11 December 2012
“Tell me what you remember,” said Rita.
“Hmm,” I breathed as I drummed my good fingers along the desk. Looking around, this place was a hell of a lot nicer than Aunt Lynn’s dingy apartment. It was nice and clean and didn’t reek of tobacco. “Well, I was in my aunt’s apartment and she had made dinner, for once. It was veggie soup,” I explained. I would’ve rather eaten the crusty food in the week-old take out boxes on the kitchen table than anything Aunt Lynn prepared herself. “I didn’t want any, though, so she just kept yellin’ ‘til I got up.” I couldn’t stand her nagging voice, I couldn’t stand where she lived; I couldn’t stand anything about that woman. Ever since I was a kid, I’ve hated Aunt Lynn. Probably the same way Aunt Lynn hated her own family. Mom used to tell me all the stories about growing up with her. Honestly, I can’t imagine growing up with anyone as sinister as Aunt Lynn. “So I got up and took the bowl,” I said, “but I told her I wasn’t hungry.”
“And then what happened, did you eat it anyway?”
“Nope,” I said with a smile, “I poured it on her.”
The way Rita’s cheery expression transformed into that of someone who had just watched a kitten get run over by a car told me she loved her job until it came to working with kids like me. I guess you have to love working with troubled kids if your title is a counselor at the Greensville Department of Child Protective Services. Unfortunately for Rita, I wasn’t the typical child abuse case.
“How did your aunt react?” Rita asked, eyeballing me with artificial curiosity.
“Do I really have to explain,” I asked, narrowing my eyes as I raised my bandaged right hand, “or do my cuts and bruises not speak for themselves?” She opened her mouth to rebut, but I cut her off. “She said I didn’t know the feelin’ of pain, even though my whole family died last week. The stove was still on from her makin’ dinner and the alcohol was still bubblin’ in her sadistic head.” I continued with a rising volume, “and now, here I am, sittin’ in your office at Child Protective Services answerin’ questions you already know the answers to. So how ‘bout this, Rita: you tell me what the hell happened.” All sympathy Rita had for me five minutes ago was gone. She opened my file and shuffled through the papers. “Well, you had been placed in the care of your aunt this past week, but with her alcohol abuse problems and your anger episodes, it would seem you two weren’t the best match,” she said.
“Glad y’all looked into it really hard before you decided to put me in the hands of a woman who’s out her alcoholic mind,” I spat.
“Lynn Anderson’s records show she had finished rehabilitation for alcohol dependency two years ago and has not been in trouble with the law since then,” Rita stated.
“Betcha she relapsed the second after readin’ the letter y’all sent her sayin’ I was gonna be livin’ with her,” I laughed. “The old hag hates me, she hates my mom; she hates everyone. Glad she’s in her place now, though. It’s been a long time comin’.”
“You’re glad you put your aunt in the hospital? I don’t think that’s a very good way of thinking about this situation.”
“Y’all are gonna learn real fast that I don’t have a very good way of thinkin’ ‘bout stuff,” I mused. “Like now, for instance. Where am I goin’ now, Rita, dope-dealin’ Uncle Doug in Michigan?”
“I think we’ve talked enough for today, Kay,” she said as she put everything back in the envelope before slamming it down on the desk.
Orphan - Pt. 1 • Opuss № I