Hope: A Memoir of Survival in Cleveland

by Amanda Berry

  After the lake, she asked him to go to church and pray again. He came back with a picture of her with a statue of Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jesus. She says she really likes church. I hope she keeps taking him there.

  August 24, 2011: First Day of School

  Amanda

  It’s time to start kindergarten. Joce is almost five. Someday we’re going to get out of here, and when she gets to go to a real school, I want her to feel she knows as much as the other kids.

  Our room already looks like a tiny classroom. When she was very young, I began taping shapes, colors, and letters to the wall. I cut out pictures of animals from junk mail and magazines and taped them up, too. She would point to them and say “cow” and “horse” and “monkey.” We played a little game where I would say the name of the animal in a picture, like “cat,” and she would have to say it back to me.

  He bought some jigsaw puzzles at a yard sale, with the Incredibles and Dora on them. She loves Dora. He also found some Barney flash cards, and we worked hard with those, so she knows her numbers pretty well.

  I read to her all the time. We have only a few books, because he’s so cheap. But after I begged and begged, he brought us more, and some of them even seemed brand-new. Can You Tell Me How to Get to Sesame Street? was her favorite. We must have read it ten thousand times: “Elmo likes books. Fat books. Funny books. Bat books. Bunny books.” We also love Dr. Seuss’s Fox in Socks. She likes the way it ties up her tongue when she reads it to me: “Fox. Socks. Box. Knox. Knox in box. Fox in socks.”

  But now it’s time to make her learning more formal. I know the Cleveland Public Schools start today, because this is his first day back at work driving his bus. He left before six for the first time since last spring. Today it also means Jocelyn starts kindergarten.

  I stayed up late last night getting everything ready. I have some worksheets from schoolbooks that he found at yard sales or at Unique. He brings home books on math and reading, and one called Hooked on Phonics. I rip pages out of them to use as worksheets, and copy numbers and letters by hand and make my own. The books help me know exactly what kids are supposed to learn in different grades, and I have made worksheets for reading, math, and Spanish. It’s simple stuff, because I want to make sure we start nice and easy, so she likes school.

  He got Jocelyn a used pink-and-purple Dora fold-up table and an old kiddie lawn chair to use as her school desk. He bought a big white board, one of those dry-erase ones, with colored markers. I taped the whole alphabet, capital and small letters, to the bedroom wall. I am trying everything I can think of to create a real classroom.

  I set my alarm for nine. Jocelyn rarely goes to sleep until after midnight and I want to make sure we get up early. When the alarm buzzes, I get up and get dressed, then I wake up Jocelyn. We use the little portable potty in our room, since the door to the hallway is locked and we can’t get downstairs to the bathroom. We have water in a gallon jug and we brush our teeth with that. I cut the top off a plastic milk jug, which we use as our sink. I put a packet of oatmeal in the microwave, add some milk from our little mini-fridge, and we have breakfast.

  “Are you ready?” I ask her after we finish eating.

  “Yes!” she says.

  She sits at her Dora desk and surrounds herself with her dolls, which are almost as big as she is. She calls them her classmates. I write the date on the whiteboard: Wednesday, August 24, 2011.

  I sit on the bed facing her. We have a couple of little American flags, and we hold them, which makes Joce feel grown up. “Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance,” I say.

  She stands at her desk, and as I take my place next to her, we both put our hands over our hearts.

  “I pledge allegiance to the flag,” I begin, and Joce tries to keep up, “of the United States of America. And to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

  She stumbles just a bit on “indivisible,” but she’s a quick learner.

  “Okay,” I say. “Please be seated.”

  We start by saying the date out loud, and then go over the days of the week. We then practice naming shapes and colors. I cut out a triangle from blue construction paper and write “blue” on it, and I tape it to the wall. She works on coloring in shapes, and when she’s done, I post her work on the wall. She is so proud.

