Christina Page 6

  “Mom? You mean, this happened to… my mom?” I whisper softly as if it will lessen the damage of what the words mean. And the significance they have for me.

  “Yes, I mean your mom. My wife.”

  I start to shake. My entire body trembles and I bite my lip as tears, big ones, roll down my cheeks. These are not like the earlier, selfish kind I tried to shed because I felt a little bit hurt by Max. Now, real tears are falling, the kind that ensue after spilling your guts. They spew out of my eyes, accentuated by plaintive sobs. My entire body shakes and trembles with every sob.

  Dad swears and slides across the truck seat before pulling me against his chest. At his touch, I start to cry harder and try to imagine what he pictures. But the images I conjure up repel me and I taste bile sliding up my throat as I try to envision how it must have been for my mother. I strain to accept it as real while knowing the victim was not just some faceless stranger. This was about my mom. And that changes everything. Yet, I don’t know exactly why, or where to start. I have a thousand questions crowding my brain, but my mouth can’t even formulate a single one.

  “I shouldn’t tell you this. But the time will come when you will find out. That you haven’t yet is some kind of miracle. It’s not unpublicized. To be honest, if we were on the east coast, I think you’d have heard about it from the rumor mongers years ago. Being out here… well, we never advertise our pasts or history. Most don’t know. Lacking the Army presence here, we are spared most of the gossip.”

  “What do you mean? Other people know about this?”

  He sighs and I feel his head nodding against the top of my head. “It made a terrible situation a lot worse for her.”

  I am overwhelmed. I am crying, gulping for air, and scrambling for the words to ask everything. I need to ask and to know everything. I feel like he’s released me into the sky without giving me wings, or a hang glider to carry me safely to the ground. Usually, that’s all my dad does: makes sure I’m safe. Now? He cuts me loose and I can’t find my direction. I don’t know my mom. Apparently, I know nothing.

  “Shh, Tiny, calm down, honey. It’s nothing new for her. You don’t have to cry.”

  “I don’t have to cry?” I scream at him. “You just told me you watched my mother getting gang-raped!”

  “I know what I told you. I’ve relived it every day for over twenty years. I even dream about it. I envision it. I watched her almost destroy herself. I lost her because of it, and somehow, got her back. So… I know what I told you, honey. I just want you to keep it in perspective. It’s not your pain, it belongs to your mom and me. It’s something I’m going to tell you about now. But you can’t turn it into your issue. Do you understand the difference? I need for you to recognize the difference. She didn’t want you to know for fear you’d take it on as your own. As you often do. And she doesn’t want you to know the kind of pain she endured. Not for a day. Neither of us wants that for you. But… you naturally have a lot of questions. I know you do. I know the confusion you must feel from our lack of honesty. I decided a while ago that you were ready to hear the truth. I mean, no one is really ready. But at some point, you need to know answers. I can’t change how bad they are. I can only give you some of them.”

  His words. Oh God! They hurt my chest. Dream about it. Destroy herself. Lost her. Pain. It overwhelms me and makes knots in my chest. I can’t stand knowing this happened to my mother. Her smile flashes through my head. Her sweet, engaging smile and laugh. The way she makes fun of my dad because he’s so serious sometimes. The way she makes fun of me because I’m so dramatic. The way she is so wonderful, and I never knew, not even a fraction, how amazing and strong and absolutely stunning she really is. I love the way she always comes to me and wraps me in her arms and tell me how much she loves me. Always.

  “S-she knows you’re telling me?”

  “She knows I plan to; yes. She can’t. Okay? She cannot sit down and out of nowhere tell you that thing about herself. It just seemed like tonight… maybe you deserve to understand the source of my obsession and overprotection with your safety.”

  I nod and nod. I do. I get it now. I cringe at my own behavior over the years. “You must both think I’m the worst, most spoiled, awful brat in the world. I’ve never wanted for anything. Nothing. You are the best parents to me and I can be such a brat. Such an ungrateful, horrible—” I start to choke on my tears. My dad’s smile is soft and almost amused as he pulls me into a bear hug.

