“The younger boy was the one that was trouble. It’s funny. I’ve tried to remember their names since yesterday, and for the life of me, I can’t tell you what they were called. Do you know?”
I shook my head. “No, I’ve never met any of them, not even Mom’s dad.”
“Well, that was a wise decision on Rose’s part. The younger boy was the worst one, but the older one wasn’t a saint either, not that they had any reason to be any otherway. I remember it like it was yesterday. Probably one of the most upsetting things I have ever seen. It was during recess. The kids and I would eat our lunches outside on the nice days, and then they would run and play for a while.
“On this afternoon, I went to the bathroom, which was an old outhouse a couple hundred feet away from the school. Your momma must have been about six or seven, and the boys were probably somewhere between ten and thirteen. I opened the door of the outhouse and there they were, all three of them. Little Rose didn’t have any of her clothes on, and both of the boys had their pants down. When I walked in, they weren’t doing anything to Rose, only to each other.”
She shook her head as if trying to erase what she was seeing. “I didn’t know what to do. I think I panicked. I just grabbed Rose and pulled her outside behind the outhouse. I didn’t want the other kids to see anything. The two boys got their pants on and came around back to find me. They were both crying and in a panic. They were begging me not to say anything. Looking back, I don’t really think they meant to be doing anything bad or were trying to hurt Rose. I don’t think they knew any better.
“For the rest of that afternoon, I got the rest of the kids busy on stuff they could do by themselves and gave them extra recess while I kept Rose’s brothers with me. I let Rose go play with the other kids. The only thing that had scared her was me opening the door and going into a tizzy. After a while, I think I finally got the truth out of the boys, or at least most of it.
“They told me they weren’t trying to hurt her, that they were just playing. From what they said, and I had to read a little between the lines, I have no doubt of what was happening. Their daddy, your granddaddy, was molestingboth the boys. From what I could gather, it seemed like that had been happening for years, even before their mom died. She was a weak, weak woman. I’m willing to bet she knew but was too afraid to say anything. They told me he didn’t do anything with Rose, that he never really even spoke to Rose. Both of them pretty much raised that poor pretty girl. I don’t know what happened or what didn’t happen to Rose, but from what I saw in that outhouse, I figure that the boys would do things with her too. Why wouldn’t they? They didn’t know any different.
“I told Kenneth about it that night, and we went out to their house to talk to your granddaddy. We tried not to outright accuse him of anything. We did tell him about what happened in the outhouse. We couldn’t even get to asking any questions about what might be happening at home. He blew up. That temper of his was well known. He got out his rifle and was waving it around, screaming at us. I thought we were gonna die for sure. We ran. I hated leaving like that. I could hear Rose crying. I’m sure all the screaming scared her to death.
“We went right to the police. You’ve got to understand that times were different back then, night and day. Such things weren’t unheard of, but they for sure weren’t talked about. You were supposed to just ignore it. The policeman wasn’t much more receptive than your granddaddy had been. He told us we needed to mind our own business, stick to teaching, and leave the poor widower alone. Kenneth started yelling and arguing back. It’s a wonder he didn’t get thrown in jail.
“Rose and the boys didn’t come back to school the next day. I heard later that they had to ride the bus to go to the school in Ft. Scott. I felt horrible. Not only did theyhave to deal with the same stuff at home, but now they had over an hour-long bus ride every morning and evening.”
She stopped speaking abruptly and looked at me expectantly. I stared at her dumbly. I think my brain shut off. It was too much information at once.
“Brooke, I’m sorry to dump this all on you. I didn’t want to make things worse or hurt you, but I thought maybe it would help you understand why your mom is the way she is. I know it doesn’t excuse the choices she’s made, or the fact that she was a bad mother, but… but, well, I don’t know. I thought you should know.”
I nodded numbly.
She reached out and squeezed my hand. Tears were rolling down her cheeks. After a few seconds, my own joined in. She took me in her old, fragile arms, and we cried together. For Rose, her brothers, for me, for her, for the whole fucking mess.
Maudrawas true to her word and never left the hospital while Sister Heinz was there. They even let her stay on a rollaway bed every night. She came home to Jed and me a little less than a week later, when Sister Heinz passed.
I hoped Kenneth had been waiting for her with open arms.
Part Three
Twenty-Five
I alwayshear about those people who don’t realize they’re gay until they hit puberty. They might be taking a shower after JV football practice, and the quarterback walks in and drops his towel after smacking one of his teammates on the ass. All of a sudden the person’s eyes open wide, his dick starts to grow, and he rushes for cover before anyone else notices. Staring at himself in the locker room mirror, glancing around to make sure he is alone, he asks himself, “Do I like guys?” He then, of course, sleeps with every cheerleader on the squad to make sure, and a few of the Goth girls, just for good measure. I’m not saying these experiences aren’t true or real for them; I just can’t comprehend such an experience.
Even more bizarre are the men who are married, have a couple of kids, and one day see their next door neighbor in his drive waxing his car with his shirt off. All of a sudden the man realizes he is not and never has been attracted to his wife. He leaves her within a few months, and by the next year has tattoos, piercings, and is walking with his children and new boyfriend in the Pride parade. Again, who am I to say he isn’t being honest with himself, that he truly didn’t have an inkling he might not be the straightest arrow in the quiver? It is just something I can’t seem to wrap my mind around.
