Claims to be Christian - Yeah, right.

Wilson went to stay with Misty. Well, that would be that. Shirley, remarried, had recently left her husband and was homeless as well. Not only were she and Joy living there, but Cheri, her little girls and Junior too. Wilson would be under the same roof with his ex-wife and all their kids and grandkids. A remarkable situation; they were one big happy family again. He wouldn’t need my babies and me. Also, with the amount of drinking and smoking going on there, it wouldn’t be long before he got started and that would be the end of his talk about sobriety and Christianity.

Wilson not only stayed sober but he kept coming around. I started letting him watch our kids while I was at work. For two weeks he courted me. One night he picked me up from work and took me to our old restaurant - just like we used to. When he dropped me off and drove away, I felt as though I’d been on my very first date ever with him.

One day I called home from work. "Wilson, I forgot my medication this morning. I just don’t feel like I can cope. Could you bring me my medicine?”
“Sure, I’ll be right over.”
But the medication didn’t help. It was my life I hated. How could a drug change that?

After just two months, I left ‘bitter’ BetterLife and went back to the family-run nursing home where I had felt more comfortable.

“Shirley is going back to live with her husband in Detroit and Joy wants to move in with me,” Wilson said one day.
I sat down. How could Joy “move in” with Wilson? He didn’t have a place. I knew I was asking for trouble again, but I really did love Joy. “Well, I guess you both could come here.”
Joy and Wilson moved back in with me on March 16. I explained to Steph that I had to do it for Joy’s sake, but she didn’t believe it. We argued and Steph moved out. Troy also went back to Salmon Lake and stayed there.

I enrolled both Joy and Andrew in swimming lessons at the YMCA. While they were in class and Haley was in the nursery, I worked out in the weight room. I was there partly to get back into shape after having a baby, partly to build myself up in case of another attack by Shirley.

Joy reported that the family from the Rez rolls joints on their coffee table. Four- year-old Andrew joined in, “I stole some cigarettes from 7-11 for them. They wanted me to smoke one.”
“And Mom,” he confided, “Rose is Louis’ girlfriend. They were in the garage and she told him to put his hand in her pants.”
I felt sick. Rose and Louis were both nine-years-old.
Standing on our sidewalk with Andrew, I pointed from one house to another.
“I don’t want you to play over there or that house either. They do bad things over there. You are not to go inside the house across from them, or play with the kids over at the red house. And stay out of that green house, too.”
“But Mom,” Andrew objected, “then there’s nobody left to play with!”

Elmer and Marcia came to visit relatives in Salmon Lake, then came down to the city to spend a couple nights with us. Having them physically in front of me was reassurance that they really existed. Seeing them was like nourishment.
“Why don’t you move on out to west?” Elmer cajoled.
“I’m buying this place. Where would we live out there?”
“There’s plenty of places.”
“Well, if we did go Wilson would have to find us a nice house first.”
“Well, don’t be so high on the horse. Sometimes you have to accept something not so good for awhile if you want to make a better life. You might have to accept living in a trailer or something.”
Later, I spoke to Marcia. ‘What happens if I quit my job, drop this house, go all the way out there and then Wilson starts drinking again?”
“He really is a Christian now. I know; I saw him crying on his knees on my living room floor. I was there.”

I still didn’t think I loved Wilson and didn’t trust that he was really going to stay sober. And I most definitely didn’t believe he was really a Christian. But I knew I wasn’t happy being a single mom trying to buy a house I didn’t like in a neighborhood I hated. I also knew I’d have to be evening charge nurse for awhile. When Andrew started school in the fall, I’d never see him.

I also knew I was an angry, bitter woman and if I kept going that way - my heart filled to the brim with hate - I’d end up like some of the bitter, old women I had worked with in the nursing homes. I decided moving couldn’t be worse than living here.

We sat around the dinner table with Mickey, Joy and my kids. We made a commitment to each other that we were going to stick together and move as a family. Grandma and Grandpa were having their 50th wedding anniversary and later that summer was my class reunion, so we decided to wait and move in late August, before school started. I’d have to prepare the house for sale and hire a realtor.

"God, please help us. Please save our family."

