Seventeen

Sometimes Alice would see kids, teenagers, in love or whatever and she would become confused and angry. Alice couldn't understand why they couldn't see what was coming. Or maybe they could and were just postponing the inevitable, making good use of what they had while they had it. She sometimes wanted to shake them and tell them the truth about life and about growing up and growing tired and growing old. She envied them, though she would never admit it to herself. They were morons. Moonfaced, soft-skulled idiots. A pair of them passed her now, ignoring sidewalk and crosswalk alike, one hand each in the other's back pocket. The girl with small, high breasts and curly black hair, the boy with smooth cheeks and fuzz on his upper lip.

Boy are they in for it.

Alice herself had been young and felt a fire within her. She had always thought that there was something great just under the surface of her skin, ready to emerge. Something that would command respect and esteem from people. It pressed outward from within her ribs and she was stirred when she thought about the size of the earth and all the people in it. When she was seventeen she had almost run away with a war veteran who came through town. He stayed for a few nights at the Days Inn. They spoke at the diner where she waited tables and he told her about the war. He was headed to Tuscon, where he had no family or friends. He wanted to start as fresh and blank as a newborn child and Alice could think of nothing more thrilling. He stayed late one night at the diner, after closing and talked to Alice for a long time. They sat close in a booth and he put his hand on her thigh. Alice was embarrassed and, trembling, asked him to leave. Secretly she thought of his warm, rough hand all night and the next day. She dreamed of going with him to Tuscon to live in an apartment together and do some kind of work that would be important and fulfilling, though she didn't know what kind of work it would be. That night he didn't come to the diner and the next morning she went to the Days Inn and found out that he had left town. She went to the diner and told the cook that her mother was sick and could she have the day off to look after her. Then she went straight to the bus station and bough a ticket to Cincinnati, the furthest she could get with the money she had. She would hitchhike or make some more money there so that she could continue on to Tuscon and find the soldier. He would be expecting her, he would know she was coming and welcome her as part of his new life. She had to wait a long time for the bus and as she sat on the wooden bench in front of the station she began to feel foolish. She thought of her sick mother at home with no one to take care of her (even though this had been a lie). The bus arrived, the doors opened and Alice couldn't stand. She just sat on the bench and quivered inside, too afraid to move. The bus driver looked at her and said finally well, are you getting on? but her tongue was cotton and her throat was ash. She thought she would cry, and was only able to muster a silent shake of her head, eyes wide and wet, nostrils flared. The driver closed the doors and drove off. Alice stood while the dust settled around her and then suddenly ran at full speed, back to the diner where she found her apron and went to the dining room to finish her shift.