I'm going to take a moment to relive a memory now, which is the main reason I came back online today. This memory is bothering me a lot. The content is a pedophile, so don't read ahead if that's too close to home for you right now. I'm in a quiet spot and doing okay and decided it's a good time to work on this... though no promised on finishing it, me.
This memory starts out with the school bus. I was eleven. I was sitting on a small travel pillow.
And I'm immediately anxious. Hm. I'll rate it a 6/10. Can go on. I do not like the number eleven, though it's kind of a lucky one for me. Significant number to me, but seeing my 11-year-old niece/cousin/2nd cousin (?) still makes me freeze up.
The school bus was dirty, mostly dusty but the windows had been left down, and it had rained earlier that afternoon, so the seats were a little wet. (OCD tells me that this makes them especially dirty and dangerous.) My memory insists that the day was humid and sunny, that the storm had cleared out before 2pm, but it simultaneously insists that there were still clouds in the sky, still threatening to rain and still humid but a bit cooler without the sun shining. I can't see the sky itself in the memory for some reason. That part of the memory has faded.
7/10 now. Totally got this though.
The bus smelled like wet human and mildew, and the seat I was sitting on was slightly torn up. This was still the old school bus, not the new one we'd be getting soon, and the greenish seats were a bit beat up. They had a plastic outside and a yellow-orange foam inside. If you hit the seat, the dust would come up in little clouds. The floor always felt dangerous, way too dirty to even look at. I couldn't dirty myself. But the pillow was already a bit dirty from being on desk seats, whenever I had to sit down. Mostly, for the past week or so, I had been standing in the back of the classroom, refusing to sit down unless it was absolutely necessary.
I would sit at the window in the bus and stare out of it. I was leave a wild onion on the seat next to mine to prevent other kids from sitting by me. The ride would take twenty minutes or so, but I only know that looking back -- at the time, I was daydreaming. Manipulative. It had a very serious plot and I would get upset if anyone interrupted me. But they didn't today.
The bus arrived at the end of the road, and the driver, Mrs. H, sped and stopped, and turned around while I stood in the isle between the two front seats. When I walked to the front, I was usually still daydreaming. Mrs. H frequently hit mailboxes, but today she didn't.
Lots of things seemed to be going strangely right. I remember taking a mental note of it.
8/10. Tight chest.
Mrs. H opened the doors, and I stopped and looked at her. She was covered in bruises. Said she was taking blood thinners, and had fallen down stairs. But she had a black eye and weird marks around her neck. By this point I knew better. I also knew that she liked me and always pointed out horses to me and asked me what I was singing if I was singing on the bus, but that the moment I grew breasts she was going to hate me. And I had started growing breasts.
(It was a well known fact in our neighborhood that Mrs. H hated women, and hated girls with breasts. No one ever figured out why. Not that it mattered much. She hated us by the time we were old enough to want to help. Would go out of her way, soon, to cause me harm. Like that basketball coach. And she hated the boys, too, so they gave up on her pretty quickly. Poor woman had only hate in her world.)
I told her goodbye, and to have a nice day. And I got off with my backpack, into the sun/cloudy light, and I must have been in a daze from there. But I remember the general concept -- I walked right back into my kidnapper's house, without saying a thing to anyone. And I wondered for the millionth time why I kept doing that, and then worried about hurting his feelings, or his mother's feelings. Making her wonder where I was, why I wasn't coming around. I couldn't bare the thought of letting her be lonely. (Yet, I didn't visit her while she was dying, a year later. Uterine cancer. She was 98, so refused treatment. She had a hard time walking and missed hiking. Like my grandmother, who used her death to manipulate her children (though the death actually happening was mostly unintended), who was paralyzed but wished so badly she could go dance once more night.)
The sidewalk to the house still went directly from the mailbox to the front door. The pedophile's family had lived in that area since the 1930s, though this house had been built in the 1970s, not quite following the typical safety protocols. For example, the front porch was slippery when it rained, so as I walked onto it, I was very, very careful not to slip. I had before. And right now, my ass was in a lot of pain still, from the dog attack.
My dad had told me the dog wouldn't have attacked me if I hadn't tried to escape the kidnapper.
I did my best to save that dog from trouble, even after the bite. The only thing that made me give up her identity was the threat of having a needle shoved into my spinal cord. I felt like a bad person, for giving the dog away like that. I knew he had been nice to me, before the attack.
