Hope For Garbage

by Tully, Alex

  “Your baby sister?”

  “Yeah. One day, my mom called me into her bedroom to tell me the wonderful news, about her miracle baby. She said it was—get this—a gift from God because there was no daddy. Obviously, I wasn’t that naïve. Her friend Tony, the grocery guy, he took her to the hospital when she had the baby. Maybe he was the father. That was the only time I ever remember Mom leaving the house in like years.”

  Trevor took another bite of his sandwich, “Mom kept Allison in the bedroom with her like she did with Jacob. Then when Allison was about a year old, I took over—just like I did with Jacob. I fed her, changed her, and then stuck her in a playpen.”

  He went on, “In middle school, we were able to go home for lunch if we wanted so I started doing that every day. Jacob learned to sit quietly on the couch and watch his cartoons until I got home. Allison was a good baby, not as hyper as Jacob. She didn’t mind the playpen at all. I would feed them lunch quickly and then hurry back to school.” Then Trevor mocked in a stern voice, “Mom was not to be bothered.”

  Dr. Fisher sighed, “Such unbelievable neglect.”

  “Yeah, I guess we were used to it. We didn’t know anything different.” Trevor knew he was coming to the darkest point in his story—the memory that he couldn’t bear to think about. He looked around the busy diner. “Do you think we could take a walk somewhere?”

  “Sure, there’s a little park at the corner. Why don’t we go there?”

  Dr. Fisher paid the tab and they headed for the park. As they walked side by side, she mentioned some of the quaint shops around the Beaumont Center. Trevor wasn’t listening; all he could think about was the next part of his story.

  This was the part he feared the most. This was the part that was so hidden in the depths of his mind, he never thought about it, let alone talked about it. This was why the man-in-black haunted his dreams, and he was about to re-live it all.

  CHAPTER 35

  “Trevor! Trevor I need you!” He heard the yelling coming from Mom’s bedroom. Shit. He had five minutes to get on his bike and get his ass to school. One more tardy and it meant detention.

  “Just a second!” He yelled back from the kitchen.

  Jacob and Allison looked up from their empty cereal bowls. “She probably wants cigarettes.” Jacob said matter-of-factly. He knew way too much for a six year old. Trevor poured Cheerios into their bowls and handed them spoons.

  “What about the milk?” Jacob asked.

  “Trevor!” Mom bellowed again from down the hall.

  “Look, I can’t get milk until tomorrow when mom gets her check. Just deal with it!” He reached over the top of the refrigerator and grabbed a pack of Viceroys out of the carton.

  Allison started crying. “I want milk!” she sobbed.

  Trevor was about to lose it. He was thirteen years old, not thirty!

  “What about oatmeal then?” Jacob yelled.

  “Just hold on!” he screamed over his shoulder. “I have to boil water—I don’t have time for that!” Jesus, they were bad off. The people in his neighborhood were pretty poor, but he would bet they all had a microwave!

  Trevor walked into the dark hallway that led to Mom’s room. Her bedroom door was only opened a crack, but the cigarette smoke was seeping out. He could feel his chest tightening up—not so much from the noxious air, but more from his anxiety at seeing Mom. Every day she looked worse.

  He slowly pushed the door open and peered inside. The room was dark. A heavy wool blanket covered the only window. Mom liked to keep it dark because it was easier to see the TV. She watched TV all day long—game shows and nothing else.

  “Well don’t just stand there stupid! Come here,” she waved him over to her bedside.

  As he took a step, his knees began shaking and his eyelid began twitching. Get a hold of yourself Trevor. He took a deep breath of the foul air and walked forward. He made sure to stop at arms-length away from mom. She didn’t want anyone coming near her, not even her children.

  He handed her the pack of Viceroys wrapped in a tissue. She carefully pulled the box away and threw the kleenex onto one of the growing piles next to her bed. She immediately struck a match and took a long drag of the cigarette.

