Part 14 (1/2)
”When I came back after a year of school, I tried to have a relations.h.i.+p with her, but it was so draining. Finally, I got tired of it. Of all the phone conversations where she talked for an hour and I talked for a minute. Of all the holidays she ruined by refusing to get out of bed. When I was a kid, I had no choice. I had to be around her emotional abuse and her mental illness. As an adult, I have a choice. Not an easy one, but at least a choice.”
”Do you think she's truly ill?”
I nodded my head.
”I begged her to get help. When I first started my business, and I was only making eight hundred dollars a month, I offered to pay for counseling for her. She wouldn't go. She insisted that our family was sick, not her. To this day, I agree with her a” our family is sick, every last one of us. But so is she.”
”Do you have any contact with her now?”
”Not if I can help it,” I said adamantly. ”One month she sends me a nice birthday card, saying she misses me. The next month, she sends me my vaccination papers a” like she's trying to get every trace of me out of her house. I mean, what do I need twenty-year-old vaccination papers for now?”
”Does your sister stay in touch with her?”
”Ann?”
Destiny nodded.
”No, she stopped talking to her around the same time I did but for different reasons. I can't even remember what they were anymore. My other sisters, Gail and Jill, both live in California. I think they moved there to get away from my family, but the distance allows them to think they have good relations.h.i.+ps with both my mother and father. I'm sure my father molested Gail. There's no way he couldn't have. In age, she's right between me and Ann. Maybe he molested David, too. As for Jill, I'm not sure about her. I'd hate to even know. I was seven years older than her, and I tried so hard to protect her.”
”How sad!”
”I've thrown away most of the things my parents have given me over the years, what few there were,” I said matter-of-factly.
”But don't you miss your mom?”
”Not really,” I answered a fraction too quickly. ”Well, maybe that's not true. I guess I do miss her a little, and I probably always will. Mostly, I miss the idea of a mother, of someone she's never been. I don't even tell people anymore that I live in the same city as her but never see her. They always suggest I reconcile, as if there's been some mild misunderstanding. I've tried, Destiny. G.o.d knows, I've tried. But what I really need to do, the much harder thing to do, is reconcile myself to the fact that the mother I have will never treat me in a loving, respectful way. And so, I can't be around her. That's what I regret. I don't regret not being around her the way she is.”
We were both quiet, sitting in an awkward silence. Ready to pay the bill, I searched for the waiter.
”How often do you see your dad, Kris?” Destiny asked me in a quiet voice.
My attention snapped back to her. I laughed a bitter laugh.
”Ironically, I see him quite often. The last time I saw him was just before I met you. We went out to dinner.”
”Will you see him again now that you know what he did?”
”I'm not sure a” I haven't really thought that far ahead.”
”I couldn't see him.”
”Sure you could.”
She looked at me strangely.
”Your coping skills are as fine-tuned as mine. I can block out the abuse, Destiny. I can separate the man he is today from the man he was then. At great cost to myself, but I can do it. Completely. Just like I've done all my life. Just like you did last night at your grandma's, until she called you 'little one.' ”
”Then I lost it,” she admitted, a bit embarra.s.sed.
”But you got control of yourself again.”
”Aren't you ever afraid you'll lose it for good, Kris? That something will trigger it, and all the memories will come flooding back at once, and you won't be able to endure the pain?”
”I'm afraid of that all the time. Ready for it, yet deathly afraid of it.”
How could I not be afraid? I'd read books and articles and newspaper stories about other women who were the victims of incest. Their lives were often pictures of childhood abuse turned into adult tragedy. Women who lost everything: their jobs, their sanity, even their lives, when the memories returned.
I took three quick sips from my water gla.s.s.
”This may seem like a dumb question, but then why would you want to see your father?”
I smiled half-heartedly. ”This may seem like a dumb answer, but I can't bear to lose both my mother and my father. For the last ten years, beginning when he and my mom divorced, I've really liked him. Heas been supportive of my work, he's acknowledged my lovers, and he's treated me with kindness and respect. My mom's abuse, I clearly remember a” in excruciating detail a” when I'm awake. His abuse s, so far, I only remembera”in vague imagery a” when I'm asleep. Each day, I try to put it all behind me, to focus on the life I have now. Most days I succeed. Some, I don't. There have been times recently when I've been afraid I'd crack under the pressure of keeping it all together, or separate rather. Today, everything in my world seems different than it did yesterday, but for the first time in a long time, I don't feel crazy.”
”Do you think your mother knows your father abused you and your sisters?”
Even though I'd already given that question hours of consideration, it took me a minute to answer.
”I think so, on some level.” I breathed deeply. ”I think that may have been part of what drove her to her bed. She's so bitter today, and half of what makes her bitter is that we all have a relations.h.i.+p with my father. It infuriates her because she believes we think she's the only sick one. It's almost like she's been on the verge of telling us that his sickness dwarfs hers, but she never could quite seem to find the words. Because to find the words, she'd have to admit that she knew what was going on. ”The main difference between my parents, Destiny, is that my mom has carried my father's guilt. But he has never carried hers. I'm sure that he doesn't waste one minute of his life today worrying that perhaps he should have done something more for his children when his wife took to her bed for years on end.”
”What did he do?”
”He golfed. He drank thirty-five thousand beers a” and I'm not exaggerating. I figured that out one day. He let us fend for ourselves. Now pretend that she did know something was going on, and again, I'm not sure that she did, but pretend that she did. What did she do? She became so depressed that she couldn't get up. That's the difference between the two of them. He feels nothing. And she feels too much.”
”I don't know how you do it, Kris.”
”Do what?”
”I don't know how you manage to live without feeling rage every day of your life, rage at these two people who did these horrible things to you.”
”I don't. I try to control my rage, but it's always there.”
Destiny reached over to calm my hands that were playing with packs of sugar as if they were cards.
”This means a lot that you're talking to me, Kris.”
”About my family?” I stopped fiddling.
”About yourself.”
”Thanks for listening.” I smiled at her shyly. She grinned.
Right then, at that exact moment, I realized that for the first time in my life, I had a true friend. It made me sad for all the years I'd spent alone, for all the time I'd lost.
Destiny must have seen the frown cross my forehead.
”Hey, Kris, why the frown? What's wrong?”