by Jack July
November 22nd, 6:00 a.m.
Larry Ellison awoke at the same time everyday, six a.m. He brushed his teeth, combed his hair and put on his clean underwear, socks, red shirt with the white circle in the middle that read, “Thing 1”, pants then shoes. In that order, the same exact way, every day. His breakfast consisted of a glass of Ovaltine, seven Ritz crackers with peanut butter spread perfectly to the edge, six banana slices and a strawberry in the center of the plate. He sat, had his breakfast, put his dishes in the sink, pulled his jacket off the hook, sat in the chair by the front door and draped his jacket over his lap until it was time to leave.
Larry’s twin sister Virginia staggered down the stairs hungover. At twenty-six years of age she looked forty. She had been the victim of a tough life. However, even when it turned around, she could not break old habits and deal with the pain. She got to the bottom of the stairs and said “Thing One,” then raised her hand to high five her brother. He responded with “Thing Two,” and returned the high five without looking her in the face.
Virginia stumbled, naked, to the refrigerator, grabbed some juice and drank it from the bottle. She swallowed four aspirin to deal with her headache then slammed another double shot of Grey Goose Vodka. She didn’t mind him seeing her naked, he never really responded. Once in awhile he would have an erection and she would masturbate him to orgasm. Then he would be his normal self for another three weeks or so. She tried to pay hookers to do it, but he wouldn’t let them touch him. Is that the way all caretakers dealt with men who had his form of autism? She didn’t know, but that’s what worked for her. She loved her brother very much. She gave up a “normal” life for him and even though he was not capable of outwardly showing it, he loved her too.
She showered and brushed out her hair. That was her greatest physical asset, her long, full, fire-red hair. Alabaster skin, light freckles over her nose, light hazel eyes—not a bad looking woman—she could have been beautiful if she cared enough or had the ability to change her lifestyle. She grabbed the same long sleeve red T-shirt with the white circle in the middle that said, “Thing Two,” out of the dresser and tugged the shirt over her big, augmented breasts. Wiggling on the bed, trying to put on a pair of jeans that were too small, she started cussing and swearing, then stepped into a pair of slutty red heals to complete her outfit. She would apply the heavy, whore make-up in the car. Stan, the mail boy, would be there today, he would do anything she asked in one of the janitor’s closets of CIA headquarters. Then came the knock at the door; their ride had arrived.
The Story of Thing One and Thing Two
Kent Ellison cheered when he found out his wife was having twins, one boy and one girl. Twins ran in his wife Karen’s family and it was something they had discussed. If that were to happen, they would have no more children. Kent promised to get a vasectomy, so the birth control drugs that played havoc with his wife’s system would no longer be a problem. Two days after they were born, he kept his word.
Virginia and Lawrence Ellison came into the world in Baltimore, Maryland on Super Bowl Sunday, 1984. Karen, born in Oakland California, had one eye on her doctor and another on the television as she screamed in pain while cheering her beloved Raiders. The game turned out in her favor, as well as the births. The children were perfect, both beautiful, and both red heads, like their Dad. They would be an active sporting family. The boy would play football like their father, the girl would be a gymnast and cheerleader like their mother. That was the plan, that was the hope, that was the fantasy. And then reality punched them in the face.
The Ellisons were fortunate to catch it early because they had twins and could compare their development. The first signs came around one year of age. Virginia was babbling and pointing with definite facial expressions while Larry did none of these things. By age two, Virginia began to string words together. Larry didn’t speak, but it was more than that. He would not make eye contact, he would not be affectionate, and he would not play with others. He would sit in his crib and line up his toys, over and over again. Kent had a picture of himself holding a football and smiling when he was two. Larry wouldn’t take anything from him, wouldn’t play with him at all. Kent was growing frustrated.
