on me?'
I knew I had strayed from the open-ended style of questioning used with
child sex abuse victims, but it seemed unlikely that Kendra hadn't been
victimized before she began selling herself for drugs. It was
possible, but the vast majority of women who become prostitutes were
molested as children.
If she wasn't molested, my guess is that watching her mother's own
relationships with men had left her vulnerable to abuse before this Joe
person ever came into the house and began grooming her. Pedophiles
often take their time developing a relationship of trust with the
child, sharing secrets and breaking barriers. Once the abuse begins,
the child chooses to permit its continuance rather than lose the
abuser's affection. After spending two months using heroin with her
mother's boyfriend, Kendra's next step was almost guaranteed.
'I'm not sure about anything, Kendra. I just wanted to make sure you
weren't keeping anything from me, to protect them or maybe your
mother.'
'Well, I'm not. If it's like you're thinking someone must've done
something to me for me to be this way, you're wrong. I guess I'm just
screwed up.'
'You're not screwed up, and it's not your fault. Do you know that?
What happened to you is not your fault.'
'That's what the advocate person said, too. Mom thinks it's my
fault.'
'I bet she doesn't.' I wasn't so sure about what Andrea Martin
thought, but I knew what Kendra needed to hear.
'She keeps saying I shouldn't have been out there.'
'Well, she's right. It's good that you're acknowledging that you made
a mistake to put yourself in a risky situation. But that doesn't make
this thing your fault. You see the difference?'
'I guess so.'
'Say it's not your fault.'
She looked at Chuck, then me, then down at her feet. 'That's kind of
dumb.'
'It's not dumb,' Chuck said. I was glad he jumped in. I was used to
working with women who couldn't listen to anyone but a man, and
thirteen wasn't too young for it to start. I needed some help.
She sighed. 'It's not my fault,' she said quietly.
'Now, look me in the eye,' I said, 'and say it louder.'
She looked at me this time, only at me. 'It's not my fault.'
This time, she sounded like maybe she meant it.
'Good girl. You're going to think this is silly, but whenever you
start to doubt that, I want you to look in the mirror and see how
pretty and smart you are. Then I want you to say that out loud to
yourself and see how confident and strong you look, OK?'
She rolled her eyes, but she smiled. 'Man, every time one of you guys
comes over, I get some new thing I'm supposed to remember to do. Look
out the window, talk to myself in the mirror. Next time, you're gonna
have me standing on my head and singing the Backstreet Boys.'
I smiled back at her and then asked why she worked out of the Hamilton,
the motel at Third and Alder. She explained that she met a group of
teenage girls at Harry's Place, a shelter for street kids. When it
became clear that Kendra was picking up spare money the same way the
others were, they told her she should work out of the Hamilton.
Apparently, the management there didn't care about what went on, and
enough girls were turning tricks out of the motel that it provided
something of a support network. The girls would watch out for each
other and pass along tips they'd pick up on the street.
Kendra explained that she worked sporadically enough that she'd managed
to avoid hooking up with a pimp. 'They're definitely out there,
though. Haley, this girl I know the best out of that group she's older
than me anyway, Haley said she did what I did for about a year before
she couldn't get away with it anymore. The other girls were telling
her she wasn't safe out there by herself, and she got beat up a couple
times pretty bad. So she was giving half of her money to some man, but
he was supposed to watch her back and make sure she stayed safe.'
I'm sure this guardian was a real gentleman.
Kendra's face lit up as she told me about the girls she'd met on the
street, at Harry's Place, and at the Hamilton. I could tell she missed
them, even if she wasn't missing the lifestyle yet.
'Do you want to see pictures of them?' She hopped up from the sofa and
disappeared into the back of the house. She returned with a miniature
backpack in the shape of a panda bear and fished out two envelopes.
'I love taking pictures. I don't have a camera, but we used to, like,