  “Tiny, you are everything we could ever want. You are smart and focused and fun and dramatic, brazen, and emotional and funny; and yes, sometimes a little bratty. Don’t you understand? All we ever wanted was for you to be all those things. To be eighteen years old without experiencing the terrible kinds of things we had to endure. She lived. We’ve never wanted anything like what happened to her for you. We want you to be grateful to us for simply becoming a normal teen.”

  I shake my head. “All those times I got mad at her…”

  “You don’t think she ever, not even for a moment, held that against you, do you? She understands. More than anyone else in your life, your mother understands you, Christina, every moment of the day.”

  I can’t stand to remember all the horrible things I’ve given her grief over. I hate knowing I failed to realize there was something like this in her past. Isn’t that a testament, however, to her abiding strength?

  Dad leans back and touches under my eye with his thumb, smiling gently. “You look just like her. It completely stuns me sometimes. Your hair is lighter brown and a lot longer, but other than that, you could be her twin sister for how she looked when I first met her.”

  “It must be horrifying for her… and for you.”

  “No. I love what a clueless, innocent teenager you will be. One who gets mad at her dad for being too protective. Because it lets me see who she might have been if she’d ever gotten a chance in this life. A little love. A lot less misery.”

  “What happened? What happened to her?” I cry out, needing to know and wanting to understand her.

  Dad leans back and releases me. “Do you want to go inside?”

  “No.”

  He nods his face stoically and I know it’s to keep his own emotions in check. I take the tissue he hands me and dab at my eyes. I sniff and finally calm down long enough to listen to him.

  “You have a lot of questions.”

  “I don’t know where to start.”

  “Start with whatever you want.”

  “Do you love her?”

  “Oh, God. Yes. Yes, Christina. I love her. I’m in love with her and I have been for over twenty years. Your life hasn’t been a lie. I didn’t marry her and have children with her just to save her, or because I felt guilty.”

  “How then? How did you guys get past all of that?”

  “Not easily. When I dropped her off at her house right afterwards, I intended to never, ever see her again. I got drunk and hoped the images of her would vanish from my mind and never come back. I wanted to forget what I saw, what I witnessed, and what I felt. Only… I don’t think, even if we hadn’t clicked, I could ever forget any of it.”

  “How did you even see her again?”

  “She had a complicated home life. Let’s put that on hold, okay? That’s an entirely different conversation. Just for now, try and understand that your aunt and she were pitted against each other for many years by the man who Jessie thought was their dad. So home was hostile territory for her. She had troubled teens, to say the least. And long before this even happened to her. She acted out pretty severely. People didn’t understand anything was wrong with her. No one suspected what happened to her, and strange to me at the time, she refused to tell anyone the truth. All the brutality she suffered. She disintegrated the longer she stayed home. She reached out to me in a number of ways and on a number of occasions. I was not real receptive at first. I still wanted to forget. I had never seen anything like what she suffered. You have to understand, being a soldier is not like bein
g a cop. I didn’t train in how to help victims. And certainly not victims like she was then.”

  “She was really only twenty?”

  “Yes, really.”

  “How did she go on?”

  “You can’t imagine… so much. Don’t try to imagine it, okay? It won’t do any good. Just try to understand. Try to have compassion. Try to understand it wasn’t something she just walked away from and got over. She learned to live with it. She had to find happiness. But there are times, and certain triggers that put her right back there. She has…”

  “Episodes.”

  Dad smiles at me a kind of wavering, sad smile. He nods. “Yes, sometimes, she has those episodes.”

  “They used to seem normal. I wasn’t supposed to bother Mom sometimes. It was always that way, so I didn’t mind. Then it started to make me mad; like, why did she get to do that?”

  “I know. We talked a thousand times about telling you. Or trying to explain it to you. But it was so awful, we didn’t think any explanation would help you. We decided it was better you were a little pissed off and in the dark than know about the things that no one should ever envision about her mother.”

