Orphan Train

tossed
     in the trash and Molly rescued, black Walmart sneakers.
    “They’ll find you someplace better suited,” Ralph says.
    She looks up at him, brushes the bangs out of her eyes. “Oh yeah? I won’t hold my
     breath.”
    “Come on, Moll. Give me a break.”
    “You give me a break. And don’t call me Moll.” It’s all she can do to restrain herself
     from flying at his face with her claws out like a feral cat. Fuck him. Fuck him and
     the bitch he rode in on.
    She’s too old for this—too old to wait around to be placed with another foster family.
     Too old to switch schools, move to a new town, submit herself to yet another foster
     parent’s whims. She is so white-hot furious she can barely see. She stokes the fire
     of her hatred, feeding it tidbits about bigoted idiot Dina and spineless mushmouth
     Ralph, because she knows that just beyond the rage is a sorrow so enervating it could
     render her immobile. She needs to keep moving, flickering around the room. She needs
     to fill her bags and get the hell out of here.
    Ralph hovers, uncertain. As always. She knows he’s caught between her and Dina, and
     utterly unequipped to handle either of them. She almost feels sorry for him, the pusillanimous
     wretch.
    “I have somewhere to go, so don’t worry about it,” she says.
    “To Jack’s, you mean?”
    “Maybe.”
    Actually, no. She could no more go to Jack’s than she could get a room at the Bar
     Harbor Inn. (Yes, I’d prefer a water view. And send up a mango smoothie, thanks!)
     Things between them are still strained. But even if things were fine, Terry would
     never allow her to stay overnight.
    Ralph sighs. “Well, I get why you don’t want to stay here.”
    She gives him a look. No shit, Sherlock.
    “Let me know if I can drive you anyplace.”
    “I’ll be fine,” she says, dropping a pile of black T-shirts in the bag and standing
     there with folded arms until he slinks out.
    So where the hell can she go?
    There’s $213 left in Molly’s savings account from the minimum-wage job she had last
     summer scooping ice cream in Bar Harbor. She could take a bus to Bangor or Portland,
     or maybe even Boston. But what then?
    She wonders, not for the first time, about her mother. Maybe she’s better. Maybe she’s
     clean and sober now, with some kind of steady job. Molly’s always resisted the urge
     to look for her, dreading what she might find. But desperate times . . . and who knows?
     The state loves it when biological parents get their shit together. This could be
     an opportunity for both of them.
    Before she can change her mind, she crawls over to her sleeping laptop, propped open
     on her bed, and taps the keyboard to nudge it awake. She googles “Donna Ayer Maine.”
    The first listing is an invitation to view Donna Ayer’s professional profile on LinkedIn.
     (Unlikely.) Next is a PDF of Yarmouth city council members that includes a Donna Ayer.
     (Even more unlikely.) Third down is a wedding announcement: a Donna Halsey married
     Rob Ayer, an air force pilot, in Mattawamkeag in March. (Um, no.) And finally, yep,
     here she is—Molly’s mother, in a small item in the Bangor Daily News . Clicking through to the article, Molly finds herself staring at her mother’s mug
     shot. There’s no question it’s her, though she’s wan, squinty, and decidedly worse
     for wear. Arrested three months ago for stealing OxyContin from a pharmacy in Old
     Town with a guy named Dwayne Bordick, twenty-three, Ayer is being held in lieu of
     bond, the article says, at the Penobscot County Jail in Bangor.
    Well, that was easy enough.
    Can’t go there.
    What now? Looking up homeless shelters online, Molly finds one in Ellsworth, but it
     says that patrons have to be eighteen or older “unless with a parent.” The Sea Coast
     Mission in Bar Harbor has a food pantry, though no overnight accommodations.
    So what about . . . Vivian? That house has fourteen rooms. Vivian lives in about three
     of them. She’s almost certainly home—after all, she never goes anywhere. Molly glances
     at the time on her phone: 6:45 P.M . That’s not too late to call her, is it? But . . . now that she thinks about it,
     she’s never actually seen Vivian talking on the phone. Maybe it would be better to
     take the Island Explorer over there to talk with her in person. And if she says no,
     well, maybe Molly could just sleep in her garage tonight. Tomorrow, with a clear head,
     she’ll figure out what to