Runaway

The wind whipped my hair around my face in various ways as I ran down the deserted, back route, dirt road with my guitar case in hand, backpack in place, and multiple song lyrics flooding through my mind. I didn’t know where I was going nor did I care. All I knew and all I cared about was getting away from this stupid, Podunk town they had told me to call home before they called my disappearance in. No one would care if I disappeared though, I would be eighteen in a month and I highly doubt that social services would want to waste their time and money trying to find a runaway foster kid when it usually took them three months to catch said kid, if they got lucky that is. It’s true, I won’t deny it, I probably had a whole filing cabinet drawer to myself due to the amount of foster homes I had been in and run away from since the day my mother died when I seven. None of those people had ever really cared about me to begin with though, they had just cared about the money and hoping that the next kid they got stuck with would be more well behaved, so I ran. I ran from the families, I ran from social services, and I ran from my past, present, and future.

“Hit me again Justin,” a gruff voice demanded at the bar barely ten feet away from me.
“That’ll make ten beers in the past hour Dave,” the bartender, who I assumed to be Justin, replied as he wiped down the counter, “I’m cutting you off.”
The man he was directing his sentence toward let out a snarl under his breath before pushing himself off of the bar stole and wobbling out the door, no doubt going to find a bar that would give him another beer.
“Hey kid,” Justin called out and I looked up from my lap to see him looking at me, “Are you going to order something?”
My heart gave a great heave at the fear that he was going to throw me out if I replied with a no but I shook my head honestly anyway. The fear of being thrown out of the comfy bar and into the more then stuffy night time air seemed to dwindle away as his eyes scanned my face and then the guitar case and overstuffed backpack sitting on the floor next to me.
“Where are you from?” He asked curiously, not taking his eyes of me as he reached under the counter and pulled out a can of Sprite.
“Sanford,” I whispered quietly before looking back down at my lap again.
“Well, welcome to Fritch,” he said before sitting in the chair across from me at the small table and letting the can of Sprite slide over the table before it stopped in front of me.
“I don’t have any money,” I protested and pushed it back towards him as my throat started to itch with thirst.
I may be a pro when it comes to running from foster homes but I’m not a camel, I had run over 6 miles and my last sip of anything was nearly twelve hours ago.
“It’s on the house,” he pushed the can back towards me again and I looked up over my eyelashes at him, “So what brings you to Fritch anyway?”
My eyes immediately flashed back down again before I gripped the can tightly in my hand and brought it up to my lips while I tried to think of a reasonable lie to tell him.
“Thirsty?” he laughed as I set the empty can back down on the table and a small smile managed to escape on my lips, “You’re not from around here are you?”
“How could you tell?” I twiddled my thumbs nervously.
“No accent,” he answered lightly, his own Texas accent pounding in my ears.
“Right.”
I made no attempt to avoid the sinister silence that followed my one word reply.
“So what are you running from?” he asked after a few minutes and my head snapped up in shock, “Abusive parents? Social services? An overbearing boyfriend maybe?”
“Second one,” I muttered scratching the back of my neck nervously, why was I telling a complete stranger this? Better yet, why was a complete stranger interested in my life?
“When are you going to be eighteen?” he questioned as he leaned across the table slightly.
“In about a month.”
“Justin, I don’t pay you to chat with customers!” an angry voice yelled and I nearly fell off of my seat as I jumped in surprise, “Get back to work!”
“I’ll talk to you later,” Justin sighed before getting up and walking back behind the counter.
I f I was smart then I would gather my stuff and leave before he had a chance to call social services to tell them he had an escapee foster, but something was telling me to stay. Maybe it was the hope that I could get a few more free drinks out of him or perhaps even the underlying feeling that he somehow understood everything I had been through. The first one seemed less crazy.

“Not sure, probably over fifty,” I answered as I tried to remember all of the foster families I had been placed with over the past ten plus years.
He let out a long whistle before shaking his head.
“What?” I asked after taking a small sip of the pop that he had set in front of me at the end of his shift.
“And all these years I thought I had had it bad,” he continued shaking his head and I let my hair fall in front of my face to hide the light blush that had started to form on my pale white cheeks.
“You were in foster care?” the question slipped out before I had a chance to stop it and I bit down on my lip hoping he wouldn’t get upset.
“From the day I was born until the day I was eighteen,” he answered, “I wasn’t in nearly as many homes as you though.”
“I get that a lot,” I chuckled, “The number would probably be a lot lower if I’d stop running after about a week after placement.”
“So you’re the running type huh?” his facial features had come together to form a teasing smirk, “You’re not going to run off on me now are you?”
“Not tonight,” I reassured him, “I’ve had enough running for one day.”
“I’d say that you’ve had enough for a lifetime. Who are you running from this week?” his tone was light and joking but I felt my heart give a jolt.
I stayed silent and I knew that he had picked up on the fact that I didn’t want to talk about foster care anymore. I don’t know why I felt compelled to tell a complete stranger my entire life’s story in one night but there was just something about him that made me feel safe. That made me feel loved.
“So what’s your name?” he had dropped his voice to a whisper and he was leaning across the table again.
“Can’t tell you that,” I teased, “You might call social services and give me away.”
“Do you really think I would do that?” his eyes had pulled together, “I was in the same position you were when I was about your age.”
“No,” I avoided his eyes but I could still see the large smile as it formed across his face, “No I don’t think that you would do that.”
“Good, because everyone needs someone they can trust,” he reached his hand across the table and took mine before giving it a reassuring squeeze.
Somewhere deep inside of me, I knew he was right. I needed someone I could trust, and he needed someone who could trust in him.
“Riley,” I let my voice fade out quickly as I tucked a few stray pieces of hair behind my ear with that hand that he didn’t have in his possession, “My name is Riley Griffen.”
“Well Riley Griffen, are you any good on that thing?” he questioned and motioned to my guitar case.
“I’ve been teaching myself how to play since my mom bought it for me, I’ve been writing my own songs since I was ten,” I answered timidly.
“Well in that case, do you want a job here?”
“What?” I looked at him with pure shock and confusion written on my face and he smiled brightly, his eyes gleaming.
“This place needs some music in it and you need a job, old Bob even says so. The question is though, what do you say?” my face brightened in an attempt to match the smile he was giving me as I nodded eagerly.