  “Then, sometimes, I saw things. Those times she’d kind of space out and it was like she wasn’t here. When she would cry and cry and cry over what seemed like nothing. It always scared me when things like that happened.”

  “And now you have an inkling of why they happened. It’s not often anymore. She sometimes just can’t control her emotions. Literally. It isn’t her being lazy or difficult. It’s simply your mom having a tough day. Things happened to her, so many things, that you have to realize the woman is made of steel to have ended up as the kind of mother and wife she is now. Becoming a doctor in her own right. She’s like no one you will ever meet again, Tiny. Everyone used to think I was the strong one; but I am nothing compared to her. She is the real superhero. To survive what she did, and then go on and build a happy life. The episodes, as you call them, were pretty minor in the overall scheme of what her life could have become if she’d been weaker or, at any moment, given up. She kept fighting it all. Everything that tried to destroy her. She’s a fighter. Every day. Always.”

  I drop my head down until my chin rests on my chest. I feel so tired. It’s like wine has flowed through me and depleted all my energy. I try to imagine what her life was like. I try to imagine it, but I can’t. I feel exhausted thinking about it. It fills me with unspeakable sadness. I don’t think so much sadness has ever arisen in me for someone else’s history.

  “Has she ever really been happy?”

  “Yes. She has. She has been happy more often than not.”

  “How?”

  “That steel in her spine.”

  I think back to our life and realize he’s right. I never thought it was anything all that deep or serious that made her withdraw from us sometimes. I assumed it was laziness. I thought it was her just not being able to deal with a busy life. I never dreamed, not even for a second, that she had so much pain inside of her.

  “How did you two end up married? I mean, what took you there?”

  Dad stretches his legs out and leans his elbow on the door handle. “Long story. But us? We’re mostly a good story, Tiny. Your mom and I are mostly all good. For now? That’s not what I need you to understand.”

  “How many men raped her?” I whisper rape. I can’t even comprehend the enormity of it in talking about my mom. My mom who sings when she’s cleaning. She dances around with the mop, listening to music that is way too young for her. She keeps up and loves the music I listen to. She sometimes ruins her cool factor by singing and dancing to it while she’s doing an innocuous house chore. She says it makes it more fun. I roll my eyes and sigh at her, while secretly feeling glad she does it because it’s so Mom. But now? It all feels so tragic.

  “I can’t be honest about that. For now? Three. While I was watching that day. Three.”

  “What do you mean, you can’t be honest?”

  “There is always more to her story. But not yet. Take it in. Let’s just take it a little bit at a time. It was enough to be horrifying.”

  “Did anyone ever get punished for it?”

  He doesn’t respond at first. His head turns and he stares out the window for long, pregnant pause. Then he glances at me and away. “Would it help if someone did?”

  “Oh, my God. Of course. I mean… yes.”

  “Then I can tell you more than one paid for his sordid participation. But I can’t tell you how. I might not ever tell you. That might be something you just have to trust me on and learn to live with.”

  “Why can’t you tell me?”

  “Because… I could get in trouble.”

  I gasp and raise my head and eyes to his. We stare at each other in the wan light. He nods kind of serious-like. I swallow and shake my head. Did he mean… what? What did he mean? I can’t fathom it.

  “Do you mean you did something to them?”

  He nods. “I did something, yes. Leave it at that, okay? Please. For now, just try to understand us.”

  “So tonight was about a lot more than just a dad disapproving of his daughter thinking about having sex.”

  He winces. I might have, too, an hour ago, but now? It seems incidental to worry about mentioning sex with my dad. He closes his eyes and nods. “Yes. It was about the things that I see in my dreams. It was about your face, so much like hers… and hearing Max’s voice saying there was danger… I lose my mind. I about lost it with your mom. You… God, kid, you’re my heart walking around. I can’t—”

  I scoot close, and for the first time I lean my head on his arm and hug his side. “I won’t, Dad. It won’t happen to me. I promise to listen to you. I’ll be more careful. I won’t have sex. Not like that. Not until—”

  “You’re thirty?” he asks in a hopeful tone, his head lifting off the window.

