He was right. For some reason, Venus was red, even though Mars is supposed to be the red planet. But this was another shock, that Leo knew his colors. It was like all of a sudden something had clicked in his brain. For a long time I’d been trying to teach him colors, using the original box of eight Crayola crayons. After that night, he named them all, like it was easy. But when Inez got him a box of twenty-four Crayola crayons for Christmas later that year, he got so upset. He would only use the original eight primary colors, and every other color he called “wrong.”
Leo is funny like that. He cracks me up. And thinking about all this now makes me miss him so much. At home, sometimes I act like he’s a big hassle. But now I feel so guilty, because he must be having so many tantrums without me there to do my part in his routines. I wish I could ask Inez to bring him to see me, but she hasn’t come back since the first day when I refused to talk. Plus, Leo would have a fit, because he doesn’t like to go new places. Only familiar places like McDonald’s.
Anyway, after the night the toaster broke, we all realized Leo was smarter than we’d thought. So I started to teach him things like ABCs. Which wasn’t that easy, because he only wanted to do it when he wanted to. You had to wait for him or he would totally ignore you. And you had to turn everything into a rhyme or chant.
As a rule, I never liked it when any of my family came down to my basement bedroom. At the time, I liked the feeling of being away from everyone else. And though the room had ugly knotty-pine paneling, the attached bath and shower more than made up for that. After Leo fell in love with my mobile and my stars, I didn’t mind him coming down at all.
Pretty soon, he didn’t even need my help. I could just lie there in the blue light of my lava lamp while Leo counted the stars and chanted the planets. Now and then I’d drift off to sleep, leaving Leo and his naked eyes alone to roam the universe.
* * *
—
LEO PLAYS IN the sandbox. He uses two fingers of one hand to slice through the sand, and then he makes two slices across with the other hand. Each time, the sand glitters and shifts the way Leo likes.
His mother and the curly lady come outside, and he can feel them watching him. He is getting used to the lady with curly hair called Shirley. But he still cries for Venus and his mom. His mom comes to see him and sometimes she stays for a while. But then she leaves again and she won’t take him home.
This time, she sits by Leo in the sandbox and says, “Your father is gone now, Leo. I’m so sorry.”
“Where?”
“I’m afraid your father is dead, Leo. You won’t see him anymore.”
Leo doesn’t understand dead. “What color is dead?”
“Oh, Leo,” she says. “Dead means you never wake up again. So maybe it is black. It means he went away and won’t come back. But he is in a good place.”
Leo grunts. “I want Venus. Where is Venus?”
“She had to go away for a while. You won’t see her very soon, but she is not dead.”
“She’s not black?”
“No, Leo. Venus isn’t black.”
“Do you like the sandbox, Leo?” She leans closer to him. Her smell is familiar.
“Can I go home?”
“Oh, Leo,” she says softly, “I’m sorry, you can’t. Just a little longer.”
“I want curlers,” he says. When his mom’s voice is soft this way, she says yes almost every time.
The curly lady laughs and his mother starts talking again. He blocks out their voices. He plays with the sand. When he hears his mom say, “Goodbye, Leo,” he almost yells, “Stay!” But his attention is caught by a rock that sparkles like stars.
That evening, I decide I might need a friend on my side, because a couple of large Indian girls from Marysville keep looking at me like they want to beat me up. Not for any good reason, but just because they can tell I’m not really like them. Like maybe they think I’m stuck up.
So at dinner I scan the cafeteria for a girl named Truly. When I spot her sitting alone at a table, I walk in her direction, trying my best to look bored. I pick her because she seems harmless and she reminds me a little of Leo. She’s super skinny and has fuzzy, short blond hair that shows through to her scalp.
With Leo, unless you keep his blond hair super short, he tugs and pulls on it until his scalp bleeds and gets bald patches. That means every few months we have to give him a buzz cut. The worst part is when Raymond sits him down near the kitchen counter, where the cord will reach. Leo knows exactly what’s coming and he screams the whole time like you’re killing him.
