Everything I Never Wanted to Be

by Dina Kucera

  The girl called Phil and told him to meet her at a convenience store in the middle of the “hood.” I would go so far as to say it was in the “hood of the hood.” The only reason you would go to this area would be to buy heroin or meth. The girl called back and told us Phil agreed to meet her there.

  John, Jen, and April were walking out the door, and I was screaming, “Are you people crazy? You’re going to get shot!”

  April said, “Not until I kick his fucking ass into the ground.” Now April was on the case and I was actually worried about Phil. They walked out. Holy God.

  I have been married to John for twenty years. He has never been in a physical altercation with anyone. Ever. Never even close. But something about your children does things to your brain. And John’s patience for Phil was gone.

  They got to the convenience store and met the girl. They introduced themselves as if they were at a cocktail party. The girl said she would bring Phil around the back of the store, so John and the girls went to hide behind the store in the dark. The last thing the girl said to John was, “Be careful. Phil always carries a gun.” Great.

  Phil pulls up in front of the store. He gets out of the car, and tucks something in the front of his jeans. John is sure it’s a gun. John looks down and sees a big stick lying by the trash dumpster. John picks up the stick.

  The gun is a problem, but the bigger problem is that Phil did not bring Carly with him. Phil and the girl walk around behind the store where the gang with the stick is hiding. When Phil is two steps away, John clocks him with the stick. Phil goes down and the girls start kicking him and screaming, “Tell me where my sister is, you shit bag!” John is now thinking the girls may kill Phil.

  John tries to pull the crazy girls off of Phil. Jen backs off right away, but April wants a few more shots.

  Someone in the apartments next to the parking lot calls the police. The police show up. Phil is wrecked.

  John explains what has happened for the last week and about trying to find Carly. Phil sits on the curb saying he doesn’t even know Carly, although he’s wearing her belt. The police are going to arrest John and the girls for assault. John is now really pissed off because he’s going to jail. He tells Phil, “We’ll meet again. Think about it this way: I only brought the B team this time. Two girls. Next time you won’t be that lucky.”

  Now the police say they are adding charges because John is threatening Phil. April is smarter and is not so direct with Phil. She says things like, “You should go to beauty school or do nails.”

  The police say we should have just called the police in the first place. John says we did. Three times. They told us there was nothing they could do, and said we should have raised Carly with morals. The police handcuff John, Jen and April, but then Phil says he doesn’t want to press charges. He just wants to go home.

  After a long scolding from the police, Stick Man and Girls Gone Wild are let go with a stern warning: “You are not police officers.”

  The next morning, a bruised-up Phil got back to whatever crack den Carly and he were living in. He told Carly, “You have to get out of here. Your family is crazy, and I can’t be dealing with this. Get your shit and get out.”

  So seven days after Carly escaped in the middle of the night, the phone rang and it was her, crying, “Can someone come and pick me up? I’m walking down a street with my bag. It’s heavy.”

  We picked up Carly and brought her home. She had been shooting up meth the entire time she was gone. We called every detox center we could think of, but there were no beds. Meth addiction is on the bottom of the list for beds because they say there is no physical danger from withdrawing from meth. So every place we called, no bed. We called about twenty rehabs and begged. We pleaded. We cried. But no money, no treatment. So we had to detox Carly off meth ourselves. At home.

  This time we had to make absolutely sure Carly didn’t leave the house. So we had to watch her in shifts. Someone had to be awake all the time and be right with her. Every time Carly hallucinated, talked crazy, became enraged, and tried to get out the front door, she was met by a family member physically restraining her. But it was too much for us. We needed help. So we called Andy.

  Carly had met Andy in Narcotics Anonymous. I knew the minute she met him she was completely infatuated. Andy is really good-looking, funny and charming. Carly ate it all up.

  Andy got a job with my husband, and Andy became very close to our family. He was clean from opiates by taking a drug called Suboxone. The Suboxone worked, but there is always the other side of the coin. It’s very difficult to get Suboxone and it’s very expensive. It’s also very hard to get off Suboxone, so it turns out to be another chemical problem. But it seemed to be working for Andy.

  Carly was relapsing during the time she was with Andy, and they broke up when Carly relapsed. But every time she promised to stay clean, they got back together.

  During the time that Carly was in the hospital and then on the run with Phil, Andy was out of the picture. But we knew Andy was clean because he was working for John. So we called Andy for help. Andy still loved Carly. He said he would come and keep her in the house when we needed to go to sleep. Carly was high but thrilled that Andy would be her guard.

  One way to look at addicts and alcoholics is the way you look at one of those Magic Eye hologram pictures they sell in the mall. When you first look at the picture, it’s just colors and dots. But if you stand still and look past the surface, there is an actual picture of something—a girl on a bike, or a cat playing with yarn. That’s how I look at people. At first, some people are just this confusing fucked-up mess. But if I’m still and look past the mess, I see something beautiful. Something deeper and more real than what I saw at first glance. And then, when I can see it clearly, I think, Why didn’t I see that in the first place? It’s so clear. You just have to be still and look past the mess. Although sometimes, I look at people and all I see is a cat playing with yarn.