  Mom was around thirty-five years old. She looked like she was in her sixties. Her face was sunken in and full of wrinkles. Her filthy, thin hair was slicked back and wrapped in a handkerchief. Deep lines surrounded her lips, partially because of the smoking, but also because Mom didn’t eat—literally.

  Trevor would offer her food all the time but she wanted only two things: bottled water and occasionally some crackers. She had begun losing her teeth. Trevor had noticed the first one about a year ago, a big black hole when she smiled. Now she had lost most of the ones in front.

  “Empty that for me.” Sitting on the bedside table was a paper plate with a mound of cigarette butts. It was only one day’s worth. Almost half of mom’s check money went to cigarettes. It was part of the reason Allison couldn’t have milk in her cereal.

  “Yes Mom,” he picked up the teetering plate and turned to the door.

  “Trevor,” Mom called from behind.

  He didn’t turn around, “Yes?”

  “I love you stupid,” she said quietly.

  ***

  Trevor looked up at Dr. Fisher. “I just remembered that.”

  “Which part?” she asked.

  “That she told me she loved me. That was the first time.”

  Dr. Fisher nodded. “And what happened after that?”

  Trevor closed his eyes. “I just went to school I guess.”

  “Well why don’t you walk me through it?”

  Trevor got up from the park bench and turned to Dr. Fisher. “I know I told you I wanted to talk about this, but now…I don’t know if I can.” No one had really heard about this part of his life. He just didn’t know if he could get the words out.

  He looked across the park at a little boy running through the trees with his mom. He was laughing and clapping happily. Is that what childhood was supposed to be like?

  Dr. Fisher’s voice was calm and reassuring, “Trevor I know this is very hard for you and you’ve been really brave so far. If you need to stop, I understand. I will always be here for you to talk to.”

  Something stirred inside him. Maybe telling her would alleviate some of the pain—some of the burden. He was sick of being the only human being on the planet who knew the whole story. He might as well just do it now.

  The blue sky was tinged with the pink of dusk. Across the park the mom was hugging her little boy. He took another deep breath, “I went back to the kitchen.”

  ***

  “Are you leaving?” Allison asked, propped up on the couch in front of the TV.

  Trevor grabbed his backpack off the floor. “I’ve got to go to school sweetie but I’ll be back before you know it. I’ll come home at lunch and make you some pb&j. How does that sound?”

  She looked up at him with her big blue eyes and goofy grin. It killed him to have to leave her. She was only three years old, but was especially small for her age. He bent down and gave her a hug. “Be good and I will be back in just a couple of hours.”

  He walked into the kitchen where Jacob sat eating his dry cereal. “This is gross. I want oatmeal!”

  Trevor ignored him, “Jacob, keep an eye on your sister. I’ll be back at lunchtime and you make sure you’re ready for the bus.”

  Jacob went to afternoon kindergarten, and that’s when Trevor would try to get Allison down for a nap. At least when she was in the playpen she couldn’t get into anything. Being home with mom was like being home alone.

  Trevor pedaled hard the whole way to school, which happened to be over a mile away. A bus came by his house every morning, but because he had to come home on his lunch hours, the bike was his only option

  The morning dragged on as it usually did. Sitting in his last class of the morning he thought about Allison and the look on her face when he left. The guilt st
arted to set in and then quickly turned to anger when he thought about mom.

  Trevor looked around at the other kids in the class and wondered what their moms were like. They probably had moms that helped with their homework and made their lunches. He would bet no one else had a mother like his.

  The lunch bell rang out and he quickly threw his math folder and pencil into his backpack. He took off for his bike and started the trek home.

  He was halfway to his house and turning down Beachwood when he heard them. Sirens—lots of them. The faster he pedaled, the louder they got.

  Then in the distance, he saw black smoke rising up over the trees. Jesus, it looked like it was coming from his neighborhood. It looked like it was coming from his street.

