Home From Within

by Lisa Maggiore

  Aunt Lodi’s hands stopped moving, and she slowly pulled back onto her knees, turning to look at Jessica, not shading the sun anymore. “How do you know about that?”

  “I found the box in the storage room. I looked through it last night.”

  Aunt Lodi stared at Jessica’s face for a long moment.

  “Dad’s dead. Don’t you think it’s time I knew the truth?”

  Aunt Lodi’s face looked burdened, but she pulled her lips apart. “I’ll tell you the truth. Jim may rest easier if you know.”

  Aunt Lodi told Jessica to give her a minute to change and she would meet her in the truck. They would have to take a road trip … to hell.

  Jessica’s nerves were jumping as she followed the directions Aunt Lodi dictated. At first, they drove on the highway north for about an hour, and then angled onto a county road for about another thirty minutes, finally turning on a very narrow path with overgrown bushes and weeds. The trees hovered over, blocking out much of the sunshine. Jessica rolled her window down slightly, taking in the banging sounds of wood hitting metal, and bugs in every form jumped or flew past as the truck crushed their homes.

  “There. Over there.” Aunt Lodi pointed to a burned-out trailer and a few yards away, a slim building that looked like an old outhouse.

  Jessica pulled the truck over to what seemed like the lowest lying weeds and parked, finally looking over at Aunt Lodi. She was pale and said, “I feel sick to my stomach.”

  Jessica started feeling guilty about pushing the issue, not wanting to see Aunt Lodi in pain.

  “Are you all right?”

  Aunt Lodi pulled her hands away from her mouth, folded them, and placed them on her lips, mumbling a prayer. After a minute, she took a deep breath in and let it out loudly.

  “I can do this. It will be good for me … for Jim … if you know the truth.”

  Jessica felt like she was in a movie, the moment felt so surreal. She started looking around at the setting. The burned-out trailer was in ruins, charred and taken over by the woods. Moss, fern, and other green inhabitants covered the side that had been left intact, while large yellow and brown weeds had struck a partnership around the top. The tall slender building had the look of weathered wood, faded by the elements, but surprisingly the door was still there, hanging from one rusted hinge.

  Jessica looked back at Aunt Lodi to see what she wanted to do.

  “I’m not ready to get out yet,” Aunt Lodi said, staring straight ahead.

  Jessica reached over to grab her hand, but Aunt Lodi pulled away. “I need a minute. Actually, don’t touch me at all here.”

  Jessica pulled back, stunned, but respected her wishes, feeling like a toddler and keeping her hands to herself.

  “I have not been back here since 1963, when that trailer burned.”

  “Were you in there when it burned?” Jessica whispered.

  “No,” Aunt Lodi said, pausing for a minute. “But Ermaline and Walker were.”

  Jessica’s eyes widened, those names were finally going to have a story attached.

  “Ermaline was our momma’s sister and Walker was her husband. Our parents didn’t like Walker, so we never spent much time together. Every now and then Ermaline would drive to the farm to visit with Momma but that was it. My parents knew nothing about wills, never entertained the thought that they may die before us. When they were killed, the state gave us to Ermaline, the only living relative. I was older than Jim, so I knew a little more about what was going on, and I was on guard around them, knowing there was a reason Momma and Daddy didn’t spend time with them. Well, I soon found out. Walker was mean when he was sober, nice when he was buzzed, and too nice when he was drunk.”

  The pit of Jessica’s stomach caved, knowing where this story was going.

  “He hurt you,” Jessica stated.

  Aunt Lodi nodded her head. “For years I was at his call. Of course, Ermaline had no idea. She worked long hours and Walker was on disability and home all day. I would find loads of reasons to stay away, but this is where I would always have to come back to. And as you can see, we were isolated, so unless I got a ride on the school bus, I was stuck here.

  “Of course we did run away once, but didn’t get far, and Ermaline convinced the county sheriff we were having adjustment problems to our new home. I was afraid to tell the truth. I thought I was the one doing something wrong, the one who people would look at as dirty. Jim asked me why I didn’t tell the sheriff what Walker was doing. I said it was because they would know I was a whore—because that’s what Walker told me I was. I just didn’t know.”

