Julia's Chocolates (17 page)

“Take it easy,” he’d tell my mother, “Take it easy. She’s just a kid.” I’d go to my bedroom and shut the door, rocking myself on my bed. If I felt a scream coming on, I’d stuff a sock in my mouth.

But Taryn never touched me. Never looked at me in a weird, creepy way.

For Christmas he gave me a new bed set—a comforter made from a quilt, with two patching pillowcases, two new pillows, and a white dust ruffle. I loved it, truly loved it, the set being the only new item I’d had in a long time. But then Taryn left when my mother dumped him for Scotty, a giant of a man who looked like a humungous fart to me, and she took the whole bed set because it reminded her of Taryn.

She burned that bed set in the fire even as I screamed at her, even as I tried to pull it out. Scotty had to hold me back while I watched the quilt quiver and roll, the pillowcases shrinking and turning into black masses in the midst of the rollicking flames.

The first night without my bed set, my sheets and blankets looked even more ripped and worn than before. I put three layers of clothes on because it was freezing and my mother was out at some bar but had told me not to turn on the heat. I huddled under an old coat that one of my teachers had bought for me two years ago, and slept.

Scotty yelled often at me and my mother. That was when I took to leaving for school early. I had breakfast with a kind cook at school each day—Kathleen was her name. She always made sure I had enough food. Then I went to my teacher’s class and helped out in the classroom. After school I made the rounds, asking if I could help this or that teacher, lapping up every single compliment and thank-you like a starving person does food. At about five-thirty, when the last teacher left, I’d go to the library and sit and read books. Teachers and reading books in libraries saved my life.

I would eat the dinner that Kathleen the cook packed me in a sack and then head home, hoping to avoid my mother, and succeeding about half the time. As soon as I approached whichever apartment we were living in, my stomach would start to ache, the pain depending on which man was living with us at the time.

I sighed. Aunt Lydia stopped what she was doing. So did I. We faced each other across the island in her kitchen, the moonlight streaming in. “I hope you can forgive me one day,” she said.

“There’s nothing to forgive, Aunt Lydia.” And there wasn’t. When I was sixteen I moved out of the rat-infested apartment I shared with my mother, and with the help of a counselor who had endured my kind of childhood, got myself declared an emancipated minor. I qualified for almost free housing, free breakfast and lunch at school, and food stamps. I was humiliated by the help but knew there was nothing else I could do. I went to school during the day, then waitressed forty hours a week.

I didn’t have any friends. Not because people didn’t try. The kids at my high school were nice to me in that they left me alone. But when you have been through what I went through, and you feel dirty from all the men who have grabbed at you and run their hands all over your body, and a mother who regularly ranted and raved in alcoholic stupors, and you’re almost always hungry and worried, and your mind feels like it’s snapping, well, that puts a damper, shall we say, on how well you’re able to maintain friendships with people.

I was in the business of surviving. I bought used clothes. I cut coupons. I saved all the waitressing money I could because I was always petrified there would be an emergency and I would have no money for food. The fear of hunger stalked me, and I began to put on weight. Frankly, for a while I felt better. The weight meant I was eating. The eating meant there was food. Regular food.

But soon I was depressed by the weight gain, believing I was the size of a silo.

I channeled that frustration into school and received straight As. I literally worked until I fell asleep at night over my books during the first few months of my emancipation. Which left no time for thinking about anything else.

Why would I want to think too much, anyhow? I had a mother who had signed me away to the state. She had given me away. No tears, no apologies, nothing. I was a nothing.

And although I had to admit after living on my own for a few months that being able to return to a safe home, a place where there would be no creepy men with sweaty hands and heavy bodies, no rampaging mother telling me how bad I was, no dirtiness and no chaos, was appealing, the fact that my mother didn’t want me, and would go to such lengths to rid herself of me, was still a stupendous blow.

I could have gone to Aunt Lydia—in fact she pleaded with me to come to Oregon on a weekly basis, but I wanted to stay in the school I was in. I had been there for two years by then, and I liked the other kids and the teachers. I had the impression that as a group they had decided to look out for me. Furniture arrived for my apartment as soon as I moved in. Boxes of food. Clothing. A new backpack with tons of school supplies every fall. Christmas presents. They cared.

