by E A Owen
For Matthew's first birthday, we went to the Omaha Zoo in Nebraska, one of the biggest and best zoos in the world. We saw lots of animals, big and small, but our favorite was the monkeys, swinging around from tree to tree and making funny noises. We got to feed the llamas, goats, and deer; and Matthew snuck some of the food in his mouth and ate it. Neither of our parents saw, and I just giggled and said, “EWWWW!” Mom and Dad were preoccupied by all the cool animals and they hadn't even noticed. Matthew didn't spit it out, so he must have liked it. To me, the animal food smelled bad and looked funny, but I found out at a young age that boys do gross things. We spent all day at the zoo, and we stayed the night at a big hotel with a swimming pool. Dad started teaching me how to swim when I was three. Matthew was still too little, but he liked dunking his head under the water and getting all wet and we laughed and splashed each other a lot.
We had a little party at the hotel with cake and presents. Matthew was old enough to rip open all the presents by himself. He ripped them apart fast, then threw the gift aside and went to the next. Mom tried picking up each gift and telling him all about it, but he wasn't interested. He just wanted to open the next and the next, and so finally she stopped trying. My mom said I was the complete opposite. I wanted to start playing with each gift I opened and kept forgetting I had more. So Mom would have to take the gift away and hide it behind her back and put a newly wrapped gift in front of me. My brother’s favorite present was the big dinosaur that roared and moved on its own. Matthew loved dinosaurs! His favorite blanket had dinosaurs all over it. After Matthew was done opening all his gifts, Mom said she had a surprise to tell all of us, even Dad. She told us she was pregnant and we were going to have another baby brother or sister. My dad gave my mom a kiss. My parents were very affectionate and weren't afraid to show it. We were a very happy family and always laughed a lot and played together.
Just six weeks after Matthew's first birthday was my fourth birthday party. We went to Storybook Land in Aberdeen, South Dakota, and I got to invite a few friends along. We had so much fun seeing all the fairytale characters from all the books Mom had read to me since I was a baby. My favorites were the gigantic castle, the train ride, and the big rainbow. I asked Mom if we could have our sleepover with my friends in the big castle that night, but she said that they wouldn't allow that. She said we would have plenty of fun at home staying up late, eating popcorn and candy while watching movies all night.
On our way home my parents picked up pizza at our favorite pizza place in Clear Lake called Pizza Shack. My favorite was ham, pineapple, and bacon. Matthew had only cut a few teeth, and so Mom cut his pizza into tiny pieces so he didn't choke—but he loved pizza too. We had cake and ice cream and opened all my presents, then laid everyone’s sleeping bags, side-by-side, on the floor in the living room and got into our pj’s and started watching some new movies I had gotten as gifts. We stayed up until midnight watching movies, painting our nails, doing our hair, and putting on makeup. Mom said we looked like clowns. My mom even let me put makeup on her too. I was so proud of myself. I don't think she liked it too much, but she laughed and knew I was having fun.
In March my other baby brother, Michael Alan, was born. He was much smaller than Matthew, only weighing four pounds, five ounces, because Mom had complications with her pregnancy and he was born eight weeks early. Michael couldn't come home right away, and so we had to visit him every day in the hospital for six weeks until he was strong enough to come home with us. It made Mom sad that he had to stay in the hospital, but I was too young to really understand what was going on at the time. When Michael finally came home, he cried all the time and Dad told me to be on my best behavior and help out Mom as much as I could since she wasn't getting much sleep at night and had a lot on her plate.
Being just four, I was very confused about what my dad was trying to say, and I responded by saying, “But Mom's sleeping; she doesn't have anything on her plate.”
My dad just chuckled and rubbed my head and said, “What I meant, sweetheart, is your mom has a lot to do and needs you to be a big girl and help her out, especially with Matthew. You've got to keep an eye on him and stay quiet so your mom can rest.”