  At lunchtime we have a sandwich that I made the night before. He brought us some chips in a bowl, which I have to make last all week, so I cover them with plastic to keep them fresh.

  After lunch we play fun games and talk about things like pollution and safety. I warn her about never going anywhere with strangers. I don’t think she has any idea what I’m talking about, but someday she will.

  We say a few words in Spanish. I don’t know much, but her dad speaks it to her all the time, so it’s fun for her to learn some new words: “Me llamo Jocelyn.”

  We finish for the day at around one o’clock because I think that’s when real kindergarten ends for the day. After we fold up the Dora table and stand it up behind the whiteboard—I hate clutter—we play a game I call “time to go home.” She puts on her little backpack and gets ready to leave, like they do at a real school. I explain to her about the safest ways to cross a street and then pretend to walk with her: out the door, down the street, cross at the corner, look both ways. She loves the imaginary trip. I pull make-believe keys out of my pocket, and she helps me unlock our pretend front door. Then we are home!

  She drops her backpack, and it’s time to do some exercises. I eat so much junk food that I need the workout, and I want to make sure that Jocelyn gets healthy exercise every day. So we stand and do twenty-five jumping jacks each. It’s funny, and we laugh ourselves silly.

  October 2011: Depression

  Gina

  I don’t want to get out of bed. I don’t want to eat.

  “Chelsea! Chelsea! Let’s play!” Jocelyn is at my door again, begging.

  I keep my eyes closed and pretend I’m sleeping. It’s late afternoon, and the days are getting longer and harder.

  Sitting on the floor and playing with Jocelyn used to be my favorite way to spend time. We played Go Fish, and I pretended to eat her fake little fried eggs and plastic sandwiches. I made her laugh when I turned my eyelids inside out.

  She is the only happy person in this house, and I love her.

  But I can’t stand being here anymore, so isolated and cut off from the world. I am twenty-one. I was fourteen when he took me and I feel like I’m still stuck at fourteen. It’s Halloween soon, and I want to be out enjoying it. I think of Chrissy and my other friends and I wonder if they have jobs and babies now.

  I am sick of being in the same bed when he comes for Michelle, and then me.

  I need this to be over.

  “Please, please, stop,” I ask him.

  His response is to call me names. Retard. Sasquatch—he especially loves that one, because he says I have big feet.

  He found a red metal stencil of the word “hope” at a yard sale and brought it home for us. I don’t know why. It’s pretty, and I have used it to trace “hope” onto all kinds of pictures and artwork. But now I’ve stopped feeling hope, so I’ve stopped writing it. I’ve even torn up some of the artwork that I was going to give to my parents, and I threw away the cut-off ponytail that I had been keeping in a plastic bag for my mom.

  Michelle says no one will ever come and rescue us, and that we will all die here.

  I’ve stopped imagining all the ways I can escape. I used to dream of killing him with the rat poison that he sprinkles in our room because of the mice in this house. I could never figure out how to do that, and I think it’s a lot easier to talk about killing someone than to actually do it.

  I’m having trouble breathing. I feel the walls closing in on me.

  I’m done hoping that he will ever change. Th
is is my life.

  December 2011: Puppies

  Gina

  Three puppies were born in our room a few weeks ago. At first I was mad that he brought one of his backyard dogs, a Chihuahua named Dana, into the room with me and Michelle. Dana had just had one of her litter outside, and he carried her and the puppy indoors where it was warmer and put her on our floor. I didn’t know what to do and just watched her pace back and forth, her paws dragging dirt all over the new little piece of carpet he had just given us. And then she had two more puppies with all of us watching. Jocelyn was so excited and named the puppies Lala, Ginger, and Kashla, after the dog we buried a few years ago.

  He told me I was responsible for making sure they were okay and didn’t bark, so that meant I was up night and day. The puppies had worms, and I had to tell him to get medicine. Amanda was worried that Jocelyn would get sick from this outside dog.

