Finding Katie: The Diary of Anonymous, a Teenager in Foster Care

by Beatrice Sparks

  Finding Katie

  The Diary of Anonymous, a Teenager in Foster Care

  Edited by

  Beatrice Sparks, Ph.D.

  Katie was my most precious pupil.

  Katie was my most precious friend.

  Then Katie was lost.

  Contents

  Foreword

  Begin Reading

  Statistics

  Questions, Answers, and Crisis Lines

  Other Books Edited by Beatrice Sparks, Ph.D.

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Foreword

  Each year, hundreds of children are taken from their homes because of abuse and put into foster homes, some of which are not much better than their old homes.

  Other kids are sent back to their abusive homes even when they cry out for help.

  Most molestations are sexual and are never talked about. Studies suggest that only about one percent of boys who are sexually abused ever report their problems. Many kids go through their lives thinking, “If I can’t trust my mother, father, teacher, or friend, who can I trust?”

  SUMMARY OF THE

  NATIONAL INCIDENCE STUDY

  OF CHILD ABUSE AND NEGLECT

  U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH

  AND HUMAN SERVICES

  In the past six years, the number of reports regarding abused and neglected children has continued to grow. Sexual abuse has nearly doubled, and emotional abuse and neglect were more than two and a-half times their normal levels. The trafficking of child pornography through the mail and via the Internet continues to increase. The total number of children seriously injured and endangered quadrupled during this time.

  Girls were sexually abused more often than boys.

  Boys had a greater risk of emotional neglect and serious injury than girls.

  Most of the kids feel unimportant and lost!

  “Where can I go for help?” is an inner cry that is floating around the world.

  Begin Reading

  Friday, January 2

  I heard Mama scream, and I jumped out of bed almost without waking up. As I tiptoed down the stairs, I could feel my heart beating so hard that it was almost like it was going to explode!

  By the time I got to the bottom step, Mama was barely whimpering, and I could hear Daddy still pounding on her. Scared to death, I slowly cracked open Mama’s bedroom door and peeked in. Mama was curled in a tight little ball, lying quietly on the floor. She looked like she was sleeping. A big wave of pain almost washed me away into nothingness. I wanted to dash in and help Mama, but I didn’t dare because I knew only too well…what Daddy might do then.

  Daddy gave Mama another hard smack and staggered in my direction. I scrambled down the last step, hid in a dark corner trying not to breathe, and stayed there until I heard him zooming down the driveway, smashing into our big metal security gate on the way out.

  Almost blinded by tears and fear, I crept beside Mama and patted her cheek, below her swollen eye. “It’s okay, Mama,” I whispered, “he’s gone.”

  Mama whispered for me to go back to bed. I wanted to ask her about lots of things but I almost knew she wouldn’t tell me.

  Back in my room, I put my pillow over my head and tried to smother out her crying. It wasn’t like any human sounds I’d ever heard before, more like animal sounds or scary movie evil wailings.

  Feeling freezing cold to the marrow of my bones, I wondered what Daddy would do when he came back. Eventually he always came back.

  Sometimes he was crying and repentant, bringing gifts and flowers and candy. But other times…

  I feel like I’m lost! Lost in my own home! Lost in my own body! But mostly lost in my own mind. Will the real, true me ever be found?

  When the blackness of night began turning into morning grayness, I heard Daddy’s car coast slowly up the driveway.

  Not knowing if he would be Dr. Jekyll or Mr. Hyde, I held my breath until…I guess I passed out or something….

  I felt like I had lain in my black, cold, never-never-land bed for forever.

  I was awakened by Daddy’s “nice” voice, calling me “lazy bones” and telling me that I’d miss my school bus if I didn’t scurry along.

  I couldn’t believe I’d fallen asleep, and more than that, I couldn’t believe what had happened. Had it really happened? Maybe it hadn’t!

  Daddy gave me a pat on the head, told me Mama was still asleep, and said I should get Cook to fix me some breakfast.

  All the way to school, I sat on the back seat of the van and wondered: Had it really happened? I was almost sure it had! Why wouldn’t Mama talk to me about Daddy and his changing personalities? Or was it me?

  It was probably me.

  When I got home from school, Mama was like a zombie. All the curtains were closed in her huge bedroom, and only one tiny lamp was turned on. It was almost totally dark even though the sun was shining outside. I felt shivers go up and down my back and wondered if we’d all gone insane!

  Time Stopped

  I’ve become more hopelessly scared and confused than I’ve ever been in my life! And the physical pain through my whole body is almost unbearable.

  Had I been dreaming? I begged Mama to tell me, but her eyes were glassy. I could hear my teeth chattering. Maybe Mama wasn’t Mama anymore. Maybe I wasn’t me!

  I was so full of questions that I was about to explode, but I knew that whatever had taken over my Mama’s body wouldn’t give me any answers. She…it…never did.

  For hours I must have sat stoically by Mama’s bed. My mind racing from blank to horrible, unthinkable possibilities. Cook came and knocked at Mama’s door, pleading for Mama to eat at least a little something. Mama told her to go away.

