When Rhonda’s mind returned, she found herself upstairs, sitting in a bathtub of warm water. She was bleeding, and her head ached. Her eyes stung, and her face felt hot and flushed. Her legs and feet, her hands and fingers, were sore and tender. Her mind was numb. Her heart was cold. How did she get upstairs? Had she really tried to call Nett? Did Ray actually kick her out of his room when she tried to tell him what happened? Her torn blouse was in the bathroom sink and smelled of vomit and vinegar. She vaguely remembered crawling under the kitchen table, then throwing up and having to clean the kitchen floor. She must have let Baby in the house, because the cat now sat beside the tub, peering up at her.
She was still bleeding when she put on fresh clothes and sat on the edge of the bed, holding the cat. Rhonda was in a state of shock and oblivious to the hot tears that fell from the outside corners of her eyes as she sat and stared and waited for Aunt Nadine to come home.
If people don’t ask you how you feel, what you think, what you want, or what you know, there is no way they can know who you are. When people don’t know who you are, they mistakenly believe they can do anything they want to you. And they will do it, if they don’t know. When that happens, it is up to you to take a stand for yourself. It is up to you to let them know what you need. It is up to you to tell them what you think. It is up to you to let them know that you don’t know what they think you know. At all times, under all circumstances, every individual must shoulder full responsibility for telling other people exactly how they feel, what they need, what they know, and who they are. If, however, you are an eleven-year-old child, chances are you haven’t learned how to do that yet. If you haven’t, and the people around you don’t realize it, you are in grave danger of being misunderstood. Rhonda was learning the dangers of being misunderstood.
Rhonda had no idea how much time had passed when the front door opened and Aunt Nadine strolled into the house and announced that she had won $250. Still clutching Baby to her chest, Rhonda somehow found the words to tell Aunt Nadine exactly what had happened. Aunt Nadine stared at her in disbelief for a very long time. Then she turned on her heel and headed for the basement. Rhonda, with Baby, moved into the kitchen and sat down until Aunt Nadine called her. She put Baby down and descended the stairs slowly, painfully.
“Tell him what you told me,” Aunt Nadine demanded. Uncle Leroy was sitting precariously on one of the bar stools, trying to maintain some semblance of sobriety, but he looked guilty as hell under Aunt Nadine’s angry stare. A greasy piece of pork clung to the front of his shirt. Rhonda looked from Aunt Nadine to the empty liquor bottles on the bar. She couldn’t bring herself to look at him looking at her. She stared at the floor between his shoeless feet, then at her own shoes before finding the courage to repeat the accusation.
“That’s a bold-faced lie!” Uncle Leroy jumped to his feet and pointed an intimidating finger in Rhonda’s direction. “I didn’t hurt her,” he slurred. “I didn’t even penetrate her.” Aunt Nadine never took her eyes off Uncle Leroy. She listened to Rhonda’s tearful declaration that she didn’t know what “penetrate” meant, but that, yes, he had definitely hurt her. Aunt Nadine’s stony glare reflected her anger and disgust. She didn’t say a word, and shards of silence hung in the space between her and Uncle Leroy. Rhonda waited for the blow that was surely about to be dealt. The piece of pig’s foot left an oily stain as it slid down Uncle Leroy’s shirt and fell quietly to the floor.
“Go to your room, Rhonda,” Aunt Nadine said without altering her gaze. “You go on and go to bed now.” Aunt Nadine’s voice was cold as ice.
Rhonda lay on her bed and listened to the silence that shouldn’t have been there. Yet there was a silence and stillness throughout the house. There was silence where there should have been yelling. There was silence where there should have been the sound of the front door slamming shut. There was silence where the sound of Uncle Leroy’s Lincoln driving off forever should have been. There was silence where there should have been comforting words and healing hands. There was silence where there should have been an apology and a promise. And there was silence where there should have been an acknowledgment of the wrong and a declaration of the truth.
