I suppose that’s why I had to leave. Not just home, but everything: family, school, Utah. I figured there had to be something better out there. I decided to go to California.
It was a Saturday afternoon, just six weeks before my eighteenth birthday, that I decided to leave. I had spent the morning at Mateo’s, then came home and packed my school backpack with two pairs of jeans, three T-shirts, two pairs of briefs and socks, some soap, a diary I had found in a Dumpster, and a pen. I also brought a switchblade that Mateo had given me when I told him I was leaving. “When you get to L.A. look up the Sureños gang,” he said. “They’re the Mexican Mafia. Any gang with a thirteen in their name is Sureños. They’ll take care of you.”
I had no plans to join a street gang. I planned to make it on my own, even though I had only about $180, money I’d mostly made helping neighbors doing yard work.
Call it naiveté or youthful ignorance, but I wasn’t afraid. Some people, mountain men, knew how to survive in the wilderness. I knew how to survive in the urban wilderness. I was a master at city survival. I could live out of Dumpsters if I had to. Even in poor places, people threw out things that were still good. I figured that would be true anywhere.
My brother walked into the room as I was finishing packing. “What are you doing?”
“Leaving,” I said without looking up.
“Leaving? Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“For how long?”
“Forever.”
“Why?” I looked up at him. He looked afraid. “This is our home.”
“This is nothing, bro. This is a dump.”
“You can’t leave me,” he said.
I picked up my backpack. “I have to.”
He stood there looking at me, crying. I hated that. I’d seen him take heavy beatings from my father without crying. What I was doing must have hurt him more than a beating. That made me feel sick to my stomach.
“Stop crying. You’re not a baby.”
“Please don’t go.”
“There’s nothing here.”
“There’s me.”
“I’m sorry.” I really did feel sorry. I would miss him, but I pushed away the emotion. “I have to go.”
I never said good-bye to my parents. I never regretted not speaking to my father. I’d said all I needed to say to him and he’d said to me way more than I needed to hear. I almost told my mother; I wanted to but decided that it wasn’t an option. I knew that she could still make me stay.
The Ogden Greyhound station was about three and a half miles from our home. I walked it in less than an hour. I had never been there before. The station wasn’t crowded. There were fewer than thirty people inside, most sitting on the benches with a few sprawled out along rows of seats, sleeping. The floor was dirty and littered with trash.
Posted on the wall above the ticket windows was a listing of the bus arrival and departure times. There was a bus leaving for Los Angeles, California, at 4:55 p.m. and arriving in L.A. at 8:25 a.m. with just one transfer, in Las Vegas. I don’t know what initially drew me to California. Maybe because my mother spoke so fondly of the time she lived there or maybe because I was born there. Maybe it was just in my blood.
I bought a one-way ticket for $69.99, shoved it deep into my pants pocket, and walked down to a convenience store on the same block and bought a couple of Snickers candy bars, a can of Dr Pepper, and two hot dogs, which I buried in the free chili and cheese sauce that came with them. Then I walked back to the station to wait for my bus.
I spread napkins down on an unoccupied bench on the east side of the station and sat. I figured it was unoccupied because someone had thrown up on the ground at one end of it and it stank. Stink didn’t bother me. (A childhood in Dumpsters will do that.) I didn’t care as much about the stink as I did some of the weird-looking people around me. One disheveled man kept turning around and shouting, “Quit following me!” even though there was no one behind him. I could put up with the smell if it kept everyone away.
After I finished eating my hot dogs I rearranged the napkins and sat back on the bench and watched people come and go. As the day went on, the station grew busier and more crowded. A few times I saw parents sending off their children. The parents were emotional, the mothers crying, even one of the fathers. The scene was foreign to me. I wondered how often they beat their children.
Then my mind started wandering through a labyrinth of unknowns. I wondered if I would ever see my family again. I wondered if my father would start beating everyone again. I wondered how long it would be until my brother stood up for himself as I had. What if he didn’t? He had always been softer than me.
I wondered if he had already told my parents that I’d left. What if they came to get me? What would I do? I dismissed the thought. It would never happen.
I’ve come to believe that before any major life change there’s a crisis in faith—the flash of doubt before one hurls oneself into the unknown. For just a moment I considered going back home as a scared voice chattered endlessly: What are you doing? You’re going to die out there. Better to stay with what you know.
I pulled the bus ticket from my pocket and fingered it before folding it and putting it back. I just had to remind myself that there was no home to go back to. Home had left me long before I had left it.
It wasn’t just my home I was leaving behind. I left my father’s name as well. From that moment on, I decided I would call myself Charles James.
Chapter Eighteen
It takes great courage to wear kindness as if one had never been hurt.
—CHARLES JAMES’S DIARY
The drive to Los Angeles was fifteen and a half hours, almost completely south along I-15, passing through Salt Lake City, St. George, Las Vegas, and Barstow to San Bernardino, where we finally left I-15 traveling west on I-10, all the way to Santa Monica and the Pacific Ocean.
