I was finishing up Christmas shopping a mom lost her child. They were calling a code Adam while I was waiting to check out. I asked the cashier what that meant and she said lost child. They were giving a description and last location. I felt for the mom and I pray that child was found. Hoping he or she was just in the toy section. It was so busy though I could see how it could happen. I fear that with my 3 year old because he likes to run off. When I know it’s going to be busy, my husband stays home with the kids and I shop alone.
Month: December 2012
Feeling Sadness
The Connecticut shooting was bad. That made my heart heavy. Earlier in the week a 2 year old in our town passed away from a pit bull mauling her. Then today 2 police officers were shot at a grocery store. I have to wonder what our world is coming to. It’s scarey to go to malls, send our kids to school, go to a movie, or even to the grocery store. We have to have faith that all will be ok and it will work out. I wish those people who feel the need to take another life would stop and think. If it is from mental illness seek help. I realize our resources are running out for mental health help, but there is a way to get help. Our world is becoming a sad world. I worry about the future of our children.
First Chapter of Carrie, Never Free (snap shot teaser)
Chapter One
My mother, Dina Wells and I had a hard life all of our lives. She wanted to marry my father and my grandparents forbid it until she was eighteen. To get back at my grandparents she got pregnant and had me when she was seventeen. My father, Kevin Wells, was about ten years older than mother. He worked as a mechanic. My mother stayed home and cared for me. At least that is what she told me later in life when things really fell apart. She started to blame me for all the things that went wrong in her life.
After my parents divorced I vaguely remember my mother going to work for a family as a maid. We lived in a large house. I had to stay inside all play all of the time. While my mother worked I had to stay in a room that was sort of set up like an apartment. I wanted so badly to play with other kids and play outside. I would look out of the window and visualize myself running in the green grass. When it snowed I would imagine myself outside making a snowman. I was hidden a house like I didn’t exist. Nobody wanted me to be scene.
When I was two, my sister Gina was born. Then later Mark and Luke were born. Right after Luke was born we left the house in the middle of the night. She kept rushing Mark and me out of the door. She put us over a fence then handed me Luke and she climbed over. I always wondered why we had to sneak away like that in the middle of the night.
We walked down the road for a long time in the dark. I held Mark’s hand as mom carried Luke. When her arms would get tired she would hand Luke to me for a few minutes and then take him back. It seemed like we walked for hours before we saw lights. A car came upon us, mother pulled me into a ditch. I pulled Mark with me. She made us duck down, but the car must have seen us because it stopped. A very young girl with long blonde hair got out of a small blue car.
“Ma’am do you need help? Are you lost?”
Mom stood up, held her finger to her mouth for us to be quiet, and handed me Luke. She walked out of the ditch and up to the girl. Mom started to talk to her, then came back to get us. We climbed into the back seat of the car. The girl took us into town to a motel room. She went inside the motel lobby and paid for the room, then turned and handed mom some money. When she was inside I could tell she was older than what she liked when we saw her on the road. We never saw her again, but this was the beginning of a different life.
We stayed in the motel for a couple of weeks. Mom left me with Mark and Luke while she went out to look for work. I was only five years old when I began taking care of my sister and brothers. Mom would come home twice a day and give us some food, made sure Luke had milk, and there were diapers for him and Mark. By the time she got home at night we were all asleep. All four of us shared a bed. I held Luke in left my arm to make sure he didn’t get hurt.
After a few weeks mom found work at a bar. After a couple of days working she found us a house near the bar so she could walk to work. The house was run down. It was two stories, the wood showed through the white peeling paint, the steps on the front porch had separated from the porch so we had to step over a gap. When we walked into the house, it smelled dirty and musty. The kitchen was straight ahead down a long hallway from the front door. To the right was the living room, with a very worn couch and chair in it. Whoever lived there before must have left their furniture, because I could also see a kitchen table and chairs in the kitchen. To left was a wooden staircase. Just past the staircase was a bedroom. I walked up the staircase with Luke in my arms, Gina and Mark followed behind crawling up the stairs. We had to walk to the right once we got up the stairs. There were two bedrooms upstairs. Each room had three twin mattresses on the floor with one dresser that had three drawers in each one.
