Into the Light

2:27 p.m. Sunday.

The diner is packed. Not surprising. It’s off a long stretch of the 5. Lots of campers. Families heading out to hike or visit relatives. There isn’t a big city for hundreds of hundreds of miles in any direction. Even fewer places to grab breakfast. All of the booths are taken, so after I push through the glass door connected to the motel lobby, I slide into a seat at the end of the counter. Glance up at the TV.

And wait.

I ignore the din. The sound of joyful voices. The scraping of utensils on plates.

I wait.

A waitress sidles up to me. Good afternoon, honey, she says, her voice thick. There’s a little twang in it.

I glance at her. Brunette hair, a nice orange hue in her lipstick. She smiles.

I point to the TV. It’s a rerun of some old sitcom I vaguely recognize. Is that on channel 19?

She looks to where I gesture. I don’t think so. Why? You want me to change it?

I nod. Press my left hand against the front pocket of my jeans, feel the few folded bills in there. And I’ll take an orange juice. And a side of waffles. Extra syrup.

She drifts away for a moment, then returns with a remote. Flips a few channels, then drops the remote next to me. I’ll be right back with that OJ, she says, then winks.

I wait for the cartoon to switch over to a commercial. I don’t prefer this, but I don’t have consistent access to a smart phone or a computer.

So I wait.

My heart thumps as the animation fades to black.

There’s an off-white clock hanging over the door I came through. I twist round, glance at it.

2:30 p.m.

The music swells, and even amidst the countless conversations around me, I recognize every note, every beat of the drum, every wordless harmony sung as the words appear on the screen:

CHRIST’S DOMINION

WITH DEACON THOMPSON

And then he’s there. On the screen. Deacon Thompson, his eyes always as blue as I remember them. He smiles.

I shiver.

There are five children surrounding him. I think it’s a good sign. He’s done so many broadcasts by himself lately. I scan quickly for any sign of her.

I see three kids with light brown skin, dark hair. A Black girl with her hair to her shoulders, straightened, her lips stretched open wide in a smile. An Asian boy beaming at the camera.

The children are close, almost as if they are vying to be on camera with Deacon.

And she’s not one of them.

I lean back. Heart sinks. Familiarity creeps in because … well, this is a rerun, too. I don’t hear the words Deacon says, though I can probably guess what they are. He’s talking about the children: how important they are. How he’s saving them. How broken the world is that week, with a long litany of sins.

And everything he and Christ’s Dominion have done to repair it.

I know he’s not reading from a script. I know that he probably means it all.

The waitress sets a glass of orange juice at my side. Lingers for a moment. I peer up at her.

You know, I might just go to hell for saying this, but that Deacon guy is kinda cute.

I don’t respond.

You know, in a spiritual way, I guess.

I nod at her, offer a weak smile. Yeah, I guess.

She shrugs. And he wants to save the children! Put God back in our lives. Can’t say the same about most people.

She doesn’t wait for me to respond before she heads to one of the booths.

I have gotten good at biting my tongue. At holding it in. I can’t say what I want to say because …

Well, she won’t believe me.

No one will.

But me, I don’t believe a word he says. Not anymore.

So I halfheartedly eat the waffles when they arrive, dousing them in syrup, knowing that they’re empty calories but they’re calories all the same. I only have twenty dollars in my pocket, and this will draw me back eight bucks. Nine with a tip. Not sure where I’m going to make more money, and the thought creeps back.

Maybe it’s time to leave.

The music swells again. I look up. Watch the number flash at the bottom of the screen, the one you’re supposed to call to give money to help all the children that Deacon is rescuing. Images flash forward: a toddler walking jerkily toward an adult couple. The kid has the same deep brown skin tone as me. Same black hair. His parents are pale and grinning and that’s the dream they sell you: Give us money. We’ll save them.

It changes. A group of kids—not one of them white—sit in a classroom. The classroom. Harriett Thompson—Deacon’s wife—is there, lecturing to them, and they nod, attentively.

And for a brief moment, my sister is on the screen.

She’s tall. Long black hair. Beaming with gratitude. In faith. I don’t know when this was recorded, though. It’s been hard to guess. Deacon’s show is broadcast over this tiny network throughout the week. It’s a recent thing, and most of these are the same as the ones that appear on his YouTube channel. His church … it’s all online. No place of worship. Just an online movement. So these videos are how he reaches people.

I think I’ve seen them all. Have most of them practically memorized. Maybe he’s trying to reach people who don’t use YouTube though. Thus: these public broadcasts. Always at the same time every week in different local markets across California.