  Late today, Daddy came home with a new fur coat for Mama, a leather jacket for me, and a huge box of See’s candy. He acted as if last night had never happened.

  I went to my room.

  Eventually Mama dressed, and we sat down to dinner with candles burning and soft music playing in our huge dining room. It seats twenty-two people, and with just us sitting there it always feels empty. Daddy told us how much he loved us and what a happy family we were and how he would soon be starting the biggest and most sensational project in Hollywood. It sounded dazzling, but for some reason spooky.

  In the middle of dinner Daddy’s cell phone rang, and Mama and I both jumped up to turn off the music. He waved for us to go to the library.

  In the library, even with a fire in the fireplace, Mom and I sat silent and frozen while our dinners got cold and our hearts got colder.

  Eventually we heard Daddy walking down the hall toward us. He was laughing and joking on his cell phone about some business things, saying Mama couldn’t accompany him to wherever tonight because “she wasn’t feeling well.” Then he walked past us and out the front door without even a good-bye.

  I helped Mama to her room. She always tried to pretend she was a queen when she was around Daddy. I wanted to scream and jump up and down but I didn’t dare…Mama might…who knew?

  Thursday, January 8

  Mama and Daddy were going to a big Hollywood party. She looked more beautiful than I’d ever seen her look before. Her skin was almost pure white and her dress was like flowing, shimmering silver. Daddy had bought a huge silver-and-pearl choker and earrings for her, and it looked like the only thing she lacked was a crown.

  Mama had always been a little bit quiet, but now she looked ethereal, like she was too spiritual, or something, to belong on this earth.

  Daddy couldn’t get over how beautiful Mama looked, and he told her ove
r and over that she would be the most gorgeous, envied woman there, desired by every man who saw her. That made him smile in the proud, contented way that always scared me.

  Anyway, it was nice to see Daddy treating Mama like she was extra special instead of…Pictures in my mind of him punching her and kicking her wouldn’t allow themselves to be erased…. It didn’t happen often, and rarely did he hit her where the marks would show.

  I wish I could stop thinking about it.

  “Have a good time,” I whispered to Mama, as she walked toward the front door. She smiled but I could see that the lights inside her were still turned off! I wondered how she could always turn them on around Daddy when he wanted her to.

  In my bedroom, I prayed over and over, “Please God, please, please, please, don’t let Daddy get mad at Mama for anything tonight. She’s too fragile…too hurt…too…everything sad and bad.”

  I can’t understand why God doesn’t make Daddy stop hurting Mama. Why does he do that? I’d like to talk to one of the nuns at school about that and a bunch of other stuff, but nuns have never been married or anything, so how would they know?

  3:43 a.m.

  Daddy was laughing loudly as he opened the front door and he and Mama walked down the hall. He was telling her that every man at the party wanted to get their hands on her and…nasty stuff…I didn’t want to hear! I was glad their (his and her) bedrooms were downstairs, and I closed my door, crunched up tightly in my bed, and put two pillows over my head.

  Friday, January 9

  At breakfast Daddy told Mama that he had to go out of town for a couple of weeks and that she should never go anywhere without me while he was gone, even to her favorite shops in Beverly Hills. He gripped her shoulders tightly. “Understand?” he said in a voice we both very deeply understood.

  As he walked out the front door, he hugged and kissed Mama like she was the most important thing in his life, and he almost ignored me. She just stood there looking like a fake, beautiful mannequin. I felt like a blob of protoplasm.

  It’s a yucky day!

  I hate the cold! I hate the rain! I hate my Catholic school! I hate California! I hate Beverly Hills! I hate my teachers! I hate my friends! What friends? I hate life! I wish I was dead. Ummmmmm…maybe somehow I can reverse back to my old fairytale days where everyone “lived happily ever after.”

  Daddy doesn’t allow me to complain. It’s all right for him to do and say and act any way he pleases, but for Mama and me, we have to be exactly what he wants us to be.

  Saturday, January 10

  5:46 P.M.

  Daddy would have a fit if he knew I was going to skip ballet practice to go shopping—not because of spending money, but because I’m never supposed to skip anything he has decided I should do. He couldn’t care less how much I spend as long as Mama and I both look like phony models or something. He even had my thighs liposuctioned for my fifteenth birthday. Some birthday present, huh?

  Mama and I came home completely exhausted and with bags full of stuff we didn’t really want. I wish we could talk.

  10:37 P.M.

  I wonder why Mama and I can’t communicate. She was “Miss Teen” something or other when she was my age, but only she and Daddy talk about that, usually in low whispers. And he laughs a lot when they bring out the photos and films that she won for her state and when she was a Miss America runner-up. But they never ask me to join them.

  Most of my life I feel like I’m a chair or something that doesn’t have any real importance or meaning. That’s dumb because I have everything I want, or they want: piano lessons, singing lessons, dancing lessons, massages with my Mama, facials, and crap…crap…crap…. Still I feel like something important is missing in my life! It’s like I’m empty, completely empty, while I’m still trying to stuff insignificant nothingness inside me somewhere!

