Every so often a clinic employee would open the door to summon a patron and get bombarded with insults and obscenities. The employees’ reactions made it obvious that they had become immune to the protestors’ tactics. I became mesmerized by the commotion and didn’t know what side of the issue I should be on. I listened to the prayers, heard pleas for mercy for the unborn, and looked at the hideous pictures of fetuses and felt compassion for the protestors. Then I heard them yell obscenities and death wishes for the patients and employees of the clinic, and questioned their motives.
The insults being thrown from both sides of the issue were hateful. I had never seen people talk to each other in such an angry fashion without violence erupting. Then a young black woman walked toward the crowd and started yelling while she broke down. “Why should I have a baby from a man who raped me?” she cried. “Do you want it? Tell me, are you going to take care of it?” “There are programs for girls like you,” a protestor responded. “What fuckin’ program is going to make me forget that my stepfather raped me?” the girl yelled as she took several steps toward the protestors as if to attack them. Several people sitting on the steps got up and detained her, then led her inside. “Those people don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about,” the girl said as she was led up the steps.
That girl’s words stuck in my mind. I began to remember the abuse that was inflicted upon me as a child and I wondered why I wasn’t aborted. I thought about the many gang members on the street who were products of unwanted pregnancies who were now producing kids falling into the same category. I wondered if the protestors ever thought that the suffering they were trying to save the fetuses could be intensified tenfold if they were allowed to be born. I also wondered if they took under consideration the amount of pain those saved fetuses would inflict on the world because of the environment they were going to be brought into. I was confused about the logic behind the protest, so I decided to ask someone.
I walked slowly toward the protestors and immediately was barraged with insults. “You baby killer, you’ll burn in hell!” a girl about fifteen years old yelled at me. The man with the Bible walked up to me and started showing me a passage. I didn’t pay much attention to him because I wanted to get my questions out. “I was raped and beaten senseless as a child. Why would you want kids to possibly be born into that?” I asked. “Those who hurt you will have to answer to God,” the man said. “Are you not glad to be alive now?” he asked. The question surprised and confused me. Before I could answer, I heard my name being called from the clinic. It was the woman Marilyn had gone to live with. She recognized me and motioned for me to come toward her.
I walked away, still thinking about the question. Was I happy to be alive now? I really didn’t know. What I did know was that, if given a choice, I would choose never to have been born. The protestors called me a child killer and reminded me that I would be going to hell as I walked into the clinic. At that moment I felt that they had no clue what they were talking about. They had no way of knowing that I already felt I was destined for hell. I concluded that the protestors’ motives were based on religious beliefs and convictions and not on the actual desire to save lives. They were so blinded by their beliefs that they seemed to know no suffering beyond what they felt existed inside the abortion clinic. I wished that just one of them had grown up in my place.
I FOLLOWED MARILYN’S friend past the waiting room toward the back of the clinic. Judging by the number of patrons waiting to have abortions, it was obvious that the protestors’ cries were falling on deaf ears. She led me into the staff lounge and told me to sit down and wait, and that Marilyn would be taking a lunch break momentarily.
The lounge was a big, comfortable room with a couple of medium-sized tables with chairs on one end and a sofa and love seat positioned behind a coffee table. On the coffee table was a big glass punch bowl filled with assorted types of condoms. The contents of the bowl took me by surprise, but then I thought it was appropriate, considering the business of the clinic. I sat on the sofa facing the door and looked at the bowl filled with condoms, debating whether to take a handful or not. Several minutes later Marilyn walked into the room.
The tension I felt was reminiscent of my days on the streets of Chicago when I was preparing to confront a rival gang. I felt very defensive, ready to protect myself. But it turned out those feelings were uncalled for. Marilyn was very polite with me, although she made no eye contact.