I wonder if that means I’m close to them—close to her. I still don’t know. I’ve tried calling in on that number they list between the sermons. Ask them where Reconciliation is, how I need to find my way. Say that I want to visit as soon as possible.

They always hang up on me.

So I watch for her, whenever I can.

Elena.

My older sister.

She isn’t in the rest of the episode. Not in the background, not in one of Deacon’s devotional messages, not in shots of all the loving homes of good, American Christians, where all the saved children are placed. The one glimpse of her—from that shot in Mrs. Thompson’s classroom.

It’s the only thing I’ve gotten in the last three weeks.

I place the dollar bills next to my empty plate, then leave the diner. It’s too loud. I pass a few booths. Families. Couples. All deep in conversation, all unaware of me. Which is how I like it. It’s easier for me to disappear that way. Easier for me to shove down the bitterness that rises in me during moments like this, when the desire tries to claw its way up my throat.

Because truthfully, I want what they have.

But I don’t get that. Not someone like me.

I’ve taken a lot of rides from strangers this past year. Learned that when you need to get somewhere and you can’t drive and don’t have money, you can’t be too picky.

Also means that sometimes you ride with bad people.

Some of the truckers are creepy. Not all. Not even most. Most are kind. Have seen lots of kids on the road. Don’t know why, but that part surprised me. After I was cast out, I always assumed that there wasn’t anyone else like me. But I’ve met some kids who’ve been rejected. Thrown away. Discarded.

I always think of Cesar, though, whenever I’m getting into a new car with a new stranger.

I met him in Las Cruces at the travel center. First one I ever spent time at after they broke me. He found me scarfing down the remains of a burrito some bougie family tossed in the garbage because their daughter took a bite and didn’t want it anymore. Gave me a bottle of water, a change of clothes. My first belongings.

Then he gave me advice.

Cesar was scrawny. Brown like me. Had a shaved head. Rough around the edges. He wore torn denim jeans and a gnarly leather jacket with punk patches glued to it over a tattered Discharge tank top. It struck me that his clothes looked like they were falling apart not because it was an intentional style, but because he was real. His life was real.

And he knelt before me. Said he could tell I was new. Could smell it on me, see it in the way I devoured food. He told me not to be so open. So desperate. "People like us are desperate, he explained as I continued eating. But don’t show it. Don’t let them know."

I swallowed. Eyed him suspiciously. Know what?

Anything about you. I can see your whole story on your face.

I looked away. No, he couldn’t. No one could.

Someone hurt you, he continued. Badly. Probably threw you away.

When I looked back at him, my vision blurred.

See? I knew I was right. You gotta cut that shit out.

I rose and walked away from him, but he followed. I been at this longer than you, he called out. And if you’re gonna survive out here, you have to hide it all.

Why do you care? I sneered, rounding on him.

Because I’m just like you.

No, you’re not.

At least, I once was.

No, you weren’t.

And no one else is actually going to help you.

I suddenly had no appetite. Tossed the remains of the burrito in a nearby trash can, very aware of what I had just been eating. Leftovers. A stranger’s leftovers. No one had offered me this.

No one else was going to help.

And so I sat there, on the curb outside a travel center in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and Cesar told me his rules. They worked for him. Work for me, too.

Before he left, he said he was sorry.

For what? I said.

Whatever happened to you, man, he said, shaking his head. It shouldn’t have happened.

No one has ever said that to me since.

When you’re like me, you have to lie all the time.

The motel we’re at is one of those low, flat buildings. Looks like it was smashed down from the top. The gray paint is peeling in places. It’s sad and old, like so many others I’ve scrounged up money for. They all blend together after awhile. But right now it’s a roof over my head that I don’t have to pay for, so I don’t mind. Most of it could be on fire, and all I would care about was whether I could take a shower or get a few minutes of sleep.

I can still hear the water running inside. Carlos has been in the bathroom for the last thirty minutes, and I know I’m running out of time. Don’t want that. Don’t want to make the Varelas even one minute late, because that’s when you start down the path to becoming a thorn in someone’s side. I’ve been with them for weeks. Longest I been with anyone since I left.

Was forced to leave.

Whatever.

The end is still the same, so it doesn’t matter how I describe it.

I know what happened, but a lie will always come out of my mouth. I think about what lies I’ll have to tell them today. The Varelas haven’t asked about the TV thing yet. They aren’t as nosy as the other people I’ve traveled with.

It’s weird. I’m not used to that—people not wanting me to tell them things. Or not expecting all that much from me. Or not acting in ways to make them feel better about themselves.

