by Randis, K. L
“Oh.”
Mom tripped over a toy fire truck as she entered the room. “Hey- Adam,” she said, looking at all the scattered pieces on the floor. You could barely see the spinach colored carpet beneath the toys and random pieces of clothing scattered everywhere, which was no great feat in this cramped room. “I thought I told you to put this away? Now let’s go, put this away, now.” She picked up a toy, decided she didn’t know what to do with it, and put it back down again. “We’re not going anywhere unless this room is spotless. You have five minutes.”
Adam practiced his lawyer skills. “Mom, I only have to finish this one piece.”
“Where we goin’ Mom?” I asked.
“Grandma’s, Grandpa’s making dinner. Once Thomas wakes up from his nap and after Kat nurses. Adam I said now.” She shoved a pile of plastic pieces into a pile with her foot.
“But Moooom,” Adam said. “It’s not fair. All I need to do is this one piece.”
I wanted to go to Grandma’s. Now. My knees hit the floor beside Adam and I searched for the part he needed. His eyes widened. “Hey, hey mom she’s messing up my stuff!”
“I’m helping.”
“No you’re not. You don’t even know what I’m looking for!”
Mom is going to yell in two seconds. Where IS it?
I locked eyes with the green connector and reached for it. The structure now complete, I looked toward Adam. His head dropped and he turned on his heel. “I knew I needed that piece. I didn’t need your help to find it.”
“Can we go now?” I asked.
Mom hustled Adam, Thomas, Kat and I into the minivan. We spent ten minutes driving down Southern State highway before we pulled up in front of my grandparents impressive, white Victorian home. Engraved columns hovered around the garden on the side of the house, and the lawn was striped from a fresh cut. Grandpa was expecting us. He was nowhere to be seen, but if I had to guess he was probably out in the backyard skimming the swimming pool. Oak trees that lined the property kept him busy during the fall and summer months between his weekly pool and grass preservations.
My seat belt was unbuckled and I jumped over the seat in front of me before Mom put the van in park. The metal door handle fumbled in my hands before I rushed it open and jumped off the platform of the van onto the grass.
Grandma came to the front door before I could call out to see if Grandpa was still lingering in the garden. “Grandma!” I said, and ran full speed to the front porch.
“Hey, sugar!” she said as I tackled her waist. She wrapped me in a soft hug and pulled me closer. Her perfume danced around my face and she tightened her grip.
“How’s my girl?” she asked. Grandma hugs were always so genuine, so warm.
Before I could answer Mom was walking up the porch steps and handing Kat over. “Careful, she’s doing the projectile spit up thing again,” she warned. Grandma held outstretched arms and took the baby while Adam zigzagged around her. Thomas waddled behind him, stopping to put a dandelion in his mouth.
“Hi Grandma!” Adam called out. He dashed into the house and I heard the wooden toy chest creak open in the front room. My grandpa had built him a custom toy box when he was just two years old, but my mom said the stain he had used on the cedar wood gave Adam an allergic reaction. Grandpa had spent weeks building it, even detailing the top in bright white letters that spelled out his name. Now it was tucked under the window of their front room, waiting for us whenever we came over.
My grandma moved us into the living room. “I just had the carpet shampooed, sorry if it’s still damp. Just put the diaper bag on one of the flowered couches, Molly.”
Symmetrical paintings of the ocean floated above each couch. I wandered over to the wood stove and looked up at the mantle filled with pictures of family, grandkids, and knick knacks from the beach.
I sunk into a couch and stared up at the ceiling that seemed to go on forever. The room smelled and felt like Grandma. “My goodness, look at how big everyone is getting,” Grandma said. She put Kat on the living room floor. “I think that somebody’s birthday is coming up, but I can’t remember who.” She met my eyes with a smile.
“Me! It’s my birthday Grandma. I’m turning eight.” I smiled. She remembered.
“Oh it is?” she exclaimed, bringing her hand to her forehead. “Well I guess we’ll just need to go to Toys R Us while everyone else swims then.”
