Page 3 of Save Me

“My dad’s here on business,” she says suddenly. “Well, kind of. We’re on a family trip, and stopping here is half-business, half-family trip.” She laughs.

I inhale at the sound. My lungs burn, but it allows me to take in the faint scent of lavender.

“This doesn’t seem like the kind of neighborhood where robberies happen.” Her gaze sweeps up and down the length of the alleyway.

Though the alleyway is small and dirty, she’s right. This part of the city is full of high-end retailers and businesses.

Yet, I scoff. “Nothing is what it seems,” I mutter.

She turns back to me, her forehead wrinkling.

I look away.

“Hey,” she calls when I start to limp away. “Where are you going? You should at least get to a hospital or a doctor.” She comes up beside me, trying to help, but again, I don’t let her touch me.

“No,” I protest. “No police. No doctor. I’m not worth it.” The words fall from my lips like the truth they are.

“What? Why would you say that? Everyone’s worth it. Every life—”

“Kennedy!” a voice calls.

She gasps and inhales. “That’s my mom. Shit, she must be looking for me.” She turns to yell down the alleyway, “I’m here!”

Using her distraction to get away from her, I push through the pain in my body to stumble my way out of the alley, tripping over garbage bins as I move.

I’m forced to stop and catch my breath once I reach the other side of the building.

Something propels me to peer around the building, though. I spot an older Black woman with two burly men in black suits rushing toward the girl.

“Kennedy, where have you been?” the older woman asks. She looks a lot like the girl.

“I-I was here helping …” She holds her hands toward where I once stood. “Where did he go?”

Her gaze sweeps down the alleyway, and I pull away from the building so she can’t see me.

“He was right here.”

“Who?” the woman asks.

“A boy, he was getting beat up.”

Her mother says something.

“Uncle Brutus, can you help me find him? I think he was hurt,” she asks.

That muscle in the center of my chest, which I once thought had stopped beating, constricts. There’s care in her voice.

For me.

Someone besides my mother is concerned for me for the first time in longer than I can remember.

“Kennedy, we can’t,” her mother says. “Everyone is waiting for us at the restaurant.”

“I … Uncle Brutus, please,” she pleads. “Can you just check to see if you can find him?”

She gives him a description of what I look like.

“I think he needs help.”

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