“It sure looks like it will be more fun,” he answered, excitement filling his voice.
“I am certain it will be, Skyler,” Katie said, turning off the SUV’s engine. “Let’s go meet them, okay?”
“Yeah!” he exclaimed.
Once introductions had been made, Skyler was invited to explore his new home. The various rooms had been painted with soft hues of light blue, yellow, and beige—a striking difference from the stark white walls of his previous foster home. There were many pictures on the walls, more plants and flowers throughout the house, and definitely more religious things. There was a cross in every room, including one right over his bed. Skyler wasn’t sure why it was there. In his last home, the only room with a cross was the kitchen, but it didn’t seem to mean anything to the family.
He noticed there was almost no clutter in the Tinsdale’s house, either. Over time, he learned Rebecca had arranged everything in a perfect order that was not to be disturbed. Skyler would later say he lived in a museum, where everything inside was on display and not to be used or touched. Toys and play were restricted to the den, while the large living room was for adults only. There was also no television in the living room. That passive, brain-rotting activity, as Rebecca called it, was relegated to the den and limited in time. Despite its designation as the playroom, the den was to be kept orderly, as was the house. Rebecca insisted all toys be returned to their appropriate storage bins when not in use, along with everything else in the house. Indeed, she expected Skyler to comply with the strict routine of their home. Children, Rebecca believed, required healthy routines, expectations, and goals. She did not hesitate from rolling Skyler into the family routine.
After meeting the family on his first day, Rebecca suggested he go play with their other children in the backyard so she could unpack his belongings and tidy up his room. Dinner would be ready at 6:00 sharp, and they were all expected to be back in the house at 5:45 to wash up for dinner.
His first interesting experience with the Tinsdale’s routine turned out to be the family dinner that evening. When Rebecca placed his spaghetti and meatballs in front of him, Skyler grabbed his fork and took a bite.
This is so yummy!
He looked up with delight and saw Grace, Noah, and Vicky looking at him with bewildered expressions on their faces. He looked at Stephen, his new father, with uncertainty. His thick, wavy brown hair was parted on the left side and combed over to the right. Stephen winked at Skyler and gestured with his index finger to wait a minute. Still holding his fork, Skyler look around the table again until his gaze landed on Rebecca.
“Honey, in our house we say grace before all meals. It’s important to thank the Good Lord for the many blessings we have to enjoy.”
“Oh,” Skyler said sheepishly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” He looked at Grace, who made a funny face at him. What the heck are they talking about? What does Grace have to do with this?
“That’s okay, Skyler, you don’t need to be sorry. You didn’t know. So, let us pray.” Rebecca sat down and folded her hands over her plate. Stephen and the children immediately mimicked her gesture.
Stephen spoke first. “Dear Lord, we are eternally grateful for the gift of your son Skyler, whom we welcome into our home this day…”
Skyler, fork still in-hand, watched Stephen and realized this was the first time he had seen people pray. So far, only one person spoke and the rest listened, but they all clasped their hands and bowed their heads. Skyler had no idea what that meant. Why, he wondered, was it necessary to assume that pose in order to pray? Why did only Stephen talk out loud? Was he the only one praying? Or was it Stephen’s turn first and then someone else would talk next, or would someone talk out loud with him? Skyler’s eyes widened with fear as he realized he might be expected to pray out loud.
“And for all these things, we pray in the great and holy name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.”
“Amen,” everyone else said, surprising Skyler.
“I see we have a lot to learn, don’t we Skyler?” Rebecca asked rhetorically. “Skyler,” she repeated, toying with the spaghetti in her plate with the tines of her fork. “That’s not a particularly Christian name, is it?”
Is she asking me or telling me?
The children giggled. “Well, tomorrow you’ll come to church with us and go to Sunday school with all the other children.”
“Church?” Skyler asked.
“Church,” repeated Rebecca. “It’s where we go to pray on Sunday.”
“But you just prayed here, a minute ago. You can’t pray here on Sunday?” Skyler asked.
Silence.
Stephen broke the silence by stifling laughter with a choking cough. Rebecca seemed horrified at Skyler’s question.