She sat at the other end of the sofa with a salad in her hand. I glanced at her, looking for a way to start a conversation, but I was speechless. Marilyn seemed to be consumed with the task of devouring her salad, but I knew she was waiting for me to say something. Finally I got up, went to the soda machine, and bought a couple of soft drinks. I walked back to the sofa, sat right beside her, and kissed her on the cheek as I handed her a can. “Thank you,” she said softly as she took it from my hand and placed it on the coffee table in front of us. “You’re welcome,” I replied as I opened mine. Those few words served as a way for us to start a conversation.
“How are you?” I asked Marilyn. “I’m OK. How are you?” she answered. “I’m OK, I guess. There are some crazy people out there,” I commented, referring to the abortion protestors. “Yeah, we have unique patients, and you should see the protestors once they get started,” Marilyn replied in her best sarcastic tone. I chuckled and began fishing in the bowl of condoms. We didn’t say much else to each other, and didn’t look at each other at all. In what seemed like seconds, Marilyn’s lunch was finished. She asked me to stay in the lounge until she got off work in a couple hours. She then tossed the salad bowl into the garbage can and made eye contact with me for the first time as she said, “I’ll see you later.”
For the next few hours, women walked in and out of the room without saying a word to me. Even when they sat for a little while, they didn’t bother to try and acknowledge my presence. I felt like a freak show on display. I seemed to be good enough to look at but not to communicate with. I knew without a doubt that they saw me as a woman beater, unworthy of acknowledgment. My only fear was whether they were right.
I read just about every magazine in that room trying to keep myself occupied as I waited for Marilyn. I wanted to walk out and come back later, but my self-consciousness about what the women in the room were thinking about me glued me to the sofa. Finally Marilyn appeared at the door and said we could leave.
We walked out the back door, where a smaller, less aggressive but very verbally abusive group of protestors met us. They allowed us to walk around them and bypass the pamphlets they tried to hand us, but they yelled obscenities as we made our way toward the bus stop. I turned back slightly to make sure that we weren’t being followed and met the eyes of a young man who assured me I would be going to hell. For some reason his words echoed in my mind, and I concluded that he was probably right. But at the same time I wanted to run to him and tell him the real reason why I thought I was going to hell. I wanted to let him know that if I had been aborted I wouldn’t have to suffer through the trials and tribulations of going to hell. I wouldn’t have all the memories of violence committed against me or the violence I had committed against others. My eyes must have said those very words for me, because I read the guy’s lips as they silently said, “God bless you.”
Marilyn and I rode the bus to downtown Dallas and shared only small talk regarding the clinic protestors; otherwise we were silent. Once we were walking on the nearly empty streets of downtown Dallas, our conversation finally touched on the subject of our relationship.
“I can’t believe you hit me,” Marilyn said softly as she stared into nowhere. “Your eyes looked so evil. I have never seen anything so evil. I didn’t know the Rey who surfaced that night. I’m realizing that I don’t know who you are.” While she talked our eyes never met, and our bodies never touched. We walked side by side, yet we were like strangers. Within me I struggled with the desire to defend myself. I tried to ignore those thoughts by looking u
p and down the streets of downtown Dallas and tried to put Chicago in its place. Only when I made myself understand that something terrible had really happened that night did I finally decide to break my silence.
“I don’t remember ever hitting you, Marilyn. I really don’t,” I said as I began to choke up. “It was dark and then I heard you crying.” I stepped in front of Marilyn and looked directly into her eyes. She hugged me and held me tightly. All of a sudden, my tear-filled eyes overflowed, and I began to cry seriously. We stood there for a while until my crying had subsided. We then walked silently about half a block, crossed the street, and sat on a brick planter that housed a tree in front of an office building.
We sat there and held each other for a long, long time. We buried our faces in each other’s necks and held on for dear life. When we finally released each other, I began to cry again, and at that moment everything started to make sense to me. What Marilyn had described, and my lack of memory, was the exact same way I remembered experiences with my mother. I don’t know if my mother remembered abusing me, but the similarities were eerie. My mother would beat me as if she had lost control of her senses, and then act like nothing had happened just a short time later. This was exactly what Marilyn was describing to me, exactly what I had done to her.
