Artist's Daughter, The: A Memoir (6 page)

M
ortified
would be a light term for how I felt. But I was so thankful to be done riding the bike, out of the freezing air, and back in the van. The day before, the Dale House staff piled into the group home vans with bikes and bags of extra clothes for a two-day orientation of sorts, which included a bike ride over Vail Pass. As in riding over the Continental Divide, the mountain range that separates our country’s east from west.

My sea-level Seattle lungs and discount mountain bike did not prepare me for this group bonding activity. I’d arrived in Colorado only two weeks earlier. I was relieved on the first day of the bike excursion when a rare September snowstorm hit and the riding was optional. What totally baffled me were the others in the group who opted to ride in the blowing snow.

I’d already suspected I might not fit in with the rugged culture of the place. Though the Pacific Northwest was similar to Colorado in its affinity for the outdoor lifestyle, my idea of getting outside was hitting the sales at an open-air mall.

Soon after I arrived, I was sitting in the staff meeting room with my Bible, waiting for others to meander in for our group Bible
study. George, the director, walked by in his wire-frame glasses and his black motorcycle jacket hanging over his marathon-running skeleton frame, a box of cigarettes tucked in his front chest pocket. He looked down at the table and laughed.

“A pink Bible?!” he shouted. “Ha, I’ve never seen a pink Bible before!”

I looked down at the pink leather cover of my Bible with my name embossed in silver letters across the front. I felt my shoulders drop as I tried to slink down in my chair. No one had ever commented on the color of my Bible before. I was suddenly aware I was wearing mascara.

It stopped snowing overnight, and the second day’s ride was not optional. As soon as I started pedaling, I knew I was in trouble. The air going in my lungs seemed to be decreasing with each breath. I’d like to say it was altitude sickness—I was too newly arrived from sea level—but really I was out of shape with a terrible bike and no gloves, riding in the biting cold. I quickly fell behind the rest of the group, and the pity riders started showing up—guys who had no problem riding extra by doubling back to ride with me and bring up the rear.

“How you doing?” one asked as he pulled up next to me and slowed down to match my sluggish pace. I could tell the lilt in his voice was forced, like being friendly would somehow make up for my lack of athleticism.

I could feel myself getting more annoyed with every push of my foot. What was up with everyone else? With all these other girls? Did I miss the fitness test when I was out for my interview?

The gap between me and the next person ahead continued to grow until I could no longer see her. I felt vomit rising in my throat. I tried to swallow and hold it back—I didn’t want to throw up in front of the pity rider of the moment—but I finally had to
stop my bike, lean over, and let it out. It became clear the only way I was going to go over Vail Pass was in a motorized vehicle.

“Alex needs to stop.”

“She can’t go any farther.”

“Derek, can you drive her to the end?”

I heard these statements floating above my head as if they were about somebody else. So relieved the torture ride was ending, I still wanted to shrink into oblivion with each declaration. And now I was going to be alone with Derek in the van? Looking like this? With no makeup, clothes that weren’t flattering, and dark circles under my eyes? Failing at any attempt to be outdoorsy and cool? So pathetic? Really?

And then once we were in the van, he had to be nice about it, to try to make me feel better. “I wanted an excuse to stop riding,” he said.

Still shivering, I thought I might disintegrate from embarrassment. I looked straight ahead out the windshield and tried to think of something witty to say. Nothing came to mind.

My discomfort was heightened by what had happened the night before. The staff sat in a large circle around the living room of the house where we were staying, going around and one by one answering a question to get to know each other. Many of us had arrived in the last month, and though I’d only been there a few weeks, after spending every minute with the staff in such an intense environment, I felt like we were building rapport quickly. But not so quickly that I was ready to share my biggest hurts with everyone at once.

It was my turn to answer the question, and within the first minute I felt my voice cracking. Within two minutes I couldn’t talk; the crying was getting in the way. I don’t remember what the question was or even my answer, really. I remember the ugly, snotty, messy sobbing that forced others to scramble to find me tissues and lean in to listen with concerned expressions. And that it was about my dad. I remember I was embarrassed by this sudden and unplanned show of vulnerability. It came on so quickly, which
meant it was close to the surface. And there was so much snot. How was I supposed to clean it up with everyone looking at me?