“Okay, Daddy,” I replied. Dad leaned down on one knee and gave me a kiss on the cheek, then wrapped his big arms around me and gave me a squeeze.
“I know you will, but Daddy's got to get to work so remember our little talk.” Then my dad left and it was just the four of us. I really hoped that Michael wouldn't cry all day again—it hurt my ears.
I looked up to my father dearly. I was the typical Daddy’s Girl. My father could do no wrong in my eyes. I hoped one day to meet a man just like him, a prince charming to sweep me off my feet.
After Michael was born, Mom changed. She wasn't as happy anymore, and she was tired all the time and didn't play with Matthew and me much anymore. So I tried to stay quiet and play with Matthew so Mom could tend to our baby brother who never seemed happy. All he did was sleep and cry. I used to ask Mom why he cried all the time, but she didn't know either. In fact, we had to go to the doctor a lot because Mom wanted to find out what was wrong with Michael and if he would ever stop crying. Then one day I overheard Mom and Dad talking in the kitchen while Matthew and I were playing with toys in the other room. I could hear my mom crying and my dad kept saying everything was going to be okay. It wasn't until months later that I found out what was wrong and why Mommy had been so sad and cried. Michael had been diagnosed with cancer. He had a tumor and was in pain all the time, which explained his constant crying. I didn't know how serious this was, or what it even meant. All I knew was that it was bad because it made Mom and Dad very sad and we had to go to the doctors all the time to make Michael better.
Michael had to stay in the hospital for a long time, and we visited him every day. The doctors told Mom that Michael would get better and he wouldn't be in so much pain anymore, and I was hoping that meant he would stop crying too. I wanted us to be a happy family again, and that meant making my baby brother better. The doctors caught the cancer before it spread, and after Michael recovered from the surgery, he was able to be a normal kid, which meant no more crying, which made us all very happy.
After what happened to Michael, however, Mom and Dad were scared to have any more children. Even though Michael was all better, they still worried all the time. Anytime Michael showed the slightest hint of getting sick, my mom would rush him to the doctor to make sure it was nothing serious. She was in fact very paranoid, but every time the doctors would reassure her that he was okay and there was nothing to worry about. She was told he was just sick like any other kid and that she had to stop worrying so much. She was told he was healthy and the chances of a tumor coming back were very slim. But my mom still worried all the time, but I don't blame her. She didn't want anything bad happening to us; we were everything to her.
After Michael’s illness, I realized it taught me a very important concept, that I desperately needed later in life. For instance, how adversity is overcome, how loved ones react and how they pull together in difficult situations. The experience has tattooed my soul and I am all the stronger for the psychological trauma of afflictions that I would later in life come to suffer severely.
***
Finally, life was normal again. Mom didn't go to the doctors every time Michael coughed or sneezed or had a fever. She started treating him like Matthew and me, and we went on family trips again, laughed, and played together. We were a happy family again. That is, until I was seven, Matthew was four, and Michael three. Mom found out she was pregnant again and was scared because of what Michael had been through as a baby. She didn't want to go through that stress and heartache again, which made this pregnancy not a happy one like all the others—and she felt guilty that she wasn't happy but scared all the time.
Only a few weeks after finding out she was pregnant, it all turned for the worse. Dad was at work and the four of us were sitting on the couch together watching a movie, Michae
l sitting in Mom's lap. I remember because she almost threw him off her when she stood up, grabbed her stomach, and let out a bloodcurdling scream. I was horrified. I had no idea what was wrong with her. She ran into the kitchen and picked up the phone and called my dad at work and told him to hurry home something was very wrong. After hanging up the phone, she slowly slid down the cabinets and sat on the floor. I ran to her to see if she was okay, and tears were streaming down her face while she held her belly. She told me to go back in the living room and watch the movie with my brothers. She said that she was going to be okay and Dad was on his way home. I did as she told me but peeked around the corner when I saw her crawling to the bathroom on her hands and knees. She closed the door behind her and I could hear her sobbing from the hallway. This made me very sad and scared.