Silence teaches you many things. It teaches you how to listen and how to hear. It teaches you how to feel and how to translate into words what you are feeling. When you can’t translate what you are feeling, silence allows you to go deeper into yourself and find the peace that surpasses understanding. A peace that enables you to move forward, even when you don’t understand. Most of the time, silence is a good thing. But there are those times and circumstances when silence will kill you. A killing silence can destroy your identity and your spirit. It can kill your heart and your soul. When silence is used as a means of avoiding something you know you must deal with, it will murder your sense of worth. When you use silence to hide the truth, to avoid the truth, or to color the truth, it is the same as saying that the truth doesn’t matter. It demonstrates your belief that people who tell the truth don’t matter.
But they do.
CHAPTER SEVEN
What’s the Lesson When You’ve Been Taught That You Are Unlovable?
Conflict is simply a result of something getting in the way of the forward flow of life. This happens when you see yourself as being incomplete in some way, and so you are trying to add something to help you feel more complete. Those who are always using others to satisfy their needs or purpose are always filled with conflict.
Tom Johnson, in You Are Always Your Own Experience
SOMETIMES YOU NEED SOMETHING to bring you back to reality. Like a bucket of ice-cold water dumped on your head. I heard pounding on the bathroom door. It was the dog, again. I was convinced that she was crazy. I needed to get rid of her and get myself an honest, God-fearing mutt. Now she was banging on the door. If I had to get out of the tub, I was going to kill that dog! Okay, she’s dead! Dripping wet, I yanked the door open to find my very expensive, very dumb dog eating my brand-new red suede shoes. I hadn’t even taken the paper out of them yet. She had. There were tiny pieces of white tissue paper strewn all over the bedroom floor. China, the dog, was lying at the entrance of the bathroom with the tip of my shoe in her mouth and her hind legs inside the shoe. I knew that if I reached down, I was going to strangle this dog. If I wasn’t such a shoe diva, I might have thought she looked cute. But I was, and right now she didn’t look cute, she looked like dead meat!
Just as I bent down and extended my arms in her direction, my husband appeared. “Oh, oh, China! You’re gonna get yourself in trouble.” He didn’t even seem to notice that I was buck naked and dripping wet.
“I thought you were working or bathing or something,” he said.
“I was remembering,” I said. He took the shoe from the dog.
“You go on and finish up. I’ll put her away.” He always knows just what to say. God! He is such a blessing.
Heading back to the bathtub, I noticed that the lump in my throat was gone. I was beginning to feel better. My boundaries were getting clearer. But I still had a ways to go, and the water was still warm.
Beanie was devastated when her mother died. Aunt Nadine had been in and out of the hospital for over a year before she passed on, and Rhonda had become used to her absence. She felt little compassion for Beanie and no grief whatsoever. She watched the aunts and uncles and cousins cry their eyes out at the funeral; then watched as they returned to Aunt Nadine’s immaculate house, got drunk, and started fighting as though it were just another Saturday night.
Rhonda retreated to her room with Baby, the cat. Suddenly, she saw Grandma and Daddy standing in front of her. Only they weren’t really there. The platters of food and the big black car weren’t really there either. Rhonda sat very still as her heart raced and she held her breath, praying for the images to disappear. Then the lady in the white dress appeared. Her eyes were closed as she stepped out of a large casket and stood before Rhonda. She was the lady from Rhonda’s dreams, but Rhonda wa
s awake. Rhonda screamed when the lady’s eyes opened wide just before her image vanished and the real Grandma rushed into the room.
Nett came in right behind Grandma and tried to calm Rhonda down. Before Grandma could say something cruel and nasty, Nett sent Rhonda up to Ray’s room, where all the boy cousins and Ray’s friends from school were hanging out. Nett thought she was sparing Rhonda, but Ray sensed Rhonda’s vulnerability and took advantage of the opportunity to exercise some Grandma-like cruelty himself.
“Hey, Ronnie. Guess what?” Ray said loud enough for all the boys in the room to hear. Rhonda had laid her head down on the pillow on Ray’s bed and was trying to be as inconspicuous as possible when suddenly all eyes were on her.
