That 70s Show Prologue- New Comer
Point Place, Wisconsin (almost)
May 1971
The long ride from New York was becoming quite painful. My mom thought it best to take all of our things and move to a small town in Wisconsin called Point Place. Odd name, but there were worse. My father was not joining us though, my mom said that he had move important things to be dealing with.
This upset me, naturally, but being 11 years of age meant that my attention went from that of sadness to excitement of the idea of an adventure. The longer we were on the road, the more that I hated being in the car. Especially with my mother.
She kept crying when she thought that I was asleep or would complain about my father. Sometimes, though, she would be calm and talk about her brother, Red Forman. They hadn't talked much since she had turned 18 and left the state completely. Her mother had also constantly ridiculed her and it caused my mother to just cut all ties with her.
My mother had married really young, mostly because she became pregnant with me, and her mother kept calling her a 'whore' because of it. She drank any chance she got, but she still worked her ass off. She had despised her marriage to my father and tried staying out of the apartment as much as possible. My father was never in the mindset and was almost home, but never alone. There was always a blonde woman in our apartment and they told me that me that she was just a family friend.
Thankfully, I am an only child, which means that I didn't have to share any of my things, especially my room because it was so small. Unfortunately, this meant that I would get bored rather easily.
The long road to her brother's house nearing a close, as there was a sign saying that we were just entering Point Place and it gave us the population count of the town. I didn't care much that or anything else, I just closed my eyes and felt the car move on the road.
Time had passed, the sky had darkened and the street lamps were on. They gave a warm glow on the streets and looked as if they were moving by at a fast pace. But, eventually, we turned slowly and stopped. Being in the backseat with most of our things, I couldn't see much other than the roof of a house and the darkening night sky. I figured that we had arrived at Uncle Red's house, meaning I could finally get out of the car and stretch my legs.
"Stay in the car for just one moment, okay honey?" My mother had turned around in the driver's seat to look at me as I was huddled up against the rear passenger side door, trying to fight off sleep. Her brunette hair was in a messy ponytail and her face was devoid of makeup. She looked so exhausted and her skin was marred from years of acne and improper care.
I just nodded my head and closed my eyes again. I drifted off again, as my mother was taking quite a bit.
An hour or so had passed when she came back, shaking me awake gently.
"Come on, honey. Time to go inside." Behind her stood an older man who was balding and scowling.
I got out of the car and she locked the car behind me. Sleep clouded my senses and I didn't pay any attention to what Uncle Red was telling my mother, but it didn't sound like it was anything good. I made my way to the couch in the living room while listening to the low mumblings of my mother and uncle. The only lights that illuminated the room was the moonlight and the dim light of the kitchen under the door. There weren't any sounds other than their voices, so I was restless for quite a while.
Eventually, I became oblivious to the world around me.
The beginnings of the morning light came into the room, causing me to stir from my slumber. Food was being made in the kitchen and I realized that I was very hungry.
My long, black hair was tangled and dirty, but I ignored it while heading towards the kitchen.
As I walked through the door, an older woman was at the stove cooking. My mother and Uncle Red were seated at the table, joined by two children. The older one was blonde and looked to be in her late teens. The other child was around my age, brunette and scrawny in build.
My mother spotted me, "Hey, baby. How did you sleep?" She seemed overly enthusiastic, but I brushed it off.
I cleared my throat and answered with a soft-spoken, "Good. Took a while to finally go back to sleep."
She nodded her head in understanding and got up from where she sat so I could have a place to sit down for breakfast.
"What are you going to do now?" Red spoke up, causing my mother to stop in her tracks. He stared intently at her over his newspaper while taking small sips of his coffee.
"Well, I was thinking of going to go back to school. It might help with getting jobs in the future." Her tone was hopeful, but her eyes were going all over the wall behind Red. She couldn't look him in the eyes and picked at the finger nails of the hand that was holding her coffee mug.
"Okay, but what about money? You are going to need money to go to college." His newspaper was now folded in his lap as his wife, Kitty, was placing food on the table.
My mother was still string off into space, thinking of anything and everything. "I'll look around," was all she said before putting her empty mug in the sink and going outside.
Everyone's attention then turned to me. I had never met any of these people before, I had only heard of heard stories of long ago about my uncle.
The young blonde was the first to speak. "So, what's your name, pipsqueak?" She gave a half-hearted smile as she put a forkful of eggs in her mouth.
The nickname that she gave me annoyed me a little, but looked past it. "My name is Anna." The food tasted so good and it took everything that I had not to just shovel it into my mouth. I hadn't really eaten in a couple of days, so I was really thankful that we had finally stopped moving. I had learned long ago that if I just shoveled it down my throat, it wouldn't stay down for long. "Yours?"
She gave a low chuckle and said that her name was Laurie. The boy next to me had yet to say a word, Red and Kitty were talking amongst themselves at this point. Probably about what they were going to do with my mother and myself.
