As far back as I can remember, everything I’ve ever owned has fit in one plastic bag. It was a white grocery store bag with two handles. Until this fire, I still had the bag with me. I could never just throw it away. Instead, I tucked it under the clothes I had.
I was placed into foster care when I was four years old. My mother dropped me off at the babysitter with a kiss on my head, telling me she would see me later.
"There is nothing else I can do," the babysitter hissed at her husband, who was sitting beside me on the worn brown and yellow couch. She picked up the phone again. "This isn’t funny. If you don’t call me back in the next thirty minutes, I have no choice but to call the cops."
I looked from the babysitter back to the television, my stomach rumbling from not eating since I had been there. "Would you feed the kid?" her husband barked when my stomach kept interrupting what the guy on the television was saying.
With a huff, she grabbed me by my arm and brought me back into the kitchen. She set me at the table and said, "Your mother will be here soon." I just nodded and looked over at her. I waited and waited while she made mac and cheese, and for a four-year-old, it felt like forever, but she finally placed it in front of me.
Hearing a knock on the door made me look up, and I suddenly remembered how happy I was, knowing that my mom was there. I ran to the front door, only to be confronted by two police officers. They came in the front door and then went into the kitchen while I was told to sit on the couch. I couldn’t really hear anything but their mumbling. Another knock on the door made me get up, thinking for sure this was my mother.
The door opened, and a woman came in, dressed in a long skirt and a white shirt. I remember looking at her and wondering if my mom sent her to come get me. Her friends were always picking me up and taking me places.
The woman went to the kitchen, giving me a sad smile on the way there, and I just didn’t understand what was going on. "Looks like you are going into the system," the husband said from beside me. "It was just a matter of time."
One of the police officers came back out with the woman who just got there. "Hi, Asher," the woman said, sitting down next to me. "I’m Shauna, and this is Detective Moro." She pointed at the police officer standing in his blue uniform. "We are going to take you somewhere while we find your mom."
I wanted to laugh at the irony of it. I slept at someone’s house that night. I woke up the next day, hoping that my mom would be there, but for the next three days, it was the same story. No one knew anything. No one paid attention to me. The person fed me two meals a day and made sure that when Shauna came to see me, I was clean. For three days, I tried to stay awake. I constantly looked out the window for my mom, convinced she would come soon. But that wasn’t how the story would end. Four days later, they found her lying on a stainless-steel stretcher in the morgue.
She was in the car with a guy driving high and drunk and ran head-on into the median on the highway. I was a ward of the state from that day on, jumping from one foster home to the next. It didn’t take me long to realize I was a paycheck for all of them, and trust me, they let me know each day.
I feel someone push me to the side, and I blink away the memories. There is no time to dwell on the past. That was my motto from when I turned thirteen. Turning my head, I see all the men have gathered around us. Ethan stands beside me, and Beau is next to him. Casey comes close to us, but he stands just outside of the circle. His hands are going crazy on his phone. My eyes go back to the ground as I listen to Jacob give orders.
"Gentlemen," he starts. "The fire marshal wants us to secure the premises," Jacob says, and I look at him, the pounding in my head intensifying. "The fire marshal just said he doesn’t think this fire will be out anytime soon." He looks at me, then at the other guys. "It’s going to be a long night." He stops talking when he looks up and sees Casey coming back to us.
All eyes turn to him when he stands beside Jacob. "Just got off the phone with my father. He said there has been no activity on the other farms." He looks down. "But until we get any report from the fire chief, I want us to keep our eyes open." He looks at us, and I nod at him.