By age six, Larry had thrown the house into chaos. He wouldn’t be potty trained, he screamed and yelled for hours at a time with no way to console him. If a parent tried to hug or comfort him he would fight and become aggressive. His father had all but abandoned him, leaving Karen to try to deal with him. She became a prisoner in the home and would resent Kent when he went with out with his friends. Fights between them were epic, pointing fingers at each other for Larry’s problems. Virginia worked quietly with Larry inside the storm. The only time peace would enter the home was when Virginia read to him. He would sit calmly and listen although not react. She also discovered his reaction to touch. His skin seemed very sensitive, so she brought in soft things that made him content. Her connection to him was unbreakable.
One evening after drinking Kent came home and confronted an eight-year-old Larry. Kent had been at a bar watching a friend celebrate his child’s success in pee wee football. He grabbed Larry and screamed at him, “LOOK AT ME, GOD DAMMIT LOOK AT ME!!” He couldn’t stop, he twisted and held Larry’s face trying to get a glimpse of his eyes, an acknowledgement of his presence. “WHAT’S WRONG WITH A FOOTBALL?” Kent kept poking him with it and kept screaming at Larry. Larry’s screams crescendo into blood curdling wails, “SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT UP,” Kent screamed over and over again until he finally threw Larry onto the bed. The boy bounced off, slammed into the wall and fell on the floor. A cut on his head began to bleed. Karen tried to stop him, and Virginia ran in and threw her body on top of her brother screaming “STOP, STOP, PLEASE STOP!” Kent froze. He looked around the room and began to cry. He went into the kitchen, grabbed his wallet and car keys, walked out the door and never returned.
The shock of Kent’s abandonment began to wane after six months. A year later, Kent filed for divorce by mail, giving Karen everything in exchange for his freedom. They had a decent savings and 401ks so she took the deal. Larry had some dedicated and some not-so-dedicated special ed teachers. He was eventually potty trained and began to speak singular words to ask for things. Virginia knew more about him that any of them but didn’t have the tools to move him forward. One thing Virginia always believed was that Larry wasn’t stupid. She could see the information going in, but Larry couldn’t get it out.
Karen stopped coming home right away in the evenings and left the kids as latch key children. This made it impossible for Virginia to have any kind of a life with friends, which continued into her young teen years. Karen would date men and they would fall into the early stages of love. They would meet Larry and run away. When the kids were 15, Karen met the man of her dreams. But once again, a meeting with Larry during a meltdown turned him away. Karen was destroyed emotionally and finally stopped caring about what happened to her children. Karen told her new love that she would send the kids to live with their father. Truth was, she didn’t know where he lived. Also, Karen said she wanted to move out west, and her new beau agreed. One day Virginia and Larry came home to a mostly empty townhouse. There was a note on the kitchen table along with three $100 dollar bills. The note said, “I’m sorry, I had to go, Mom.”
Virginia sat at the kitchen table watching Larry eat. She felt no pain or anger. No tears flowed. There was just a pathological need to protect him. She knew that eventually they would lose their home, and the Government might come to split them up. She had to prepare for that. She found a cheap motel, $10 a night that she thought they could move into. Larry could go to school and eat two meals a day but she still needed to make money. Her father had once joked about how the beggars in the train station probably made more money than he did. Maybe she would try that.
After a few months they came home from school and found a pad lock on the door along with a Sherriff’s sticker. She went to th
e back door, smashed the window with a rock, crawled through, opened it from the inside and pulled Larry in. She packed their clothes, went to the city bus stop and headed to downtown Baltimore. In the day time the area wasn’t too bad, although the people in the hotel seemed scummy. She watched them carefully and always played tough. The room was small and dank; they would share the bed, which was nasty. Fortunately, she thought to pull sheets from her and Larry’s beds. Virginia forged her mothers name and wrote a note to her school that she had moved. She dropped off the note, left Larry at his school, and headed for the train station.
It was easy to get a little money, although the professional beggars staked their territory and threatened her if she got too close. Her first day she collected fifty-five dollars, which was enough to feed them and put a couple more days on their rent. Eating out was expensive, so she sometimes went without meals to make sure Larry got the few things he would eat. She balanced well for a few months until Larry needed clothes and a few fees requested from the school. She would have to be more aggressive with her panhandling.