"What about you? What's your name?"
He became flustered, trying not to choke on his orange juice. "My… my name is Eric."
I held my hand out to the scrawny blue-eyed boy. We shook hands after he hesitated for a brief moment.
The rest of the morning went by smoothly, Eric and I had chatted away during breakfast. Laurie left not long after finishing the food on her plate, saying that she may be home late. Kitty, who I found out was a nurse, cleaned up the kitchen before her and Red left for their jobs. My mother was nowhere to be found, but that wasn't odd at all. Plus, I wasn't completely alone, I had my cousin with me.
I had taken some time out from hanging out with him and decided it to be best to take a shower. Thankfully, my mother brought out some of my bags before she left, so I dressed myself in a floral dress with white shoes. I brushed my hair back and kept it back with a headband. I was so grateful that my hair wasn't as frizzy as it usually was.
Eric and I had been in his room, looking at his action figures and him telling me all about his G. I. Joe's when there was a knock on the back door. He hurried out of the door and I followed closely behind. He poked his head through the kitchen door, turning back to look at me and saying, "Don't worry. It's just Donna." He continued out the living room to let the girl in.
I stayed behind, too nervous to go out there just yet. My hand on the door, I heard a third voice. It belonged to a male and he didn't sound happy. He had said something about his mother leaving him alone with nothing to really eat, so he decided to come over here with Donna to see what he had.
The door to the fridge opened when I walked through the door. There was a redhead with Eric at the backdoor, talking and laughing.
"Eric." I stayed by the door, just in case it became too much to be in the room with so many new people. Three sets of eyes immediately snapped towards me.
"Who's that?" The redhead.
Eric came to my side and draped his arm over my shoulders in a protective older brother kind of way. "This is my cousin, Anna. She is going to be staying for a while."
Donna looked really happy to meet me and came up to give me a hug. "It's nice to meet you. I didn't know that Eric had a cousin."
My cheeks became rosy at her words and I managed to pipe out, "I can say the same."
Apparently, I spoke too low for the boy who was still rummaging through the fridge. "Is she a mute?"
"Only when I see an ass." This time he heard what I had said and just laughed at my words.
"Okay, kid. Have fun with that." He just shook his head and proceeded to make himself a sandwich.
Donna brought my attention back to her, "So, how old are you?"
"Um, I am 11 years old."
"Where are you from?" Donna was eager to hear about me, eventually pulling me back into the living room so that we could both be comfortable while we talked.
"Oh, uh, I am from New York." I was nervous and began to fiddle with the hem of my dress.
"Really?" She bounced a little on the couch next to me. "That is so cool. What is it like?"
My mouth had become dry as I remembered the years of being in the city. The number of things that I had experienced while being there. "I only remember things here and there. I didn't leave our apartment all that much, mostly stayed in my room with my books and the few toys that I had had. I only can tell you of the times that I left because we were moving, or going shopping, or going to school." I looked more at the floor instead of at her face or the faces of the boys that decided to join us then. "I remember it being very crowded and loud. I didn't like going outside all that much because there were so many people. Plus, there was this guy near our last apartment that would just sit next to the steps at all times of the day. He liked to watch people a lot."
Donna seemed kind of disappointed by this, but asked another question. "Well, what did you do while you were in your apartment."
My eyes traveled all over the room avoiding them, their eyes that could probably see more into my stories. "Well, I was always home with my father and a 'family friend.'" I made sure to put quotations around those words and they gave me a quizzical look about that. "My father told me that she was just a family friend, but you don't sleep with family friends. Right?"
The others were shocked at this and before anyone could ask anything more, Laurie came through the door. Apparently, the day had gone pretty quickly and I guessed that Kitty and Red wouldn't be too far behind.
"What are you munchkins doing in the living room?" The way that she said 'munchkin' was not in a sweet way, it was more condescending.
Eric piped up before the rest of us could say anything. "We were just talking about New York." He gave a panicked and high-pitched laugh.
She narrowed her eyes at us and just shrugged her shoulders before heading back upstairs.
I turned to Eric, "Why were you so nervous? It was not like you were lying or anything."
"I know. I just didn't want her to ask more about it." He hung his head, saddened by the fact that I was almost reprimanding him about his actions.
I placed my hand on his thin shoulder and gave a light squeeze, "It's okay. Just try and be more calm, okay?"
He nodded his head and then our four-person group went towards the couch to watch some television before the adults came back.
We had gone through a couple of programs before Kitty walked through the front door. We had situated ourselves into a comfortable group on the couch, minus the boy that I found out was named Hyde. Donna was on the far right against the arm with Eric right next to her and I had the far left arm rest with Hyde seated on my right. I had taken my shoes off and curled a bit onto the couch, thankfully I was smaller than most 11-year old's or else I would have been touching the angry boy next to me. I don't think that he would have liked that.