The door to my left creaks open. A man with a long beard and a thick mustache pokes his head out. Hair on top of his head is bushy and curly, too, and he’s trying to dry it with a white motel towel.

"Manny, is he still in there?" Ricardo asks.

I nod.

He curses in Spanish, then gestures to the filthy, empty swimming pool beyond the metal gate just ten feet from us. Coulda filled that up with all the water he’s wasting.

I shrug. No big deal. I can be quick.

Ricardo steps out of the room, and his button-down shirt is still open, and the lapels spread like wings at his sides as he moves. His chest is bare and a little damp, and I avert my eyes quickly. Shouldn’t be thinking those things.

He pounds on the door. Carlos! he calls out. Please hurry up! We have a long trip to make today, so we need to get going soon!

The door swings inward, and I realize I didn’t hear the water shut off. Carlos scowls at his father first, then at me. He’s shorter than I am, with hair just as bushy and curly as Ricardo’s. Got the build of a running back. Wouldn’t be surprised if he’d played football before his parents pulled him out of school. He’s only got on a pair of boxer briefs, and bottom part of his stomach hangs over them. I guess he gets his size from Ricardo, too.

More thoughts I shouldn’t have pop into my head. I push them away, too.

It’s not that big of a deal, Papi, Carlos says. We’ll get there when we get there.

Ricardo sighs. Shakes his head. Never said it was a big deal.

Another argument lingers there. It’s been happening a lot. Heard Ricardo tell his wife the other day that he suspects it’s because Carlos’s seventeenth birthday is looming. It’s making him disagreeable.

I start to back away. Don’t want to be a part of this. As soon as you’re inserted into the affairs of others, you become a risk. Traveling with the Varela family has been less chaotic than what I’m used to, so I don’t want to lose this window of calm.

Even though I know I will eventually.

Carlos catches me, though, looks me up and down. Steps back, pulls the door open as wide as it goes.

Shower’s all yours, he says to me.

Ricardo sighs again. I didn’t realize I had raised the world’s moodiest teenager.

Carlos offers a sarcastic smile. And I’ve still got another year to perfect it.

This is my only opening. I duck inside past Carlos as the two keep bickering and picking at each other. I quickly nab the pouch of toiletries tucked into my duffel, as well as a change of shirt, socks, and underwear. The bag is fairly small, but it has to be. One of the many rules I have, the ones that keep me moving, that keep me alive.

Don’t own a lot. Keep it all organized. Be ready to leave at a moment’s notice. A living situation can always go toxic or unwelcome faster than you think. Make the bag as inconspicuous as possible so it’s easier to tuck out of sight. You want people to functionally forget you’re there. And if they forget you, you might get to stay with them longer.

But not that long. No one actually wants you around.

I shut the bathroom door quietly. Can still hear Carlos and Ricardo.

I don’t belong here.

It’s not a surprise thought. Or an unfamiliar thought. It’s the truth.

I don’t belong anywhere.

I’m a boat, adrift at sea. No oars. No engines. Just letting the waves and the current take me where they may. Right now, that place is … this. With the Varelas.

I strip out of my clothes, fold them neatly, and place them on the back of the toilet. Turn on the water. Wait for it to get hot.

Is today the day I leave? Or do I have more time with these people?

Four weeks. It’s been four weeks since they met me outside of Fresno and asked me to join them on their journey. Monica and Ricardo have reassured me that I can travel with them in their ridiculous van as long as I need to, but I’m still awaiting the moment it all falls apart, just like it has so many times before.

The water runs over me. I scrub quickly, intensely. This might be my last shower for a while. Can’t ever presume to know what my future holds. A year ago, I was with my sister. A year ago, they cast me out, and I been on the road since then. Drifting. Found weird jobs, hitchhiked a lot. Made some money down in Santa Barbara for a while working for a guy named Hernando who ran a landscaping business. Job gave me mean calluses. I can feel them now as I rinse away the soap, as I run my fingers over my face.

I lasted two weeks. Ten days of paid work straight, but that ended when he couldn’t pay me at the end of a shift. Asked if he could pay another way. Pulled down his pants and started rubbing himself.

I couldn’t help shirking away. Or laughing. And I ran when he picked up a shovel, his face red with fury, and swung it at me.

My own cheeks burn as I wrench the water off. Because if he hadn’t gotten mad at me, I probably would have said yes.

I don’t know what that makes me.

