Friends, that are Troubled by Miranda Jensen

    Jeff Robinson CC




Friends, that are Troubled


Another Arrival.

   When Francesca Gubler arrives at West Sun, one might say she is confused, scared, or even panicked. She would say that she is devastated. 
     Like those before her. 
     Like those after her. 
     They came for Francesca at sunrise. In the comfort of her Pottery Barn duvet—purchased by her mother, who will donate it in a month’s time—Francesca wakes to two, tall men. 
    “Get up!” they screamed. Just as they screamed at Daisy. Just as they screamed at Tara. Just as they screamed at Sabrina. Just as they will scream at Anita. 
     They sat beside her on the plane, Francesca caught in the middle seat, sweating, fretting. She did not know the two men’s names, she still does not. I do. Should I name them?
      No. This is not their story. But they have one. will have one. had one. 
      Here is what Francesca knows as she walks into the dark building, a faded blue West Sun sign looming above.                      
                     1.  She has been taken. With her parent’s consent. Not hers, obviously. 
                     2.   This cold, dead land is Utah. 
                     3.    Whatever comes next, she is not ready for it. 
      Here is what Francesa does not know, and what I will allow you to.                      
​                     1.    John and Hannah Gubler are rich, desperate parents, who did not expect their little girl to be so gosh darn disobedient!
                     2.    Survival is not guaranteed. 
                     3.    She will walk out of West Sun a different person. For better? For worse? I won’t say. 
     The skinny nurse with sour breath tells Francesa to take off her clothes. Another order of many that she will obey. Shirt rolls up. Pants roll down. Shoes slip off. Every crevice, every hole is violated with the nurse’s gaze. Francesca is shaking when the nurse says, “Pee.”
     She understands now. Maybe she even predicted this. Perhaps she will reflect on this moment one day, and think herself naive. Self-loathing is an art that Francesca will hone at West Sun.  
      Pregnancy is not a possibility. But she realizes as she crouches into a squat, that her dark, yellow pee will reveal other secrets. 
    The nurse passes her a blank identity. She shoves on the orange shirt and khaki pants. Francesca is more than scared now, she is frustrated and angry. “This is a mistake. I’m not supposed to be here.”
      They all say that. said that. will say that. 
      Need I remind you, this is no fiction. Francesca is as real as you, reader. The dystopia you read on the page is the truth. 
      Whose truth? Good question. 
     The two men take Francesca into another car, and she spends the 42 minutes and 53 seconds reflecting. How could they do this to me? she wonders. Why am I here? she asks. She knows these answers, but right now, her anger is too thick for reason. 
      Eventually, the anger that was fear will become resignation. That is, in fact, the point. 
     Francesca arrives at sunset. Bobby/Bob/Robert—yes, I give you his name—greets her in the rubble with a toothless smile. One might say he welcomes her. I won’t embellish. He greets her. 
     “Welcome to West Sun!”
     As they hike up the icy hill, Francesca grips onto frozen trees. Beautiful but cold. She will be cold for a while. Bobby talks about the four guiding moon phases, the next four steps in her journey to becoming the best girl she can be. Francesa is told that she will be here for weeks, when it is a journey of years.
     With a plastic bag of snacks, a ballpoint pen, and a teal notebook, Francesca is guided into a room. A cell? Semantics. Robert smiles when he tells her he’ll return the next day; he pats her shoulder when he tells her to write down her story. 
     “What’s my story?” of course Francesca asks. 
     “There are no wrong answers.” Lie. “But you can start with why you think you are here.”
     Then Bob leaves, locks the door, and Francesca is left alone. She should appreciate the solitude, the privacy while she has it. But she doesn’t know what’s coming. 


My Indoctrination. 