“Oh mom, no,” Mom started, shaking her head, “Not necessary.” She handed Kat a stuffed bear and pulled a pill bottle out of her pocket. Two oval shaped, cream colored pills fell into her hand, and with a fluid motion she popped them into her mouth and threw her head back.
Now you see them now you don’t.
I had heard my mom repeat the story of how she hurt her back thousands of times. She had worked as a nurse’s aide at Great Side Hospital in lower Manhattan up until three years ago. Her shifts were sporadic, and having three small children at home made it difficult to juggle everything.
She managed to generate significant income working mainly around Dad’s work schedule. They had asked her to work a double shift last minute a few weeks before Christmas and she obliged, making a quick last minute call to the babysitter.
A heavy-set man had just come out of surgery for gall stones and she assisted in transporting him to his room. The registered nurse left the room suddenly, telling my mom not to move him until she came back with more help. She hurried out before my mom could protest otherwise.
The man groggily tried to shift himself from the cot to the bed on his own. His weight fought against him and he began to slip through the two beds. Mom acted on instinct, and pushed against the cot to catch him between the two instead of letting him fall to the floor.
Two nurses walked into the room a second too late, and scrambled over to help just as Mom fell to the floor from the pressure. She herniated and ruptured seven discs in her back all together, and doctors were sure she would never be pain or painkiller free for the rest of her life.
She had saved her job by doing the right thing and she saved the hospital from a major lawsuit. In return, she became a permanently disabled mother to four children under the age of five, eventually succumbing to such intense chronic pain after five back surgeries that she started collecting social security disability and had to leave her job permanently.
I remember one day I watched a girl run off the school bus and her mom swooped her up and swung her around in a tight hug, backpack attached and all. The mom kissed her head as she set her down, eyes bright and chatting about how her day was. My eyes welled up. I came home and accused my mom of not loving me.
“Why can’t you pick me up?” I cried. “I’m the smallest one in my class, I’m little!”
Mom started crying too. “Oh, Brooke, I’m sorry. I just…can’t.” She gripped the edges of her back brace with white knuckles.
I couldn’t even sit in her lap as I sobbed. My only comfort was to stand next to her while she sat at the kitchen table and bury my face in her shirt until I had nothing left to cry.
That day I learned to let go of things like being picked up and feeling hugs that squished my bones. Instead, I focused on giving those things to Adam, Thomas and Kat. I wanted to feel that closeness, even if I was the one who had to initiate it.
“Oh no, no, I want to.” Grandma beamed, watching my mom swallow her pills. She turned to me. “You ready, sugar? Let’s go.”
We talked about the beach and my upcoming birthday as she merged onto the highway. “So, tell me everything, what grade are you going into?” she asked.
The only time I stopped talking the entire ride was to ask her what she thought about the rule of checking out only three books from the library at a time. I was pleased to find we shared the same opinion of it being totally unfair.
As we pulled into the parking lot of Toys R Us she asked me what I wanted. “I’m not sure,” I said. I tapped my foot and waited for Grandma to turn off the car. The store was full of beautiful do
lls, board games and costumes. I was headed right for the pink aisle.
Grandma held my hand as we crossed the parking lot and gave it a little squeeze as the double door opened in front of us. “Whatever you want,” she said. She meant it.
I sped past the clearance toys and stuffed animals. The Barbie aisle was a short distance from the outdoor play section. Grandma strolled close behind me. “Oh, look at this one,” I said. Princess Barbie was off the shelf and cradled against my chest. Swim Team Barbie stared at me. “Or this one, Grandma she has a bathing suit, she can swim with me.”
Grandma laughed. “She can! Whatever one you want, take your time.”
Each doll’s face and features had to be considered along with the extras each doll came with; a stroller, an umbrella, binoculars. There were so many. I lined up three choices next to each other and studied them. School Teacher Barbie won, she came with a blackboard and real chalk. “This one,” I said, and handed it to Grandma.
“Excellent choice.”