  Trevor pedaled faster as the panic set in. A large knot immediately formed in the pit of his stomach. When he got to his street, the knot felt like a fist that someone had thrust into him at full force. He almost couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

  Amidst the mass of blue and red flashing lights, a large crowd had gathered in front of his house. Trevor looked to both sides of the crowd—the run-down yellow duplex stood on the left, and Mrs. Perkin’s cat-infested bungalow stood on the right. This was definitely where he lived, but there was no house. All he could see was a pile of black rubble smoldering in its place.

  Things began moving in slow motion. His feet were moving forward like they were on auto-pilot. He looked around at the crowd of people. Their mouths were moving, but he couldn’t hear anything. It was almost as if he was floating under water.

  He found himself moving toward the lights where a man dressed in a black suit stood talking to a group of police officers. They didn’t notice him in all of the chaos, and as Trevor got closer, the sound of the man’s voice became clear.

  Trevor stood next to the man-in-black, and looked up at his face as he spoke. The words trickled down to him like tiny knives stabbing him in his heart, “It looks like a gas explosion from inside—probably the stove. We have three bodies, one adult and two children. They never had a chance.”

  With those words, Trevor fell to his knees and screamed, until he couldn’t scream anymore.

  CHAPTER 36

  Trevor took a deep breath, “And that’s what happened.” He slowly looked up at Dr. Fisher, not sure what to expect.

  He could see the pity on her face, “Trevor, that was really gutsy. I’m proud of you.”

  His feelings of guilt started creeping in and then the anger, “Proud? Seriously? I left those kids to fend for themselves and they died!”

  The whole thing was too much. He felt like he was going to explode. He stood up from the bench and began pacing.

  Then he started yelling, “It’s my fault Dr. Fisher! Don’t you get it! I left those kids alone! I should’ve been there!” He fell back onto the bench and lowered his head.

  And then Trevor began sobbing—four years of feelings flowing out of him—an outpouring of bottled up anger, grief, and guilt. “I wish I was home that day. I just wish I would’ve died.”

  Dr. Fisher put her arm around him, “Here,” she handed him a tissue. “Trevor, I know you’ve heard this before but this was not your fault. You have to know that. The investigators determined it was a deliberate act by your mother.”

  He had to say what had bothered him for years, what he was too afraid to tell anyone. “I’ve gone over this a million times in my head, okay? When I left, Jacob wanted oatmeal. He tried to make it himself and turned that stove on—he left it on. It was my fault!”

  Dr. Fisher put her hands on Trevor’s shoulders and turned to face him. “Look at me Trevor. I know it’s hard to hear this, but this was only one person’s fault—your mother’s.”

  He needed reassurance, “But you don’t understand. She never got out of bed! Ever! She never would’ve turned the stove on.”

  She sighed, “Trevor, even if that was the case, it is still your mother’s fault. It was not your job to raise those children. It was her job. Look at me.”

  Trevor’s eyes were blurry from the tears but he tried to look her in the face. He could trust her—he felt it. For some reason he knew Dr. Fisher wouldn’t lie to him.

  “Your mom told you that she loved you. You said she had never done that before—why that day? It may very well be the case that she was saying goodbye.”

  This thought swirled around in his head. Could Mom really have done this? Trevor had always blamed himself—always.

  “No. I mean why didn’t she just take a bunch of pills, like she did last time? Why this way? Why would she have to take them with her? It doesn’t make any sense. How could she do that to them? How could she do that to me?” He searched Dr. Fisher’s face for answers.

  “I don’t have an answer for that. Trevor, your mom was obviously a very ill woman. No one will ever know what was going through her mind.” She continued, “Even you will never really know.”

  He was hearing what Dr. Fisher was saying, but he just couldn’t find himself to accept it. Mom was crazy about a lot of things, but to do something like this? He couldn’t wrap his head around it.

  “The one thing you have to know is that this is not your fault. You are the victim in this—the victim. You’ve endured a childhood that no one should.” She reached over and grabbed his hand, “And in spite of it all, you’re living a very admirable life.”

  The emotions were overwhelming. He truly didn’t know what to think anymore.

