“Are you really just going to leave me alone with that?” I asked while looking down at the crumpled twenty dollar bill my mother had shoved into my palm. She did not even pause to look back at me as she reached for the heavy brass handle of our front door.
We were in our small apartment in Bakersfield on a humid Thursday morning. My mother, Lydia, was hauling two massive suitcases toward the hallway while her long nails shimmered with a fresh coat of bright red polish.
She wore sunglasses that were far too large for her face and they seemed out of place in the dim, dusty hallway of our building. She smelled strongly of expensive perfume, the kind she always wore when she wanted to feel superior to the people in our neighborhood.
I was only eleven years old and I was still wearing my blue school uniform. The day before, she had pulled me out of class early with a bright smile, promising that we were going to spend some quality mother and daughter time before her big trip.
There was no time spent together at all. I only watched her pack her belongings until way past midnight while loud travel videos played on her phone.
I sat on the worn-out couch pretending to watch cartoons, but my stomach felt tight and heavy the entire night. Every time I tried to ask her a question about where she was going, she only gave me a sharp and annoyed look.
“There is instant soup, some canned beans, and a loaf of sliced bread in the pantry,” she said without turning her head to look at me. “Make sure you do not make a fuss while I am away,” she added as she zipped up her final bag.
“How many days are you going to be gone?” I asked with a trembling voice. “I will be away for a few weeks because a great opportunity came up and I truly deserve this break,” she replied.
She talked about London, Paris, and Berlin, but I did not really understand what those places meant. I only knew that they were not here and that she was planning to leave me alone in a two room apartment where the power was about to be shut off.
We had a gossipy neighbor who never helped anyone without asking for something in return, so I knew I could not turn to her.
Before she stepped out, Lydia reached over and adjusted the collar of my blouse with a fake sweetness that she always used when she wanted to make me feel ungrateful.
“Listen to me very carefully, Maya,” she whispered while looking into my eyes. “You must lock the door and you must not tell a single soul that I am gone,” she commanded.
“People are abusive and they will try to take advantage of us if they know the truth,” she warned me. “Do not get me into any trouble while I am enjoying my vacation,” she said firmly.
Then she leaned down and kissed my forehead before dragging her heavy suitcases down the hallway. I remained perfectly still in the middle of the living room as I listened to the sound of her footsteps fading away.
For the first two days, I did exactly what she told me to do. I kept the door locked at all times and I carefully counted every piece of food we had left.
I made small sandwiches with bread that was already starting to go stale. I ate cold beans straight from the can and drank tap water because the milk in the fridge already smelled sour.
At night, I pushed a heavy wooden chair against the front door because the silence of the apartment felt terrifying without her there. The air felt heavier and uglier as if every little noise outside could somehow slip under the door and hurt me.
On the fourth day, the power finally went out just as I had feared. The constant whirring of the refrigerator stopped and the small fan in the corner turned off.
The entire house fell into a deep and haunting silence that made my ears ring. I sat on the cold kitchen floor with my nine dollars and a few coins in my lap, trying to decide if I should buy candles or save the money for food.
By the sixth day, I decided to go to school because I could not stand being in the dark apartment anymore. I wore my favorite oversized sweatshirt to hide how much I was shaking from hunger and nerves.
My teacher, Mrs. Patterson, stared at me for a very long time during the morning lesson. “Maya, is your mother doing okay lately?” she asked me when the other students went out for recess.
“Yes, she is just working a lot of extra shifts right now,” I replied from memory, using the lie I had practiced. But later that afternoon, I felt a sudden wave of dizziness hit me while I was in the school bathroom.
I vomited up the tiny bit of bread I had managed to eat that morning. When Mrs. Patterson found me huddled on the floor, I realized I could no longer keep lying so convincingly.
Half an hour later, I was sitting in the school infirmary with a small box of apple juice in my hand. I watched as a female police officer and a social worker walked through the door.
The officer, whose name tag read Riley, crouched down in front of me and spoke in a very gentle tone. “You are not in any trouble at all, sweetheart,” she said while reaching out to pat my hand.
“I just need you to tell me the truth so that we can help you,” she promised. For the first time since my mother had walked out that door, I felt more afraid of keeping quiet than I did of speaking up.
I did not tell her the story in a nice or organized way. I said everything as best as I could between heavy sobs and feelings of deep shame and anger.
I told them that my mom had left me all alone to go to Europe. I explained that she only left me twenty dollars and told me specifically not to tell anyone.
“We were running out of food and the electricity went out days ago,” I whispered while wiping my eyes. “I have been sleeping with a chair wedged against the door because I am terrified of hearing footsteps on the stairs,” I confessed.
Ms. Jensen, the social worker, went with the police to inspect the apartment while I stayed behind at the school. When they finally returned, they no longer looked at me with doubt or confusion.
Their expressions had shifted into something hard and serious. “We found very little in that apartment,” the lawyer said in a voice that sounded like stone.
“There is almost no food in the cabinets and there is a power cut notice posted right on the kitchen wall,” she noted. Then she paused for a moment and looked at Officer Riley before looking back at me.
“What is wrong with my mom’s room?” I asked when I saw the look on her face. “The room is almost entirely empty, Maya,” she replied softly.
I did not understand what she meant immediately. Officer Riley decided to say it more clearly so there would be no confusion.
“Your mother did not just leave on a whim, she planned this trip very carefully,” the officer explained. That phrase hit me much harder than the hunger in my stomach ever could.
Up until that exact moment, a part of my heart had kept making up excuses for her. I thought that maybe she had been forced to leave or that she would be coming back any minute.
But the truth was that she had packed all of her best clothes, her makeup, and all of her important documents. She had left me the bare minimum amount of money and food just so she could leave without feeling guilty.
That night, I did not go back to the dark and empty apartment in Bakersfield. They took me to a house in a neighborhood called Oildale that belonged to a woman named Rosemary.
Rosemary was a retired nurse who spent her time taking in children who were in emergency situations. I thought a foster home would feel cold and uncomfortable like I was just a borrowed child in someone else’s life.
But as soon as I walked through her front door, she draped a soft blanket over my shoulders. “What would you like to have for dinner tonight, Maya?” she asked with a kind smile.
I could not even find the words to answer her. I simply burst into tears when she placed a bowl of hot chicken soup and fresh bread in front of me.
For the next three weeks, the authorities tried their best to locate where my mother was staying. She was not missing or in any kind of danger at all.
