I STARTED running away from home when I was ten years old. I’ve forgotten how many times I’ve been caught and returned. Only to run away again at the first opportunity. Why was I running? The usual reasons.
I still remember the first time. After they beat me nearly to death, my parents lay in their usual stupor, minds gripped tightly in narcospasm. They were naked; dawnlight shone from mahogany skin. Their bodies sprawled at the edge of a marble swimming pool, like toppled Greek statues. They had the same build, lean and lithe, although my father was taller and heavier. They both had amber curls cut short, and wore earrings and necklaces of sonic gems. Sonic jewelry glittered from fingers and toes as well. Her breasts were faint swellings, scarcely more noticeable than his. His penis, though limp, was still red-streaked.
I’m not sure how old they actually were–over a hundred anyway–but they appeared young, with a physiologic age of twenty.
I had crawled from the house and made it halfway to the pool before passing out from pain. My back was a network of welts, blood dripped between my legs. As I gathered strength, I knew I had two choices: drag my parents’ comatose bodies into the pool and watch them drown, or get away myself. I decided I lacked the strength for the former. Or the courage.
So I ran instead.
You learn a lot on the street. When you get hungry enough, you do things you never thought you’d ever do. Ironically, they’re quite similar to the things at home you’re running from. After a while, they don’t seem nearly so bad.
But hustling on the street is not without risk. There are still lots of antiquated laws on the books. And plenty of unimaginative vice varks around to enforce them. You’re a little green at first.
My first time away, I was pinched in a public park with my pants down, squatting over the face of a woman old enough to be my grandmother. Such a harmless perversion, really. Her dog had recently died. She paid well, so the varks let her go. I had nothing to bribe them with, so it was off to jail for me. Shortly thereafter, I was home again.