Within days of the sentencing several black churches in South Niagara were vandalized including the African Methodist Episcopal Church which Hadrian Johnson had attended. Small fires were started along Howard Avenue in a predominantly black neighborhood and young black boys reported being threatened by older white boys on their way home from school.

  No one would tell me of these developments—the white backlash. I would read of them, piecemeal, over a period of time—weeks, months.

  Imagining a white backlash like something in the river—discolored, frothing water, thirty-foot-long snakes churning and writhing. Almost I could see this, the terrifying rush of the white backlash lapping against the rocky shore of the Niagara River . . .

  By which time I was living in Port Oriskany. Eighty miles away. With Mom’s youngest sister Irma (who had always liked me, though she’d liked Miriam and Katie a little better) and her husband Oscar Allyn.

  They’d always wanted children, it was said. It had been a mystery to me as a child, why.

  For a long time waking confused and frightened in this new place, in this new bed. Not knowing where I was, or why. Desperate and hopeful thinking that I would contact the South Niagara police, the school principal, Ms. Micaela—The bat. I was wrong about the bat. I never saw the bat. The bat is lost, no one has ever found my brother’s bat.

  Safe House

  SAFE FROM NOW ON, VIOLET.

  Very quickly it happens, an underage child can become a ward of the county.

  For the protection of the child, the child must be removed from an unsafe home environment.

  Officers for Children’s Protective Services are as empowered as law enforcement officers and can act as swiftly. It is their task to protect the endangered child. It is not their task to placate the wishes of any adult nor is it their task to determine if a child is telling the truth, or some degree of the truth. By the time truth is established a child might be severely injured or dead.

  And so, without being allowed to return to my home and with just a single telephone call to my mother I was “removed” from my family and placed in a “safe house” for the time being—a foster home for traumatized children and adolescents of whom a number had been beaten and/or sexually abused by relatives predominantly fathers and older brothers.

  (Though there were others who’d been beaten, abused, left to starve by their mothers.)

  (And others who were retarded, or mentally ill, from households where adults were mentally ill and dangerous to the well-being of children.)

  (And others who were runaways—a category that overlapped with the traumatized.)

  I had not told anyone that either of my parents had ever physically injured me or even threatened to physically injure me and yet it seemed to be taken for granted that indeed I had been injured, traumatized, threatened by one or both of my parents as well as by my brother Lionel. It was explained to me that my family situation did not provide safety for me at the present time; a Family Court judge had approved the order of removal, particularly since my older brothers were prime suspects in the Hadrian Johnson murder, and one of them lived in the house with me.

  In the foster home we moved like zombies fearful of being touched. Fearful of being spoken-to, looked-at.

  Is mental illness contagious? Mental retardation? I did not want to think so.

  Recalling how we’d stared with fascinated dread at Liza Deaver. Liza Lizard. And if poor Liza glanced in our direction we looked quickly away, turned away giggling together.

  No no no. I am nothing like you. Don’t look at me!

  In the foster home there came a frequent dream in which the outer layer of my skin was peeled off and oozed blood. In such dreams headaches like corkscrews began and grew worse through the day after I woke up dazed and groggy.

  We were allotted aspirin in the facility. Low-dose child aspirin that had no effect upon the hurt in my brain at all.

  Here was a surprise—I’d been removed from school as well.

  School! But I loved school . . .

  It was explained to me that I would be allowed to return to school—soon.

  Also, it was revealed to me that my family did not want me back—ever.

  My mother and Miriam arrived at the foster home to bring me some of my things. Clothes, books haphazardly tossed into cardboard boxes that were soiled and torn. Winter boots, in a shopping bag with a broken handle. Fleece-lined jacket. Toothbrush, comb. (Both looking battered and shameful to see.) My mother and sister were allowed into the facility only after showing IDs at a security desk and submitting to an interrogation my mother considered “insulting” and for which she seemed to blame me.

  When I saw my mother I rushed to her, to be hugged. I was crying, my swollen eyes leaked tears.