She took my hand and headed toward the registers. I let her cruise me around passing people and aisles so I could study my Barbie’s clothes inside the box. A toddler down one aisle threw himself on the ground in protest over a matchbox car. The checkout lane was a few feet in front of us when I saw something. I tugged on Grandma’s hand. “Wait. Grandma, can I look at something?”
She checked her watch. “Sure sugar, quick though, Grandpa should have started the grill by now.”
An end aisle with a clearance display caught my attention, and I picked up a small book with Disney’s Aladdin and Jasmine on the cover. I turned it over in my hand. A jingle from the side forced a smile. A small, silver lock clasped the front and back of the book together. My eyes widened. “Grandma, I want this instead.”
I handed it over, and Grandma turned it over in her hand. She checked the price, a mere $3.99, and gave me a crooked smile. “This?” she asked. “Do you know what it’s for?”
“It’s a journal,” I said. I saw them on TV and read about them, but I never had one. A real journal, with a lock to keep all thoughts and secrets forever bound to the person who wrote in it. “Please, Grandma?” I asked. I tried to read her face.
She looked at the Barbie in one hand and journal in the other. She thought for a minute, and then bent down until her blue eyes were level with mine. “If you really want it and only if you promise to write in it every day, until it’s completely full,” she bargained.
My heart skipped. “Every single day,” I promised.
“Okie Dokie.” She stood up and tucked the Barbie on a nearby shelf, shaking her head. “Of all the things in this store, it doesn’t surprise me.” She put the journal on the conveyor belt and paid with a crisp five dollar bill.
We got back to the house just as Grandpa was pulling burgers and hot dogs off the grill. I rushed inside, eager to show my mom and Adam my present. “Look what Grandma got me!” I gave it to Mom and wiggled in next to Adam on the patio bench to eat a cheeseburger.
“Oh?” Mom said. She flipped it over. “Mom, you took her to Toys R Us and got her a book?”
“It’s what she wanted,” Grandma said. She shrugged taking a seat next to Kat and Grandpa. “She’s the birthday girl.”
“It’s not a book Mom, it’s a journal,” I corrected. Lemonade dribbled down my chin. “Grandpa, Grandma got me a journal and I have to write in it every day. I will too, I’ll write on every page.”
“Mmm,” he said in agreement, putting ketchup on his burger. “Good.”
Grandpa wouldn’t have been a very good journal keeper. He doesn’t talk much. It’s usually what he doesn’t say that says a lot.
After dinner Adam and I swam in the pool while the adults poured drinks into glasses shaped like tennis balls. Grandpa’s brow was pressed together as he stood next to Mom’s chair. He was telling her something important, I knew, because he shook his finger at her as he talked. Grandma brought us ice pops a short time later and we sat next to the adults to eat them.
Grandpa still had a perplexed look on his face and tried to give Mom some money. “You need it, just take it Molly,” he demanded.
Grandpa didn’t like it when Mom turned down his ideas. She gave a brief rebuttal before he stuffed the bills into her purse. He mumbled for a few more minutes and finally excused himself from the table to check his tomato plants.
When it was time to leave, I thanked Grandma again for the journal and tucked it under my arm. “Remember your promise,” she said, winking at me and giving me a final hug. I couldn’t wait to get home to write in it.
We pulled up in front of our undersized ranch. Dad’s car was absent from the driveway. “I’m putting Kat to bed,” Mom called over her shoulder, “Adam clean up these toys before your father gets home, and Brooke, load the dishwasher?” Kat slumped over Mom’s shoulder like a hefty rag doll, puffing out breaths of air.
I lugged a kitchen chair over to the sink. Once I was level with the countertop I picked off dried spaghetti and splashed water inside the cups that had sour milk. The liquid soap bottle weighed my arm down but I finally managed to pour some into the square tray of the dishwasher. The sink was empty ten minutes later and I used my shirt as a towel.
The front door opened and I heard heavy boots in the hallway. Dad was home.
Chapter Three
I was nine when my best friend across the street let me write in her journal. My Aladdin and Jasmine one had every page filled and my mom refused to get me another one.