It’s one of my least favorite things about being Leo’s big sister. But you have to do your part. So while Raymond holds him tight enough to leave bruises, I use the clippers, trying hard not to nick his pale little head. Inez is the one who insists we go through this. But then she always refuses to help and goes to another room.
That’s just like Inez, to want to look the other way.
Now I plop down across from Truly, hoping she’ll notice and start talking to me. But she doesn’t. She acts like I’m not there, like it’s cool to ignore people. She eats her spaghetti super slow, sucking each noodle and then patting her tiny pink lips like she doesn’t have a care in the world or she’s eating in a fancy restaurant.
I’m tempted to get mad, but I decide to go first instead. In my best casual we’re-all-in-jail-together voice, I ask her what “got her in here,” which is how I’ve heard the other girls strike up conversations.
Truly takes another bite of spaghetti and slowly sucks another noodle and I think she’s going to ignore me, until she pauses and says in this sweet but husky voice, “Stealing stuff. Stuff I needed.”
“Oh. Cool,” I answer, not at all sure if it’s supposed to be. I have never understood how people can shoplift—because it would feel so scary, and if you got caught, how embarrassing! I go red just thinking about it.
“I already know why you’re here,” Truly says, finally turning her gold-brown eyes on me. “But, then, everyone does.”
I nod, uncertain how to answer. And then it dawns on me that maybe the other girls are more scared of me than I am of them.
I’ve already had one lawyer, Mr. Dutton with the nostrils. Now they have switched it to be a woman lawyer. I bet they changed lawyers because they think I’m more likely to open up to a female. But they’re wrong. I’m ready to throw my white sheet over my mind the second she goes near that night.
On the bright side, the first time I meet with Betty, I can tell I’m going to like her. She’s heavy and round, wears lots of makeup, and reminds me of a sassy waitress in a southern diner. She pumps my hand with her plump one, and then she asks me to sit down and make myself comfortable.
She tells me to call her Betty. She explains that she’s court-appointed, which means I get her for free. I know it’s because Inez doesn’t have money. And even if she did, I doubt she’d spend it on me now.
At least Betty’s office is more impressive than my caseworker’s. Her desk is wood instead of metal, the window is way bigger, and there’s a big painting of lily pads on one wall. Something about the room reminds me of the time Inez took me to see “a shrink,” as Raymond called him, because she said I had anger problems and lacked impulse control.
It’s true that I was angry a lot, and it was also true—at least at home—that I had a temper, especially when it came to Raymond. Sometimes, I picked fights with him for no good reason. It was almost like I wanted him to hurt me so I could have some way to explain to myself why I hated him so much.
The shrink was an old guy with a smoker’s cough, and I remember being as rude to him as I could. When he lit up, I asked, “How can a doctor who is so dumb that he smokes cigarettes expect to help anybody?” He frowned and snubbed out his cigarette. I don’t know what he told Inez, but she never brought me back to see him—or any other shrink—a
gain.
Maybe she shouldn’t have given up so easy.
At first, Betty does like the others and asks me easy questions that have nothing to do with what happened. But I get the feeling she cares, like she’s not just pretending to be interested so we can get to the real questions. Questions about Raymond. About why.
When she asks what I dream of doing with my life, I surprise myself by telling her the truth. I usually don’t tell people my dream, because I’m afraid they’ll think it’s dumb, or that it’s just because of my name, which has nothing to do with it. “I want to be the first American woman in space,” I tell her, blushing a little. “But now it’s probably not going to happen.”
“Because of what you did?”
“No, because of that woman Sally Ride,” I tell her. “She’s going to make it into space any minute. Do you even think that’s her real name? It sounds like a name she made up to go with her job. Like a stage name.”
