"Violators cannot live with the truth: Survivors cannot live without it."
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October 15th, 1982
Today is my birthday. I've spent 43 days in this shitty place. Marie comes to see me. She hasn't been around much. Her exhaustion is apparent by her growing belly and short patience. I'm starting to resent her. Maybe even hate her.
"You need help, Rick. You need to try to fix this before the baby comes. I can't take it anymore."
Marie has always had this need to try and 'fix me', whatever the fuck that means. She's embarrassed to be seen with me at the Center, I can tell.
She thinks, 'God, I'm carrying this unstable, crazy bastard's child, what a piece of shit.'
Sitting in the courtyard across the picnic table from her, she feels like a total stranger. The bitch is keeping me stranded in this place, dangling the future of my only child in front of me for leverage.
The episodes were worse during the night. I would often wake up screaming for Elizabeth, only to be confused to see Marie next to me instead.
Red hair instead of blonde.
"Riiick... go back to sleep. You know your sister's gone." she would groan with more irritation than concern. That's when the drinking started to get a bit worse. Blacking out was the only thing keeping me asleep most nights.
I drove up to Elizabeth's grave the day before I checked in.
After almost eight years I still can't think of anything to say other than 'fuck you' and 'why?'
I wish I could just say goodbye.
R.S.
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October 17th, 1982
"Breaking Silence" is my hardest group. I haven't been able to stay all the way through so far. Maybe today.
Ms. Judy asks for a volunteer to read the statement of purpose. I'm feeling brave today, so I raise my hand. I stand up, clear my throat. Everyone is looking at the floor.
"To talk about incest," I say "the violation of a child's innocence by a parent or guardian through any unwanted touch, vaginal, anal, oral-" I stop, feeling a catch in my throat. I was thinking about the size of my mouth, how it was barely big enough to fit three fingers.
I'm such a fucking coward.
"I can't do this." I say, handing the paper back to the group leader. She nods and hands the paper off to a patient named Kim.
I'm not here anymore. I'm in front of my workbench. I can see my tools, the cool metal, the microscope, the computer.
I hear voices that are far, far away.
"Rick? Rick, are you still with us?" I hear Ms. Judy's voice say.
Please don't call me back. I want to stay here. I don't want to be there, I'm so close to a breakthrough on this cell oxidation.
"I think it's important you join us again, Rick-"
You know I can't talk. I start to feel the chattering.
"Rick, you don't have to talk, but give me a signal that you can hear me."
I nod my head in a jerky motion, hoping it came across.
"Good, Rick. Stay with us." I hear her move to the whiteboard.
"Today, we're going to talk about the cost of keeping silent-" I hear the squeak of the marker.
I think about Elizabeth. She paid the ultimate price for her silence. A few years after her overdose, I found her journal in her lab. It was personal, and she didn't know if what had happened to her was real or not. She wrote in horrific detail the disgusting fucking things mother made her do. I had also been unsure of the validity of those memories throughout my life. When something like that happens so young, you wonder if your mind was just playing tricks on you.
"Cost of keeping silent: suicidal feelings-" check. "-self-mutilation," check. "-substance abuse," double check. "-eating disorders, and sexual promiscuity." Check, aaand check.
Why didn't I fucking speak up? I feel guilty knowing that I'm certain in the reality of what happened, but she never got that. She drowned in her own vomit, wondering if her demons were in her mind, or wearing a deep purple dress.
I open my eyes to look up at the board. Death is not on there. It bothers me.
R.S.
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October 22nd, 1982
I've recovered another memory.
It hit me while I was sitting in art therapy, continuing work on my black hole. Maybe that's why it happened- I'm looking too deeply.
It scares the shit out of me.
I'm six years old, running through the hallway of an office building.
My hands are sticky.
I've wet my pants.
I'm crying.
I see Elizabeth at the end of the hall laughing at me, unknowing. "Baby, baby, baby," she says.
I crumble into a ball in front of a bathroom door, crying harder. Mr. Locke, the office janitor walks by and sees me. His skin is soft and black, and he has kind brown eyes.
He crouches in front of me, wiping my tears with a handkerchief. He takes my hand and leads me into the bathroom. He lifts me up onto the sink to wash my hands, hard. All the while he's shaking his head saying 'there, there' over and over.
When he's finished, he sets me down on the floor and takes my hands into his large ones, looking right into my eyes.
"Grown-ups shouldn't do this to little boys."
At the time, I didn't understand. But when I looked at my hands in his, I wished they were black too.
R.S.