Francis 1, 1985

My dad went inside the store and I waited, sitting in the car, looking around. I knew he wouldn’t be gone long. I got out of the car, crouching down, walking quietly, hunched over alongside the row of cars. I got to the last one and looked back to the store. He was still inside. I ran to the sidewalk in front of a bank in the corner of the parking lot, peeking around the corner to make sure I hadn’t been seen. Looking down the busy street for an opening in traffic, I ran out across Warner and down the street a couple of hundred yards, making a left turn into a residential area. I slowed down to a jog, trying to stay on the grass close to the houses, looking back to see if I could see his car. I cut across a school, over a fence, into the heart of the neighborhood. I wasn’t worried he’d find me here. I was less than a mile from my friend’s house and I walked through the neighborhood, down the street and across Springdale.

I knocked on the door. Are you supposed to be here, he asked. No, I said. We went into the living room and I sat at the bar, my friend poured us glasses of scotch from his father’s liquor cabinet. We drank. What are you going to do now, he asked. I don’t know, I said. We went into the backyard and sat in chairs in the sun. It was 75 degrees outside and the sky was clear and blue. The ocean was 2 miles away. We sat back, holding our glasses of scotch, talking about 2 girls we had crushes on. They were friends. We called them to see if they were home.