I laid Luke on one of the mattresses and sat down beside him. I quickly picked him up when I saw how stained it was. I looked at the other two mattresses and they weren’t stained as bad. I laid him on another mattress and told Gina to keep an eye on him so I could put the other mattress outside.
I pulled and pulled on the mattress. Mom heard me upstairs, “Carrie what are you doing?”
“Mom, help me please.”
Mom came up the stairs and took the mattress from me. She took it through the kitchen and placed it outside of the backdoor. I grabbed Luke and all four of us went back downstairs. We walked into the kitchen and looked out of the backdoor. The yard was small and not fenced in. Trash was all over the backyard. We would only be able to play out front. We walked back to the front and went out the front door. Mom must have pushed the steps up to the porch because the gap was gone.
There was no railing on the steps so I sat down and went down the steps on my butt holding Luke. Once I got down the steps I walked over and laid him in the grass. Gina and Luke ran around the yard playing.
Mom came out of the house, “Carrie, I am going to work. You kids need to go inside and lock the door. Don’t come out. I won’t be home until after you are asleep. All of you sleep in the same bed to try to stay warm. Tomorrow we’ll go out and get some blankets and clothes.” She kissed each of us on the head and left.
We went into the house and I locked the door. We all went into the kitchen. Mom had set the milk in the sink with cold water. I guess that was because we probably didn’t have electricity yet. On the table was a bag full of the food we had left from the motel and the one bottle we had for Luke. I poured some milk in his bottle and fed him. I grabbed a bag of chips from the sack and handed those to Gina and Luke. We sat at the table eating until the bag of chips was gone.
I sat at the table holding Luke, while Gina and Mark chased each other up and down the hall. They fell a few times and would get up giggling and start all over again. Once it started to get dark, we all went upstairs and lay down on a mattress. I don’t know what time I finally fell asleep, but the other three almost went to sleep instantly. When we woke the sun was shining through the dirty windows. The sun reflected just how dirty the house was. Dust was everywhere. As I sat up I saw a mouse ran across the floor and into the closet. Mark and Gina got up and tried to catch it.
Went all went downstairs and mom was up. She had donuts on the table for us. “Look, I got these on my way home last night free because the shop was getting ready to throw them out.”
We all started eating them like we had never eaten before. Mom turned around with a cup of coffee and said, “The cabinets are full of food. I got a ride last night to the grocery store. There are crackers, chips, cookies, and some food in the refrigerator. The electricity was turned on this morning. The food should still be good though because it has only been there for a little bit. I am going to go lie down for awhile and then take you all shopping for some clothes. A friend of mine is coming to get us. While I rest, Carrie, you get yourself and everyone bathed.”
Mom went into her room and lay down. She left her bedroom door open so she could still hear us. We sat in the kitchen eating the donuts then stepped into the bathroom that was between mom’s bedroom and the kitchen. I filled the tub with water and all four of us bathed at the same time. It was hard to help Gina and Mark while holding Luke, but I did it.
After our bath we went into the kitchen and sat at the table eating a snack quietly. I looked through the kitchen door and saw outside, because the front door was open, a tall man of muscular build wearing jeans and a leather jacket was walking up on the porch. He didn’t have a shirt on under his jacket and he had a small amount of dark hair in the center of his chest.
He walked in the door, “Where’s Dina. I’m ready to get this over with. You brats go to my car.”
I felt a little scared. I had Luke in my arms already. Gina and Mark got down off of their chairs and we walked outside to get into his station wagon. There was trash all over the floor of the car and in the back seat. I brushed it onto the floor so we would have a place to sit. We got into the car and waited on them. I looked outside the car window and watched for them, until Gina started screaming. A snake was crawling on the floor of the car. I opened the car door and got out, then had Gina and Mark get out.
Mom must have heard the screaming because she came running out of the door, “Why are you screaming?”
“Snake, momma, snake!” Gina screamed pointing at the car.
“Frank! I told you to leave the snake home. My kids don’t need to be around that thing.”
“It won’t hurt them, Dina,” he said as he put his arm around her and kissed her. “Here, I will put it in its cage in the back of the car. They won’t see it.”