.
Andrew was a happy, outgoing kid. One of his favorite games was running and hiding behind the living room chair as soon as he heard his dad's car pull up outside. Wilson then came in and made a big deal about trying to find him. Andrew would squeal and laugh when his dad finally crept over and grabbed him.

When Andrew played outside, I had to keep an eye on him. Turn your back for just a minute and he'd be up on the neighbor's porch ringing their doorbell. On a Friday in early May, Wilson and I worked all day penning Andrew in with a fence around the yard. Andrew and I then went to spend that night at my dad's. Cheri called me there the next day, upset. While we were gone, Wilson had gone out drinking. Cheri's broken voice betrayed the strong mask she usually wore; she wanted me to do something to stop him.

"We were all over to Verlin's house," she told me, "Everyone was drinking, then my dad asked me to tie the tourniquet for him while he shot up. It was my 16th birthday and he was asking me to help him shoot up!"

"What happened? Why is he doing this when everything was going so good?"

"He said he felt under pressure." she answered without explanation, "He also plans on going to Texas on Monday."

I felt the color leave my face. Why would he want to go off and leave us? Not knowing what else to do, I called Elmer Dovetail.

"Don't be scared,” he said, "God will watch over your family. Believe it, and thank God for already having helped you."

I tried to do that. I told myself that I wasn't scared about what Andrew would do without Wilson; I wasn't scared that he wouldn't come home. I told myself that I wasn't scared that he would lie to me some more, that he didn't love me, or that I was going to lose my best friend, my son's father.

"God, please help us and Wilson. Please save our family."

It turned out one of Wilson's friends had a large amount of money in the bank and the possibility for fun and travel was too much to pass up. Two days later Wilson gathered some things and left for Texas. With no one to talk to, I wrote a letter to Andrew:

"If he was having problems, I would have listened. He didn't give me a chance. He didn't give me any warning. Now it's too late, because once he starts drinking its almost impossible to get him to quit. I wish I could stop him somehow. I wish I could make him come back. I wish he wasn't an alcoholic. I do love him.
I pray, but he still drinks. So maybe prayers don't work. Maybe if I had more faith the prayers would work.
I haven't eaten since Sunday. I can't eat when I'm scared."

A couple days later Andrew heard a car across the street. He squealed with glee, and ran behind the living room chair, waiting. After several minutes, he peeked out from behind the chair and called, "Daddy! Come get me!"

"Daddy isn't here Andrew."

Andrew was silent a moment, and then stepped out, his lip quivering and eyes beginning to water, "Where's Daddy?"
.

I heard rumors that Savannah had been beaten and molested by Annie’s boyfriend out near Mission. It was a rumor said in passing; it was just part of a conversation. I’m not even sure who said it.

Late one night during that ricing season some relatives drove up to Dorothy's house. Wilson and Dorothy went outside to talk to them. I stayed inside knowing it was none of my business. From the window I could hear Savannah screaming and crying, "I want my mom! I want my mom!"

Annie was gone again, drinking, and no one wanted the responsibility of keeping the girls. Poor Savannah, she knew that no one really wanted her and Candis, so she screamed for her mom to let her aunts and uncles know that she didn't want them either. I'm not sure who finally took the girls or where they went, but they didn't stay at Dorothy's.


Ricing was almost over.

"My dad said this will be the last time we rice together," Wilson told me ruefully.Walter had a feeling and just "knew" this was the last time. His dad wouldn't come out and say something like that unless it was true.


At home, Wilson’s daughter Cheri had stopped coming on the weekends. She spent time with her friends instead. I was sorry she didn't want to see us but also secretly relieved and even more relieved when Misty also quit coming. The fewer kids to take care of, the easier the weekends were. Besides, we never really went anywhere anymore, except to visit my family, and Wilson didn't go with us. It was easier the fewer children I had.

We were hearing from Junior and Joy that Cheri and Misty were running around. The little ones also said that their mother was paying the older girls to steal cigarettes from their corner store.

Sitting on the warm sidewalk with Junior and Joy one morning, I wondered why I was hanging around. Why couldn't I just walk away?

Suddenly, Joy looked up at me, smiled, and asked a question. Junior laughed at her question, and I hugged them both.


Maybe God wants me to stay here for them.