  But Mom did not hug me, not exactly. Her arms lifted—weakly. It was all she could do not to push me away.

  “Violet. What have you done.”

  Her voice was faint yet accusing. A soft fading wail of despair.

  It was a shock to me, I was nearly Mom’s height. A gangling big girl at twelve and soon to be thirteen, wishing I could shrink to a smaller size to the Violet Rue of just a few years ago when my mother and my father too had loved me.

  Still I was wanting to think that Mom and Miriam had come to get me. So badly I yearned to be taken home, I did not immediately absorb the meaning of the cardboard boxes.

  It was true—I was frightened of Lionel. But Lionel had been arrested by this time . . .

  Yes, Lionel been arrested. But no he was not in police custody.

  His bail bond, like Jerome Jr.’s, had been posted by my father and so Lionel was still living in the house and in this way presented a clear and present danger for me in the eyes of Children’s Protective Services.

  Rat bitch. Rat cunt. We’ll take your fucking head off.

  The bail bond for manslaughter was much lower than the bail bond for homicide would have been. Still, Daddy had had to present a cashier’s check ($60,000) to the South Niagara district court, to assure that Jerome Jr. and Lionel would not flee before their crimes had been adjudicated; for most of this money he’d had to take out a second mortgage on the house.

  It was Miriam who informed me of this news. For my mother could barely bring herself to speak to me at all.

  Miriam saying to me, in a whisper, as if a whisper were less accusatory, yes sure there was a chance our parents would “lose” the house. What’d I think? Was I stupid?

  My mother’s hands leapt to her face. As if, not wanting to hear what Miriam had whispered, she’d covered her (bloodshot) eyes instead of her ears.

  Miriam exchanged a quick savage glance with me. Meaning—don’t upset Mom. Try.

  The visit did not last long. Fifteen minutes? Ten? Slow—at first—as the cranking-up of a roller-coaster ride, as the doomed car ascends the first, sickening hilly loop of track. But then, fast.

  Staring at boxes with my things in them on the floor of the cell-like room without recognizing what they were and what they meant.

  In a halting voice at last my mother spoke. Through a buzzing in my ears I heard some of what she said.

  Violet how could you! Ruining our lives.

  Your father can’t even talk about it. Can’t talk about you.

  As long as you can stay here you’d better. There’s no place for you at home.

  And don’t you dare cry! This is all your doing.

  I had not been away from my mother for more than a few days. In this time she seemed to have aged. Her skin was floury-white. Beside her mouth were deepening lines. Her eyelids, like mine, were reddened and swollen. She was swallowing compulsively as if the interior of her mouth was very dry. (As Katie would tell me later, Mom has been sedated. No one knew exactly how many pills she was taking but no one was supposed to speak of it.)

  Mom was frowning, distracted. A fly was buzzing at the ceiling.

  At a window, another fly. (Or was it the same fly?) (Or were there more than two flies in the room?)

  Mom fell silent as if she’d run out of words, and was exhausted. Miriam took up the task explaining to me with twitchy smiles that no matter if Lionel was at home or not I would not be returning home—“Not for a while, Violet.”

  Instead, “arrangements were being made” for me to live with my aunt Irma and my uncle Oscar Allyn in Port Oriskany, which was eighty miles away.

  I heard these words, carefully spoken by Miriam. But I did not really absorb them for I was waiting for Mom to refute them, and to look at me.

  Oh no, Violet. Of course—you are coming home with us. Right now!

  These words I wanted so badly to hear, it would seem to me afterward that my mother had actually spoken them in a trembling voice.

  Instead Miriam was saying evasively: “Daddy is very upset, Violet. You know how he can get. Right now, it’s pretty extreme. He says he doesn’t want you back home—he doesn’t want to see your face. He can’t get over how you ‘went outside the family’—didn’t tell him about Jerr and Lionel. And claimed you didn’t feel ‘safe’ at home. Police had a warrant to come into the house. They’ve been questioning all of us! Even Mom! We’re hoping Daddy will change his mind—in a while. You know, if Jerr and Lionel don’t get sent away . . .”