  Tears started streaking down Aunt Lodi’s face, and she let them drop onto her lap. “Jim was only seven when we came here. The abuse started a few months later. Those weapons you found, the sticks and daggers, he made those so I could fight Walker off. Walker didn’t hide what he was doing; Jim saw what was happening. When Jim was eight, he took a butter knife from the drawer and stabbed Walker with it. Walker threw him in the outhouse, locking him in there until Ermaline came home, but she ended up pulling a double shift and didn’t return until the next day. Jim stayed in that God-awful building all night until Walker let him out, right before Ermaline got home. If you look inside the outhouse, you’ll see carvings Jim made on the walls, carvings of him killing Walker.”

  Jessica looked over at the outhouse. The door was held in place by a rusted piece of metal at the top of the left side and the small roof was completely peeled off. She watched a bird fly in and out of the structure, seemingly calling it home.

  Aunt Lodi made no attempts to plug up her nose or eyes as she cried without inhibition.

  “They had a Rottweiler chained from a stake in the ground over there. Walker would put the dog by the outhouse so Jim couldn’t escape when he was thrown in there for attacking Walker on many different occasions. We were so scared of that dog.”

  “The only thing that kept me and Jim alive in that first year was our love for each other and our horses. Ermaline agreed to board the two horses that were ours from the farm—Buttercup and Lightning. We would trek two miles up the road and stay for hours, sometimes falling asleep in their stalls, until woken by the farmer and shooed on back to hell. Jim and I would race through the trees, up the creek, and back through the pines; that’s the only time in our life after our parents’ death we truly felt safe and free. But all good things must end when you are living with evil.”

  Jessica, who had been staring at the wreckage, turned her face toward Aunt Lodi again, wishing to eradicate some of the pain.

  “Remember the picture with me and Jim on the horses?”

  “The one on his nightstand,” Jessica said.

  Aunt Lodi smiled. “We were so happy that day because we got our horses back. And please forgive me, God please forgive us, but we were also happy because Ermaline and Walker were dead.”

  “Around when I turned thirteen and Jim nine, Ermaline said she ran out of money to care for our horses. She sold them to another farmer in the area. Walker laughed when she told us at supper, and Ermaline threw a piece of cornbread at him. I tried not to, but my tears just started falling onto the table. Jim—he sat there with a look of hate. Ermaline apologized but said it had to be done, and then left the trailer to go to work. I had to clean up the cornbread that was scattered all over the floor while Jim got smacked around by Walker for having that look of hate on his face. I think Walker was starting to get a little scared of Jim, thinking maybe one day, he really would succeed at killing him.”

  Aunt Lodi broke off her speech and rubbed her temples in a slow circular motion as Jessica found her stomach retching and felt embarrassed by her apparent lack of grit.

  “There was a country vet named Norbert Olson. He used to care for our animals on the farm. He was kind to my parents, and they always thought highly of him. Every once in a while, we would see him in town since he had a clinic there. He would ask how we were being treated, and we always put on a strong face saying fine, but I think h
e could tell that was not so. When I was fifteen, he asked if I wanted a job, helping in the clinic. I jumped at the chance but only if Jim could come too. We spent all of our time in that clinic, and Mr. Olson figured something wasn’t right when we asked to stay there on Sundays, too. He never questioned us directly, but I could see in his expression he sensed something was amiss. He said we could stay in the apartment above the clinic as long as we kept it clean. Of course Walker was outraged, since I was not at his call anymore, and tried to put a stop to it, saying Mr. Olson must be doing something ‘funny’ to me. Mr. Olson took a drive out to see Walker when Ermaline was at work. I’m not sure what happened, but when he came back, he had a box with our clothing and a few other items from the trailer and said we could call this place home if we wished.