“You know Junior, here?” Ray nodded his head toward Uncle Lowell and Aunt Dora’s twelve-year-old son who sat on the floor between two of Ray’s football buddies. “Hey, Cousin Junior,” Rhonda said weakly, not knowing where Ray was going with this. Junior knew exactly what Ray was about to do and averted his eyes without answering Rhonda’s greeting.
“It ain’t Cousin Junior, stupid. Junior is our younger brother.”
Why Ray felt the need in that moment to disclose this information, Rhonda did not understand, nor question. She had too many other things to think about. With Aunt Nadine dead, it could be that she and Ray would have to move again. Where would they go now? Who would not want to be bothered with them this time? And now her brother, who seldom had anything to say to her, was announcing in front of everyone that their cousin was actually their brother. It was information that Rhonda neither needed nor wanted, but that didn’t stop Ray. He went on to explain that when Junior was born he was so messed up that their mother, Sarah, gave him away because she couldn’t take care of him and their daddy wouldn’t take care of him. Junior had been only two months old when Sarah died. “Why,” Ray said angrily, “didn’t he just give all of us away? At least that way we could have all been together!”
Before Ray could say another word, Rhonda sat straight up in the bed and told him, “He did give all of us away!” Rhonda looked over at Junior and realized that they were spitting images of one another. She bolted from the room, stepping on the cutest boy in the bunch on her way out. She found a relatively quiet corner in the kitchen amidst the drunken relatives, and sat down near the door leading to the backyard, humming to herself. “What a friend we have in Jesus. All our sins and grief to bear …” Rhonda really needed a friend.
Something magical happened to Rhonda when she danced. She forgot to remember that she was overweight. She forgot to remember that rainy Saturday night. She didn’t think about her daddy and she didn’t think about Grandma. When Rhonda was dancing, she was free. She was beautiful. And she was at peace. Rhonda had started dancing after Aunt Nadine died. Sometimes she went to dance practice with Beanie; sometimes she went to the after-school center. When she couldn’t think or feel, dancing made it all better. Dancing had helped her body to develop, and, finally, she could fill a bra cup. Her bottom, which had been just round, was now shapely, and her stomach was flat as a board. The boys in school started calling her “foxy,” instead of “wiggy.” Dancing kept her alive.
Nett called more frequently now, and Rhonda’s dancing gave them something positive to talk about. One Saturday, as they sat at a table in Nett’s favorite diner, she asked Rhonda, “Am I your friend?” Rhonda felt pangs of guilt. Nett had always been good to her, but after the stories she’d heard at Aunt Nadine’s drunken parties, she wasn’t sure if she could still trust Nett. She didn’t have the nerve to tell Nett about her misgivings, so she looked up from her almost empty plate and answered, “Yes.”
“Do you trust me? I would understand if you didn’t. I know it has been hard for you to understand why I left you at Aunt Nadine’s for so long, so that’s why I would understand if you didn’t trust me anymore.” Nett’s question and the aftertaste of the greasy french fries gave way to a sour taste in Rhonda’s mouth. Somehow she knew where Nett was headed, and it was making her sick to her stomach. Rhonda simply said she understood; she didn’t like it, but she did understand.
“Since we are friends, and since you do trust me, will you tell me the truth if I ask you something?” Rhonda was beginning to squirm. Then she thought, “Maybe she’s going to ask me about stealing money.” That wasn’t the question, but what Nett asked was directly related. “Has your uncle ever touched you? Has he ever put his hands under your clothes or anything like that?” Rhonda stared at her across the table. She knew she’d throw up if she opened her mouth.
“I’ve seen the way he looks at you, and I don’t like it.” All of a sudden, Rhonda was burning hot. Then she began to shiver as if the temperature in the diner had suddenly dropped to subzero. Bloody underwear flashed in her mind, and she could smell the stench of stale liquor. It started as a murmur, but by the time it spilled out of her mouth, Rhonda was screaming, “Stop it! Stop it!” When she realized she was talking to her friend in a public place, she changed the statement, but not the volume. “Don’t ask me that! Don’t ever ask me that!”