I was one of just seven people getting on the bus in Ogden. Many of them had big suitcases and travel bags, which the driver stowed beneath the bus. I had only my backpack.
I walked on, handing my ticket to the driver. There were a couple dozen people already seated, looking tired and bored. A few of them glanced up at me as I walked down the aisle. I walked to the back of the bus, where there were fewer people. I still didn’t want to sit by anyone.
I sat down in the last row on the left side of the bus. There was a young woman sitting alone across the aisle from me. She looked like she was about my age or maybe a year older. She was pretty, with large green eyes, a narrow face, and long brown hair. Even more than pretty, she looked friendly.
I put my pack on the aisle seat and sat down next to the window. After I’d settled in, I glanced back over at the young woman. She was looking at me and smiled. So far she was the only one I had seen on the bus who didn’t look like they were in pain. I’m not exaggerating. I could have been sitting in the waiting room of a dentist’s office for all the joy that surrounded me. Of course, I wasn’t little Miss Sunshine myself. I shyly acknowledged her smile with a nod, then looked out the window.
Just a few minutes later I heard the pneumatic door shut and the bus’s brakes release. The bus slowly backed out of the parking space, stopped, and lurched forward. My new life had begun.
Outside of moving to Utah as an infant, I had never traveled more than thirty miles from home—a fact that, for the first time, struck me as significant as the scenery around me became foreign.
My thoughts went back to my brother’s sadness. I wondered how he would fare. I decided that I would send him a postcard after I was in California, just to let them know I was there and what I was doing, whatever that was.
My thoughts were interrupted by a soft voice. “Want some chocolate?” The young woman held out a Hershey’s chocolate bar.
“I’m okay.”
She cocked her head. “It’s just chocolate. You don’t like chocolate?”
“I like chocolate.”
“Then have some.”
> “Okay.” I reached over and she broke off a square and handed it to me. “Thanks,” I said.
She slid to the edge of her seat to be closer to me. “You’re welcome. I’ve got all sorts of snacks in here if you’re hungry. I even baked some chocolate chip cookies. It’s a long ride. More than fifteen hours from here.”
“Thanks.”
“Where are you headed?”
“Los Angeles. Isn’t everyone on the bus going to Los Angeles?”
“No. There are stops all along the way. This route just ends in Los Angeles.”
“Are you going to Los Angeles?” I asked.
She nodded. “Where in Los Angeles are you going?”
“What do you mean?”
“Los Angeles is big. There’s a lot of different suburbs.”
“I don’t know yet,” I said. “Are you from Utah?”
“No. I’m just coming back from Idaho. I’m from Culver City. That’s in Los Angeles.”
“What’s it like?”
“Culver City?”
“California.”
“You’ve never been there?”
“I was born there, but we moved when I was a baby, so I don’t remember anything.”
“It’s nice. I mean, it’s crowded and you got your traffic and crime, but there are a lot of palm trees and nice beaches. The weather’s almost always nice. A lot of the areas around me are affluent.”
“What’s affluent?” I asked.
She smiled. “Affluent? It means it’s rich. There are a lot of rich people in California.”
“Oh,” I said. A moment later I asked, “Are you . . . affluent?”
She laughed. “Would I be riding the bus if I were?”
“I don’t know.”
“No. I’d take an airplane.”
I nodded. “Affluent.”
“I’m Monica,” she said, extending her hand. “Like Santa Monica. What’s your name?”
“I’m Charles James.”
“Is Charles James your first name or is James your last name?”
“It’s my last name. Like Jesse James.”
“Oh. Any relation?”
“Yeah. He’s my great-great-great-grandfather.”
“That’s cool,” she said. “I once tried to see if I was related to anyone famous. I’m not.”
“Everyone probably is somewhere.”
“Maybe. But if I was, I think it would be more like my great-great-great-great-grandmother was a house wench to the queen of England.” She laughed. She had a pretty laugh. “It’s just good we’re not in those days anymore.”
Less than an hour later the bus made a stop in Salt Lake City. It was already dark outside. The city had the tallest buildings I’d ever seen. About a third of the passengers got off and more than double that got on. I was glad that no one sat next to Monica, though a few of the guys looked like they were about to. No one looked at me. I think I scared them.
We continued south along I-15 for another four hours. A little after ten we stopped at a gas station food-mart for a dinner break. The building was about the only thing in the town.
“Where are we?” I asked.
“Parowan. It’s a really small town. Want to get something to eat?”
“Sure,” I said.
“Take your pack. You don’t want your stuff stolen.”
I stood and swung my pack over my shoulder, then followed Monica off the bus. The driver was standing just outside smoking a cigarette. He blew out a cloud of smoke and said, “You’ve got fifteen minutes.”
There was a Subway sandwich shop connected to the gas station. Monica used the restroom, then met me in line. I got a ham and cheese sandwich. She got something Italian. We didn’t have time to stay and eat, so we carried our sandwiches over to the food-mart and bought a gallon jug of water, some toffee-covered peanuts, and a liter bottle of Coke. We took everything back to the bus.