  We had a good system for watching Carly. Andy liked to stay up late, so he would watch Carly until 3:30 or 4:00 in the morning. John wakes up naturally at about that time (I don’t know why), so then Andy would go to sleep. It was a good system, but we had two major problems.

  One was waiting for Phil to drive by the house and shoot out the front windows. The front part of the house was the living room and one bedroom. The answer was to board up the windows. But we leased the house, so we had to board up the windows from the inside so the landlord didn’t drive by and realize he had crazy people living in his house. No one could walk into the living room or bedroom, so we had to conduct life in the back of the house.

  The second problem was that Carly was really, really out of her mind. I knew it would help if we could just get her to go to sleep, but meth keeps you up for days and days. I had medication that would put her to sleep, but I was worried about the overdose problem. I didn’t know what to do. She was pacing around the house and having hallucinations that people were trying to take her or chase her or kill her.

  So here is another proud mother moment that should be in a greeting card. I asked Jen and April to buy some pot for Carly. Marijuana. If nothing else, I thought it would take the edge off for Carly, and you can’t overdose on pot. I didn’t feel great about the idea, but I couldn’t watch Carly be crazy anymore.

  The girls went and got some pot, which I know is illegal but so is assault and we had already crossed that road. Trust me, if we say bring our daughter home, you should bring her home. You don’t want April rolling up on your crack den when her sister is in there. April will assault you into submission and then feng shui your living room on the way out. It’s called Divine Order.

  I went into Carly’s room. She was sitting in a corner and Andy was sitting on her bed. I gave her the Mary Jane and said, “Smoke pot.” She grabbed it and lit up. Twenty minutes later she said it didn’t help. I said smoke more.

  Here’s the fact: it eventually worked. Each day it worked better and better until the day I sai
d okay, no more pot. Not because I’m a strict parent, but because we ran out. But for those couple of days, it saved us. I would say, Please eat something, then smoke pot.

  So Carly would eat, smoke, eat, smoke. Three days later, the pot was gone, and she just started eating and sleeping. She finally began to come out of it. She started making sense and the hallucinations stopped. She came to me and John and said, “Thank you for not letting me go.”

  While all of this was happening, life was going on. It was Halloween. Everybody at work was dressing up, but not me because I’m not fun. I did go look at costumes one day, but the costumes for women were all sexy-slash-something. Sexy nurse. Sexy librarian. Sexy nun.

  My failure as a mother was always clear at Halloween. While the better mothers handmade their children’s elaborate costumes, I waited until noon Halloween day to go to the costume store. By that time, the shelves appeared to have been ripped apart by packs of wild wolves, and all that was left was pieces of different costumes. I would say to April, “What do you mean, ‘What is it?’ It’s an eggplant costume. Put the clown shoes on with it so it will look really cute. Do you want to wear the Elvira wig, too, or no?”

  Some years were worse than that. We couldn’t even afford pieces of a costume. So I would put face makeup on the girls and buy one of those little containers that you put on your face to look like a scar. “What do you mean, ‘What are you?’ You’re an infected cut! It’s fun, right? Go! Get some candy!” One year I got a stick and glued a big piece of paper on it that read, “On Strike!” She was a picketer. Cute, right?

  I was checking groceries, and I got a text from Jen. April’s new boyfriend had beat April to a pulp. I faked sick and left work. I was sure I’d be signing a piece of paper the next day.

  I went to April’s house and she clearly had a concussion, but she refused to go to the hospital. I could see lumps all over her head and bruising all over her legs and arms. She also refused to come to my house where she would be safe.

  April’s house isn’t far away, so for the next few days, John and I drove back and forth, trying to take care of Carly at our house and April at her house.

  John and I were at home one day, and April’s shit sack boyfriend called to tell us that we would never see our daughter again. In the background, we heard April screaming. Then the boyfriend hung up.

  A while later, April called and said everything is fine. He was just mad. He was sweet as sugar now and sorry, and he bought her some gifts. But then he kicked the shit out of her again because she wasn’t “listening.”

  April’s boyfriend was a very violent person. Restraining orders didn’t stop him, they encouraged him. So after he beat April again, John and I went to April’s house, packed all her things into a U-Haul, and moved her to a different place where the psycho wouldn’t be able to find her. Andy helped us.

  I’m back at work, and John texts me to say, “He found April. Tried to choke her. Carly is asleep.”

  A short while later, I’m sitting in Ballsack’s office signing a paper. A Secret Shopper said I didn’t smile at her. Ballsack reminds me that a smile is part of the uniform.

  Ten minutes later I hear Ballsack over the intercom: “Huddle to the break room!”

  A huddle is where the boss calls us all in and tries to pump us up about groceries. This chain of grocery stores uses a lot of numbers and percentages, and if you were a one hundred percent employee, you knew these numbers. I, on the other hand, couldn’t give fucking fuck about the numbers. I hate huddles. They are stupid. I don’t give a shit what you say during the huddle. I’m only going to want to kill myself more when it’s over.

  Ballsack, pacing back and forth in the huddle: “Who knows our store average?”

  Silence.

  Ballsack: “Dina?”