  “Ermaline was fine with it, as long as she got her budget money from the state. At that time that’s the money the government gave orphaned kids. Mr. Olson told her she could keep it, and from then on, I raised Jim above the clinic. Mr. Olson helped us of course. We would ride out to farms to help him care for animals, receiving dinners and canned food as payment. Along the way, we searched for our horses, believing that one day we would happen upon the farm they were at and Mr. Olson would get them back for us.

  “I graduated high school and got a job at the local market as a cashier until Jim graduated. But Jim started getting into trouble in high school, drinking and fighting with a bunch of guys, the ‘going-nowhere bunch,’ I called them. Jim said he was going to hang out the summer after graduation then get a job in the fall. Well, I saw where that was headed so I said no. I’m the one who convinced him to join the Army, the only place I thought that could save him from himself. But in order to join the Army, you had to have a birth certificate and the only people we knew to have that information were Ermaline and Walker. We could have gone to the court building and requested a new birth certificate, but Jim pumped our heads up, feeding our egos, wanting to show them that we were in control of our lives. So we went to reclaim all of our personal items: pictures and other things that were rightfully ours. I had not been out to their place in seven years, and let me tell you, I actually had to pull over so I could throw up on the side of the road. Jim coped by cracking his knuckles and sipping on a flask of Johnnie Walker. By this time Jim was well over six feet, and I was worried about his anger; he really had a lot of hatred toward Walker and I was afraid he might hurt him.”

  Aunt Lodi’s tears slowed down until they came like a casual drip from a faucet.

  “The first Rottweiler had been replaced by another vicious-looking dog that barked endlessly until Ermaline opened the trailer door and told it to shut up. She then turned to us saying how happy she was to see us and called to Walker, ‘the prodigals have returned home.’ I never thought of that place as ‘home.’

  “I barely made it through the door when the stench from Walker’s too many drinks hit me hard. He grabbed me and said how much he missed me, and before I could step away from his grasp, Jim went ballistic. He pushed Walker so hard that Walker flew into the small stove where some food was cooking. Walker’s sleeve ignited and as Ermaline struggled to push him down and put the fire out, a towel in the kitchen also went up in flames. Before we knew it, part of the kitchen had been surrounded by fire. I was frozen for a minute, but Jim pulled me into their back bedroom and started searching for our stuff. He yelled for me to help him but all I could think was these two were about to get burned up, and even though they had done wrong, they should be saved. But I couldn’t move into action. Jim grabbed a small metal box and rushed me out the rear door. By that time, the kitchen and living room were now ablaze, and while maybe we could have pulled them out, we didn’t. I don’t remember hearing them scream; in fact, I barely remember hearing anything but that dog barking like he was the one burning. Jim and I looked on as the heat and brimstone and everything that I envisioned hell to look like overtook the place, wiping out all physical reminders of Ermaline and Walker. When we finally got into the car, I looked at Jim and said, ‘I think our nightmare is over’ and started to cry. Actually, we both cried and hung onto each other in the front seat, with the blaze casting sparks of light until Jim said we needed to get away before the place blew.”

  Aunt Lodi gave Jessica a small smile as she leaned her head against the headrest.

  “Mr. Olson broke the news, and me and Jim played shocked and saddened, asking if anyone knew what happened. After a while it was ruled an accident, knowing that Walker’s blood alcohol was so high he could have ignited the fire with one blow of his breath. That metal box contained our birth certificates, a few old pictures from the farm, and the sales receipt for our horses. We burned the other contents, their personal stuff, and set off to get our horses back. Unfortunately, the farmer who originally purchased them had passed away, and they were sold at auction. We could have gone to the auction house to get that information. Jim was ready for us to take a road trip and chase them down, but I thought it would be in Jim’s best interest to go into the Army. I was afraid that what happened to Ermaline and Walker would prove to be a memory that would be hard to shake without Johnny Walker. Jim disagreed, but in the end, like always, he did what I asked him to do. I told him I would find them and we would go together and reclaim them, money in hand. So Jim left for boot camp and I, the one who was afraid of Jim falling into the trap of Johnny Walker, fell into a different trap—the ’60s.