I graduated and received a full-ride scholarship to a prestigious college because I studied obsessively to keep my mother out of my head and nailed the SAT. “Have you got two brains in that head of yours?” my counselor had asked me, shaking her head over my score. “Maybe three? Anyone ever tell you that you’re brilliant?”

I spent the summer with Aunt Lydia and tried to think and be and pretend I was a normal person like everyone else, then flew back to Boston with this admonition from her: A woman’s estrogen is her strength. Capture that estrogen, embrace it, flow with it. Be your estrogen. You rule, Julia, girl, and I adore you.

At college I felt much like how an aardvark would feel among peacocks. I was fat, not stylish, not sired from a monied daddy with a salesman-like laugh, and I had never been on a yacht. Plus I still had all my secrets. The secrets kept me apart from the other girls—girls who partied really hard and slept around like you wouldn’t believe, but you knew they would turn into proper society ladies the second they left campus.

“I’m going to have all the sex I can now,” one gal told me, “because when I’m married I’m going to have to stick with that one penis. Do you think I can do that, Julia? Stick with only one penis? For fifty years?”

I told her that was a difficult question to answer.

She nodded. “I think I might have to have a couple of penises on the side, Julia. They’ll be my ‘secret penises,’ so to speak. For pleasure and fun and relief from the one-penis-per-married-girl rule.”

Still, the girls were generally nice in an offhand way, even as they often studied me as one might a science experiment in which purple organisms are growing. And they loved my chocolate treats. They could not figure out why I took so many classes, and they thought that my waitressing was “quaint.”

“It’s spectacular that you’re getting to know the lower classes, Jules,” my roommate, Tabitha, said. “Spectacular. And it will look good on your résumé. Like you really can be counted on to know how to relate to poor people. You know—worked your way through school, that sort of thing. It’s a smashingly good idea, although so dull, isn’t it? Working, I mean.”

I got fatter in college as I dealt with a lot of issues with my mother and my childhood and didn’t date. In fact, men scared and often repulsed me. I went through a period of wondering if I was gay but figured I wasn’t. I simply didn’t want a man around me. Not that there were any men at my door anyhow.

After getting my art degree, I took a job at an art gallery with the help of one of my instructors and later had the grand privilege of meeting Robert.

I looked over at Aunt Lydia. She wiped both hands across her eyes, smearing chocolate right across her cheek. Aunt Lydia hardly ever cried. Of the two of us, I was definitely the Queen of Tears. For long moments, we both stood there. Sometimes things in life are so painful nobody can speak, so I sang what I was thinking, low and husky. “I neeeedddd your love…I wannnntttt your looovvve,” I sang and sang until Lydia laughed and then sang with me. We took a minute to dance around the kitchen, our hands waving in the air, and then we got back to work under the white light of the moon.

W
hen I left the library the next day Shawn and Carrie Lynn’s mother, Brandy, was waiting for me. She was about twenty-six years old, caked in makeup, and sporting stringy blond hair. She was appallingly thin, had several open sores on her face, and her hands shook. A maniacal smile was plastered on her face like one of those haunting clown dolls.

“Who you think you are?” she spat out, the smile still there. She scratched her back with both hands, up and down, up and down.

“Mrs. Coleman—”

“I ain’t no Mrs. Coleman, bitch, and you quit calling the police on my family.” She held Shawn firmly by the arm as Carrie Lynn cowered behind her brother, gripping his hand. Shawn’s eyes were firmly on the ground. “You don’t know shit about what’s going on, so stay out of my business—you got that, girl?”

I looked at her. Didn’t move, didn’t nod. No, I didn’t get that, ‘girl.’

I wanted to say, “But do you ‘get’ your son’s bruises? What about Carrie Lynn’s? Do you get that she’s scared to death of you? Do you get that they’re starving? Do you ‘get’ that your children’s clothes are dirty?”

But I didn’t say anything like that. I knew that woman like the back of my hand. She was my mother, reincarnated with a drug problem.