I dry quickly using the last clean towel, then rub lotion over my skin, moisturize my face. Another rule: Never use a shared bathroom longer than necessary. I’ve got the whole routine down to under ten minutes, because most people won’t notice an occupied bathroom in that amount of time. Thankfully, we’re checking out today, so I don’t have to clean up the water or any errant body hairs. That’s part of the routine, too. Don’t leave anything behind. No proof that you exist.

It’s easier that way.

I dress, then head out into the room to pack up. Carlos is dressed now, and he’s lying down on his stomach, the TV remote in his hand, some reality TV show blaring loudly. I ignore him as I roll up my sleeping bag, then stuff it in my duffel with the dirty clothes and my toiletries.

You know you’re allowed to sleep in beds, right? he says. You don’t always have to be on the floor.

It’s fine, I say, zipping up my bag. I’m used to it.

He changes the channel. You’re weird.

Can’t argue with that. I’m reminded of it regularly, and in that moment, I try to remember the last time I slept in a bed.

Damn. Long time. Nine months? Maybe?

Don’t wanna think back too far. There’s a big hole there. Black and terrible and painful. It’s like they cut a part of myself from my body. Can’t spend too much time dwelling on it.

So I don’t.

I sit at the foot of Carlos’s bed as he flips from one channel to the next, so fast that I’m not sure how he catches anything. How does he know what all these shows are?

Right. He probably grew up with this.

Elena and I hopped from foster home to foster home. Meant I never really grew up watching TV.

Guess I didn’t grow up with much of anything.

So I sit there in my unfamiliarity, and I wrestle with the question I always keep in my mind.

Is it time to go?

Haven’t decided yet.

They’re nice people. Carlos doesn’t really like me, though. He doesn’t hate me, but he’s certainly not my biggest fan. I think he sees me as competition or something when it comes to his parents. Don’t know. Don’t really have proof. Just instinct at this point, a feeling based on experience. Kids don’t want to have to compete for attention from their own parents.

So I sink into my own hollow reality. The images flash on the TV: a family touring a home. A couple getting married. A car commercial. A superhero movie.

All a fantasy to me.

Another cartoon. A judge in a courtroom yelling. A basketball team on the court. A news broadcast. A dog running on a—

Go back, I say.

Hair raises on the back of my neck.

I saw his face.

Go back? Carlos keeps barreling through channels. Why?

Just do it! I say.

My tone is sharp, forceful. I feel Carlos shift on the bed. He goes back. Back past the comedy set, past the dog on the beach, and then:

It’s a shot of a forest. Yellow tape strung between trees. People standing around, one hunched down, staring at something. There’s a banner along the bottom of the screen.

BODY FOUND OUTSIDE RELIGIOUS CAMP

A newscaster with a deep, clear voice speaks over the next image:

It’s him.

Deacon Thompson.

It’s a still from one of his YouTube videos. One of the ones I’ve seen a million times because … because she is in it.

I watch. I listen.

"Local authorities have not confirmed any details aside from reiterating that the body was found outside property lines."

Heart is racing. There’s bile in my throat.

The broadcast cuts to an officer. Crop-cut hair, baby face with reddened blotches on pale skin, beige uniform.

We’re a little shaken up, he says, frowning. We’re just a little mountain town. Idyllwild doesn’t really get stuff like this.

Idyllwild.

The news anchors are saying something about the successful Christmas toy drive that Deacon organized last year, and I don’t care. Doesn’t matter. Can’t really hear any of it anymore.

A body.

There’s a body in Idyllwild.

Is it her?

Is it her?

They tell me that I’m not ready yet. That it’s been too soon since my miracle, since reconciliation came for me.

I sit in classes with Mrs. Thompson. I study with Deacon in his home. He tells me everything: what reconciliation does. How it is to be achieved. We rehearse my story. We rehearse scenarios. The Thompsons prepare me for every possibility.

My parents are trying to be encouraging, and I can tell they expect a lot from me. It’s in the way they gaze at me over dinner in the lodge, or the way they watch me from the couch in the evening when I come back to the cabin after a long day. It’s in the hesitant touches, as if I’ll disappear if they do anything but graze my skin with their fingertips.

And it’s in the hopeful gaze of my sister Elena. She watches me, too, not just in class, not just in the garden, not just on our morning hikes amidst the tall, lanky pines.

I think she believes I’m going to disappear.

But still, I’m not ready yet. Soon, Eli, Deacon tells me. Soon, we will reopen this place for the others. Then you will show your miracle to the world. You will create others.

It’s all I want.

To love these people. To be loved by these people.

And to make Deacon Thompson proud.