Sometimes men would grab at her and make lewd comments, but she backed away or threatened to get the cops. One day, with the money and food running out, a man invited her to the men’s room for twenty-five dollars. She wasn’t sure why, but she was about to find out. He sat her down on the toilet, unzipped his pants and stuck his penis by her mouth. She reached out to touch it, but he said, “No, open your mouth.” She panicked. He tried to hold her but she dropped to the floor, screamed, crawled under the stall then ran from the men’s room and got lost in the crowd.
Virginia sat in the restaurant watching her brother eat his chicken strips and fries. She had just enough money to pay for his meal and tomorrow’s bus fare. She thought about what had happened earlier in the day, how bad could it be? Many different men approached her and at $25 each she could make a couple hundred dollars a day. She didn’t have the street sense to know the rules, so she learned them the hard way.
The more she did it, the easier it became. Then her “regulars” wanted more. One decided to take more, and he did. She said no, so he hit her until she stopped resisting. He threw the money on her sobbing body in the stall. That’s how she lost her virginity. Fortunately she wasn’t bruised too badly, and when she got herself together, she continued to work. Every day Virginia grew a little tougher and a little smarter. She was robbed, so she had to learn to hide her money. She was raped more than once, so she finally decided to offer that for sale as well. After a few more months she made enough to start saving. She would need it.
Suddenly sores appeared on her lips, painful sores. She went to the free clinic and found out she had herpes. No customers would even look at her. It took a few weeks to heal so she went to the parks and museums, walked around busying herself, shopping for cheap clothes in thrift stores for herself and her brother. She saw for-hire posters in a few restaurants and retail places, but she needed ID and a phone. She would have to wait until she was eighteen. If, she laughed to herself, she lived that long.
She would watch her brother, and he seemed solid. He was on a good schedule, he ate well and she washed clothes on Sundays so he was clean and bathed. He was okay, he was with her, and that was all that mattered.
A few more months passed. Virginia had lasted a little over a year when the bottom fell out. The program for Larry’s school had been cut, so she had nowhere to take him. They sat together on a bench in the train station, so Virginia had to put earplugs in his ears so the noise wouldn’t drive him to an episode. The money was running low, her vagina burned from an infection, the blisters began to come up on her lips again, and her ribs were bruised and possibly cracked from falling down on the edge of the toilet bowl during sex with a violent customer. She was running out of options other than going to social services and turning him over to the state. She figured she could make it on her own. But what would they do to Larry? She knew. They would drug him until he was a zombie. He was in there, she knew he was, he just couldn’t get out. She needed a hug and Larry didn’t do that.
Virginia never went to church. Her parents were more the “new age” religion types. She thought it was crap because any religion worth a shit wouldn’t let you abandon your kids. While sitting on the bench in the train station, she said her own prayer. “Hey asshole in the sky, it’s me, Virginia. I’m fucked, I got nothing left, how about a little help, Amen.” She got up and left. She didn’t return to the train station for a couple of days. Her sores didn’t blow up yet and Friday she had good regulars.
She made sure Larry was sitting in the stall next to her so she could see his feet while she did her business. By the end of the day she had made a hundred and fifty dollars but she knew that wouldn’t be enough. Then suddenly, that prayer she had vulgarly tossed up to heaven sat down next to her. “I haven’t seen you for a few days,” said the old widowed teacher, Lola Grayson.
Virginia looked around and said, “You talkin’ to me?”
“Yes,” replied Lola.
Virginia reached down for Larry’s hand and said, “Let’s go.”
“Wait, please, just give me a minute,” said Lola softly.
Virginia looked at her suspiciously, sat back down and said, “Okay, what?”
“I know him, let me tell you about him,” said Lola with a friendly, understanding smile.
“Lady, you don’t know anything,” said Virginia with an angry sneer.
Then Lola began, she told Virginia all about her brother, all his quirks and behaviors, everything Virginia thought no one else could ever know. Virginia sat a little stunned, gathered her composure and said, “What do you want?”
