“Ma’am, we need to tell you what happened. Do you think you’re up to hearing it?”
I heard Sue say yes, she wanted to know. But at the moment her attention was on me as I dialed the phone.
I told Glenn what had happened and he said he’d be right over, then I rushed to the couch so I could hear the story.
“Your mother was murdered,” the tall one said. “She was beaten and raped with a broom handle and left to die in a cotton field.”
The words were shocking, frightening, horrifying. An image of Sue’s mother being raped with the broom handle entered my mind like an intruder and stayed there. And then a flashback of Harvey holding the wrench in his hand, threatening me with it, flooded my mind and I went away.
I don’t know how much time went by before I heard Sue’s voice, which seemed far, far away. “Thank you officers,” she was saying.
The shorter policeman handed Sue his card and told her she could call any time. He told her that someone would be contacting her so that she could go down to identify the body.
Sue came and sat on the couch beside me. We just sat in silence for I don’t know how long. I hoped she felt me next to her, supporting her in my mind, because I couldn’t move or do anything else.
Suddenly Glenn was through the front door and grabbing Sue up in his arms and saying, “Oh honey, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m here now. You’re going to be okay. I’m with you.”
I took in Glenn’s words as if he was talking to me. I started to feel my body again. I was able to get up to make room for him to sit next to Sue on the couch. I was able to once again feel Sue’s pain, to put my focus back on her.
I didn’t see much of Sue after that. I wanted to do anything I could to help her but when I did see her, her pain was just too overwhelming for both of us. I didn’t know how to act around her. I was afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing. And Sue seemed to have disappeared behind a wall of her own. I understood her need to protect herself—from her pain and her aloneness and her shame about the circumstances of her moth-er’s death. I was happy she had Glenn.
Becoming friends with Sue had been my way of trying to put a distance between myself and all the dangerous and criminal elements on Janice Drive. She was so down to earth and eager to create a different kind of life than what she saw around her, and I thought we could do it together, support each other in escaping our dark pasts. But instead, Sue’s life brought even more trauma and darkness into my life. Now I had three images haunting me: Steve’s ugly, dirty penis; Harvey threatening me with the wrench; and Sue’s mother being raped with a broom handle.
chapter 24
I don’t know why I started shoplifting. I just suddenly had the urge to do it one day when I was at W. T. Grants, a department store near Hillcrest. I often went there to look at lipsticks, nail polish, and makeup. I didn’t have any money, so I just looked. I picked up one lipstick after another and tested the color on my hand, like my mother did when she was working with customers. Then I went over to the nail polish section and looked at those colors. They enthralled me. Nail colors like blue and green and purple were popular at the time, and I became mesmerized by them the same way I had when I used to look at pictures of precious jewels in my encyclopedia.
Then one day I felt compelled to put a bottle of nail polish in my purse and walk out without paying for it. I was terrified of getting caught and soon my heart began pounding hard in my chest. I could hardly breathe. I felt dizzy. But as soon as I opened the front doors and was safely outside, I felt another feeling. A feeling of exhilaration. A feeling of power. A feeling of triumph. These feelings were so powerful that they blocked out the memory of any fear I’d felt. They blocked out any sense that what I was doing was wrong. From that day on, I was hooked. I started going to Grant’s every Sunday while my mother slept in.
I always showed Pat and Patricia all the things I’d stolen, and one Sunday they both asked to go with me. Pat’s parents had given her permission to go since they trusted me, and Patricia’s mother was delighted that I wanted to spend time with her daughter.
During the long walk to Grants, I taught them all my tricks. I told them how to look nonchalant and how to make sure no one was watching them when they took something. I suggested they take only one item the first time, just to get used to it. Before we went into the store, we split up so no one would figure out we were together.
I was the first one to walk out the front door, my purse filled with lipstick and nail polish. I felt the familiar dizziness and pounding of my heart and was anticipating the thrill of victory as I reached outside. But this time I felt the hand of someone on my shoulder and heard the words, “Stop right there young lady.”
It felt like someone had thrust a cold steel spike into my spine. I froze in my tracks. I’d been caught. My body started shaking all over and I thought I was going to pass out. When I turned around, I saw a big man wearing a white shirt and tie. He grabbed me by the collar and pulled me