Betty reassures me that even if I am the second or third American woman in space, that would still be quite an accomplishment. Maybe I could be the first woman to land on the moon or on Mars or something. I’m relieved she doesn’t seem to think what happened will hurt my chances.
I go on to tell her about my friends, especially Jackie and Vanessa, but I don’t want to focus on them too much. “Jackie has the best mom,” I say, “because she is the opposite of Inez. Mrs. Newton actually packs Jackie’s lunches, and she makes dinners that aren’t Hamburger Helper and gross stuff like that.”
Betty laughs.
When she finally asks about Raymond, she calls him “Ray.” Clearly, she’s been talking to Inez. From the start, Inez insisted that everyone call Raymond “Ray,” because she thought “Raymond” sounded dumb. I call him “Raymond” for the same reason.
“So, Venus,” she says. I brace myself, ready with my sheet. “Let’s talk about Ray. Tell me how this thing with your stepfather began.”
“What thing?” I ask, wishing I sounded less snotty.
“Whatever thing it was that made you want to hurt your stepfather.”
“There wasn’t a thing.”
Betty squints at me. Her black eyelashes have so much mascara they look fake. I don’t even wear mascara, but I really miss having lip gloss and my Baby Soft perfume.
“I need you to tell me how you felt about your stepfather.”
“That’s pretty easy. I hated him.”
“Okay,” says Betty, nodding. “Why did you hate him?”
It was a simple question, but I didn’t know where to start. I hated the way he chewed. The way he smelled like motor oil. The way he constantly cracked his stubby fingers. The way he actually combed the thick blond hair on his forearms. I hated the way he watched me load the dishwasher. I hated the way it felt when he touched my back or got sloppy drunk and called me Veenie. I hated when he was mean to me, but I hated even more when he tried to be nice. Like the time he tried to offer me one of his Rainier beers behind Inez’s back. He must have known I hated him, but it was like he was always trying to create secrets between us. But most of all, I hated the way he treated Leo.
I go with this last one. “I hated the way he treated Leo.”
“How did he treat Leo? Did he hurt him physically?”
“Yeah,” I say. “Raymond would shake him when he was already crying. Or he’d box his ears with his fists. Stuff like that. He got mad because Leo refused to act like a regular kid. When I tried to interfere or defend Leo, then Raymond and I would end up in a brawl. Once, he threw me down the stairs.”
“Oh my,” says Betty. She’s been writing things down. “Where was Inez when all this went on?”
“He usually did it when she was at work. He was alone with us a lot because he only worked part-time at an auto shop in town, and the rest of the time he worked on cars at home in the garage.”
“What did your mother do when you told her about Ray hurting you or Leo?”
“Sometimes she’d believe me and they’d get in a fight. Other times, she’d think I was making it up or exaggerating. She liked to say that I egged Raymond on. And maybe I did.”
“Oh, Venus,” Betty says, like my name is a sad thing. She places a hand on her heart, which makes me think of the word bosom, which I always love when I come across it in old-fashioned novels. She is quiet for a moment, jotting down more notes. “What kind of relationship did your mother have with your stepfather?”
“They fought a lot. I don’t think she really even loved him. I was always rooting for her to kick him out, but she never would. I think she just didn’t want to be poor again and go back to the projects.”
Betty nods. She’s quiet for a moment, and I worry what she’ll ask next. “I’m really sorry,” she finally says, “but I have to ask. Did Raymond abuse you, Venus?”
I squirm at the question. Sigh heavily. “If what you mean by abuse is did he sometimes hurt me, well, yes. Like I already told you.”
“Okay, Venus. That’s what we call physical abuse. But there’s another kind of abuse when a grown-up touches a child in their private parts or makes a child touch theirs. That’s called sexual abuse. Did Raymond do this to you?”
“No! Oh my God! Do you realize how gross that is? I would never let him touch me like that!” I realize I’m practically yelling.
Betty holds up a hand. “I’m sorry. But I had to ask. I need to understand what happened that day to make you so angry.”