I didn’t want to talk about my dad. I hated talking about him. And I was afraid the way it came out would make me look out of control, too broken myself, too vulnerable to help the kids we were there to help. And it was the only show of emotion of that level that night. It felt too exposed and too intense for what the sharing time was supposed to look like. I couldn’t talk and motioned with my hand to move on to the next person. I hoped she was as messed up as I was. I was disappointed to hear she wasn’t.

After everyone shared and the circle broke up, a few people approached me to ask if I was okay. I wanted to scream, “Of course I’m not okay. I’m a mess!” but I’d already made a scene. All of the years of holding it in, and it came out right here with an audience of fifteen. I wanted a chance to do it over, to come off presentable, collected.

Derek came up to me and tried to be nice. He remembers saying, “I had no idea. About your dad.” All I remember was thinking he was thoughtful and hoping I would become camouflaged by the sofa I was sitting on.

So, doubly embarrassed, I sat in the passenger seat of the van and tried to think how I could redeem my image in front of this very cool guy. I was thankful to have one-on-one time with him, but I could think of about a thousand different ways I would have liked it to come about. Ways that involved him initiating rather than responding to my crisis.

Ever since that football player in Olympia spoke, I’d had an image of a man who would love and take care of me. A man who was stable and kind and principled. All through college I’d prayed for God to send me someone to protect me. Someone to start a family with, to share in my new beginning. I knew Derek had that potential, but I didn’t want him to see these needy parts that were already seeping out, spilling in front of him in a big mess. I was still trying hard to hold it in.

L
isa and I sat in the parked car, putting off reentering the chaos of life in the community, or “on the block,” the term we used to describe the cluster of homes that made up the Dale House Project. We’d been away for an hour—a trip to get a soda and a temporary reprieve for her from her identity as a group home kid.

Lisa sat next to me not moving, and I sensed she wanted me to keep pushing the conversation. She held her large cup of soda in her hand, and I could hear the ice clink as she shifted her weight in the passenger’s seat. We’d had similar conversations before, and she’d blown off my questions with a sarcastic “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

I wanted her to believe she was worth pursuing, so I repeated my words: “You can tell me what happened.”

Lisa looked at me out of the side of her eyes, smirking. She knew she held power in that moment, a rare feeling for her.

I wanted us to be close, to be her big sister figure, for her to like me. In some ways I was like a five-foot-two, 110-pound, white-girl puppy running circles around her, wanting her approval. She was offering me perspective on my own disappointments; her life was
helping me better understand mine. She was finishing her sentence with the courts for assault, and her anger spewed everywhere—in her spiteful comments, her physical posturing, telling anyone who would listen she would hurt them before they had a chance to hurt her. I knew this kind of overflowing anger had a story behind it. I suspected I knew what it was in general terms, but I wanted her to trust me with the details.

Lisa shifted her weight again. Her body carried many extra pounds, she may have weighed almost double what I did, and her dark brown face was covered in acne. She smelled of a combination of ripe body odor and cigarette smoke. Her hair fell out of its ponytail around her face like a halo of frizzy curls. I suspected her poor self-care was evidence of past sexual abuse, her way of guaranteeing no one would be attracted to her like that again. But she hadn’t confirmed my suspicions. Yet.

“You can trust me,” I said.

Her smirk didn’t go away. I knew those words sounded cheap. Trust? What was that to a seventeen-year-old girl who’d been abandoned by the world? Who tried to hide in a body of fat and stench to protect herself? Who looked at me with my size 2 jeans and seemingly perfect life? How could she ever trust me? But I had been working for months at being consistent with her. Making small promises and following through. Taking her on trips, like this one to get a soda, to listen for the feelings behind her words and affirm them. Driving her to her GED tests and picking her up with an excited “How’d it go?” Doing my twenty-two-year-old best to fill in as many gaps as I could from her years of holes. I was practicing giving those important parenting messages: “You are valuable. You are precious.”