“I’m sorry,” I said, so contrite. “I think you have the wrong person about that police-calling business. I didn’t call the police. I do Story Hour at the library with the children. That’s it.”

“You’re telling me you didn’t call the police?” Her eyes were narrow, like slits of hate.

“No, I didn’t. Why would I call the police?” I opened up my eyes real wide and tried to look as innocent as possible.

“’Cause you’re the only adult that spends time with them. Shawn and Carrie Lynn are always going to the stupid library with that old hag inside.”

“Well, it wasn’t me. What did you say your name was?” I extended my hand and shook hers. Her hands felt like ice, and I could feel the tremor. Sheesh. What was this woman on?

“I’m Brandy Wilshire. Me and the kids don’t got the same last name. They’re stuck with their retard fathers’ names the sons of a bitchs’ cows.”

I wanted to slap her, to shake her, but instead I smiled. Above all, I wanted to help her children. “I’m glad you stopped by.” I said it like I thought she was a concerned parent and it was so sweet of her to say hello to the local librarian. “I’ve been wanting to tell you what a smart boy and girl you have.”

That stopped Brandy in her tracks. The smile even dropped. She looked better when she didn’t smile. She had hardly any teeth on the top row. I couldn’t see the bottom. “What?”

“Shawn and Carrie Lynn. They are so smart.”

“Well that sure as hell ain’t what Shawn’s teachers have said. This kid is dumber than a board!”

“Oh no!” I wanted to tear her eyelashes out. What a bitch. But I smiled. “He’s bright! So bright. He’s learned to read! He can memorize anything. He never forgets what he learns….” I went on and on, standing right there on the library steps. And then I launched into Carrie Lynn’s intellect. Bright. Incredible reader. Advanced for her age. Wonderful listener.

“I gave Shawn a book one time, and he done never read it at all because he can’t. He doesn’t got much in the brain department, just like his daddy. Fact is, he reminds me of his daddy damn near every day. That man ripped me off, got me knocked up, then got himself jailed for murder and left me high and dry. No child support, no nothing. He’s a piece of shit.” She scratched at her neck, looked at her fingernails, scratched again.

I knew what to do. It was the same thing I did with my mother. And with Robert. That last thought gave me pause. I had spent so much time stroking Robert’s ego, to get him to calm down, I was an expert.

I nodded gently.

“And Carrie Lynn’s father ain’t no better. He runned off, too, with another woman. I didn’t much know him, but he knew I was knocked up again, and he didn’t care about me or Carrie Lynn. And both my babies were screamers. All the time, they screamed.”

I wasn’t surprised. Babies tend to scream when they’re not fed.

“Shawn and Carrie Lynn’s brains must come from you,” I soothed. “They are so sharp. Sharp as tacks. In fact, a little more time in the library would probably help out a lot. I know, being a good mother, that you probably want them at home with you, but I know you work and you’re so busy—”

“You got that damn right. I am busy. And without school, they’re always underfoot. I got things to do, I ain’t no rich suburban bitch housewife who’s got time to kill.”

“Of course not. I’m sure you work very hard.” Yes, having sex with one loser after another for drugs must be exhausting. I knew enough about drugs to know that they killed the soul of a person and replaced it with a version of the devil.

“Speaking of working hard, since the kids are reading so much now, I thought they would need a library card. Shawn, go on in and get two library card applications and bring them out here.” Before Brandy could object, Shawn was off. Carrie Lynn stayed close by my side. Within seconds he was back.

“Just sign right here, Brandy, after you fill out your address, and I’ll make sure that Shawn and Carrie Lynn get a library card. That way when you’re working they’ll have something to do and they won’t get in your way.”

At first I thought she was going to object, but then those mean little eyes got crafty and she nodded, signing her name and address. I took the cards from her.

I might have felt a little bit sorry for Brandy because of her drug habit if she wasn’t such a miserable, pathetic, criminal loser of a mother.

“I’m here from one to five. They can come every day at one, and I’ll send them home at five. They can help sort books. I can read with them. We’re not busy.”

I imagined Ms. Cutter’s face if she could have heard me. She would look as if she’d sucked down an entire lemon in one fell swoop. Two members of an “undesirable family” in her library for hours! Shame!