“Dear boy, you do know who the Lord is, don’t you?” she asked.
Skyler shook his head slowly from side to side.
“Do you know who Jesus is?”
“I can spell Jesus,” Vicky shouted. “J-E-S-U-S!” She punctuated each letter with a clap of her hands.
“That’s right, dear. Well, Skyler, do you?”
Skyler hesitated for a moment, trying to wrap his head around the question. “Uh, I know someone with that spelling, but he pronounces his name Hey-zus. Heyzus Martinez. He was in my class at my old school.”
Stephen’s polite attempt at concealing his utter amusement broke the silence as he coughed loudly and finally gave into a fit of laughter. Rebecca looked mortified.
“Sweet Jesus,” she murmured. Then she smiled at him. “You can meet Jesus tomorrow when you come to church with us.”
“He’ll be there? Heyzus goes to church with you?”
Rebecca eyes popped open. She looked flabbergasted again. “No, Skyler, not Heyzus, JE-sus. JE-sus Christ, the Son of God.”
“Oh,” Skyler answered. “I’ve heard of God, but never met him.”
“Mommy, daddy’s silly,” Grace said, one of the younger and oblivious children. Noah snickered next to her.
Rebecca looked sternly at her husband, who desperately tried not to laugh. Ignoring Grace’s comment, Rebecca turned back to Skyler and said, “You can meet him tomorrow, at church.”
Stephen excused himself and stepped into the living room, laughing the entire way. “Heyzus Martinez,” he managed to squeak out, slapping his knee and doubling over with laughter.
Skyler wasn’t sure what he had done that was so funny, but it made Stephen laugh uncontrollably and made Rebecca frown. These people are very confusing.
* * *
Skyler slurped his cereal and remembered how Rebecca had regimented his first week at the Tinsdale’s because she didn’t want his arrival to disrupt the family routine. She introduced him to more rules and expected his immediate compliance. In reality, the routine wasn’t very different from what he was accustomed to. The key difference was that he didn’t need to listen to the sermonizing of a drunk man before bed or anticipate when a drunken rage might ensue. Instead, Rebecca assigned passages from the children’s Bible for him to read so he could catch up to the other kids his age at Sunday school. Skyler thought the Bible was weird, but he decided not to tell that to Rebecca.
“Well,” Rebecca said, jarring Skyler back to the present moment. “Thank goodness we’ve cleared that up, right?”
He nodded and chuckled along with Rebecca, who shook her head and smiled.
Oblivious to what her mother was talking about, Vicky moved to her fifth finger, but then switched hands to continue. “Then we’re going to have lunch, I think, and then have recess on the playground. I don’t know what we’ll play though, since it hasn’t been decided yet. We’ll probably vote on a game during lunch like we always do.”
“Okay, and after lunch recess?” Skyler asked, spooning more cereal into his mouth. “Tell me more.”
Vicky moved on to the next two fingers. “Then I think we are going to do Science and Social Studies because it’s Friday. We’re drawing maps of the city and writing
in the places we know of on them.”
“Wow, sounds neat,” Skyler exclaimed. He took another bite of his breakfast.
“I wish I could go back to that,” Noah said. “I’m sick of book reports and pre-algebra. I’ll take drawing any day.” Until now, he had been listening silently, staring at nothing in particular on the kitchen cabinetry.
“You can always take an art class next year, honey,” Rebecca said.
“Yeah, I know, but next year doesn’t make this year as much fun,” Noah retorted.
“School is as fun as you make it,” Rebecca said matter-of-factly. Noah shrugged and ate more cereal.
“And that,” Vicky said, slightly irritated that she had been interrupted, “Is what I will do today.”
“Very good, Vicky,” Rebecca said. “Thank you for sharing your exciting plans with us.”
“Skyler, can we watch a Disney movie tonight?” Though many at church questioned the purity and godliness of children’s movies, Rebecca had made a point to pre-screen the movies and then reinforce the morals and, in some cases, invent a biblical message for each movie. When he first moved in with the Tinsdale family, Skyler and Vicky had bonded by watching children’s movies, including some of the more recent Disney movies. Now, Skyler enjoyed curling on the couch with his younger sister and watching whatever movie tickled her fancy. Because they had watched so many of them repeatedly over the past year, they could recite the character’s lines and sing along with them as well.