  When they were old enough he gave Kashla and Ginger away to relatives, but he let me keep Lala for a while. After she was weaned, I started putting out food for her and playing with her. She was white and fluffy and comforted me. But then one day she nipped Jocelyn, so he gave her to one of his daughters. She was my pal. I miss her.

  Castro’s Story: A Prickly Musician

  One day in early 2012 Tito DeJesus got a text message out of the blue.

  Hey, I’m back in the scene. Do you need my strings?

  DeJesus didn’t recognize the number, but it was obviously a musician looking for work. Everyone knew DeJesus as “Titopiano,” and he was well regarded and well connected in the Latin music scene.

  Who is this? he texted back.

  It’s Ariel.

  DeJesus laughed out loud. His old friend Ariel Castro had finally entered the twenty-first century—he was texting! Castro was one of the best bass players DeJesus knew, and they’d been playing together for almost twenty years. But he wasn’t big on technology.

  Whoa, Ariel, you’re finally getting with it! he texted back.

  Castro had fallen out of touch recently. DeJesus knew that too many bandleaders had gotten fed up with Castro’s behavior, always showing up late to practices and gigs and arguing with them over their choice of songs. He was an excellent musician but prickly and arrogant, and a lot of people thought he wasn’t worth the trouble.

  DeJesus felt sorry for his old pal, so he called him back and invited him over to his apartment to jam. Castro showed up with a twelve-pack of Corona, and they went over a few musical charts and new arrangements, DeJesus on the piano and Castro on the bass.

  Out of the blue, Castro asked, “Hey, man, did they find your cousin yet?”

  “Who?”

  “Gina. Did they find Gina yet?”

  DeJesus then realized he meant Gina DeJesus. “Oh, Gina!” he said. “I don’t know if she’s actually my cousin. We might be related, but I don’t know for sure. And no, man, the family hasn’t found her yet. We’re praying.”

  “Well, you know, I hope they do find her,” Castro said. “I’m praying, too. It’s a shame what happened to that girl.”

  Castro was more than a decade older than DeJesus, and had become a mentor to him. When they first met, Castro said he admired DeJesus’s piano playing and told him, “Let’s get you some gigs, let’s get your name out there.”

  So they started playing gigs at local Puerto Rican hot spots, and in 2010 they played at the Fiesta de Luz, a big fund-raiser at Progressive Field, home to the Cleveland Indians. Someone took a picture of the band that day that shows the musicians dressed all in white, with Castro wearing glasses and a neatly trimmed mustache.

  DeJesus always thought Castro was a little odd, “a weird cat.” They often drove together to gigs at clubs in Youngstown, about seventy-five miles southeast of Cleveland. Even if he was offered a free hotel room because the shows ended so late, Castro always insisted on driving home to Cleveland, no matter the hour. Since Castro was often his ride, DeJesus accompanied him.

  On the way home from Youngstown one night, Castro was driving his van down the highway when he said, “I gotta take a leak.” DeJesus told him to stop at a rest area, but Castro said he couldn’t wait because he was in a hurry to get home. When DeJesus suggested he just pull over and go on the side of the road, Castro suddenly said, “Take the wheel!” and opened the driver’s side door.

  “What the hell are you doing?” DeJesus shouted.

  “Hold the wheel! Hold the wheel!” Castro yelled.

  With DeJesus steering at sixty-five miles per hour, Castro unzipped his pants, pushed the door open a crack, and started relieving himself onto the highway. DeJesus never knew what was coming next with Castro.

  DeJesus liked Castro but often found him to be an argumentative know-it-all who was easily upset when he didn’t get his way, someone who argued for the sake of arguing. He always felt he deserved to be paid more than other musicians, and if he learned that others were getting a higher fee, he complained loudly.

  He often raged that the world was against him, especially women. The clubs they played together were often filled with beautiful women, and DeJesus watched with amusement as Castro hit on them endlessly, never missing a chance to ask one of them to dance. They were usually much younger and always shot him down, which infuriated him.