I told Marilyn about how my mother would act after one of her violent rages. She agreed that I had done the same thing, and she said that I should seek counseling for this problem. As Marilyn spoke, I sat there wondering if my mother remembered any of the beatings she’d inflicted on me. I wondered if her decision to rid herself of me was because she was frightened of the terror I might invoke within her, and not because I was a problem child. I began to tremble and everything became blurry again because my eyes flooded with tears. I buried my face in my hands as I told Marilyn that I was scared to know that I could unknowingly hurt someone I cared for.
Marilyn, with all her wisdom, became a listener that night. That night I should have listened to her and made promises of change. I should have been on my knees begging forgiveness. Instead I cried my heart out about myself, and she listened. Marilyn held me and wiped my tears, stroked my hair, and kissed my cheeks softly. She stared off into the city as she fought her own tears and tried to remain strong for both of us. Finally I was able to regain my composure, and we just held each other quietly.
About three hours after we got to downtown Dallas, we started walking toward the bus stop where Marilyn would catch the bus back to her friend’s home. The last bus going toward my apartment had already come and gone, so I decided to accompany Marilyn on her bus ride.
On the way, we talked about how Dallas sucked as a major metropolitan city, and how its citizens tended to be very sweet and nice around you and then talk badly about you behind your back. Marilyn said she wasn’t quite happy where she was staying, but that she was too scared to come back and live with me again. When we got off the bus she asked me to walk her home, then she would ask her coworker to drive me home, and if not, I could at least call a cab from there.
The coworker Marilyn was staying with was a Mexican woman in her late thirties who worked at the clinic as a medical assistant. She lived with her boyfriend, who was also Mexican and about the same age. Although both of them spoke with Mexican accents, they called themselves second-generation Texans and considered Mexicans to be only those people from Mexico who came into the United States illegally. (For the most part, this was the attitude of most American citizens of Mexican descent in the Dallas area.)
Marilyn’s coworker was noticeably surprised when we walked into her house together. She was short, about five feet tall, and chubby, with short hair. Marilyn introduced me and explained how I had missed the bus so she had asked me to accompany her. “You need a car to survive in Dallas,” a man’s voice said from the kitchen. At that moment the boyfriend made his appearance. He was about six feet tall, with black hair and a beer gut, and he wore cowboy boots. He came over to me and shook my hand, then asked his girlfriend to come into the kitchen with him. I sat on the living room couch by myself looking at the pictures on the wall of family members and Catholic saints, and the Mexican pottery and other decor, and wondered why so many people in Texas denied being Mexican.
“Come with me to the store,” the boyfriend said as he walked into the living room. “I can’t eat without beer.” He laughed. We walked outside and got into his pickup truck, parked in the driveway of the house. He started the truck and then said, “Why don’t you hit me?”
I was absolutely startled by his words. I felt my blood rushing through my body and my face burned. “What?” I responded in a loud voice that was almost a scream. I looked at him and waited for his response. “Why don’t you hit me?” he repeated.
My muscles tightened and my fists balled instinctively. I wanted so much to hit him, but I knew that any violent action I might take would solidify Marilyn’s fear of me. I looked him straight in the eyes, got out of the truck, and slammed the door closed. I headed toward the house, but I didn’t want to go in carrying the anger Marilyn was so afraid of. I paced the driveway like a madman. I talked to myself softly but angrily, while I stared at the figure inside the truck, who posed yet another threat to my life. I stared at him as if daring him to come after me.
He got out of the truck and walked toward the back. I watched every move he made and prepared to attack him once he got within striking distance. All the violent episodes from my days as a Latin King, when I was thirsty for violence, began to fill my mind. My body trembled, and I started to size up my opponent for the kill and my surroundings for a possible weapon to kill him with. The fact that the boyfriend was five inches taller and outweighed me by over a hundred pounds didn’t cross my mind. I was oblivious to everything except the man who would become my next victim of violence.