“Why do I have to say it?”
“It’s okay to cry, honey,” she says in this soft, caring voice.
“No, it’s not!” I squeeze my stupid eyes shut, but a few tears spit out anyway, like a sprinkler when you first turn it on.
“Why isn’t it okay to cry?”
“Because if I cry, then I might think about it! And I’m not going to talk about it. It’s way too embarrassing!” I feel that sheet slipping, and my throat starts to close. And then I’m leaning over and hiding my face in my hands. I can hear Betty rolling her chair out from behind the desk. “It’s okay, sweetie,” she says, patting my back. “That’s a good girl. Just let it all out. That’s a good girl.”
Let it all out makes me realize I’m sobbing. I can feel my spine shaking under Betty’s hand while she pats my back with gentle thumps. It’s the same thing I sometimes do to help Leo calm down when he can’t on his own. It’s the only kind of touching he allows, and I’m the only one, and you have to count the pats out loud or it doesn’t work.
But I don’t really care about the pats. I just want Betty to keep calling me a good girl.
* * *
—
LEO IS PLAYING with a plastic shovel in the sandbox when he hears a voice. “Leo!” The voice that is trying to come in is a man’s voice but not his dad’s. Leo hates it when voices try to poke into where he is.
“Leo!” The voice is louder. Brown shoes come into view, and then the man is touching his arm. Leo tries to yell but the man sticks something over his mouth. Scared feelings get stuck in Leo’s throat. He is being lifted out of the sandbox, kicking his feet.
The man puts him in the backseat of a car he doesn’t know. It is different from the truck he didn’t know with the curly lady. He is going to have a tantrum, even though Venus says don’t.
Leo needs to blow his nose. No crying, Leo! Mother says. Get a tissue, Leo!
His mother isn’t here. There is no tissue. He curls up on the floor of the car to rock, but there’s not enough room. He looks for his purple blanket. He can’t ride in a car without it. Where is his blanket?
Leo hears the car start. He can’t cover his ears like he always does, because his hands are stuck together in front of him. He tries to yell but nothing comes out. He sees white stitches on the car’s brown seat. Some part of his brain begins to count them. He starts to calm down.
At some point, the ca
r stops. The man takes the covering off his mouth. It hurts and Leo cries out. The man’s hair is the wrong orange. The man tells Leo, “Stay quiet.” When Leo sees scissors, he screams with fear and tries to hide on the other side of the car. But the man pulls on him and then he cuts the tape between Leo’s wrists. Now Leo can move his hands again. Then the man gives him a blue race car. He straps him in the seatbelt and says in a mean voice, “Stay.” They start driving again and Leo cries. After a while, he stops. He spins the wheels on the car and stares into the turning.
On Sunday morning, Inez shows up—and they let her in my room, and it’s not visiting hours. I notice something is wrong—more wrong than everything that’s already wrong. For one thing, she’s not wearing any makeup. Not even lipstick, which is normally the first thing she puts on when she gets in the car. For another thing, she looks wild-eyed, like she just came out of seeing Jaws.
“Leo’s gone missing,” she announces.
“What do you mean, missing?”
At first I’m not worried at all, because Leo disappears now and then, but he’s always either behind the couch, near the heat vent, or on the floor of his closet, curled up with his purple blanket. He doesn’t leave the house except maybe to walk around the block with me, or sometimes to visit McDonald’s.
“He’s gone!” Inez exclaims angrily.
“Did you check the usual places?” I ask. “The couch—”
“He hasn’t been at home, Venus,” she interrupts. “Leo and I have been staying at Shirley’s. He’s been missing since yesterday.”
Shirley works with Inez at J. C. Penney, and I guess they’re friends. I’ve never met her, but Inez has had her over to watch Leo when she’s in a pinch and I’m not around.
“Shirley’s? But why would…” Before I even get to the end of my sentence I know the answer.
My Name Is Venus Black Page 3
