Eleven Girls on a Trailer Floor

Friday night

Friday at six the cars started pulling into Cottonwood Court.

Minivans with soccer stickers. Tonya Pruitt’s farm pickup with a dusty sleeping bag in the bed. Amber Wolfe in her scrubs, dropping off Hailey with a bag of microwave popcorn the size of a pillow before heading up the highway to her shift.

I stood on the porch next to the couch in a tarp and watched every one of those mothers pull up to lot 14. I had wondered, all week, if any of them would sit in the car a beat too long, or look at the skirting, or the gravel.

Not one of them did. Tonya climbed out and hugged me.

By seven thirty, ten girls in pajamas had covered every inch of that living room floor exactly the way I drew it on the envelope. Kaylee’s bag was by the window, where she could see the lights on the ceiling and the steps out front.

Kaylee laughed so hard at something Hailey said that she got the hiccups. She had to lie flat on her back on her sleeping bag with her arms straight out, hiccuping at the Christmas lights, while two other girls tried to scare them out of her.

I stood in the kitchen doorway listening to it. I hadn’t heard that laugh in five days. I had to turn around and pretend to look for something in the cabinet.

My mother was in the kitchen behind me. She had brought a big crockery bowl covered with a damp dish towel, and she had set it on top of the dryer, where it’s warm.

“What’s that?” I asked her.

“Dough,” Mom said. “Don’t touch it.” Then she leaned into the living room and raised her voice over the music, which she never does.

“Don’t you girls go to sleep on me,” she said. “I’ve got plans for midnight.”

Ten girls cheered like it was a football game.