  That finally makes me smile. “I was thinking more like after I’m in love. In a relationship. Not trying to spite my dad and prove how old and adult I am.”

  “I want you to be happy. I want you to feel young. And I do need to let go. I realize some of that. It’s just hard with all of this in my head.”

  “I have a lot of questions.”

  “I probably have some of the answers.”

  “Will you keep talking to me?”

  “Yes. I’ll try and help you understand this, which is impossible to understand how anyone could do to another.”

  “I won’t be such a brat.”

  He pats my head. “Be a brat. Be normal. That’s all your mother ever wanted for you.”

  I am dumbfounded. I don’t know what to do or think of these revelations, or the pain that resides in my mom’s heart. It hurts me now, and it’s been over twenty years for her. As I grab for the truck door handle, my dad adds, “Christina?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Please don’t go looking online for information about this, or your mom, or me. You’ll find it. What you’ll find is not what you want to see, or hear. Trust me on this, okay? I know it’s like I’m simply taunting you to look, and it would be natural to, but I know what’s there. And trust me, it will hurt you far more than it will clarify anything for you.”

  Duh. Why had I never simply typed either of my parents’ names into the internet? But then again… who does that? Who does random searches on their parents? I mean it’s not like I sit around thinking about their history. I have a vague idea of how they met. It was in Mexico on vacation or something. Dad was on a break from the Army… well, shit, now I know where all this happened, don’t I? But I just never spent much of my adolescence thinking about my parents’ pasts.

  “Tiny? Can you promise me?”

  “I promise you.” But… as I say it, my fingers start itching, and I’m literally aching to type on my laptop. I mean, it is just impossible to be forbidden from doing something without wanting to do it. At least for me.

  He nods. We both get out and head towards the front d
oor. Dad suddenly stops and hugs me again. He kisses the side of my temple. “I’m sorry. I’ll try and separate you from what happened to your mom. I know you’re not her. It’s just…”

  “I understand. I finally understand, Dad.” And now? I think I even appreciate it.

  I head into my bedroom and slide down onto my bed. Leaning back, I clutch one of the throw pillows. I feel a deep sense of sadness. It is such a sad story. Evil like I’ve never conceived. And my mom lived through it. My dad witnessed it. I wasn’t sure yet what it had to do with me, but I knew it hurt inside my chest.

  Sunday mornings are lazy around our house, and I rarely emerge before noon nowadays. But today I do. Today, after a night of barely sleeping and the strange quasi-trauma of my father’s revelation, I am out in the kitchen first. The kitchen is long and wide, leading into the sunken living room and dining room. It’s all open and airy, and now, I wonder if that was to give my mom space. I know she hates small spaces. She has funny quirks that she gets adamant about. I am munching on a banana when I hear a noise from the hallway and glance up. My mom stops dead just where the hallway opens to the rest of the house… and me. We stare at each other. I can tell she cried sometime in the last few hours. Her hair is messed up a little in front, like she pushed at her bangs. She clutches her pink robe tighter to her and walks towards me. Is she angry with me? With Dad? Does she feel betrayed? Hurt? What? I am apprehensive as she gets closer and her usually expressive face seems dull and lifeless.

  We stare at each other, mother and daughter. We do look a lot alike. We’ve been mistaken for sisters since I turned about twelve. And it happens a lot. Our faces are shaped the same. Our eyes the same shape and shade. Our noses, our mouths, and even the thickness of our hair are alike. We are both small in stature. She’s got bigger boobs than me. But otherwise… yeah, it’s a little startling.

  “Dad told me.” It blurts out automatically because I don’t know what to say. I am not used to feeling uncomfortable with my mom, of all people.

  “I know.”