  Sent away. I might have surmised that my brothers were likely to be incarcerated yet it had not exactly occurred to me that they would be sent away.

  “Oh, God”—Mom gave a little cry of pain. She couldn’t remain here in this terrible place, she said. Couldn’t breathe here. She would wait for Miriam out in the car.

  This was something that one of us might’ve said, as children. Rick, or Les, or Katie, or me. I don’t like it here, I’ll wait out in the car.

  It was not something an adult would say. It was not something our mother would say. Yet Mom said these words in a hurt, petulant voice, and turned, and walked out of the room, unsteady on her feet but with determination.

  I followed limping to the door. Helplessly stared after her. I’d been taken by surprise and had not the strength to call after her—Mom! Mommy . . .

  “Violet!”—Miriam spoke sharply. “You haven’t been listening.”

  “I—I have been . . . I have been listening . . .”

  “Mom isn’t feeling well. I had to drive here. Since you—since—falling down the steps, cutting your head—then at your school—saying those things about . . . Well, since all these things, Mom has been very upset, and of course Daddy—Daddy has been worse. You’re lucky you are here, Violet. Frankly.”

  Again Miriam explained: —my aunt Irma, Port Oriskany, transfer to a new school. For I could not remain at home, Daddy was adamant about that. And no other relatives in South Niagara would take me in. Rat they were calling me. Never forgive ratting on her own brothers. Saying her parents abused her.

  Miriam spoke rapidly, evasively. In one breath telling me that the situation was hopeless, everyone hated me and would never forgive me, and in the next breath assuring me that Daddy would (maybe) change his mind but not for a while—“You know what Daddy is like . . .”

  Trying to recall, had I told police that my parents had abused me? I had no memory of this, it had to be a mistake. The woman police officer had misheard me when she’d questioned me at school. But—

  Miriam wasn’t interested. Whatever I was trying to say, trying to explain, she wasn’t interested, her eyes flashed with tears of exasperation, dislike.

  My sister I adored but could not trust now. For clearly Miriam was on their side.

  Roughly hugging me goodbye, kissing me on the forehead. Pressing three ten-dollar bills into my hand—“This is from me, Vi’let. In case you need something. Don’t tell anybody I gave it to you, OK? Not even Katie? Promise?”

  Runaway

  GOT AS FAR AS THE LOCK STREET BRIDGE BEFORE THEY caught me.

  Five miles from the safe house to the bridge. On foot, much of the time running / limping.

  It was strange, my knee did not hurt so much now. Or if there was hurt, it seemed far away like something occurring in a distant room. For I was desperate to get back home where (I wanted to think) Daddy would forgive me when he saw me. Daddy would let me return to my old room.

  At the foster home it was runaways who were admired, envied. Runaways who were the toughest kids. (One of the girls, a little older than me, sulky and silent, had smudged, angry-looking tattoos up and down her arms.)

  Surprising that Violet Rue should be one of them—a runaway.

  After my mother and my sister left, God damn that I would cry.

  Hugging myself tight, arms crossed over my chest, shoulders hunched and face shut up tight as a fist.

  No bullshit. Nobody fuck with me.

  There were black kids in the facility. I felt dread, that they might know whose sister I was. That they might guess.

  Except I was just “Vi-yet” to them—if they knew any name for me at all.

  And maybe they felt sorry for me. Dazed-looking white girl, with a (soiled) big square Band-Aid on her forehead, something wrong with her left knee that made her wince and limp.

  In the facility last names didn’t matter. Family names, adults’ names did not apply.

  Daddy had never liked it, the name Kerrigan called up associations with his politician uncle. In South Niagara people tended to either love Tom Kerrigan or hate Tom Kerrigan so there was the feeling you were being wrongly judged.

  But now, with Jerome Jr. and Lionel arrested, their names, faces on the front page of the newspaper, Kerrigan would become yet more notorious.

