The Lonely Trailer (Ch. 10)

One afternoon when I was in 2nd grade Fred had found out about my mother running around on him with another man.  I was watching Captain American on TV.  Earth, Wind, Fire, Water, and Heart!!!   I wanted to be Wind.  I had a candy ring on my finger and jumped up on my sofa extending my arm out like the characters on the show.  "Wiiiiiiinnnnd!"  Fred came up to me interrupting my show and said, "Do NOT let your mother in this house when she gets here."  I felt terror run through my body like goosebumps spreading from my arms down to my legs.  This was going to bad.

I heard my mother at the door.  She rang the bell over and over.  She pounded on the door and screamed at Fred, "Give me my daughter you son of a bitch!"  She sounded like she had lost her mind.  Her voice was high and she shrieked each word out like a war cry.  Fred looked at me and asked, "Do you want to go out there with her? " I shook my head no.  I must have looked terrified because Fred started laughing and said, "I don't blame you kid."

There use to be a giant white shell on Fred's front porch that to me looked the size of a small car.  I'm sure that's the exaggerated memory of a small child though... but that's how I remember it.  My mother's ranting stopped and this made us wonder what she was doing.  We both looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders.  Then the giant white shell came crashing through the front window!  Fred was stunned and I was scared to death.


After a couple seconds she was standing in the living room with shattered glass around her.  Fred grabbed her by her hair and slammed her on the ground.  She cried out in agony.  I screamed for them to stop!  With my face scrunched together so I could see through my tears I ran in the house and got a knife. I held it out towards Fred in an attempt to protect my mother.  Laughing at me, he looked at the ground and shook his head, "You're a little traitor," he said.... then he left. 

I wanted to run after him and tell him not to leave me with her!  I wasn't a traitor!  What was I supposed to do?  I cried because I knew what would happen next.  My mother got up and told me to get my things together.  She hobbled around gathering as much as she could and then called for a ride.  Our ride took us to the emergency room where my mother found out she had a broken tailbone.  Hours later we were on our way to our new home, my mother sitting on her donut and me stuffed in the back seat with all of our belongings. 

We moved in to a trailer that sat in the front yard of an old dilapidated house infested with cockroaches.  It was a two story white house and the front yard had lots of trees in it.  I started at another new school.  Living in the trailer I felt like I was some kind of lowly commoner from one of the princess movies I loved to watch.  I yearned to go in the big house and be with all the "royalty" there, cockroaches and all.  My mother got to go up to the house regularly, while I was left in the trailer with 6 channels on a 12 inch old TV.  I felt so suffocated in there and cramped.  I was lonely and bored.  It was so hot in there too and for some reason I wasn't allowed to go out side and play.  I hated my mom for leaving me in there and my resentment would build and build all night.  Instead of giving her the cold shoulder when she finally came back, I would be so excited!... like a puppy that's been left alone all day.  I wanted to punish her for leaving me there by withholding my love, but I never could.

 School was a great escape for me.  I got to school an hour early wearing the same pair of crusty old socks everyday.  The other children teased me because of my dirty clothes and unkempt appearance.  I had no friends, but it was still better than being shut up in the trailer.  At recess I would sit against the wall by the water fountain and read books the teacher let me take outside. Eventually she allowed me to just stay inside with her during breaks and Ms. Belle became my best friend. 

When Easter came around I got to go up to the big house.  I was so excited!  There was an Easter basket in there for me! I got a kite that Easter and a walk man with a "Silly Songs" tape in it.  For about two weeks after that my mom would take me after school to an office parking lot and we would fly kites.  I lost interest in the kite after about 10 minutes, but my mom would fly it for what seemed like hours.  I would skate and strap on my walk man and sing at the top of my lungs, "Do your ears hang low? Do they wobble to and fro... can you flip'em over your shoulder like a continental solider?  Do your ears hang loooooow?"  I loved it, but my mother seemed too obsessive about the kite and after awhile she started to scare me.   She was acting weird... it was just a dumb kite.  She would get so upset if the kite wouldn't stay up long enough, or there wasn't enough wind.  With her eyes opened wide and her pupils black and large she would mumble bad words under her breath like she was casting an evil spell or something.  She would cry sometimes, scream and stomp her feet or pull out her hair.  I skated farther and farther away from her each day, afraid that her madness might some how be contagious.