**One Month Later**
I sat down on the stool that had been placed next to the unplugged jut box, people seemed to think that it was funny to play songs on there and drown me out when they were drunk, and pulled my guitar onto my lap before flipping my hair over my shoulder so it wouldn’t get in the way. I snuck a glance over at Justin who was trying to convince Dave, for the third night in a row, that he had drunk his share of the supply and should head home in a cab.
“Riley, I don’t pay you to stare at your coworkers!” Bob yelled and I let out a puff of air before turning my attention back to the guitar in my lap, “That’s more like it.”
My fingers gripped the pick I was holding in my hand tightly as it brushed along the strings that I had been playing for eight years. The gentle strumming of the guitar flowed throughout the bar and I watched as several pairs of eyes, drunken and sober, turned to watch me.
“Nobody said it would be easy. Nobody gives you guarantees ‘cause a heart can always be broken and there can be no loving without tears. Runaway to a place that nobody knows. Runaway, I gotta let this feeling go. Runaway if I can’t find love. I gotta runaway,” my voice melted in with the guitar and I closed my eyes so that I could focus on what I was doing, “Nobody’s looking for perfection. How could they give it in return? But I told myself to believe you and you just gave your love to anyone. Runaway to a place where nobody knows. Runaway gotta let these feelings go. Runaway cause I don’t to hurt anymore. Though my heart is always searching if I can’t find love I gotta runaway.”
I let my eyes travel back over to Justin and I saw that he had stopped arguing with Dave to listen to the new song I was playing tonight.
“Runaway, runaway, runaway. If I can’t find love. If I can’t find love. ‘Cause the heart can only be broken and there can be no loving without tears. Runaway to a place where no one knows. Runaway, gotta let these feelings go. Runaway and I don’t want to hurt anymore,” Justin had made sure I didn’t need to hurt anymore once he had found me, “Though my heart is always searching. If I can’t find love I gotta runaway. Runaway, runaway. If I can’t find love, I gotta runaway. Runaway, runaway. If I can’t find love, I gotta runaway. If I can’t find love, if I can’t find love, if I can’t fine love, if I can’t fine love.”
I felt my fingers come to a stop and a small amount of clapping brought me back from the world I had escaped to while singing. I had written that song the night that Justin had first found me, scared and alone in this very bar, while he snored in his bedroom and I sat restlessly on his couch trying to figure out why this carefree, twenty-two-year-old cared in a way that none of the fosters I had ever been with did.
“Riley,” Bob grumbled from the open door of his office and I shook my head clear of thoughts before starting up on my usual round of songs.
You would be surprised though, just how fast time passes when you zone out and let your memory do all the work for you. Because next thing I knew, I was playing for Justin and Bob as they finished locking up the bar for the night.
“Ready?” Justin asked stopping in front of me with his thumbs hooked into my back pockets.
“You bet,” I answered and hopped off of the stool before kneeling down and gently placing my guitar into its case and then buckling it shut. No offense to Justin, Bob, or even Dave but I had a list full of places that I would rather be on my eighteenth birthday.
“So where did that new song come from?” he took my case from me as I stood up, something he insisted on doing every night, and looked at me curiously as we started making our way to the backdoor.
“I wrote it on your couch,” I laughed, “The night we met.”
He nodded as he closed the door behind us and I heard Bob lock it shut as Justin and I started making our way up the stairs that lead to the small apartment over the bar that we lived in. I had to admit, I’d fallen hard for this boy over the past month. Let’s face it though, in a few weeks when he finally remembers that I’m eighteen now and don’t need to run from social services, he’ll kick me out and tell me it’s time to grow up. He had been an unofficial foster family, that’s all.
“So how was your birthday?” Justin asked unlocking the door and then leading the way in.
“It was good,” I answered tonelessly as he kicked off his cowboy boots and I did the same with my old, ratty pair of sneakers, “Thanks for the new strings and guitar pick by the way, I really needed them.”
“No problem,” he chuckled.
I yawned deeply and stretched out as he plopped down next to me on the couch that was positioned in the middle of the room. I let my back fall against the couch again before my head tilted to the side so that it was resting comfortably on his shoulder. His arm wrapped around me protectively and I tried to fight off the butterflies that were starting to take flight in the pit of my stomach.
“So how many did Dave have tonight?” I whispered into his shirt and there was a light rumble in his chest as he laughed.
“More then I want to count. I’m telling you Riley, that man Is going to keel over one day because of Alcohol poisoning or a destroyed liver,” his voice went from joking to serious as he spoke and I wrapped an arm around his waist as I tucked my legs up behind me on the couch.
“Doesn’t he have a wife or kids? Anyone that could get him to stop?” I questioned.
“No, he doesn’t have any kids and his wife left him nearly twenty years ago. That’s why he drinks, says he’s got no one to live for so he doesn’t see why he should,” he replied, “I know where he’s coming from though.”
“What do you mean?”
I looked up at him and saw that his five o’clock shadow was coming back in the same form it has been this morning before he shaved.
“I felt the same way before you came along,” he smiled down at me and the butterflies took flight again, “You’ve changed my life Riley.”
“And you’ve changed mine,” I whispered, causing a brighter smile to break out on his face before he leaned back and kissed me with every single bit of love that he had in his being.