“I’m sorry, man, I shouldn’t have said that,” the boyfriend said in his broken English “Texan” voice while he stood at the rear of the truck. “You don’t fuckin’ know me,” I said in a low angry voice. “Stay the fuck away from me, I will say good-bye to Marilyn and get the fuck out of here.” “No, man, don’t do that. Don’t leave. My old lady will be pissed off at me,” the boyfriend said. “I’m sorry. Come on, let’s go to the store.” He made his way back toward the driver’s side of the truck. I watched him as he walked and wanted to run at him and rip his throat out. My desire for a confrontation made me get into the truck with him instead of going in and saying good-bye to Marilyn. I looked at him wildly, waiting for one stupid word to come out of his mouth so I could gouge his eyes out, but it never came. He started the truck and began to reverse out of the driveway without making eye contact with me.
“I’m sorry, man, I didn’t mean to make you so angry,” the boyfriend said as he drove. “You told me to hit you. What was I supposed to do, get happy?” I answered. “Yeah, that was stupid,” he said. “I’m sure you had a good reason to hit her.” “Pinche viejas (Fuckin’ old ladies) need a slap every now and then to put them in their place.” For the rest of the drive to the liquor store and back, this man went out of his way to justify my violence toward Marilyn and the need to periodically show violence toward women. He mentioned that if his girlfriend weren’t paying most of the bills at home, he would have probably kicked her ass once or twice already. I don’t know what kind of impression he was trying to leave me with, but he succeeded in convincing me that he was a drunken fool with a big mouth.
When we got back to the house, I went in as calmly as I could manage. I didn’t want Marilyn to see any signs of anger in my eyes or in my body language. The boyfriend’s decision to go from a threat to an ally made that easy to do. What I didn’t do was let my guard down with him. All his attempts at starting a conversation with me during dinner I met with an uninterested “uh huh,” or a nod of the head. I agreed to let him drive me home and thanked him several times, but I think he knew that I was ready to attack him at the slightest provocation. At his request, Marilyn and his girlfriend accompani
ed us on the drive back to my home. It was a quiet ride. Marilyn and I held hands but didn’t say a word to each other. The other couple broke the silence only to ask if they were headed in the right direction. As far as I was concerned, it was a successful evening.
Marilyn and I talked on the phone over the next couple of days. She told me that her coworker’s boyfriend had bragged about how he put fear into me by asking me to hit him. Marilyn apologized on his behalf. She said she felt bad that I’d been greeted by such ignorance. I assured Marilyn that the boyfriend was just tooting his own horn and that I had been close to attacking him, but hadn’t. She said she was proud of me for being able to control my anger. She was sure that I was showing obvious signs of improvement, and that made her feel safer about returning. I knew that the violence that had not taken place that night had nothing to do with my self-control, but I didn’t say so. It had more to do with my fear that Marilyn would see me explode and decide that getting back together with me was not a good idea. I felt lonely and kept Marilyn falsely believing that the worst had already happened, while sensing that something was aching to come out of me.
My loneliness and feelings of abandonment had me calling Chicago, pouring my heart out to people I knew couldn’t care less about my predicament. I called Marilyn’s little sister and told her that Marilyn was no longer with me because I had hit her. This I did while crying like a baby. That call really did relieve some of the guilt and pressure I felt about the whole situation. It also helped to bring Marilyn back to me. Marilyn called home one evening and her sister told her about my call to her. After that, Marilyn became convinced that I was regretful for what had happened between us, and that I was safe to live with. Marilyn’s renewed confidence and trust in me gave me a false sense of security. I knew I was wrestling with feelings and thoughts I could not understand and had no clue how to safely release them.
Once a King, Always a King: The Unmaking of a Latin King Page 21