The storm door was wide open, as it always was after a storm. The old woman couldn't close it. So I reached for it, carefully, to close it behind me as I entered the house through the front door.
Billie and Shadow came to greet me immediately, Shadow being her normal social self. I was always flattered when Billie came out, because she distrusted most people. But we had known each other long enough now that we were good friends.
The pedophile's mother, N, was sitting in her usual spot, past the front room. Despite the pedo getting a new blue carpet in the front room, he still didn't have the lights on, and still used the room for storage mainly. So, for all general purposes, the home was set up like a straight line, this room being pretty useless. Past this room was N, who slowly turned and smiled with effort as I walked in. She was watching Charmed, an episode where one of the witches accidentally goes back in time because of a demon's curse/a spell, and is helping a woman give birth to one of her ancestors. Or something like that.
The pedophile was still at work.
"Where have you been?" N asked, in a quiet and gentle voice.
I explained, Away. I explained that a dog had attacked me, but that was it.
Her face didn't change expressions, much. A slight look of confusion, at best. Something about the dog made her seem to think something, and I couldn't quite place her facial expression but knew it wasn't something I expected. Almost like she was listening to gossip.
I had been spending less and less time here. I would leave before the pedo returned from work, and then slightly earlier and earlier everyday. I had hoped that N wouldn't figure out why. I wouldn't tell her I was uncomfortable. I would instead tell her that I had odd chores to do or my dad would get angry. Things like draining water from a wagon, removing rocks from the ocra strip, or doing massive amounts of homework.
I just realized why I'm confused about the weather. This is two different memories. Ugh. Tiring.
The dog bite happened in 2006, when I was eleven. But by the time the dog bit me, I had pretty much escaped...?
But that was late 2006. In early 2006, I started getting my life back, right after I went from being ten to being eleven. It started after my dad started showing me pictures of things that could cut off my head, and CSI shows that showed people getting decapitated, and after he started threatening my life with decapitation and raw cookie dough. Had me eat cookie dough and then convinced me it would kill me, because I was too young to know what salmonella even was yet. (Now I respect it.)
But early 2006 after the threats and when my mom was dying was when I both gave up and got my life back. I didn't want to die a failure, so I started suddenly doing my homework. I got the award from President Bush for the most remarkable improvement, made him look great. But I was way too young to get politics. I just knew my dad didn't like Bush because Bush was republican. He didn't seem to have any other reasons.
And THAT is part of the memory that's bothering me. Being congratulated on graduation might have triggered that, because of the thing with getting an award from Bush for, what I saw, as trying to not be an utter failure before I died.
A pretty human fear, I would say. Only a human would care so much about what people thought about them after they were dead. Except several other apes I guess, and at least three dolphins, but hey. I happen to not be your typical dolphin.
At least when my mom died within the next month, she wouldn't think I was a bad child. (Though, she ended up surviving!)
Must be why I'm retroactively noticing things that went right. Though confusing myself a bit still, with the timeframe of the memories.
I got off the bus on a sunny day and I was feeling rather confident, accomplished, and generally okay. For once. I was my dad's favorite child, so I was more likely to get those kinds of feelings after getting great rewards.
Then I walked directly into the pedophile's house. Like a good child.
I was determined to be good, I guess. Though I knew it was wrong on some level.
N was in the room past the entry room. Watching Charmed. Pedo wasn't home from work yet, and I sat on the couch and watched charmed and chatted with N. Being careful that she didn't know too much bad. She had already had a husband who was mean, who she both missed and was glad to be rid of.
Confusing concept to 11-year-old me.
Then pedo got home. His dogs greeted him. He went back into his bedroom to relax and listen to music, and I walked back with him. I think I did so without thinking about it, or I was in some kind of mild dissociated state. Not certain.
He closed the door behind him, which I knew was to better hear the music. His carpet was blue, I think, and his window was covered in blankets. One had an image of three wolf heads howling at a moon, with that blue textured background. Common shirt design, always freaks me out when I see people wearing that now days. He also had Native American women pictures around him, and eagles everywhere. And his stolen highway sign. He was very proud of that thing.
My sister thought it was pretty neat. So I did too.
Tonight, the pedophile seemed distant.