He grabbed the snake and put it in a cage in the back of the station wagon. We all got back in the car, but on the way to get clothes, Gina leaned into me hard and Mark was leaning against her. Mom was holding Luke, so I was able to comfort both of them.
Frank didn’t drive for long before we got to a store. He sat in the car while mom took us in to go shopping. As mom got out of the car he handed her some money. We went inside and there were only racks of what looked like very worn out clothes. Mom took us to the back of the store where the kids clothes were. She bought each of us one pair of pajamas, three pairs of pants, and three shirts. Then she took us over to a toy section and told each of us we could have a toy. She picked out a stuffed animal for Luke. I picked up a naked doll that had messy hair and half of it was ripped out, Mark picked up a fire engine, and Gina picked up a teddy bear. Mom rushed us back up to the front to pay so we could leave.
The next week Frank moved in with us. He stayed around for a couple of years. He treated us ok. At least we weren’t left alone a lot. He worked during the day while mom went to work at the bar. He left when I was seven years old. He left because mom told him she was pregnant. He said the baby couldn’t be his and that she was a whore screwing around. I remember he slapped her across the face before he left.
Mom cried for days. She chain smoked and guzzled bottles of alcohol. She must have lost her job because she didn’t go back to work until after Adrian was born. I know during the time mom was pregnant we had a lot of food in the house. After she came out of her depression from losing Frank she cleaned, cooked, and we were allowed to be kids. We played outside, we looked healthy, and Gina and I went to school daily. Life was good, and then mom found another job and things turned badly. Different men were in our house a lot. When there wasn’t a man around she would become depressed, yell at us, and hit us. I started skipping school, stealing food, and money to make sure my brothers and sisters were taken care of. Formula and diapers were the hardest to steal. When I had to get those, I put Adrian in the stroller and hid the stuff in the stroller. As she began to talk it became harder, because she would ask what I was doing and people would look over at us.
I had to learn to hide food because when mom and her boyfriends would come home drunk, they would eat the food I stole for us. I started hiding the food in our room. Mom never went up there. I learned to steal water from the neighbors and many times we washed up from cold bucket of water because the electricity and the water were turned off. I used wipes on Adrian to clean her up. I would rub them together to try to get them warm.
One night shortly before I was arrested and we were put into foster care, our mother came home, her hair was a mess, it was always a mess, stringy blonde hair that looked greasy, but that night it was a real mess and her make-up was running down her face. She went into her bedroom and slammed the door. I went into her room which was a big no to try to figure out what was going on and Gina was right behind me. I tried to push her away, but she wouldn’t go.
I opened the door slightly and looked in. Mom had a needle in her arm. She pulled the needle out and threw it on the floor. She then lay back on her bed and went to sleep. I tried to go in there when she was gone and get rid of all of the needles because I feared Adrian would get a hold of one. Now that she was four years old, she seemed to get into everything and question everything. One day I wasn’t fast enough about getting the needles picked up. We all went to school and Adrian was in the house with mom, but she was sleeping. Usually she just played in the hallway until we got home. One day that wasn’t the case. For some reason mom had her in her room When Gina and I got home from school Adrian was playing with three needles. Mom was passed out in bed. I picked up the two on the floor while Gina tried to get the one from Adrian. In the process she was stabbed with the needle. The needle went all the through her hand. I ran into the kitchen and grabbed a towel to wrap her hand, but there wasn’t much blood since it was a puncture wound. I was so afraid she got some of the drugs in her system. She must have because she lay down next to mom and passed out. When mom woke up it was the worst fight anyone could imagine. I was always afraid of being beat every day, but this was bad. Her anger was out of control because Gina was in her bed. When I heard the screaming I ran to mom’s room. I couldn’t move. Mom’s anger was out of control. I couldn’t do anything. I was so afraid my feet wouldn’t move and I couldn’t talk.
Second Book in the Series completed and Self-published
Gina, Luke, and Mark, Secrets Behind the Glitter and Gloss is finally completed. I’m so excited for the Wells Family Series to continue and doors continue to open about these five children and their story. Although these books are fictional, the children feel alive to me as I’m writing. Is that crazy?
lrhatfield 