“I don’t have the money for that crap Brooke,” Mom said, “Write on a piece of paper.”
Since Alyssa hated to write, and since we were best friends for life, she let me use the one her mom got for her.
I was playing Barbie’s with Kat in the kitchen when Alyssa’s mom called my mom. Mom rolled her eyes when Meredith’s number flashed across the caller I.D and she steadied her voice before she picked up.
“Oh hey Mer, what’s-?” Mom’s silence as she listened forced me to look in her direction. She twisted the cord around her finger and turned her back to us. “Mmm hmm? Yea, Brooke likes journals.”
My face tingled with heat when Mom paced two short steps towards the living room. She spun and looked in my direction, the receiver glued to her ear. My mom was always the one chatting away on phone calls, but she was unable to utter a single syllable, darting her eyes at me with an open mouth.
I prayed that Alyssa’s mom was asking if I could come over for dinner, or to play. The banquet my Barbie was attending with my sister’s teddy bear was no longer interesting and I half listened, half pretended to brush Barbie’s hair.
“What do you, I mean, can I see it?” Mom’s voice rose. The thud in my chest was nothing compared to the knots that started to form in my stomach. What did I do?
Mom grabbed her tea and headed for the door after slamming the phone down. “Brooke, watch your sister.”
My legs weren’t fast enough to chase her. “Mom, what’s-”
“No!” She screamed when she saw me trying to follow. “You get back at that table, and you watch her until I get back. GO.” She disappeared through the front door and I paced the kitchen. Hours went by. Maybe it was minutes. I wish I had known Alyssa’s number by heart, I would have called her.
After Kat and I put our Barbie’s back in their bin, the front door opened. My mom’s quick footsteps in the hall made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and I looked for a place to hide. With knuckles clenched, I readied for the screaming to start. Whatever she says you did, just apologize. Apologize and offer to clean up the kitchen.
Crumbs that lingered on the kitchen table became my focal point so I didn’t have to see her face when she entered the room and I moved them around with my finger until I felt eyes on me. Mom’s eyes. I couldn’t look at her. Silence. Please say something.
I had to look. My eyes darted up, briefly, to catch my mom standing with her back to the counter and her one hand covering her eyes. It was what she di
d when she was about to explode. She buried her face, building up, maybe asking God for forgiveness for the terror that was about to reign in this kitchen.
“Brooke.” Her voice was solid, calm.
“Yea?” I flicked a crumb. Should I start screaming first? She would drown me out.
She moved her hand down her face, dragging her fingers past her eyes and cheeks. When she pulled her hand away I thought for sure her skin would come with it.
“Let’s go. Kat, you too, now.”
Alyssa was nowhere to be found as I sat on her couch staring at the journal I had been writing in the past few weeks. I couldn’t look up. How am I going to explain this?
“Brooke, honey,” Alyssa’s mom started, “Do you know what sex is?”
There isn’t a right answer to that question lady.
My toes curled in my shoes. There was a hole in the big toe of my right sock. I wiggled it. My lips pressed hard against each other in a hushed war with my head. Say nothing, Brooke. Journals are secret, they shouldn’t have looked.
“This picture.” Mom slammed a cold finger against the page in my lap. “Where did you see this? How did you draw…” She trailed off. “Where did you get ideas to draw pictures like that?”
Alyssa’s mom squinted at me. “Did she maybe see this on TV Molly? I know those late shows can be full of garbage like this.”
“Is that it Brooke?” Mom’s voice heightened. “Did you see this on TV?” She played the unknowing parent role. “Did you see this when you weren’t supposed to?”
My head was too heavy to look up all the way, just enough to look at their eyes. They were curious, frightened. They didn’t know what to think, those eyes.
“Well, Brooke?” Mom’s voice reached furious status. “You didn’t draw these pictures from nowhere. You didn’t learn the word sex and penis from your books at home. Did you think we wouldn’t find this? What would make you write and draw these things? This is Alyssa’s journal, not yours! Do I need to look at the journal you have at home?”