People at nearby tables were staring. Nett must have realized what was about to happen, but she couldn’t get out of her seat and around the table fast enough. Rhonda was now wailing so loudly that one of the waitresses came over and asked if everything was all right. Oh sure, Rhonda thought, people always have breakdowns in diners. Nett waved the woman away as she tried to slide off the diner bench, pulling Rhonda along with her.
Rhonda was trembling and wailing. Nett tried to help her stand, then walk. They made it through the diner and through the maze of people trying not to stare. Nett guided Rhonda into the ladies’ room, where Rhonda fell to her hands and knees and crawled to the nearest corner. By then, Nett was crying too. She walked over to where Rhonda was cowering and sat down next to her. They sat crying and rocking for a long while. A few ladies who entered offered them tissues. Others just stared. Nett didn’t say a word all the way home, or the next day when she arrived to help Rhonda load her belongings into the back of a taxicab. It took Ray about two weeks before he decided to join them.
With school, homework, three dance classes a week, drill team practice, and household chores, it was a wonder Rhonda had any free time at all. Let alone time to get pregnant.
She and Reggie talked about sex for a long time. Eventually the talking gave way to the doing. They started going to “hooky” parties with other kids from the community band they both played with. They’d skip school and spend the day partying. When Ray would become suspicious because he hadn’t seen her in school, Rhonda would skip the hooky parties and attend classes for at least the next few days. It was purely accidental that Rhonda discovered that on days she was at school, Reggie was spending his time at the hooky parties locked in a room with a girl named Beverly. Reggie admitted that he and Beverly had been “together.” Rhonda was crushed. Her silence around the house alerted Nett, and it wasn’t long before Rhonda told Nett everything. It precipitated their first “womanhood” talk. Unfortunately, the talk came too late.
There are things that young girls with budding breasts and plump round bottoms need to know about becoming a woman. Unfortunately, at the time they need to know these things, their circumstances may be transitional. Their families may be unsettled or dysfunctional. The women in their lives may be busy, ill, or absent. Or the women may be too uncomfortable to talk about the things that perhaps no one talked to them about. Young girls still need to know, and they have questions that need to be answered. All young girls need training, womanhood training, in the sacred art and science of becoming a woman. This training includes having information and examples that will enable the young girl to take care of herself and her “womanness” as it grows within her and through her.
At the time Rhonda needed to be taught about being a woman, her circumstances were very transitional. Aunt Nadine was in and out of the hospital, Beanie was always distraught, and Nett was an infrequent visitor. No one had told Rhond
a about menstruation, first love, or sex. None of the women in her life ever mentioned or exemplified self-nurturing, self-respect, or self-honor. Rhonda had no one to giggle with about the sacred, secret, innocent “girly things.” She saw no pictures or examples that would help her understand what would happen to her body, what to expect once it happened, or what to do about it when it happened. Most of what Rhonda learned came from the walls of the girls’ restroom at school and from what boys saw fit to say when they wanted to educate you fast. By the time someone noticed that Rhonda was becoming a woman, it was too late for training. Her innocence had been stolen, and she had received all the information she could handle “on the job.”
Teddy hung around with the other boys in front of Nett’s apartment building. He lived on the top floor with his mother, his brother, and his mother’s boyfriend. Nett had her eye on Teddy because she had noticed that Teddy had his eye on Rhonda.
“Stay away from that man! He’s not a boy, he’s a man, and I don’t like the way he looks at you.” Rhonda didn’t say a word. She had absolutely no intention of staying away from him. In fact, she’d been waiting for a time when she could speak to him when Nett wasn’t looking. She didn’t have to wait long.
When you need to be loved, you take love wherever you can find it. When you are desperate to be loved, feel love, know love, you seek out what you think love should look like. When you find love, or what you think love is, you will lie, kill, and steal to keep it. But learning about real love comes from within. It cannot be given. It cannot be taken away. It grows from your sense of self. It grows from your ability to re-create within yourself, and for yourself, the essence of loving experiences you have had in your life. When you have not had loving experiences, or when you do not have a sense of self, the true essence of love eludes you. Instead, you hold onto, reach out to, and find yourself embroiled in, your mistaken beliefs about yourself and love.
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