back to the righteous path of God. That’s what He said.”

“He did?”

“Yes’m.” He looks back over his shoulder. “Why are you running away from home? God told me you was running away.” She looks at him in astonishment—perhaps he really was sent by God. But then she looks down and doesn’t answer. “Where are ya tryna go, sweetie pie?”

“The West Coast.”

“Why, hell, that’s where I’m goin’ too.” He keeps tonguing the sockets of missing teeth in his grin. “I can give ya a ride if you want.”

Rebekah gets a bad feeling and looks around the bar. The man leans in close, pressing the front of his body against her side, and breathes heavy enough to make her ear wet. He rubs her knee. “Come with me, sweetie pie.”

She turns her head but can’t get away as he starts kissing her neck, the fog of liquor about to make her sick. God, if you want to send someone, send someone else. Please, God, she thinks to herself. “You’re too close, mister.” She tries to push him away, but she’s too weak against his weight.

“Hey,” a second man yells behind him. She breathes easier when he’s pulled away from her. “You best just leave her alone.” Rebekah sees a young man in a soiled apron that’s supposed to be white, in a stance that says he’s ready to fight. “Now, I ain’t messin’, Joe, you just get on out of here, ya hear?”

“It ain’t like that, me ’n the girl was just talkin’, is all.” He puts his hands up.

“I’ve seen enough of what you call talkin’.” The cook takes the man’s hat and throws it hard into his chest. “Now I suggest you be on your way, I ain’t playing around.”

“Fine, fine. I’m leaving,” he says as he grabs his cap and drags his feet. Rebekah watches a few men from the bar start to gather around the cook. “But you ain’t seen the last of me, kid.” Eyeballed by almost a dozen other truckers who show signs of backing the cook up, the man leaves. When he’s out the door, the men go back to their spirits. Rebekah finds herself crying again, alone with the tall glass of beer he left behind. She doesn’t know what comes over her, but she puts the foam to her lips to taste it. The bitterness of it makes her cheeks water. Forgive me, Lord. She throws her head back and chugs the first beer of her life, breathing only out of her mouth in between swallows so as not to taste it. It runs down the side of her face and neck before she slams the glass on the table. She uses her sleeve once more to pat away the ale, with heavy gasps to catch her breath. She stands up and the room spins under her feet. She looks around for the man in the apron, but he isn’t there. She can’t explain what possesses her, the need to chase after this stranger. Perhaps this is who God sent.

“Have you seen that cook with the dirty apron?” Rebekah asks a bartender.

“Your hero just went to the back for a smoke,” she answers with a smirk as she dries mugs.

Using too much strength, Rebekah nearly falls through the screen door of the kitchen that leads to the back alley. Outside, the cook sits on top of a few red milk crates near full trash bags, smoking. The vents of the kitchen hum above them. “Thank you,” she blurts out. Suddenly, she feels awkward, with intervals of clearheadedness between the bouts of dizziness.

“It was nothing.” He smiles at her. She feels a flutter to her stomach, unsure if it’s the beer or the fact that she’s never before talked to such a handsome guy in all her life. He takes a crate and places it in front of him, waving her over to sit. “Where are you heading, anyway?”

She crosses her arms, too bashful to look into his eyes. “West Coast. Or as far as I can get.”

“Away from whoever did this to you?” He points to her face.

She clears her throat and looks down. “I had it coming.”

“No woman has it coming.” He winces with anger. “You don’t deserve that.”

“No, I did.” Rebekah looks to him for a moment. “Because I sinned.”

“Everyone sins.” His cigarette goes out and he relights it. “Doesn’t make it right, though.”

“I’m Rebekah.” She holds her arms tight, unsuccessfully trying to hide her body in the snug clothes.

“Gabriel.” He holds his hand out to her.

She stares at it with hesitation for a moment. “Like the archangel.” She puts her hand in his.

“Sure.” He sucks hard on his cigarette. “Like the archangel.”

Rebekah watches him shake his hair from the hairnet, a full head of black and soft locks over jade eyes. He unties his apron to reveal a white undershirt and sleeves of tattoos. “So you’re a cook?”

“Part-time. I help my ol’ man do drywall on the weekends. Helps me pay for tuition at U of L and my rent.”

“My brother went to the University of Louisville!” she squeals. “Did you know Mason Paul? He’s a big-time lawyer now.”

“Never met a Mason Paul, but it’s an awfully big school. Name sounds familiar, though. Oh, wait, sure, I know who he is. He’s the one defending the Becker case all over the TV. That Becker, sure gonna be one hell of a linebacker, I’d say. I knew the name Mason Paul sounded familiar.”

“What is school like?”

“You’ve never been to school?” She shakes her head. Suddenly, Gabriel realizes what kind of girl she is. Must be a Mormon or something like it, the sheltered kind. And now she’s running away, rebelling, naive. Those types come a dime a dozen back at the university. “You’re not missing much.” Her purity attracts him and he doesn’t want to stop staring at her. He can see that her frail bones and soft skin have never been touched in a way that they should have by her age. It’s like looking at the sands of a shore that’s never been discovered by the ocean. But he fears she will drown out there, out in the real world, away from her shielded existence. “You shouldn’t be trying to hitch rides cross-country with truckers. It’s dangerous for girls like you.”

“It’s my only way out.” She rubs the toes of her shoes on the dirt. “Do you believe in God?”

“I believe in something …” He looks away, not wanting to appear strange when he sees her shy away from his gaze. “When was the last time you ate something?”

“Yesterday, I think.” He puts his finger up and walks back to the kitchen. He returns with a burger and fries in a foam container.

“I can’t afford it.”

“Don’t worry about money.” He watches her inspect the food as if she’s never seen anything quite like it. “You need to eat.” She uses both hands at once to shovel the food into her mouth. “Why don’t you let me take you out one day? Like a proper date, before you head off to the West Coast, I mean.”

She looks at him wide-eyed. “I’m not allowed to date boys.”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty.”

“You’re old enough to make up your own mind and stop doing what your parents ask of you.”

“I do what God asks of me.” She continues to shove the food in her face. Gabriel takes his apron and goes to use it on her arm, where some ketchup spilled. But she pulls away, fearful, like an injured bird, broken in the sun and being circled by vultures.

Gabriel stares at her with wonder, and though she’s spoken only a few words, he’s fascinated by the mystery that surrounds her. He wants to know her more, he has to know her more. He could see her vulnerability from a mile away and feels the need to wrap her innocence in a blanket and keep it away from the cruelty of a world that wants to take it from her. “I’ll take you to the West Coast.” And as he says the words, he surprises himself. But she’s a reason, the excuse he’s been looking for to drop everything around him and see the world. “I know you don’t know me, but you can trust me.” For some reason, he expected more of a joyous reaction.

“Thank you,” she says, with her eyes down and half a cheeseburger in her cheek.

“Let me take you home. We can leave in the morning.” Really, his intentions are good. “You can have my bed and I’ll sleep on the couch. OK?”

“All right.” She believes this is her prayer come true, that God sent Gabriel to save her from the man who rubbed against her and wanted to take her away. She shows a glimpse of a smile as he takes his apron and throws it in the Dumpster behind him.

“Let’s go.” He leads her through the alley and toward the truck-yard. “I’m parked right over there.” He seems to almost skip in his pace. He stretches his arms over his head and looks up to the night. “Share this moment with me.”

“What?”