I wouldn’t be here without him, of course. Elena found me, the Sullivans took me in as their own, and Deacon … well, I’m evidence that this place is real. That it is blessed.

I can’t let anyone down.

Yo, you good, Manny?

Carlos taps me on the top of my head, and I startle, my body a tightly wound knot.

Why you so jumpy?

I shake it off. Push myself upright. I’m vibrating. My skin is on fire.

A body. They found a body.

I know who it is.

It’s her.

It can’t be.

It’s her.

An abyss opens in me, one I have long kept shut. It aches, threatens to pull me into it. The thing I always avoid thinking about … it’s right there.

No. Not here. Not now.

I steel myself against the tide. Memories are flooding back, and I can’t stop them.

Why now?

Why now?

Manny, what’s going on? Are you okay?

I snap to attention. Turn around. Carlos is staring at me, his dark brown eyes wide.

What?

You just like … zoned out. Went somewhere else.

I blink at him.

Shit.

He saw it all.

Lies form easily these days. My brain spits them out, smooth like oil, and they slither off my tongue.

Sorry, I say. That news story … just reminded me of a bad dream I had last night. About … finding a dead body.

Oh.

He looks away.

I don’t know if he believes me, but I don’t care.

I can’t be here.

I rush to the door. Close it softly behind me. It’s getting warmer out. A thick humidity clings to my skin.

So does the terror.

And the rage.

They separated us. Took her from me.

I tell myself that she’s fine as I pace outside the motel. That there’s no reason to believe that’s her body. It could be anyone. It could have been there long before Deacon Thompson bought the land.

That body can’t possibly be her.

Lie lie lie lie lie.

My heart thumps. I’m pouring sweat. That shower I took was pointless.

I’m spiraling.

This is all I am anymore. Panic and terror and fear and bitterness. It’s all I can be. They took the rest from me. All I know anymore is survival. I control what I can: the stories I tell. Who I tell them to. The people I stay with. The strength and power of being alone.

I want to grab my duffel bag.

Leave the Varelas behind.

Wouldn’t be the first time I disappeared. Won’t be the last.

I am soon to overstay my welcome anyway. That always happens. At some point, this family will tire of me. They’ll pull away. Talk to me less. Make comments they don’t think I can hear about how I am a burden. I am stress-inducing. I’m so complicated.

All things I’ve heard before.

So maybe I should just go now. Go …

Go where?

Idyllwild.

Wherever that is.

I should just go. Go and find out. Go and chase that certainty.

A year of calling that fucking hotline, and here it is: the location of Reconciliation. Idyllwild. I don’t know where that is. But it doesn’t matter. It’s somewhere here in California.

I can get there. Hitchhike. Save up for bus fare. Doesn’t matter. I can go.

I should go.

But I don’t know if I can. If I can go back to the place where they broke me into pieces.

I don’t know that I should. She chose them. She is part of the problem. If the body isn’t her …

Why should I assume she wants to see me again?

But it was always supposed to be me and her. That’s how it used to be.

God, I fucking hate this already.

Carlos startles me again when he bursts out of the motel room. He glances over at me once, then darts to the adjoining room where his parents are.

The thought blooms without hesitation: Is he annoyed with me already?

I want to believe that. It is easy to, because it provides me with an exit. A reason to leave this behind.

But I have no plan. No means of reaching her, other than a name:

Idyllwild.

She’s in Idyllwild.

Alive or dead, that’s where my sister is.

We leave Redding shortly after.

As I approach the van, Monica asks me the same question she does each morning. She’s standing there in a summer dress with bird-of-paradise flowers on it, her arms crossed, leaning up against the black van.

It’s a big van. Fancy. Has a couple TVs in it. I’d never seen that outside of semitruck cabins. The seats fold down in the back so that there are beds, and there’s a box mounted on the roof where the Varelas store all their clothing and belongings. Well, the stuff they keep with them. Most of what they own is still in storage in San Jose.

So, Manny, she says. Do you want to come with us today?

This is her thing. She told me that I should never feel like I’m being forced to join them. I do appreciate it, but … I can’t tell her why. That would require that I tell her the truth.

And she won’t believe me.

I hoist my duffel bag up on my shoulder.

Part of me is screaming to leave them behind. But I don’t even know where Idyllwild is, and at least I’ll have some food and a place to stay for another night.

Yeah, I say. Sure.

I drop my bag in the back row of seats, and then Ricardo invites me to sit shotgun. I don’t think it’s because he wants the company. I am not terribly good company these days anyway. But it’s a study morning for Carlos. He’s graduating soon, but he still has more of his homeschooling to do with Monica until