“She’s not going anywhere,” Shawn repeated, flashing the key ring.
Tyler tossed me his own keys. “Just go,” he said.
I ran to Tyler’s car, which was wedged between Shawn’s truck and
the chicken coop. I tried to back out, but I stomped too hard on the gas
and the tires spun out, sending gravel flying. On my second attempt I
succeeded. The car shot backward and circled around. I shifted into
drive and was ready to shoot down the hill when Tyler appeared on the
porch. I lowered the window. “Don’t go to work,” he said. “He’ll find
you there.”
—THAT NIGHT, WHEN I came home, Shawn was gone. Mother was in the
kitchen blending oils. She said nothing about that morning, and I knew
I shouldn’t mention it. I went to bed, but I was still awake hours later
when I heard a pickup roar up the hill. A few minutes later, my
bedroom door creaked open. I heard the click of the lamp, saw the light
leaping over the walls, and felt his weight drop onto my bed. I turned
over and faced him. He’d put a black velvet box next to me. When I
didn’t touch it, he opened the box and withdrew a string of milky
pearls.
He said he could see the path I was going down and it was not good.
I was losing myself, becoming like other girls, frivolous, manipulative,
using how I looked to get things.
I thought about my body, all the ways it had changed. I hardly knew
what I felt toward it: sometimes I did want it to be noticed, to be
admired, but then afterward I’d think of Jeanette Barney, and I’d feel
disgusted.
“You’re special, Tara,” Shawn said.
Was I? I wanted to believe I was. Tyler had said I was special once,
years before. He’d read me a passage of scripture from the Book of
Mormon, about a sober child, quick to observe. “This reminds me of
you,” Tyler had said.
The passage described the great prophet Mormon, a fact I’d found
confusing. A woman could never be a prophet, yet here was Tyler,
telling me I reminded him of one of the greatest prophets of all. I still
don’t know what he meant by it, but what I understood at the time was
that I could trust myself: that there was something in me, something