“Well, I’ll be sleeping over at Cam’s house tonight. But maybe tomorrow night if we aren’t doing anything?” Cam had become Skyler’s best friend and they often slept over one another’s houses on Friday or Saturday nights because their parents frowned upon them hanging out together on school nights when they should be studying.
“Oh,” Vicky said, slightly disheartened. Skyler looked over at Rebecca for confirmation.
Rebecca glanced over at the calendar and nodded. “I think a family movie night tomorrow night would be fun.”
Noah groaned. Skyler guessed his brother wasn’t keen on watching a Disney movie again.
“Honey,” Rebecca explained. “Tonight Noah has a soccer game. We’re going to the game as a family so we can cheer him on. When we get back from his game tonight, it’ll be time for you to go to bed with the angels.”
“Vicky,” Skyler said. “I promise, we’ll have lots of fun tomorrow night.”
“Okay,” Vicky said. She shifted in her seat and began planning the movie night. “So, can we have popcorn with our movie sing-along tomorrow night?”
Skyler and Noah looked at each other and smiled. Rebecca leaned over and kissed Vicky on the head. “My little planner. Yes, love, we’ll have popcorn tomorrow night and a Disney family sing-a-long.”
Eventually, the bathrooms became free and Noah claimed the upstairs bathroom. Skyler showered in the downstairs bathroom and then ran upstairs to get dressed. Dressing for school was simple because of Cornerstone Christian Academy’s uniform policy. However, on Fridays, students could wear a t-shirt with a positive (and preferably biblical) message. Girls could wear uniform pants instead of the standard jumper skirts and white blouses. While most students chose to wear t-shirts with religious messages on them, Skyler always chose something else.
Today he wore his blue Captain America t-shirt because the girls in school told him it brought out his blue eyes. He finished spiking his black hair and smiled as he checked himself out in the mirror one last time. He stood tall at his full height of six-foot-one. His hair was perfectly spiked and he loved how the fitted t-shirt accentuated his athletic build. Today will be a great day, he thought, borrowing the line from Vicky’s repertoire of encouragements.
A yellow index card note tucked into the bottom right corner of his dresser mirror with the hand-written words “You are Blessed!” caught his eye. It had been there since his testimony, but he tended to overlook it each day. It was a gift, so to speak, from Pastor Bob Miller’s wife, Gloria-Jeanne. She had given it to him in a card with the instructions to put it on his bedroom mirror after his church testimony. Skyler chuckled as he thought back to that strange day. Man, what a shit-show that was.
* * *
Skyler adjusted quickly to life at the Tinsdale’s and accepted them as his new family within the first month. The Tinsdales were nice people; but not ordinarily nice people—they were really, really nice people. Sickeningly nice. And super Christian. In fact, it was the adjustment to Christian family living that caused the most struggle for Skyler. He wasn’t raised Christian, and his apparent lack-of-baptism created a visible scandal for Rebecca.
Stability, however, was the top priority for Skyler by the foster care agency—and Katie’s—collective mind. Here, they believed, he would be safe, encouraged to grow, and live free from verbal and mental assault—at least from the negative, soul-crushing, and mind-breaking kind. But they didn’t know about the Jesus kind, that when wielded by the right (or wrong) type of people, could be intimidating and hurtful in its own psycho-spiritual way.
With some silent reluctance, eleven-year-old Skyler began attending church services at Tabernacle Holiness Church with his smiling foster family. At first, he thought the whole ordeal was a bit weird. There was a lot of music, clapping, standing, people talking in foreign languages, yelling, blessing, and a bunch of other things church people said and did to be—or look—holy. The church even came with a pulpit pounding pastor and a lot of spirit-induced hallelujahs and amens.