  And there was the blunt terrible headline:

  12-YEAR-OLD SISTER OF SUSPECTS

  Provides “Crucial Information” to South Niagara Police

  Hadrian Johnson Investigation Continues

  Fortunately there had been no picture of me in the paper. Not even my name. My brothers were not so lucky for their pictures would appear prominently many times, in many media outlets.

  It had not been difficult to escape from the safe house. What the staff knew of me was that I was one of those pathetic children who’d had to be removed from her family, for safety; I did not impress them as being daring enough to run away back to that family, and risk further harm.

  In the early morning before dawn. Before others were awake.

  Skinny enough to push through a narrow space (window opened at the bottom, just a few inches) the way an animal would—one of those desperate creatures who, to be freed from a trap, would gnaw off a paw with their teeth.

  Taking nothing with me. Just clothes I was wearing. The fleece-lined jacket with wadded, stiff old tissues in the pockets.

  Making my way through underbrush outside the house. Avoiding the long cracked asphalt driveway.

  Knowing then to run not on the shoulder of the highway but beside it. Through fields, vacant lots. Behind billboards and along a railroad track.

  Some of the soil was marshy, muddy with a thin crust of ice on top. Much of it was littered with the debris of broken trees. Burrs clung to my jeans and thorns tore at my hands.

  Thrilling to be outdoors, out of the safe house.

  I would never return, I thought. They could not make me.

  Wildly I thought—I will hide in our house. In the cellar. No one will know.

  At the city limits the highway joined a major roadway called Denis Boulevard. Now there was traffic. Fields disappeared but there were vacant lots, alleys through which I could make my way. There began to be sidewalks. Swiftly I walked here, I did not dare to run. I did not wish to appear suspicious in the eyes of strangers. I did not wish to call attention to myself in any way and yet it seemed that vehicles slowed, their occupants stared at me.

  A girl! Alone.

  Why is that girl running, alone . . .

  As I approached Lock Street, and then the Lock Street Bridge, which would bring me to Black Rock Street and to my house, I began to feel frightened. As if an anesthetic were fading my knee began to hurt. Miriam had warned me—He doesn’t want to see your face.

  At the bridge the pain in my knee intensified. My legs became weak. I could not seem to catch my breath. Wind from the river made my eyes water. Below, the Niagara River rushed dark and glittering in patches like the scales of a great snake but there were no black snakes visible in the water near shore. There was no oily-chemical odor to turn my stomach.

  Leaning against the railing of the bridge, feeling suddenly tired. On the pedestrian walkway with my back to traffic. Recalling the morning when Katie and I had seen the snakes in the river.

  Not long ago. Yet it seemed long ago.

  The morning of the day when Hadrian Johnson had been struck down.

  The morning of the day when Hadrian Johnson would begin to die.

  There came a sharp male voice behind me—“Hello? Miss?”

  A South Niagara police cruiser had glided to a stop beside the walkway. One of the officers had rolled down his window and was staring at me.

  He’d recognized me, I thought. Children’s Protective Services had sent out an alarm.

  Quickly I turned away. Trying not to panic. It would be (falsely) claimed by both police officers that I’d begun climbing over the railing of the Lock Street Bridge, to throw myself in the river, and in that instant the officer nearer me was out of the cruiser and rushing at me fiercely shouting—“No! Stop!” Always I would remember, he was faster than I was. And how fast he was. Gripped my arm, dragged me back from the railing, harder than I could have imagined any adult man might grip me, and when I struggled, sobbing and screaming at him to let me go, he did what law enforcement officers are trained to do, without a moment’s hesitation gripping my arm harder, really hard, behind my back, and raising it, even as he tripped me off-balance so that I fell to the plank walkway, now paralyzed with pain, a pain so intense in my upper arm that I could not even scream, I could not even draw breath, losing consciousness as swiftly as a light is switched off.

  He hadn’t even asked my name. Hadn’t taken time. Needing to know only that I was a ward of the court, a runaway. And that was the way South Niagara cops treated runaways.