He was just listening to music, while Billie laid under the bed. In about two hours he would have sex with the dog. He had convinced me it was just how he was born. I still think he was right. (Sorry. A lot for a mind to go through, I guess.)
But he was distant. The silence between us was unusually uncomfortable, and I was aware that he was more lost in his own world than usual.
I gently tapped his wrist. I remember noting the thick but smooth skin for the millionth time, and thinking this must be a Native American trait only. He was almost 100% Native American, so I guess it wouldn't be too weird for a kid to think something like that.
(He never seemed to remember that my family thought of itself as Russian, though I was born in the United States. Thankfully. (Family would never exist otherwise. Jews. Except mother's side. Mother's side, WWII vets. My mom knew of a German ex-Nazi in hiding, but otherwise not too much. Being forced to torture Jews/other human groups is evidently just as awful to a mind.. feeling like you just went along with it and agreed... except for the psychopaths. My CIA step-grandfather thought people fearing for their family life was hilarious. That man made it impossible for me to feel safe owning a cell phone for the longest time. He died last year after trying to get me to go to Costa Rica with him. Likely planned to do bad things when there would be no consequences, because of his soon-death. )
(Sometimes the world is an awful place. Not always though.)
Multiple generations of trauma on all sides. Most of them totally lost their minds. Then faced awful deaths, most of them.) )
The pedophile turned and looked at me, with a slightly startled expression. Like he was curious, too, wondering what I'd ask for.
"Are you okay?" I asked him.
He stared at me. Then, in what felt like a rare moment, he turned his head away and wiped at his face. He was always very careful around me. I had never seen him wipe his face like that.
"I'm having a hard week," he admitted, his voice quiet and vulnerable. A second later he straighten his back, as if to remind himself that he was a man and shouldn't be vulnerable.
The gesture didn't fool me, nor did it deter me. "Do you want to talk about it?" I asked.
He stared at me, unsure how to move ahead.
"When I have bad weeks," I continued, "I get something nice to eat. I like to treat myself. And sometimes I go outside and enjoy nature."
I noticed the subtle changes of his breathing then, how it got slightly faster, as if he were anxious. Scared of something. That confused me. I felt that it shouldn't, because teachers had told me that I had a adult-level ability to understand other people's emotions and it literally terrified them. Demons, probably (when in doubt, it is definitely demons and Satan, unless it's God, angels, or a gift of some other kind; honestly, it's hard to tell these days (yes, I'm being funny, sorry for the bad timing on the humor)).
But, no. I knew it, because I could practically feel it coming off of him, despite how subtle it was. And that was confusing. Why was he scared?
With his anxiety clouding my senses, the sound of his music started to overwhelm me. I wanted it to be shut off, or at least turned way down, but all I did was look at the volume dial.
He ran a hand through his head hair, leaving his braid alone. He opened a drawer and pulled out cigarettes, lit one. He moved it to his other hand, away from me. I didn't mention that we were in an enclosed room with no window to open. I didn't really matter what hand he held the cigarette in, as far as I could tell.
I knew my mom liked to smoke when she was especially stressed.
"Sometimes adults have bad weeks," he said, avoiding eye contact.
"Everyone does," I said sincerely, trying to be understanding. "Kids do too."
"You don't usually like to acknowledge that you're a kid," he said, giving me a look. "Is it my fault?"
I immediately assumed he wanted me to comfort him, so instead of thinking up a careful answer, I said, "No."
He frowned. His hand was shaking.
That worried me. I began to wonder idly if he was about to lose his shit. My dad always lost his shit when he was angry.
"My dad makes me have bad days," I explained, bravely, trying, I guess, to let him know he was frightening me. I had the biggest urge to crack open his bedroom door, and I coughed at the cigarette smoke wondering if that would allow him to notice. He watched me cough, and I became self-conscious and I got quiet.
The conversation gets harder and harder to recall as I go on, but I do remember him saying, "Your dad is a white man. A bad man. He thinks I am his friend and he doesn't know a thing about me. But he thinks his ways are right and true. Most of my people kill themselves before they are sixteen, because there is no place in the white man's country for us."
I don't know what I said to this anymore, but I do remember being interested, knowing by his tone (despair and sorrow) that he was being honest, and incredibly vulnerable.
Wondering if I had tanned enough that summer, stayed tan enough over the winter, yet still being proud of my "very Russian hair."
