Teen Ink

My twin sister and I always made a game out of everything. We made games to clean our room, games to get ready quickly, games to determine who was the faster runner or the higher jumper, the better hula-hooper or basketball shooter. We had a game for everything. But there was one game neither of us ever won because we were destined to lose from the start.

One summer night, we were both excited to be going to the local fair. Our five-year-old minds were fixed on images of whirling merry-go-rounds and Ferris wheels, bumper cars and arcade games, pink cotton candy and powdery funnel cake. Our mother dressed us in identical outfits, and we waited by the window for our father to pick us up.

We made a game of guessing how many cars would pass until our father’s burgundy van came cruising down the street to our gate. I guessed five, six, seven, next car. She guessed, three, four, five cars until he comes. An hour later, three cars until he comes. An hour and a half later, when darkness filled the empty street and 9 o’clock struck, we said, wearily, two cars until he comes.

We fell asleep on the couch by the window, forgetting our game and the whirling merry-go-rounds and Ferris wheels, bumper cars and arcade games, cotton candy and funnel cake. We forgot about the passing cars – red, green, blue, but never burgundy.

We awoke to the sound of our mother’s voice. She said that our father was outside. My sister and I, in our identical outfits, with drowsy eyes, looked out to see a burgundy van with a man standing beside it. He seemed tall but not tall enough, responsible but not responsible enough, and sorry but never sorry enough.

He yelled into the window, his deep voice tinged with a slight Jamaican accent. He said that it was too late to go to the fair but that there was always next time. I heard next time and felt never. I must have stopped listening to, or rather hearing, what this man said because the next word I heard was good-bye.

And then he crept off in his burgundy van, maybe to his home, maybe to the fair to see the whirling merry-go-rounds and Ferris wheels, bumper cars and arcade games, cotton candy and funnel cake. Wherever he went, I knew it did not involve me. Our game of passing cars was exhausting and disappointing, and I did not want to play anymore. I was looking for a car that didn’t exist. I was looking for a car that would never come to take me away. I could never win this game.

From that moment on, I resolved never to wait for anyone to come take me away. I would find my own way.