Tortured Souls (On Hold)

Chapter 3

With my new dose of courage sloshing around in my mug, I made my way back to my mom’s room to get the next instalment of my life history.

My mom may have been under the influence of pain killers, but she knew I was under the influence of alcohol as soon as I came back into the room.  I wasn’t swaying or slurring, I had learned how to function relatively normally on a slight buzz a long time ago.  I guess it was an addict’s intuition that ratted me out.

“Tati, did you get what you needed?” my mom asked with that disapproving raised eyebrow thing she always did.

“I just needed a bathroom break and a short walk to get the blood flowing again.”

I knew she didn’t believe it, but there is something about admitting to your mom that you are doing something you know she will disapprove of.  Maybe I had just forgotten how to be honest with myself and others.  She didn’t press the issue any further, and I took my perch on the chair that had my butt print firmly memorized in it.

“Let’s see, where was I…, yes, how I met your father.  He was the cutest boy in the school.  All the girls dreamed about going out with him, and he was no stranger to having girls give themselves to him, hoping to capture him as their man forever.  I am not sure there is such a thing as forever in high school.  I am sure that if I hadn’t gotten pregnant, he would have kept on playing the field, but my father was a force to be reckoned with.”

“Sorry mom, but how is it possible that in 1988, you could really force anyone to stay with a girl just because she was pregnant?”

“My father was going to press statutory rape charges against him.  In our State, it could be done with anyone under sixteen-years old, which I was.  The laws have been changed now of course, but my father insisted that he make it right.”

I could see the pain my mom was enduring all over her face.  I thought that perhaps it wasn’t all due to the cancer either.  She took a couple of those wincing breaths and paused for a few moments before she continued.

“He refused to marry me; he wanted me to have an abortion.  I didn’t want to kill my baby, so we were at a crossroads.  My father thought that kicking me out of the house would make him ‘be a man’ and do the right thing.  I had nowhere to go, so when I showed up on his doorstep that night, his parents were furious.  His father hauled him out to the garage and they were out there for about an hour.  You could hear them yelling at each other.  Then the scream came.  His father had taken a tire iron to his backside, but his father hadn’t counting on him actually fighting back this time.  Jim had broke his father’s arm and then hit him in the head with the tire iron, knocking him unconscious.  We now had nowhere to live.  We spent that night in his car.  I don’t know why I didn’t think he would ever hit me like he had his father, I just assumed he did it because his father had beat him since he was a child, and he finally fought back.  Anyway, the next day we were at the welfare office, and because I was pregnant we got a unit right away.  The only reason he kept me around is because he saw me as his meal ticket.”

“So you dropped out of school then, right?” I asked still trying to get the timeline constructed for what began my troubled life.

“I had no choice, the morning sickness started, and by the time that passed, I had missed so many days that there was no hope in catching up with the homework.  I thought after you were born I could go back, but I found out taking care of a newborn on my own was a bit harder than I had expected.  With all the horrible things I was going through with your father, I just couldn’t go back, so I hope you don’t blame yourself for anything, Tati, it really had nothing to do with you.”

“Don’t worry there mom, I am definitely not blaming myself for anything that happened,” I said with a hint of malice.

“Tati, I can tell you are angry with me for what has happened, and I can’t blame you for that.  I should have left your father, I was just too scared.

 “Scared of what exactly?” I queried.

“Scared to be on my own.  I know living with your father was a nightmare, but for me, living alone was even scarier.  I decided the devil I knew was better than the one I didn’t.  I am not making an excuse for anything, it was just the way I felt at the time.  In the end, I ended up alone anyway, but I didn’t have to make that decision, it was made for me when your father left for that slut he is shacking up with.”

“I know what it is to be scared mom, but really, of being alone?  Is that the best reason you have for all the hell that is the collective experience of my childhood?”

“Tati, you have to remember how I grew up.  I was always protected.  I was never alone, especially not with boys.  I had no other experience to draw from.  My spirit was broken into a thousand tiny pieces and it just couldn’t be put back together, at least not at that time.  I know that Jesus can heal all the wounds and put it all back together, but I had never felt further away from him than I did at that moment.  I felt so unworthy, ashamed and guilty.  I had seen others go to the altar growing up that had shattered lives, but then they hadn’t grown up in the church the way I had.  How could I ask for redemption, when I knew better to begin with?  It is only now as I lay here that I am beginning to understand how wrong that thought was, and I am learning that it is never too late to call on him for help.  That is what I really want you to understand, Tati, you have to allow him to help you.”

“God has never done anything to help me, so why would I look to him for help now.  It doesn’t look like he was much help for you, and you grew up in a religious home.  You expect me to blindly trust this unseen person with my life when he has never made his presence known to me.  Where was he when my father was beating the shit out of me or you for that matter?  Where was he when I was being beaten by Brad, mom?  You expect me to think that after all this time he is the answer?  You have got to be kidding!”

 “Tati, you should be angry at me for not showing you the path of love, not God.  I was just so crushed when my parents threw me away that I couldn’t see God as loving anymore.  There was just so much I didn’t understand, and I need you to learn now so that you don’t have to end up like me; dying and trying to make peace with the people in your life that you injured.”

My mom was starting to cry and I just couldn’t take it.  I didn’t want to be manipulated by her tears, I had had enough of that.

“Mom, I think you better have a rest.  You are only going to be in more pain if you continue on crying.  I am going to go grab something to eat, and I will come back in a few hours to check on you.”

“Tati, no, please don’t leave, this is too important.  Don’t shut me out, Tati,” my mom pleaded, but I was already on my way out the door.