“My brother touched me,” she said. She looked at me out of the corner of her eyes again to assess my reaction.

Very aware of my face, I nodded to show her I wasn’t going to be shocked. That she didn’t need to be ashamed. “I’m sorry.”
Knowing there were no words that would take away the terrible that had happened in her life. That any attempt at condolences would just seem hollow and fake.

“He would come in my room and have sex with me.” Again she looked out of the side of her eyes.

Again I nodded, prompting her to keep talking. I willed my face to show her she wasn’t at fault. She didn’t have to hide the truth.

“I’m sorry,” I said again. Although I could feel my body tensing up, I wanted to protect her from my reactions. I didn’t want her to know my stomach was turning at the thought of someone climbing in bed with her and using her. So, for her sake, I kept nodding.

Then the shock waves started.

“He got me pregnant.”

We had now surpassed any grotesque details I could have come up with on my own. I knew she didn’t have a baby. She answered my unspoken question just as it was starting to float through my mind.

“My parents made me have an abortion.” Her voice started wavering. I could sense her barricade of anger was beginning to fragment. She kept talking, further widening the crevice of self-protection.

“They didn’t believe me.” She started crying. “My brother denied it and they didn’t believe me.” Her shoulders fell, and she laid her chin on her chest and let the tears roll down her acne-covered cheeks. I knew she didn’t like being touched—I now knew much better why—so I reached out my arm closest to her and put it around her shoulder as a test to see if she would accept a hug. She leaned back into the crook of my arm, rested her head on my shoulder, and I wrapped her in an embrace. The ice in her cup clinked as her body shook. I was grateful she didn’t ask where God was when all of this happened, because I didn’t have an answer.

“They didn’t believe me” were the words laced with the most pain.

“I believe you,” I said. “You can trust me.”

After a few minutes of muffled sobs, her body relaxed. She kept her head on my shoulder. Her hair was in my face, and I smelled the cigarette smoke. I wondered when she’d last washed it. I wasn’t going to let this moment go, this moment of trust I’d been working toward. I let her decide when it was time to get out of the car.

The next day I stood in the kitchen of the main house, loading the industrial dishwasher and thinking through my next steps with Lisa. As I scraped pieces of egg off the plates into the trash barrel on wheels, I wondered what she needed from me.

Breakfast for twenty was done, and kids were leaving for school and jobs. A few waited outside, smoking, to meet with the onsite teacher to prepare for upcoming GED exams. Trying to get twenty teenagers off the couch and out the door for the day was like plowing through marshmallow paste.

I closed the dishwasher door and looked out the window at two boys playing basketball in the single-hoop driveway court, passing time until their tutoring appointments. Their short, brown bodies were far from NBA height, but they were used to puffing them up to make themselves appear as big as possible. They had on almost identical outfits: form-fitting white tank tops and black Dickies that barely rested on their hips. They waved their arms in the air with choppy up-and-down motions, a sloppy street sort of basketball. Sixteen and seventeen years old, the hair on their upper lips suggesting they were doing everything possible to muster up mustaches. And then the younger one started laughing. His head tipped back and his smile pointed to the sky. Despite his teenage attempts at facial hair, I saw a flash of the little boy that was still in him. A quick glimpse of the children hidden in these rough boys who’d already started lives of crime.

Instantly I was struck by the sacredness of that place. A place that allowed two young men to play a kids’ game. Straddling childhood and manhood, they were offered a chance to place both feet on the
childhood side for a moment, to capture, for just a few minutes, something ripped from them.

I grabbed the countertop as emotion took over. I stood frozen as the tears came rushing out and gratitude and grief rushed over me. Gratitude for a place that resembled heaven on earth, where Lisa and these boys who’d never had a safe home to go back to now did. Gratitude that God was allowing me to be part of it. And grief for the broken state of the world, more dark and painful than I’d realized. Grief for the kids at the Dale House. And for me. And gratitude once more: that God pursued us all. Pursued me. And offered me hope in my hurting places.