"Why do you care about me?" I remember him asking that, but I can't remember what I said anymore. I'm not positive it's the same memory as earlier either.
Then he explained that I wasn't like my dad at all. He could tell I got along with nature but in a "normal" way (?), that I cared about his opinions, and he hoped I would influence politics one day. He told me his mother had been raped by some white guy who realized that if he was an American citizen he could go in and rape without consequences because of the way the law worked. And I saw his hand shake again, and he took such a long drag from his cigarette that it went out. He very quickly and clumsily got another one.
"What are you scared?" I think I asked it that way, but I asked some question to that effect.
That's when it got really, really weird.
He clutched his cigarette and blurted, through what was clearly an adrenaline rush (I could tell by the tone, all the colors of being overwhelmed, though part of it had come from me too), "I'm guilty. I'm not scared, I'm ashamed and disgusting."
He had mentioned feelings like this, once, when he explained to me once how when he first realized he was in love with a dog, he doubted his sanity but was afraid to go to a doctor. He admitted he eventually had to accept himself, otherwise he would have killed himself. And most of his friends had killed themselves in their teen years. Apparently because of the way of the world, as I had learned that day. Being under the white man, seeing the pain of defeat even after those who truly remembered it were long dead. Feeling that the world forgot and turned a blind eye and didn't care all that much.
So I assumed at first he was talking about Billie. Having sex with the dog. And I don't know exactly what I said about it, but I did say something about the dog and sex with dogs.
He looked at me, looked at my chest. I was growing breasts and I knew what he was looking at. Then he said, "You aren't the white man I thought you were. White girl." (I remember him specifying.) "I am not sexist, I know better. I can see you think for yourself. But your spirit is like a dog, not a cat. Because you are loyal and you care for your master even when he hurts you. And you make your master love you and you make your master wonder how well he cares for you, down to the last kibble."
He fed his dogs only the best, most high quality things. He didn't have sex with Shadow, the puppy, because she was a puppy and that would be wrong. Sexual abuse, that. And he had her spayed, and knew she would never be interested in sex. And he respected that. He was telling me he respected me more than he respected white men like my father.
And I agreed that my father was crazy.
I can't remember if it was before it got weird or right after, but the pedo sobbed (really did, took a full minute to get control of himself) and I was utterly confused. He admitted that he "actually liked" me and then he told me to go home. He let me go. He told me not to come back until I was an adult.
Something like that.
It was after that that I was attacked by the dog.
But I didn't really see him again after that. Except a few times. The occasional time he asked me to walk with him, after I got scared to enter his house. After his mother died, when he went to move to China to marry that girl, and he begged through my father to be able to see me one more time, but I didn't go (I feel so much guilt over this). Also the time he grabbed my arm suddenly while I was outside and pulled me to him so he could show my his new wedding band.
And of course, that time I opened the front door and he was standing out there, after a warrant had been made, and he was clearly not arrested. Waiting for me.
I am still angry at that nurse/social worker for forcing me to tell my mother about the rapes. It complicated things. I was scared that the pedo was in my yard, because I thought he might be angry that I had tried to get him arrested. And what good what going through the effort of that warrant? Now my mom felt bad and helpless, I suffered, and I was scared of the pedo standing in the yard. Useless effort, and torture, that warrant. It didn't matter at all, and worsened my life. I feel pity for that man, and I didn't want him to hate me. I don't know why, but I'm still upset at the "justice" of it all.
And he never turned himself in. Didn't want consequences. But, he did have quite the breakdown, that night he released me. I feel he truly felt guilty. I remember sitting in my yard, and suddenly feeling watched. Wrong. It was so strong that I went into my house (usually I was escaping my dad) and sure enough, soon there were police, ambulances, and a search party. He had gone a bit crazy, his mom said, maybe dangerous, and then he had fled with the threat of suicide. He drank alcohol and took a bottle of pills, had cut himself, was threatening to shoot himself.
I felt I had broken him. I understood that he felt dirty and wrong and confused. He was basically still a kid.
Adult me looks at "I understood that he felt dirty and wrong and confused" and wonder if he manipulated me. Yet I feel that he must have been at least slightly honest, because he was willing to kill himself over it.
I really don't know what to think about it. But at least it's off my chest now. I'll need to go back and see if I can remember anything else, because large parts of this memory are missing or being attached to completely separate memories.
