MISTER chapter VII

This is chapter 7 of a short 'book' - an autobiographical tribute to my foster father.  To start at the beginning, go to Chapter 1 and work your way backward.  When it's all entered on this site, I will try to reset the chapters so they read chronologically forward instead of backward.  In the meantime, I hope you bear with me!

  
 Chapter 7 - 1979       

  “I don’t want you to leave,” I groaned.

             Lisa and I were flopped back on my bed, head-to-head, our legs dangling off opposite sides, staring at the ceiling.  I had learned that Dad had never left Lisa to fend for herself at the church like he had told me the day she left our home.  He had actually brought her to a highway rest stop, transferred luggage and belongings, and thus began Lisa’s life as an only child, first, enjoying life with Grampy’s son and daughter-in-law, then went to Washington D.C. to live with our mother and they eventually moved on to Arlington, Virginia to a larger, three bedroom apartment.  Strangely, Lisa really called her by that name - ‘Mother’.  She told me Mother preferred it.

            Eventually, Lisa was joined by our sister, Robyn, who had spent a few years living with my mother’s cousin.  We had all just been reunited at a resort in Hyannis, Massachusetts, where my mother was participating in a presentation for her company and Lisa had come home with me to Grammy and Grampy’s home afterward, to spend a few more days before flying back to Virginia.

            Time was passing much too quickly.  I was madly elated to be with Lisa again, and I didn’t want it to end.  Even though Grampy’s home had been my very own home for some time, Dad still called the shots, and it was becoming clear that he was not happy I had spent any time with Mother.

            Being with Mother was uncomfortable for me, but having Lisa by my side made it all worth it.  Mother had tried to engage me in a ‘tickle fight’, something I wasn’t at all accustomed to.  Grampy and Grammy were reserved, loving and tender in other, sincere ways.  I pretended to be OK with being tickled, following Lisa’s lead, but just couldn’t bring myself to tickle anyone back.

            I wasn’t so sure I was on board with my mother’s attempts to include me, anyway.  I wondered why she had never even tried to be a part of my life, and couldn’t view her as anything more than a stranger.  I wouldn’t have known her if I passed her on the street before this.  No matter.  Lisa accepted her, and I wanted to spend as much time as I could with my sister, so I made sure to be as nice and polite as possible.

            Lisa rolled over to face me. “I wish you could come to Virginia with me.  It’s right outside Washington, there are really neat subway trains and you can walk almost anywhere you want to go.”

            “I don’t know.  Dad would never let me, and I wish you could just stay here with me, anyway,” I replied, for a moment, sampling, then squashing the thought of moving from my country home to a big city.

            “Let’s not waste time thinking about saying good-bye,” Lisa suggested.  “What do you want to do now?”

            We were just dreaming up some sort of activity when I heard Grampy on the phone in the hallway.  There was no other phone in the house, so unless a person wanted to stretch the cord to the laundry closet and sit on the dryer with the bi-fold doors shut, everyone could easily hear everyday conversations.  Normally, this was never a problem.

            “That is not a good idea.  You need to think of Elizabeth and what’s in her best interest,” his voice was escalating. “I do not agree with this at all!”

            Grammy quickly ushered us outside, though twilight was casting long shadows on the porch, already.  Lisa and I nervously played for a while, then were called in through the back slider door.

            Standing threateningly in the living room was Dad with a police officer in tow, spouting at Grampy, commanding him to pack my things because he was putting me in the car and moving to upstate New York with me tonight.

            “She’s MY daughter, and I am her father - not you!” Dad raged. A sour, familiar smell of stale beer wafted over to where Lisa and I sat together on the far side of the room.

            Grampy stood toe-to-toe with Dad, as Gram softly said “Earl” a few times from her armchair.

            “You treat her like a possession - a barnyard animal with no feelings at all - not a precious little girl!  Look at the fear in her eyes.  Do you care even one bit what you‘re doing to her?” Grampy’s passion was evident.

            “I’ll treat her anyway I see fit,” Dad spat back. “Come on, Liz, get your things.”

            I had always tiptoed around my father’s moods and never, ever dreamed of saying no to anything he told me to do.  I had become very adept at not exposing an ounce of emotion, good or bad.  Tonight, gaining strength from my sister on one side, and my dog, Crisco, on the other, I looked steady into his eyes and said, “No, I don’t want to leave with you. I want to stay here.”

            Dad took a step or two toward me and the officer stepped in.  “Sir, why don’t you go home tonight, speak to a lawyer in the morning and come back tomorrow.”

            Dad hesitated for a moment, then said, “No.  We’re doing this right now. They have no legal right to keep her from me.”

            Placing a hand on his arm, the officer simply said, “Sir, I insist.” And then he was gone as quickly as he came.

            Grampy gathered me to him in a rare gesture. “I’m sorry you’re frightened, Elizabeth.  We must pray for your father and seek the Lord’s will in this situation.  We know that God is with us at this very moment, and He loves you more than you will ever know.  He never closes one door without opening another.”

            “Is he going to take me tomorrow?” I asked.

            “I don’t know,” Grampy’s words were not comforting, but his honesty was. “We do know you don’t have to go with him tonight, so we’ll pray on it and see what tomorrow brings.  No matter what, we don’t need to fear because ‘The Lord is our refuge and strength; a very present help in trouble.’”

            Drying my eyes, I asked, “Will you make sure the door is locked tonight?”

            “I check the doors every night before bed, and I’ll be extra sure no one can get in tonight,” he promised.  We both knew who ‘no one’ was.

            The next morning, Gram announced that Lisa and I were going to be picked up with the grandkids by a lady in the church, who had invited us to swim at her house for the day. Grampy’s middle son was the pastor of our church, so all us kids were often invited to tag along in some of the parishioners’ family activities.

            I liked going to this lady’s house.  She had a son who was a few years older than me, and I was almost a teenager.  He mostly hung out with his friends, but once, he strolled up to the above-ground swimming pool, hoisted himself up on the side and dunked his head and hair under water.  Coming up he shook the water off his thick, blonde hair the way models would do in a hair commercial, and walked away without saying a word.  I stopped playing with the younger kids long enough to admire him sauntering away in a very cool, indifferent manner.  Today, I hoped he might just happen to be home.

            Sometime in the afternoon, and after overhearing a muffled conversation by the adults in the house that I was  ‘in hiding’,  Lisa and I were brought back home, where we were intercepted by Grampy in the living room on our way through to the kitchen.  Gram joined him, a reassuring peacefulness adorning her face, as always.

            “Your mother has agreed to come bring you to live with her,” Grampy began. “We want to protect you, and feel it’s best for you to go live with her.”

            I didn’t ask why, or tell them I was terrified or that I didn’t trust Mother.  Instead I expressed the sum of all my unanswered fears and questions, in one simple, matter of fact question.

            “Will Crisco be able to come with me, or will he have to stay with you?”

            “Your mother’s apartment won’t allow dogs, but he can stay here and you can see him anytime you come back to visit,” Grampy’s voice was upbeat, giving me strength, and with that, Lisa and I went to my room and gathered our belongings for the short flight to my new home in the city.