  “Well...(I knew it had a point in it)... forty-two point... I don’t know.”

  Ballsack: “Seventy-six point four.”

  Me: “That’s right.”

  Ballsack: “Who can tell me what our goal for the quarter was?”

  Silence.

  Ballsack: “Dina?”

  My phone vibrates. I think I may vomit. I try mirroring: “What was our goal?”

  Ballsack: “What was our goal! You know! Our goal!”

  “Forty....”

  Ballsack: “No! No! No! Eighty-one point six!” Then he launches into a ten minute thing about how we need to pretend the customers are our own flesh and blood, and if we don’t want to do this, there are piles of applications from people who will do it. My phone is vibrating the entire time.

  We end the huddle in the same motivating way we always do. We all stand in a circle, put a hand in, and shout something inspirational. Like, “We’re number one!” or “I’m a team player!”

  After the huddle I look at a text message on my phone. It says, “April says she loves him and there’s nothing we can do about it.”

  That day, April invited the boyfriend to the new place. Weeks later we moved her again after another drunken, drug-fueled assault. But she invited him to the new place again. She said we simply had to support the fact that they were in love and were going to be together forever—or at least until he murdered her. We said we would not support her in this violent relationship. Shortly after that, he beat her again. So we moved her again. And April invited him over again. Not surprisingly, he beat her again. And we moved her again.

  All in all, we moved April four times in less than a year. It only ended because the boyfriend went to prison for a prior conviction. Thank God for prior convictions.

  But by the time the boyfriend went to prison, April’s relationship with us was very strained. One evening, extremely intoxicated, she became angry with us, busted out all the windows on the front of our house, and then drove her SUV into the back of our Jeep, smashing it into the closed garage door. We had her arrested.

  It was a bad night, and it was all because of alcohol. April may be aggressive when she’s not drinking, but she never in a million years would have broken out our windows and rammed our car if she was sober. She is so, so gorgeous, and so intelligent. But the alcohol is going to sink her.

  It’s no different than Carly using heroin. Many people feel that alcohol is different from drugs, but it’s the same. The only difference is that the commercials for alcohol are better. Alcoholics end up cradling the toilet just like heroin addicts. One isn’t more glamorous than the other. They both suck.

  My heart feels sad because these days it’s hard for me to find April even when I’m looking right at her. I miss that funny little girl who would lend me money from her piggy bank and say, “I’m going to lend this to you, BUT there will have to be a little extra come my way when I get it back. I’m not a bank.” She was ten. I was borrowing money from a ten-year-old.

  After the attack with the stick, Andy was at our house for more than a week. At that point, he was exhausted and ready to go home. Carly wasn’t a fun person to be around, and moving April wasn’t in the original plan. But Andy helped like he always does. Then he went home. We will always be thankful for his help.

  Those were dark days. One reason they were dark was because all our windows were boarded up. But they were also dark because Carly was in the back room smoking Mary Jane prescribed by her mother. I think to myself, Did I really do that? Yes. I did. It was a horrible situation to be in.

  Now the whole thing seems sort of funny. If someone needed something in the living room, they would crawl in there, grab it, and crawl back. I can envision them wearing full camouflage, with a helmet with a plant on top, crawling flat on their stomachs into the living room: “Cover me! I’m going in!” Just to get the new People magazine that was lying on the table.

  The day after the assault with the stick, Phil’s father called. He said they were pressing charges against us for assaulting Phil. Judging by the four million dollar house they lived in, I immediately assumed they had the resources to do that. Phil’s father and I screamed on the phone back and fo
rth for about fifteen minutes.

  Then I said something about Carly meaning everything to me. Phil’s father became quiet. He said he understood. I told him what the police officer said about how we didn’t raise Carly with morals. He said he and his wife had heard that one before, too. Then he told me about Phil.

  He said Phil wasn’t always like this. When Phil was a teenager, he was very athletic. He was also funny and kind, and they did everything together.

  I cried and told Phil’s father similar things about Carly. We talked about how this is the way we see these kids. This is what we remember. The drug addict that other people see is not the same person that we know.

  The truth is a gray area. The truth is mixed in with laughter, tears, trauma, rain, snow, and heat. I face the truth about me... that one sentence that I confess to myself and only to myself. I think about other people who have that one sentence that defines them. He robbed a bank. She is a prostitute. He is a heroin addict. But there were thousands of things that took place before that one sentence became their “truth.” That doesn’t forgive the moment when we jumped the tracks. But it’s important to remember what it was like before we made that leap—and to remember there is more to the “truth” about a person than that one statement.

  Phil’s dad and I talked for another half hour, and for the first time in many years I spoke with someone who really, deeply understood. He and his wife lived our heartbreak every day. Someone understood.

  It was like a weight lifted off my shoulders to talk to someone who could truly understand our pain. He decided not to press charges, and told me he wished well for Carly.

  I told him with all my heart I hoped Phil came around, and I was so sorry for any additional pain we had caused him and his family. He told us to call if we needed anything. I was so, so grateful for that conversation.

  I’ll never have a conversation quite like that one again because people really don’t get it. They want to, but they just don’t.