"Well, hello kids. How was your day?" We gave a unanimous "good" and went back to watching the television. "Anna, where is your mother?"
I looked around me and said, "I don't know. She left this morning without telling anyone where she was going."
Kitty showed her disapproval and shook her head. She mumbled something under her breath and made her way to the kitchen.
"What is your mom going to do?" Eric.
"I don't know. She never tells me anything. I stopped asking a long time ago, she kept saying that I was too young to understand or that it was something personal and I should stop sticking my nose into everything." My eyes never once left the ad that was playing on the screen but my heart rate started rising with agitation.
Hyde had been staring at me though that, noticing me curl into a tighter ball while never once blinking while answering my sweet little cousin.
The topic dropped after that and we all stayed where we were until the dinner was done and everyone, minus my mother, were present to eat the food.
Donna left but Hyde had stayed behind, saying he didn't want to go just yet.
"So, Anna, are you looking forward to going to school here?" Kitty was smiling, she seemed to always be smiling. She also made me feel comfortable while around her.
I had had a mouth full of mashed potatoes when she asked this, so I ate as fast as I possibly could. "I think that it will be fun. Hopefully, it is better than the schools in New York."
"What was wrong with them?"
"Oh, nothing. It was more the people than anything. They never made me feel welcome, even though I had been around these kids all of my life."
Hyde finally spoke up, "Join the club. It might not be any better over here."
I gave him a confused look, asking, "Why do you say that?"
He put his fork down and stared at me across the table with the most serious look that I had ever seen on a 12-year-old. "If you don't have the money or the popularity, there will always be a large group that will outcast you. So, with you being a newbie, I wouldn't expect anything more than a light shunning or teasing." He went back to eating and I just stared at the boy who seemed more grown than he should actually be.
Laurie began talking to Red about something that she wanted to do and I ignored that conversation, more focused on what could have made this curly haired boy so hateful towards the world.
An hour or so passed and then the people of the house began going their separate ways. Hyde apparently decided that he was going to stay over last minute, so he and Eric went to Eric's room. Laurie vanished out of the house, something about going to a friend's place. Red and Kitty turned in shortly before 10:30, leaving me all alone in the living room.
I couldn't sleep, so I pulled out my bags and started going through them. They were mostly clothes, not many winter clothes thankfully. I only had two bags, so we couldn't take a lot of my things anyway. At the bottom of the biggest bag was a small envelope.
Curious, I opened up the envelope and saw a paper the said it was a birth certificate. My name was on it. There was also a small paper card that was called a Social Security Card. The final thing in this tiny envelope was a handwritten letter.
All it said was:
Sorry.
The handwriting was my mother's and I knew that this meant that she wasn't coming back. I didn't know if I was supposed to cry or not. I thought about what may happen to me. The Forman's would have no choice but to take me in as their own, and I didn't think that my uncle was going to be too happy about that. He didn't seem like the type of man to waste time or money, and I saw myself as a burden on him. Why else would both of my parents just leave me if I was nothing more than a burden?
I couldn't see much of anything, the tears blinding my view as I thought about why my parents would just leave me with people I knew nothing of.
Sleep had taken over at some point in the night, because the next day I woke up on my side facing the back of the couch.
"Why do you think that she would do this?" Kitty's worried voice soothed me just a bit. But the sadness under it all brought back the memories of the night before.
Red sighed, "I don't know, Kitty. I really don't know."
Footsteps were heard on the stairs, coming down.
"Oh, why don't you boys just head on into the kitchen and make yourselves a bowl of cereal. Okay?" Kitty had moved closer to the couch, probably to block their view of me.
"Sure, mom." Was all Eric said before he and Hyde continued to the kitchen.
Kitty had made her way back to Red's side, "Should we wake her?"
"Now would be better than later. Don't you agree?" He was tired, and pissed. Obviously at my mother.
Kitty made her way to my side, but I had already opened my eyes and sat up. I knew that they were worried, mostly about what they were going to have to do with me.
"You don't have to keep me if you don't want." My voice was rough from the night of crying and lack of hydration.
Kitty hurried to my side, scooting close to hug me in a motherly way. I was unaccustomed to this, so I just sat there stiffly with my hands in my lap. Her laugh was nervous, I could tell where Eric got it from, and said, "Oh, why would you think that?" Never once losing the smile on her face.
Without missing a beat, I replied with, "Because neither of my parents want me. Why would you?"
Red moved closer and knelt in front of me, looking very stern and certain in his words. "You don't have to worry about that. We will try everything in our power to make sure that this is the last place you have to live in, okay?"
I could only manage a nod at his words. With everyone in agreement on this, Kitty took my hand and brought me to the kitchen to make sure that I got something to eat. Red stayed behind, grabbing the phone.
The boys didn't say anything; I think that they knew better. So, us three kids sat around the table and ate our cereals in silence while Kitty and Red were in the next room talking to some people on the phone.