I just sat on the couch, trying to watch the movie, but I couldn't focus. I was sitting on the edge of the couch biting my nails, not knowing what was wrong with Mom. Matthew and Michael hadn't seemed to notice what was going on, their eyes glued to the TV screen. I snuck away from the living room, tiptoed down the hall to the bathroom where my mom was hiding and put my ear up to the door; but I couldn't hear anything.
She wasn't crying anymore, and so I quietly asked, “Mom, are you okay?” She didn't answer. “Mom! MOM!” Still nothing, so I slowly turned the doorknob, hoping she hadn't locked it. I pushed the door open and she was lying on the floor, unconscious. I got down beside her and shook her shoulder, repeating over and over again, “Mom, wake up, wake up!”
I started to panic. I didn't know how long it would be before Dad got home, but then he came rushing through the door, yelling, “Madeline, where are you?”
I spoke up. “Dad, Mom's in here!” He came running down the hall, panic on his face. “What's wrong with your mom?” Dad softly asked me
“I don't know, but she won't wake up!” I replied. He told me to go get my brothers and meet him out in the Yukon.
As my dad carried my mother out to the vehicle, she looked lifeless, her head hanging down. I remember being scared and wondering if my mom was even alive. My dad laid her in the passenger’s seat and leaned it back, so she wouldn't fall forward as he drove. After he buckled her safely in, he made sure all of us were in the car and secured in our seatbelts and then sped off to the hospital in Hendricks, Minnesota, the closest hospital to our house. My dad must have been going 80 mph the entire way to the hospital, and the trip didn't take us long at all.
Waiting for the doctor to come out and tell us if Mom was going to be okay seemed like eternity, and my father kept pacing back and forth nervously while my brothers were playing with the toys in the waiting room. I didn't want to play. I just sat in a chair with my hands folded in my lap, patiently waiting for the news. When the doctor finally came out, my dad rushed over to him and he quietly told my father what was wrong with my mother. They talked for a few minutes and then the doctor turned away and walked through the doors. My father came over to me and told me to keep an eye on my brothers because he needed to go see Mom. I just nodded and dropped my head down while he walked away. I glanced over to make sure my brothers were still playing in the same spot, which they were, as quiet as could be. Dad must have been in there for twenty minutes before he came back to check on us, and we were all in the same exact places as when he left. He came over to me and kneeled down in front of me.
“Mom is going to be okay, but she needs to rest for a while. Let’s go home. We can come back and visit her later, after she has had time to rest.”
I didn't find out until years later what really happened to Mom that day. My parents kept telling me that I was too young to understand, that it was complicated. They just told me that Mom had lost the baby and she was lucky to be alive. I didn't understand what they meant, did not understand how she could lose the baby, which was in her tummy. They had to explain to me that the baby died and Mom would not be able to have any more children.
But that wasn't the case at all. A year later my mom was pregnant again, but she was skeptical that this news was true due to what the doctors had told her about her condition after she had the miscarriage almost a year before. Both my parents were very scared this time. Mom saw the doctor a lot in the beginning to make sure everything was okay. After every appointment they reassured them that the baby was healthy and growing properly.
Once my mom started showing, it wasn't necessary to go to the doctor as often anymore and she only went to regular, scheduled appointments. Mom and Dad called the baby their “Miracle Baby” and informed us it was a baby girl. Now I would have a baby sister, and that made me excited! At first they were going to call her Michelle, but at the last minute they changed their minds and named her Angelina Hope because she was their Angel of Hope. I was nine when she was born. My mom got her tubes tied this time. I wasn't sure what that meant at the time, but the doctors reassured them that they were lucky this time and that may not be the case the next. Besides, my parents said four kids was the perfect number for them. They were very grateful we were all happy and healthy, and that’s all that mattered.
