The Search for Artemis - By P. D. Griffith Page 0,9
coursed through the dim alleyway. The wind flipped through page after page of the notebook lying next to him on the pavement, each leaf covered in his doodles and notes.
Based on the date printed on the newspaper he’d slept on, it had been just over three weeks since he ran away. If he were at home, Landon would have woken up resenting the fact that he was about to spend another boring day walking the halls of his high school. Landon actually wished he were sitting in a sterile sophomore classroom listening to the monotone ramblings of a biology teacher. He even dreamed about the school lunches. After a week or so of living off of other people’s scraps, school lunches started to seem gourmet.
Landon slowly rose to his feet. His body ached from head to foot after sleeping so many nights on the hard asphalt. Once he stretched, he picked up his notebook, stashed it in his duffle bag, and threw the bag over his shoulder. Maybe he would be able to find a half-eaten meal lying on top of a trashcan. That would be the most luck he had experienced in a week.
The alley shot off of Hugo Street, one of the city’s major roadways. It was lined in dumpsters and garbage cans intended to serve the tenants of the storefronts and apartments and spacious enough for a garbage or supply truck to drive through. Loose pieces of paper and debris littered the ground and trickling down the middle of the asphalt, a small stream of grimy water snaked toward the open street. Even with its size, the alley was probably the most depressing and disgusting place Landon had slept since he ran away.
He stared at the metallic zigzag of a fire escape as it cascaded down the brick facing of an apartment building. Since he went back to his apartment complex, he had been haunted by random images in his dreams. They were never more than images, but they didn’t make any sense to him. How could visions of flying books or couches on the ceiling make sense to anyone?
After looking through the garbage the store clerk had thrown into the dumpster for a potential morsel of food that resembled a breakfast, Landon decided to move on into the streets of the city. He wasn’t sure of the time of the day, but the city was alive. Cars congested the roads and honked at one another as they drove to their respective destinations. The sidewalks teemed with people who fought their way down the narrow paths. Landon noticed over the past couple of days that he didn’t have as much trouble moving through the streets as everyone else. People seemed to want to avoid him in any way possible and making eye contact was out of the question. He felt like an outcast. Was it the way he looked or just the way he smelled? When he ran away that night, he hadn’t thought to grab his deodorant off the dresser. Even so, this was more than stench. People seemed to avoid him like a plague, as if he were some sort of diseased menace to society. It started to take its toll on him because apart from feeling like he was running for his life, he also felt more alone than he ever had before.
As he walked down the sidewalk, he noticed a woman that looked surprisingly like his mother. He stopped in his tracks and turned, catching a glimpse of the back of her head moments before a sea of pedestrians blocked his line of sight. Could it really be her? Without thinking, Landon began to weave through the crowd, determined to catch another look. He ricocheted off a businessman and tumbled into a crowd of teenage girls, but none of this could avert his eyes from this woman who may be his mother. He started to gain ground, and he couldn’t wait to see her again. She looked just as he remembered. Her hair was large, brownish-black and frizzy from all her wild curls. It lay right under her shoulders and bounced with life as she walked. She also wore her favorite color, emerald green, and she was right there. Did he look so different now that she hadn’t noticed him when they crossed paths moments before? That must be it. It made sense; Landon was covered in dirt, his hair was greasy and matted to his head, and stains overran his clothes. Then