“You want these two underfoot, fine by me, Trixie,” said Brandy, her mouth twisting. She scratched at her face, then her arm, then checked her skin. I figured she was on meth. “But you tell whoever called the police that I got a gun and I ain’t afraid to use it on anyone who gets in my business, you understand that?”

“I do understand that, ma’am,” I said, all sweet again, at the same time praying that she would die soon. Like get hit by a Mack truck. “But I didn’t call. We’ll see you tomorrow at one, Shawn and Carrie Lynn,” I told them, smiling. Shawn didn’t look up, but I could tell he was smiling. Carrie Lynn caught my eye. A tiny little smile lurked at the corner of her lips.

Stash insisted on another target practice. I went to bed with the sounds of bullets whizzing through my dreams. For some reason, it helped me sleep. I woke up refreshed and calm.

And ready for Ms. Cutter.

Ms. Cutter did blow a gasket when Shawn and Carrie Lynn started coming in and staying from one till five. In fact, she blew a gasket right in front of them. I wanted to kick her. At that moment, I didn’t know who was worse, Ms. Cutter or Shawn’s mother.

The Vulture drew herself to her full height. “This is not a charity house, and we are not a home for wayward youth, either.”

I turned and told Shawn and Carrie Lynn to wait in the children’s section. It was a Monday, and Shawn looked pale and exhausted again, as did Carrie Lynn. Since they were both scared to death of Ms. Cutter, they ran off as quickly as they could. I knew Carrie Lynn would pull her blanket over her head as soon as she sat down.

I was furious. Couldn’t Ms. Cutter see that they needed help?

“Shawn and Carrie Lynn are members of this town and have the right to use the library. They can help me shelve books.”

“We are not a baby-sitting service, Ms. Bennett. I forbid this.”

I stood there, thinking about her forbidding this. Thinking about forbidding children who were desperately in need of a respite from an abusive home from using the library.

Roxy Bell stood up behind her desk, then came to stand behind me.

“Ms. Cutter, you’ve managed to scare the children of this town away from the library, and their mothers—” I began.

Ms. Cutter looked as shocked as she would have if a naked man wearing an alligator mask had streaked through the books on tax law. “I have done nothing of the sort! I insist on quiet in my library, and young mothers today don’t respect that.”

“Young mothers today would probably like to attend Story Hour with their children. Other people would probably like to feel welcome in their own library. They would probably like to check out books,” I said.

Ms. Cutter crossed her arms in front of her chest. “I’ve had enough. I am reporting you to the board. I’m sure they’ll have a lot to say about your care of indigent children with a hooker for a mother.”

I knew more about having a hooker for a mother than I wanted to know. And I had a pretty good idea of the life that mother was giving to Shawn and Carrie Lynn. And I also knew that all children should be welcome in the library.

I walked to Ms. Cutter’s desk and opened up the bottom drawer with a key that was taped to the bottom of her pencil holder.

“Get out of my desk, this instant! You’re fired, Ms. Bennett. Absolutely fired. Get out of here, and get out of my desk!”

I held up the bottle of vodka.

Ms. Cutter froze.

Roxy Bell’s mouth fell open.

“I believe the board would like to know what you have in your desk, Olivia.” I used her first name deliberately. “In fact, I’m sure it would amuse them greatly, as it would amuse the rest of the council. And the councilmen and councilwomen’s spouses, and their friends, and in-laws. Even the in-laws’ dogs might be interested. Can you imagine how people living here will laugh at this?”

The librarian’s face went white, and I suddenly hated myself. I wanted to help Shawn and Carrie Lynn, but I didn’t want to hurt or humiliate anyone. Even someone as bitterly mean as this woman.

“Surely,” I said quietly, putting the vodka back in the drawer, locking the drawer, and retaping the key. “Surely we can find something around here for Shawn and Carrie Lynn to do?”

Olivia Cutter nodded her head, her shoulders slumped, her face now gray.

“I’m sure we can,” she squeaked.

Roxy Bell clapped her hands and clicked her red pumps, her white curls bouncing around her head.