Lola looked at the floor then looked up and said, “It’s not about what I want, it’s about what Jesus wants. You are one of his children and he has sent me to help you. He took me by the hand and showed me a love like no love I have ever seen. He showed me a sister with a love for her brother that was so deep she would sacrifice her soul to protect him. I am here to take you home with me, to give you both a chance at survival. You will die here, and I can’t allow it.”
Virginia didn’t believe her because she didn’t trust anyone. “No, you will call the cops and they will take him away. I can’t have that.”
“That’s why you need to come with me. I know he would suffer without you. I won’t allow that either,” said Lola.
Virginia gave it some thought and came to the conclusion that she didn’t have a lot of choice, so she agreed. Lola Grayson kept her word. Her house wasn’t big, but it was big enough. It was warm, comfortable and most importantly, safe. Larry didn’t adjust at first and it took several meltdowns and screaming episodes before they could get him to a place where he was comfortable. But eventually it happened. Lola petitioned the courts for guardianship, and with absentee parents she it was successful. Lola did insist they go to school, so they went to the one where Lola taught: a private, and rather expensive, school. With Lola as their guardian, the price was less expensive and the SSI that came with the children paid for it. Larry began to thrive, but Virginia, still hard from the streets and damaged by her parent’s abandonment, was more difficult to control.
Virginia’s first day of school fell under the “it’s a small world” category. She sat down in her second period history class when she saw a familiar face. Mr. Carpenter stood up in front of the class and said, “We have a new student, I would like you to meet Virginia Ellison.”
Virginia stood and Mr. Carpenter froze. Mr. Carpenter was a former train station client. He began to shake and perspire. He completed the class and when the bell rang, everyone was dismissed. All the students walked out except for Virginia who just sat and looked at him. When the last student walked out and the door shut, Virginia stood up and slowly walked to the front of the class, bent over a little and placed her palms on the desk, smiled and said, “Well, well, well…if it isn’t Alexander the mother fucking Great
. That’s what you made me call you before you held my head and fucked me in the mouth, ain’t that right…Al.”
He had no idea what to say, he spit and sputtered until he choked out a, “I’m sorry, I’m really sorry.”
“For what? Why are you sorry Al? If it weren’t for you, I may not have been able to feed myself. It was a, well, a business relationship.”
She just stared at him while he tried to gather himself, then she said “Your wife works here doesn’t she?”
His eyes locked on her, his face contorted in a look of horror.
“She’s a big one. How much does that woman eat?” Then she laughed an evil little laugh. “What happened Al, she stop taking care of you? You know, when I was sucking some guy’s dick at the station he told me a joke. It went something like, ‘What do you feed women to stop them from sucking dick?’ What do ya think it is Al, tell me, what?”
Mr. Carpenter wouldn’t speak.
“Okay Al, you ready for this? Wedding Cake! Ain’t that hilarious!? I bet your wife would laugh at that.”
“Oh god please no, I have a family, I have kids,” he pleaded.
“What do you think I am? Oh, hell no Al. I’ll make you a deal, I say nothing and you say nothing, how’s that?”
“Seriously? Are you serious?” Mr. Carpenter nearly pleaded.
“Oh sure, we all have a past. And besides, I may need a favor someday and you can never have too many friends. So, what do you think? Are we friends?” said Virginia with an evil little grin.
“Yes, yes, thank you so much,” said Mr. Carpenter, feeling relieved.
Virginia nodded, turned and walked to the door, at the door she turned around and said, “By the way, is your class difficult?”
“Not for you,” said Mr. Carpenter.
Virginia didn’t make many friends; she was far from a teenager and had little interest in the teenage scene. What she had was a very large sexual appetite. If a boy asked her out, she was on him like a wolf. A few of her teachers also enjoyed her company. She was extremely seductive and knew exactly what men liked. Trust was a concept she didn’t understand and love was only given to Larry. There was no man in her life because every man she had ever known had abandoned, used or abused her. However, she was not malevolent. She had no need to see others harmed or hurt. She did put herself and Larry first, above all else.