me and then just as quickly lets it go. I turn to find a guy whose expression can only be described as appalled, or maybe stricken. “You okay?” he asks with such intensity that I flinch. He doesn’t give me a chance to answer before he’s unzipping his hoodie and pulling it off. “Here. Put this on.”
I stare stupidly at the gray sweater.
“Should I call an ambulance?” he asks gently when I don’t take it. “Or the cops?”
What? No! I shake my head jerkily.
His gaze locks on my shoulder where my dress is ripped, causing shame to burn across my skin and set my heart on fire. The mixture of alarm and horror on his face reduces me to what he must see; a pathetic and broken woman.
I reach for the sweater and he doesn’t hesitate to help me into it. I jam my cellphone, that’s still clutched tightly in my hand, through the sleeve.
“Thanks,” I whisper, looking him straight in the . . . chin? As I raise my eyes, I frown. I don’t look up to many men when I wear heels.
“Let’s sit over there,” he suggests, indicating a bench down the street. I go willingly, surprised my instinct to run isn’t being triggered like it was upstairs.
Once we’re seated, I try to wake my phone again, but the screen remains stubbornly dark. I pry the case away from my phone. “No!” I hiss. My ID is there, but my emergency cash is missing.
“Don’t worry,” he says from beside me, stretching out his long frame so he can dig his cellphone out of his jeans pocket. Offering it to me after he punches in his code, he seems to be focusing on anything but my face.
Cautiously, I take it and then we both watch my thumbs hover over the numeric keypad until a choked sound erupts from my throat and my shaky hands fall to my lap. “I don’t know any of the numbers. They’re all in my phone.” Feeling completely defeated, I backtrack in his phone and punch the location button. The incredible relief I feel almost brings me to tears. I’m just in Mountain View, not far from my apartment in East Palo Alto at all. Now I just need a way to get there.
“Listen,” the guy says. “I’m not going to offer you a ride because that would be creepy, but I’ll order you an Uber, okay?”
I look into his concern-filled brown eyes. “I’ll pay you back,” I whisper.
“That’s not necessary. I’ve got three sisters and a daughter,” he says darkly, pushing his long blond bangs off his forehead. “If any of them,” he takes in my appearance again, “were in a similar situation, I’d want someone to help.”
I hand back the phone, gratitude and mortification warring inside of me. As he pulls up the app to call a ride, I suddenly wish that I was worthy of his concern, that I could reassure him that this has never happened before, that I was just a good girl caught in a bad situation. But I don’t want to add liar to the growing list of negative words that could be used to describe me, a list that already includes fool and binge drinker.
The few minutes it takes for the ride to arrive are mostly filled with my worried glances being thrown in the direction of the apartment building’s main door, and my stranger’s concerted effort to keep his attention averted.
“Thank you,” I murmur when he opens the car door for me.
He barely nods, probably eager to be rid of me, like the sight of me is too awful for him to contemplate. It gives me a second to get a better look at him though. He seems younger than I first thought. With his sun-kissed skin and sandy blond hair, I feel like he should be headed to the beach with a surfboard under his arm. But I’ll never know because the car pulls away from the curb and I leave him behind forever.
During that quick, ten-minute car ride, I resolve to change my life.
This isn’t who I want to be.
Scott
On my way out the door, the convenience-store smell of greasy hotdogs and stale coffee gives way to the almost warm, evening air of late March in Northern California.
University Avenue outside Stanford is busy with people looking to unwind on a Friday night and I’m definitely one of them. I hope the caffeine in this soda gives me enough of a boost to keep me