  Then Dr. Fisher asked him something that seemed to come out of left field, “Trevor, have you ever thought about why you garbage pick? I mean, what really motivates you?”

  Trevor thought about it, “Well, my uncle made me start garbage-picking so I could ‘earn my keep’ and then…”

  “And then?”

  “And then I guess I liked finding things I could fix—that didn’t have to be thrown away. It’s better for the environment, you know, less in a landfill. And I love giving toys to the kids at Haven House.”

  The sun was setting over the horizon and people were starting to leave the park. “And certainly, that is all true. But I have a theory about your subliminal motivation for garbage-picking. You want to hear it?”

  “Wow, my subliminal motivation?” He actually did want to hear it. “Sure, okay doc…tell me.” He was curious now.

  “I think when you drive down the street and you see something on the curb, you see more than just garbage. For example, you see that wheelbarrow, missing a wheel. You know that all it needs is a new wheel, and it will be like new.” She paused, “You know that wheelbarrow isn’t trash, and it doesn’t belong in a dump. You know that someone, somewhere, will really appreciate that wheelbarrow. It just needs a little fixing and a new home.”

  She put her arm around his shoulder and gave him a quick squeeze. “That wheelbarrow just needs a chance. You are giving that wheelbarrow hope.”

  Trevor could feel the emotions swelling up inside of him, “Hope for garbage, huh?”

  “Yeah, I guess you could say that. Hope for garbage.”

  Dr. Fisher seemed to be able to read him like no one else could. But weirdly enough, it didn’t scare him. It only made him feel more comfortable around her.

  Now he was totally exhausted, but in a good way. “Well, thanks a lot for listening to all my stuff. I guess I kind of wasted your whole day.”

  Dr. Fisher smiled, “Absolutely not. I am so glad we had this talk. You’ve been really brave.”

  As the darkness settled in, the park got quiet and crickets began chirping. Talking to Dr. Fisher about the past was something he didn’t think he’d ever be able to do. But now that he had, he felt so much better.

  “Well, we should probably be heading back now,” she said.

  “Yeah,” Trevor agreed, “And do you think I could ask you for one more favor?”

  “Sure Trevor, anything.”

  “Do you think you could wheel me over to Lorene’s house?”

  CHAPTER 37

  Lor
ene looked around her son Brian’s room. The Cleveland Browns posters still covered the walls and his drum set still sat in the corner. She had kept it pretty much how he’d left it when he went off to college—with one big exception—now it was clean. Hopefully, Trevor would feel at home here. God knows what kinds of conditions that poor kid had lived in. He deserved better.

  Lorene was excited, but nervous as well. She had asked Reggie to run to the grocery store and pick up some snacks and things a teenager would like. Of course she reminded him that Trevor was a vegetarian, so no pepperoni pizza or any of those Slim Jims that Reggie loved so much.

  Just then Lorene heard a car pull up out front. She peeked out the bedroom window but it was only Reggie returning with the groceries. She hurried downstairs to greet him. “You need any help hon?”

  Reggie put his hands up. “No, no. You know the drill. I’ll bring all of the bags in. You just put everything away.”

  Lorene took the gallon of milk that Reggie was holding and put it in the fridge. As Reggie put the bags on the kitchen table, Lorene unloaded them. Reggie might’ve gone a little overboard. She didn’t know where she was going to put all of this stuff!

  She was moving things around in the refrigerator when she felt someone standing behind her. “You need something out of here Reggie?” she asked over her shoulder.

  No answer. She turned around to find it wasn’t Reggie at all. Trevor was standing there with a bag of groceries and a smile on his face. “Hey Lorene.”

  She stood up, and without even thinking about it, stretched her arms out in front of her. “Trevor! Welcome to our home!” He gave her a quick hug and she was shocked by how thin and frail he felt. This boy needed to eat! “Hon, you sit right there at that table. I am going to make you a late snack!”

  He didn’t look very interested. “I just ate a little bit ago. I’m not really hungry, just tired.”