The spectacle of church worship didn’t enamor Skyler. He had become an excellent judge of character by watching people. Almost two years ago, when his mother became ill, Skyler watched the doctors, nurses, and caretakers as they talked over him and tried to help a ten-year-old boy understand the severity of his mother’s illness. Then, at his first foster home, he watched his foster-father’s abusive and drunken behavior and learned how to survive in an alcoholic family. This was an important skill for knowing when to disappear before ever having to duck the rabid anger—and possible fist—of a drunken Sean McMahon.
At the Tinsdale’s, he had learned the signs of religious hypocrisy. The Christians were similar, he observed, except they didn’t hit people. Sometimes in church, however, they did put their hands on each other’s heads and sometimes they would fall backwards, lying stiff and quiet on the floor.
The Tinsdales insisted he attend services with them as a family. It was only a few years later, when he tested his independence, that he learned they expected him to follow their rules or face relocation. The latter was not an option for Skyler. Not again.
Though he found church services awkward for the first few months, he eventually became comfortable with the church world through one of his most uncomfortable church moments. The pastor invited—or pressured—Skyler to testify before the congregation about how his faith, albeit that of a young boy, saved him and kept him sane during his terrible, Satan-worshipping first foster home placement.
Rebecca did her best to coach Skyler along as he wrote and rehearsed his testimony. She felt it important that key phrases such as, Jesus is my rock, I was blessed, and the Lord’s guidance and unfaltering faithfulness should be used in a boy’s first time public-outing-of-nasty-dirty-laundry-bleached-and-made-clean-with-the-blood-of-Jesus story. Skyler didn’t know how to tell Rebecca the words felt awkward and fake. And what the heck did unfaltering mean? And cleaned with blood? Seriously? What was wrong with these people? Even Skyler knew at eleven years old that blood was a nasty and persistent stain.
Whether or not he was ready to process the experience of his first foster family—or his mother’s death—weren’t questions Rebecca cared to ask. In her mind, Skyler was ready, and if he wasn’t, Jesus would give him strength. She reminded him of that every time he seemed unsure of himself. Rehearsal after rehearsal, Skyler stood in the living room in front of the fireplace, shaking as he read his testimony. Stephen and Rebecca sat on the couch and listened, beaming with pride at their soon
-to-be-hatched Christian boy. The other children were excused from listening to the rehearsals, as they were too young and Rebecca didn’t want them repeatedly listening to such a brutal story. They would miss the official church testimony as well on account of Sunday School, a luxury not afforded to Skyler on that particular Sunday. For Testimony Sunday, he had earned the special privilege of remaining with the adults during the sermon.
When the time came for his testimony, Pastor Bob called him forward. As Skyler climbed up the sanctuary stairs, he could feel over one hundred sets of eyes boring holes into his back as he walked over to the pulpit where the pastor’s wife, Gloria-Jeanne, patiently waited for him. His nervousness drowned out the enthusiastic and god-fearing introduction that Pastor Bob Miller gave him.
Gloria-Jeanne smiled at him. She pointed to the stool that had been placed in the pulpit. “When Pastor Bob steps back, you stand on the stool so the congregation can see you,” she instructed, her soft, sweet voice relaxing him a little. “Don’t be scared, you’ll do just fine; the Lord will see to it. Trust in Him and He will give you strength.”
Pastor Bob stepped out of the pulpit and smiled at Skyler. Everyone started clapping at the same time. Gloria-Jeanne gave Skyler a gentle nudge on his shoulder as she stepped back with her husband. Skyler stepped forward, climbed up the stool, and settled into the pulpit. His papers crackled in his hands and he cleared his throat and opened his mouth to speak.
And then it happened—something he was not prepared for, something that Rebecca, in all her efforts, had forgotten to warn him about because she never considered that anyone would dare interrupt her protégé.
“Testify, little brother-in-Christ,” someone shouted. The voice came from the second row. Skyler’s eyes darted with surprise to a large lady with an even larger blue hat who waved her hand in the air as she encouraged him. She wore a tight flowered dress and neon green sweater shawl that didn’t match. Skyler suppressed a giggle and cleared his throat. He saw Rebecca send an unnoticed and murderous glare toward the woman, but the comments didn’t stop with her.
The Climb Page 2