We must have been the last ones to return, because when the driver saw us coming, he threw down his cigarette, climbed inside, and started the bus. He immediately closed the door behind us. We went back to where we’d been sitting.
“The next stop is Las Vegas,” Monica said. “We change buses there.”
“Do I need a new ticket?” I asked.
“No. Just the one you have.” She looked at me. “What are you going to do when you get to California?”
“Find a job.”
“What do you do?”
“Whatever I can. I’m a hard worker.”
“Have you ever done yard work?”
“Yeah. A lot. My father is a gardener.”
“That’s good. My girlfriend’s brother owns a landscaping company. He’s always looking for help. You won’t get rich working for him, but it’s not bad. I think he starts his employees at twelve dollars an hour.”
Twelve dollars an hour sounded like a fortune to me. No one I knew got paid that much. Not even my father. “Twelve dollars?”
“Like I said, you won’t get rich working for him, but it’s more than flipping burgers somewhere for minimum wage.”
“Do you work?” I asked.
She nodded. “I work at a retirement home. I’m a CNA.”
“What’s that?”
“It stands for Certified Nursing Assistant.”
“That sounds important,” I said.
She laughed. “If changing old people’s diapers is important.”
I thought for a moment, then said, “It is for the old people.”
Our bus rolled into Las Vegas a little after one in the morning. I had never seen anything like the city before—a galaxy of bright, flashing lights, teeming crowds, and shiny expensive cars. Even at one in the morning, the streets were more crowded than Ogden at rush hour.
The driver turned off the bus and announced over the P.A. system that this stop was the end of the line and everyone needed to get off. Everyone stood and gathered their things, though a few people had to be woken up. One guy was really confused. I heard him ask if we were in Phoenix.
The Las Vegas bus station was very different from the one in Ogden. It was nice, for one thing. Clean. It was open to the air and there were palm trees around it, something I hadn’t seen outside of a magazine or television.
I waited for Monica as she got her luggage from the bus’s storage. The weather was much warmer and more humid than it was in Ogden. I took off my hoodie. I was already sweating through it.
“Is it this hot in California?” I asked Monica.
“No,” she said. “It’s warmer than Utah, but not Las Vegas. This is the desert.”
Buses filled with tourists kept arriving at the station. For most of them Vegas must have been their final destination: they were acting excited and uninhibited, like they were drunk or something. People kept saying, “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.” Whatever that meant. I wanted to leave.
“Do you know where we’re going?” I asked Monica.
“Yes. Just follow me.”
Monica had two bags, which I helped her carry. We walked past four or five buses until we came to one with a sign in the window that read LOS ANGELES / SANTA MONICA. There was a line of people boarding.
“This is it,” she said. “It’s always more crowded than the first one. I’ve got to give them my bags. Why don’t you get on and save us a seat so we can sit together?”
“Okay,” I said, glad that she still wanted to sit by me. I got in line and boarded the bus. Like Monica said, it was more full than the one we had left and there were only a couple of seats near the back still vacant. I grabbed a seat and put my pack on the seat next to it. A few minutes later Monica walked down the aisle. I raised my hand so she’d see me. When she got to me I said, “Do you want the window?”
“No. You can have it.”
I slid across the seat and she sat down next to me, stowing her things under the seat in front of her.
“I’m glad you’re here,” she said. “I might have ended up sitting next to some stinky fat
guy. The first time I was on this bus, this old guy with hair growing out of his ears sat next to me. I fell asleep, and when I woke up he was touching me.”
“Where?” I asked. She touched her chest. “What did you do?”
“I screamed. The bus driver stopped the bus and made the guy sit up next to him. Then he made him get off the bus at the next city.”
“He probably wasn’t too happy about that.”
“No, he made a big fuss. But when the driver threatened to call the police, he ran.”
I shook my head. “Perv.”
“There’s always some drama on the bus. The last time I was leaving Vegas I sat next to this woman who was crying hysterically. When she finally stopped crying, she told me that she had driven from Pasadena but had lost all her money and her car at one of the casinos. The casino had bought her the bus ticket back. I thought, for as much money as they made off her, they could have at least sprung for an airplane ticket.”
“How many times have you taken this bus?”
“This is my third time, round-trip. My father is on the air force base in Boise, Idaho.”
“He’s a pilot?”
“No. I wish. Then maybe I could fly up. He’s a helicopter mechanic.”
“That’s cool,” I said.
“I don’t see him very much. My parents divorced five years ago. At first my father was stationed in Germany, then three years ago they transferred him to Idaho. That’s when I started taking the bus to see him.”
I thought it was strange. I was taking a bus to get away from my father.
“How about you? Why are you going to California?”
“I’m running away from home.”
“Oh,” she said, suddenly looking concerned. “Things aren’t good at home?”
“No. My father’s abusive. At least he was, until I finally beat him up.”
“Wow. So he made you leave?”