I understand the men who weren’t able to accept they were gay until later in life, until it was too late to not devastate their loving wife’s life. That makes sense. But tonot know, to be so out of touch with yourself that you wake up one day and are surprised when everything about yourself is opposite than what you thought it was… if that is feasible, it must be the most unsettling experience imaginable.
There was never a time I didn’t know I was gay. I didn’t always know what gay was, but from the first moments of my memory, I remember feeling that special feeling about other boys. As a little kid, I clearly recall craning my head around in the car to watch as some shirtless guy jogged down the sidewalk, only to have my attention reclaimed by a wordless smack on my leg from Mother. Instinctively, I knew it was something that would not be a good thing to let other people know, that it made me different. In my mind, it somehow made me less of a boy; as if I had somehow been made wrong. No matter how many prayers I prayed, the only thing I wanted to do with a girl was to comb her hair.
There was a change that happened right before high school, however. Around that time, I decided I wanted to be a boy. That I liked that I was a boy. That I hoped I would grow up to one day be a man. It was then that I started working out and lifting weights. I realized I didn’t really know how to be a man. Sure, I had Grandpa, Chuck, and even Donnie as examples of what a man was like, but they didn’t really seem like men to me. They were just who they were, sexless. I started to emulate men I’d seen in movies. I’d watch how they walked and would practice their swagger until I got it down and made it my own. I would listen to how they spoke. Their volume, their intonation, their fluctuation, and their cadence. By the time I accomplished my gradual transformation, I could have easily beencast in an old Western movie with John Wayne and appeared as an equal to his masculinity.
I would regularly get out a ruler and measure my penis, wondering if I was growing enough, if it was big enough for a man.
Before then, I was a girl. At least, I wanted to be a girl. I hated everything that made me a boy. I didn’t really know what it meant to be a girl, but I knew it would be easier than being what I was. I wasn’t sure what I was. I knew I had a penis, which I hated, and that made me biologically a boy. The only negative thing I could see about being a girl was that I would be a fat girl. I was a fat boy, so it seemed logical that I would also be fat if I were a girl. That was the only thing that girls had harder than boys. People made fun of me for being fat, but I knew it would be worse if I were a girl. It was more acceptable to be fat if you were a boy.
I had always been somewhat jealous of Donnie. Everyone loved him. He was always gorgeous. I have gone back and looked at his childhood pictures to see if it had just been my adoration of him. It wasn’t. I don’t think he ever had an awkward phase in his life. If I didn’t love him so much, I’d want to kill him for being so unintentionally perfect.
As much as I longed to be everything Donnie was, it was Della’s life I envied. She got to giggle and run away from the little boys who chased her, screaming about cooties. She got to have long hair. She would let me braid it for her and put in different colored ribbons. She got to have all the toys I wanted. She and I would play with her dolls endlessly. I would take masking tape and wrap their legs up, turning them into mermaids. Once in a while, Donnie would play with us. He never made fun of me for playing with Della’s dolls, although he would get boredwith our games quickly and want to play catch or hunt for bugs in their backyard. Soon enough, he would convince Della to play with him. I would go with them, but I’d take a doll with me. They would dig and put beetles and spiders into their jars. I’d sit close to them, far enough away to not have to touch a bug but close enough to talk with them, and comb the doll’s hair and think about how pretty my red hair would be if I could grow it long like Della’s.
It had become a habit to go into Mom’s room when she would leave for the bar or do errands of some kind. I would wrap a towel on my head for hair and slip into her closet, trying on outfit after outfit. By the time I was in fifth grade, I was tall enough that most of her clothes were only a little bit too long, but I was fat enough that I couldn’t close most of her skirts around my waist, so I would hold them shut with one hand behind my back and use the other to curtsy or toss the long towel of hair over my shoulder. My favorites were her broomstick skirts. They would crinkle all around my legs, one moment transforming me into a mermaid as I sat on the bed, flipping my legs together to look like I was swimming in the mirror. The next moment they would flair out in a perfect circle as I twirled like Cinderella at the ball. I really didn’t care for her high-heeled shoes. They were pretty, but they were too hard to walk in. I did like how they made me taller, however. They were especially good to wear with her longer skirts so I wouldn’t step on them.
My favorite, however, was her makeup, especially her lipstick. I would change the color of towel on my head to match the shade of lipstick. I’d get a sheet of notebook paper and kiss it, doing my best to leave the perfect lip shape on it every time. I would try to put on eye shadow, but I could never do it very well since I had to close myeyes. It was harder to wash off as well, which would be a problem when I’d hear Mom’s car pull up and need to get everything put back together quickly. That happened often, but I was always careful. I only took out one or two pieces of clothing at a time and paid very careful attention to hang it back up just the way it had been. I never dressed in her clothes and makeup at the same time. I was afraid of getting something on her clothes. As soon as I would hear her car coming down the road, I would put everything back. If I had been using her makeup, I would rush to the bathroom and lock the door. I was always worried she would ask me why I was in the bathroom so much when she got home, but she never did.
It was close to my twelfth birthday. I had just started shaving once a week or so. I also had underarm hair. When I noticed hair growing around my penis, I was alone in the house, which was good. I cried for hours. Even through all my feelings for other boys and trying to keep everything a secret, none of it was as humiliating as all the hair growing from my body. I hadn’t ever thought of it happening. I knew Donnie was shaving already and had noticed his hair when we had gone swimming, but it never seemed like a possibility for me. No matter what I tried to do, it wouldn’t stop growing. I was turning into a man against my will. My body had been invaded by an alien, and I was no longer in control.