***
For Angel's second birthday, my parents took us to Disney World. I was eleven, Matthew was eight, and Michael seven. It was the best vacation ever! Dad took a whole week off from work and we all got to fly on an airplane for the first time. We flew out of Minneapolis, Minnesota and got to see the Mall of America, which was so big and so cool. There was even an indoor amusement park right in the middle of the mall and we couldn't believe our eyes. Dad said that, on our way home from Disney World, we could each pick something to buy at the Mall of America because we wouldn't be able to bring it on the plane with us. There were so many stores in the mall that I had no clue what I wanted, but I had all week to think about it.
That was the last thing on my mind when we got to Disney World, however. We stayed in a log cabin for the week. It had two floors with a loft and we had it all to ourselves. It was like being at home, including a kitchen with dishes, silverware, cookware, a washer and dryer, and even a massive stone fireplace and a Jacuzzi. I wanted to live here forever. What would be better than having Disney World practically in our backyard. We went on tons of rides. I swear we stood in line waiting most the trip, but it was well worth it. We kept bugging our parents to tell us when we were coming back, and they said not for a long, long time since this was a very expensive trip and took almost all of their savings. But that was the last trip we would ever take with our parents again.
III
Eight Years Later
(Mary Elizabeth)
My parents were killed by a drunk driver when I was twelve. The man that killed my parents was from a wealthy, powerful family in South Dakota. The charges were dropped to vehicular manslaughter and he was sentenced to ten years in prison, all but thirty-six months suspended. After only serving thirty months, just two and a half years, he was released. My life and the lives of my three younger siblings were ruined forever because of him. We had to learn how to cope daily with neither of our parents in our lives. They will miss birthdays, Christmases, graduations, weddings, the birth of their grandchildren. Over the years, I grew so much hatred for this man, Lance Conrad, who took my parents’ lives and he only had to spend two and a half years in prison. He got to come out free as a bird and continue living his life as if nothing had changed, and this made my blood boil. I grew very angry and bitter toward him, toward the system, toward the world. My parents didn't deserve this; we didn't deserve this. We are good people.
After doing some serious digging using a few connections, I discovered that Lance Conrad had a rap sheet a mile long, including a history of violence and drunkenness. He was charged with several counts of assault with a deadly weapon, public intoxication, statutory rape, DUI, drug possession, theft, and manslaughter. This information was not easy to get since his family had money and paid to have his criminal record covered up. He had a blood alcohol level of .32 the night he killed my parents, four times the legal limit.
He walked away from the accident with only a broken nose, two black eyes, and a cracked rib. I was told he must have been unconscious when he swerved into their lane at 65 mph.
My parent’s car was unrecognizable. There was no way they could have ever survived. The hood was completely crushed to the back seats because the car rolled several times before landing on the hood. My parents were completely crushed in the car. The police said they died on impact, that they didn't feel a thing, but that didn't make it any easier to deal with. And no one was to blame except Lance Conrad, a 23-year-old boy who left a party drunk out of his mind and should have been in a coma, not behind the wheel of a car. That night forever changed our lives and was only the beginning to the cruel, twisted events that were to unfold.
***
In South Dakota it is not out of the ordinary for gusts of winds to reach 60 mph, making cold days seem much colder. Today was especially cold, with a bite to it that sent chills to the bone. In the winter, temperatures can drop double digits into the negative, the wind chill -50 degrees. It takes some getting used to, but to be honest, I don't think time will ever make these cold, windy days bearable to even those who have spent their entire lives here. It can be brutal.
I was taking classes at South Dakota State University aka SDSU, home of the Jackrabbits and our colors are yellow and blue. I was going to school to become a Registered Nurse, just like my mother. I really missed her and sometimes wondered what life would have been like if both my parents were still alive. My grandparents did a great job raising us, and both my parents had life insurance policies, the benefit divided equally among the four of us children. My grandparents set up a savings account for each of us with the money that we could access once we were eighteen. Let’s just say it was a lot of money and will do some good as long as we spend it wisely.