Page 80 of My Girl

“He’s adopted too, you know that?” Mrs. Galloway says. “And he treats his family with respect.”

And his family probably treats him with dignity,I think.Not like a little rodent they hide in the basement.

The words don’t come out.

A while later, the station wagon slows. We reach two layers of gates with barbed wire at the top.Nevada Southern Detention Centeris written on a red and white sign. A small box—almost like a standing closet—is right outside of the gates. A man comes out and checks Mrs. Galloway’s ID. He glances at me, then waves us through.

Noise echoes in the hallways. We come to a big gray cafeteria with long tables, kind of like the tables at school.

A woman sits by herself. Her head down. A receding hairline with black strands.

“Hello?” Mrs. Galloway says. “Ms. Gaines, do you hear me? I brought your son.”

The woman doesn’t move. She faces the table.

“Ms. Gaines?” she asks. “Do you want your son to end up like you?”

Finally, the woman looks up. Her brown eyes are dark and regular, like they could belong to anyone. My eyes are like that too.

But her eyes are circled with bags and wrinkles. She’s either old, or she doesn’t sleep at all.

I don’t know which is more annoying: being Mrs. Galloway’s adopted reject or Ms. Gaines’s biological spawn.

A hand bangs into the back of my head. I snap around, facing Mrs. Galloway.

“What?” I growl.

“How about you, Roderick? Do you want to end up like your mother? Yourrealmother?”

“Of course not.”

“She’s disgusting, isn’t she?” The black-haired woman drops her chin again, and Mrs. Galloway lifts her nose. “No matter how bad it gets, you’re still better off with us than you are with her.” She clicks her tongue. “You should be grateful for that.”

Mrs. Galloway escorts me back through the prison with a hand on my shoulder, as if she wants to show the inmates and guards that she’ll protect me. It’s just for show. The bitch only cares about her precious little Gage.

The station wagon is silent as we drive. For a while, we’re the only car on the highway. I fantasize about ways to kill Mrs. Galloway—decapitation, burning her alive, a gunshot wound to the neck—and I crumple the cracker wrapper in my hands. It irritates her when I don’t sit still, and I like grating on her nerves. Her reactions always energize me.

“You should be more grateful,” Mrs. Galloway repeats. “I saved you from a life of poverty. If it weren’t for me, you would’ve been a drug addict by now.”

I stare at her blankly, then I laugh. I laugh so hard, I choke on my own spit.

“What?” she asks. “What’s so funny?”

“You didn’t want to saveme,” I say. “You just liked the idea of being a savior.”

She faces me as she drives forward. If I provoke her enough, we may get into an accident. We may even die. It’s exciting.

“You ungrateful little?—”

“Look at yourself in the mirror, you dumb cunt!” I shout with amusement. “You can’t save someone like me. Youmademe this way.”

The brakes screech. The car lurches forward.

Mrs. Galloway slaps me across the face. The impact echoes in the station wagon.

Stars fleck across my vision.

“You were born this way,” she says, her voice low and calculated. “Make no mistake, little boy. You come from a long line of trash, and that’s who you’ll always be.”