  “Dude, man, you’re a glutton for punishment. You look like an idiot with those girls,” DeJesus told him.

  “Fuck those bitches. Fuck them all,” Castro said. “Don’t they know who I am? I’m a musician!”

  “Whoop-dee-do!” DeJesus said, teasing his friend. “You may be a musician, but you’re a friggin’ school bus driver. Who the hell wants to date a school bus driver? You’re nobody special. Neither am I.”

  “Fuck you, Tito,” Castro said.

  April 8, 2012: Easter Dresses

  Gina

  We are all wearing the new sundresses I bought. Last week I saw a newspaper flyer with cute $10 dresses, and since Easter and both Michelle’s and Amanda’s birthdays were coming, I asked him if I could give him money to buy a dress for each of us. And he did!

  Every so often he gives me money. Sometimes when he is in a good mood, and after I wash the floor or do other housework, he hands me cash, usually $5, saying, “You’re going to need money when you get out.”

  I think it makes him feel less guilty. Some years I get more than others, but usually I end up with about $50, and spend it on special things like take-out Mexican from Chipotle or poster board. Sometimes he says no when I ask him to buy me something with that money, and sometimes he takes it and buys nothing.

  The dresses were supposed to be a surprise, but I was too excited to keep them a secret, since I don’t get the chance to share good news very often. I wanted to make sure I got ones they liked, too, so I asked Amanda what color she wanted. She said there was no way he’d actually get us something brand-new.

  Of course, he got the wrong sizes, so the dresses were way too big for all of us. I hemmed them and made matching headbands with the extra material and elastic waistbands from his old underwear.

  Today it feels good to wear something new as I say my Easter prayers. Every day my prayers are the same: I ask God to give my parents a sign that I am alive and to please, please, please give someone a sign that we are right here inside 2207 Seymour Avenue.

  April 2012: Nine Years Gone

  April 11

  Amanda

  “Daddy, I want you to take me and Mommy to Titi Beth’s house.”

  I’m floored. Out of nowhere, Joce tells him she wants to visit Beth. Puerto Ricans say titi for “aunt,” which she’s learned from him.

  “I don’t know where they live,” he says, dodging her question.

  “Mommy, do you know where they live?” she asks.

  “I’m sorry, baby,” I tell her gently. “They moved, and I don’t know where they live now.”

  “
But I really want to go to Titi Beth’s!” she says. “I want to play with Mariyah and Marissa and Devon!”

  “You’re just going to have to wait,” he tells her.

  He goes in the other room, and Joce starts grilling me.

  “Mommy, where did you live before I was born?” she asks.

  “I lived in a nice house with Beth and Mamaw.”

  “Do you remember what it looked like?”

  “I do. I haven’t been there in a long time, but I had a pretty room, just like we have here.”

  She’s been asking more and more questions like this lately, and I’m sure it’s because she’s tired of being in this house. She goes out with him a lot, but she knows that other kids do more things. She sees it on TV and at the park. Other mothers come outside and play, but hers can never go with her. She’s beginning to figure out that this is not normal.

  April 21

  He says he wants this all to end in a shootout with the police. He knows someday he’ll have to pay for our kidnappings, but he’s so afraid of going to prison that he would rather be shot dead by cops. He says he has his gun ready. I hope someday that the cops do find us, and he gets his wish.

  I’m watching the morning news because it’s the ninth anniversary of my kidnapping, and there’s a story about me and Gina. Lately she, Michelle, and I have been talking more, and we’ve drawn a lot of pictures together. Last year, when he cut off my hair, Gina really helped me through it, and we’ve been getting along better since then.

  I let Joce stay in the room when news about me is on. Beth comes on, talking to a reporter, and she looks skinny.

  “Is that Titi Beth?” Joce asks.

  “Yes, that’s her. Wave to her!” I say, and we both wave at the TV.

  Joce steps right up to the screen and talks to Beth.