  Mama spends most of her time in bed, in her curtain-drawn room. Daddy doesn’t want her to go in the sun. He likes her soft, milky-looking skin. He’s always whispering how “it turns him on.” He, on the other hand, goes to his tanning parlor regularly and to his gym and club and stuff. I hate to even think this, but I’m usually glad that he’s rarely home. He always has business meetings or something and has a suite in a Beverly Hills Hotel where he stays half the time.

  Tuesday, January 13

  Today has been the most wonderful day of my life! Sister Mary took eight of us girls, who had won student awards, to the museum. Jennifer and I giggled at some of the paintings that looked like two-year-olds had done them. Then we told Sister Mary that we needed to go to the bathroom. She gave us her scary you’re-going-straight-to-hell look and told us to meet the group in the lunchroom in about five minutes. Like two happy little unleashed puppies, Jennifer and I bolted down the stairs.

  We passed the dinosaur room, and we were in awe. These things are really worth looking at! As we backed toward the wall so we could better see the whole width and depth of the monstrous creatures, we crunched into two guys about our age who were as fascinated as we were. Together we talked about living in that time. The four of us were alone in the room, and it was like we had known each other forever. For the longest time we didn’t even exchange names, but when we finally did, we also made up names. I was Olga, Jennifer was Luella, Mark was Aaa and David was Anagoge.

  When we finally looked at our watches, we knew Sister Mary would skin us alive. As we started to leave, David and Mark asked for our telephone numbers. Scared about what Daddy would do if a boy called me, I kiddingly asked Mark if he could talk like a girl. He said he could, and so did David. We all laughed then and Jennifer and I scrambled up the stairs as soon as we’d given them our phone numbers.

  We were shaking when we got into the lunch room, scared that Sister Mary might have called our parents. Thank goodness she hadn’t, though she did have an aide looking for us. Jennifer lied and told the group that we’d found a little girl, crying and lost, and we were so concerned about her that we forgot about our group until we had taken the child to her mother.

  Sister Mary said she was proud of us and told us to eat fast so we wouldn’t waste any more time. We did, and the rest of the day we giggled and quietly whispered about Mark and David and how Jennifer would have to do penitence for lying.

  It’s strange, but I feel like I’ve known Jennifer for forever, even though I’d barely said “hello” to her before.

  Jennifer’s parents are as over-protective as mine, and both of our hearts were beating in harmony as we wondered if either of the boys really would call.

  At our private Catholic girls’ school, boys were like unknown creatures and, as I thought about it, I was never without a chaperone. I was either on the school van or with Mrs. Jolettea, or Cook, or Mama, or some other adult. Actually, when I thought about it, I couldn’t ever remember being alone with any boy, even at birthday parties at Daddy’s friends’. I always had people watching over me.

  11:50 P.M.

  I went to sleep crying again, dreaming that I was a princess locked up in a castle so big that it poked up through the sky. Still I was a prisoner, always tethered to a warden! Would I ever be released? Would I ever have someone to talk to who really wanted to talk to me and be my friend? Did my Mama and Daddy really love me? They never hugged or kissed me except when they were showing off to their friends. I wanted them to be like parents in old movies who hugged, kissed, teased, played games, and went to Disneyland, laughing and loving all the time. And never ever being hurtful or unkind!

  When I woke up, I started to think about my childhood. I remembered once when I was little and I was sitting on Cook’s lap in the kitchen. She was hugging me and singing to me, and I was purring through my whole body and feeling so warm and comforted that I never wanted to leave. Yet the minute I heard Daddy coming down the hall and calling my name, I jumped off Cook’s lap and quietly answered him.

  He screamed at Cook for letting me be in the kitchen and swatted me so hard across my bottom that I fell on the floor. Then he dra
gged me to Mama and told her what a bad child I was and how I was, even at my age, wanting to hang out with low-class people.

  I was so little that I didn’t even know what was happening. I just kept saying over and over again, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry” as blinding tears cascaded down my face. It seemed they were both against me and there was nobody in the whole world on my side.

  I wanted to go back to bed and completely forget about my parents. Instead I’d dream of Mark being my boyfriend and David being Jennifer’s and the four of us running away together to a faraway, enchanted, loving land.

  Wednesday, January 14

  9:45 P.M.

  Mark hasn’t called so I guess he and David were just making fun of us. Or maybe David called Jennifer but Mark wasn’t that interested in me.

  I felt like the loneliest, most left-out person in the world. I decided to go out and swim a few laps in the pool just to get rid of some of the bottled-up sadness, or whatever it was eating me up inside.

  Thursday, January 15

  Today I met Jennifer in Sister Martha’s class. Sister Martha is almost blind, so Jennifer and I passed notes back and forth. David hadn’t called her, either, and we both said we didn’t care because they were probably just a couple of losers, anyway. But we did care! I could see it in her eyes just like I could feel it in my hurting heart!

  Blessed Friday, January 16