     I learn the rules slowly. I learn that there are three other girls, Daisy, Anita, and Tara, who also think they shouldn’t be here. I learn from them not to say those words out loud. I learn that Robert is a masochistic dick who gets off watching teenage girls miss their mommies, and shiver in Utah’s Wasatch Mountain Range. Most of all, I learn that there are four levels to this fucking shit hole, and if I want to leave this fucking shit hole, I have to graduate from all of them. 
   Honestly, it’s not the rules that get me. I live in Mormon paradise, where white underwear and caffeine-free tea are not merely recommended, it's mandatory. My whole childhood has been defined by one silly little book, so a silly little brochure doesn’t faze me in the slightest. 
     But the wilderness? 
     It’s brutal.
    Hour-long hikes in pouring rain or searing heat, shitting and peeing in the dirt, bugs crawling and biting my cooch, and mind-numbing cold as I try to sleep in a plastic tarp at night. Between the tortillas and trail mix and lake showers and body odor and hunger and therapy. 
     I’m losing my mind. 
    It’s hard to know if I’d like any of these girls if we weren’t here. Everything that makes us us is forbidden. My clothes, my eyeliner, even my goddamn earrings were taken from me. I can’t talk about what exactly (weed, sex) got me here. Nor can I talk about why exactly (dramatic, wealthy mom and dad) I’m here. 
    Instead, I say fancy things like blame-shifting and self-reliance, and the other girls do too. Because Robert, and his two minions, are always listening. Watching. And when they aren’t, we are watching each other. 
    I have guesses, of course, for why the others are here. Sabrina’s a tomboy, borderline boy, so she’s here to learn gender. Anita, our newest addition, has that pale sweaty sheen of fresh sobriety. Even her cross necklace is tarnished (yes, she got to keep that, and I didn’t get to keep my studs). Tara’s probably a party girl, she’s got the looks for it. 
     Then there’s Daisy. 
     Daisy…
     Weed? Addy? Oxy? Coke?!
     She’s a wild card, a mystery in a place where secrets are not kept. Daisy is hard of hearing, so she has a soft accent, and her hands often twitch when she starts to speak as if she might sign. She’s not allowed to. Apparently, her parents demanded she lipread only. 
      Thanks to Jacob Lider, my first crush, I know a couple of signs. 
     After Robert forces Daisy to stand in front of us and read a messy letter from home, I try it. With a hidden smile, I tuck my right thumb into my left fist and pull up.
      Shit. 
     Daisy signs it back.
     That’s how I get my first friend. We sign Shit every time Robert talks about the forest’s cleansing aura, and how our new lives start today. We sign Shit when Anita ‘twists her ankle’, and we have to stop hiking for the day. We sign Shit when Sabrina moves up to the ‘Full Moon’ level, where she gets a bag of M&M's for her good work. Too bad she’s allergic. 
     Daisy becomes my only happiness at West Sun. Daisy becomes my only reason. To not run away. To not give up. To not jump off one of the cliffs we hike. 
    But even Daisy can’t fix the cold nights in the tarp, the blisters and bruises, the everpresent warning that I Am Here Because I Am Broken and I Must Be Fixed. 
      I know that there’s nothing to fix. But I can’t say that I know I’m not broken.


Our escape.

     Sabrina comes up with it. The girl at the highest level creates our plan to run away. We are amazed and disbelieving. 
     Yet it’s a good plan. 
     Tara is the lookout. Francesca and Daisy are the arms. Sabrina and Anita are the runners. 
     Anita is the one we worry about. The one we suspect might…tattle. But when she takes our hands to pray to Jesus for a safe, successful escape, we believe her. We have faith. 
     We start at midnight. Or at least we think, we tell time by the sun here. Robert and his two minions are fast asleep when Francesca and    Daisy smack their heads with wood. 
     Thunk. 
     Whap. 
     Crack.
     Sabrina and Anita have the supplies, they’ve already started the run, and Tara jumps down from the tree to join Daisy and Francesca. 
     We meet at the spot by the river. Three nights ago we’d used the white noise of the water to discuss, to confess, to plan. 
     Once we are all in the cave, we stand in a circle and smile. 
     Tara and Francesca kiss. 
     Daisy runs her hands over her face and sobs. 
     Anita and Sabrina fist bump. 
     When we finally pull each other all in for a group hug, reality sinks in. We can touch. We can laugh. We can admit. We can misbehave. 
     We can trouble.

​


Miranda Jensen is a creative activist with roots in the Bay Area. Through her writing and critical theory, she seeks not merely to interpret the world, but to change it.