  “I had spent from age eleven until twenty-two taking care of and raising not only myself but also Jim. I never realized that without that anchor, I was like a stormy sea. Plus the memories, all those terrible memories, had no place to go because I kept them sunk real low. But trust me, secrets make you sick.”

  Jessica could not help but say, “I know.”

  Aunt Lodi turned toward Jessica. “I know you do. But the secrets I’m talking about are the kind that you will do whatever it takes to forget. And that’s what I tried to do. I was everywhere and nowhere for a while, finally ending up in San Francisco during the Summer of Love. I sent Jim letters, staying places long enough to get a response back, but nothing came. I thought he was dead and believed I didn’t have much to live for either.”

  For the first time since Jessica and Aunt Lodi became engaged in the story, Aunt Lodi chuckled. “He tracked me down in a friend’s rented room on Haight Street. I thought I got a hold of some bad stuff and kept saying ‘No, you’re not Jim. You’re the devil.’”

  Jessica had visions of hippies strewn through the streets of Haight-Ashbury while her father, in fatigues, stormed the place, making the hippies walk around him as he strode down the sidewalk on a mission to save his sister.

  “He brought me to Chicago where he set up residence and introduced me to his girlfriend, Katherine. Oh, I wish you could have seen your mother’s face when she set eyes on me. I wore flowers in my hair because I was addicted to that song and felt like flowers were some magical beings that could transform the hate I had for myself into something sweeter, at least to those looking at me from the outside. After smoking too much hash in the apartment and cooking with it, your mother had a fit when she realized she ate one of my ‘special’ brownies. Jim then pushed me into rehab. But I wasn’t an addict; I was suppressing memories of abuse and needed someone to talk to. So that’s what rehab did for me—allowed me a safe place to confront the past without falling into a state of self-induced amnesia.

  “I came out of rehab and quickly realized a big city like Chicago made my skin crawl—too many people on top of each other. I could not stand to be in close proximity to anyone but Jim. So, with his blessing, I returned to the UP and set up my life where I live right now. Jim helped me buy the property—he gave me a place to call home.”

  Jessica sat motionless while the picture of her father saving Aunt Lodi settled into her head.

  “War was not good for your father but at the same time it was. He had all the makings of a killing machine from living here, but I figured better to kill for y
our country rather than incur a death sentence in Michigan. Sometimes I regretted pushing him into the Army, but that was the best solution I had to offer at the time.”

  They sat in silence for a while until Aunt Lodi spoke again. “I think he saved Paul because he saw himself in him, knowing that without me or Mr. Olson, he would have been on that track too.”

  Jessica nodded in agreement, and while her head was still absorbing all that was shared, she felt angry for not knowing this information when her father was alive.

  “Why didn’t he want me to know all this?” Jessica finally asked.

  Aunt Lodi looked past her and toward the charred remains. “He didn’t want to remember it. He surely didn’t want you exposed to it.”

  “But it would have explained a lot about why he did certain things. I would have understood him better.”

  “Those were his wishes; this is his story.”

  “And yours.”

  “Yes. We are braided by experience—survival really.”

  The sun was fading over the edge of the tree line to the west as a sharp breeze started shaking the vegetation.

  “How did you get the horses back?”

  “Once I settled up here, Jim came in the winter to help me with some stuff. We started talking about the horses and decided to find them. It took us a week, but we located them on a farm, about twenty minutes from my home. After all those years, I knew they remembered us because Buttercup nuzzled her nose in the nape of my neck like she did when we were together long ago. The owner—her name was Ingrid—said she never saw her do that before. Ingrid’s the one who took the picture of us on that sunny winter day. I made it a point to go there once a week to ride Buttercup, and Ingrid was great about it. The horses passed away when you were a little girl. I don’t think you remember, but we took you to Ingrid’s and you fed them carrot sticks. Your dad lifted you up so you could reach your small hands up to meet their mouths. It was so heartwarming.”

  Jessica smiled at the thought of her father holding her in a loving embrace while she met the horse that helped save her father and aunt from such distress.