II

  “Praying for Violet”

  VIOLET, HERE. A LETTER FOR YOU . . .”

  My aunt Irma could not have been more surprised, turning the letter over in her hand, frowning suspiciously.

  “The return address is South Niagara. Do you know anyone named G. Pyne? On Highgate Avenue?”

  Wanting to snatch the letter from my aunt. My letter! But I knew to be cautious.

  It was possible, my mother had warned Aunt Irma who was her younger sister not to allow me to receive letters from Geraldine Pyne . . . (But then, Aunt Irma would not have shown me the letter, would she? I was too confused to think clearly.)

  This letter was the first that had come for me in Port Oriskany. Weeks I’d been living here, in the beige-brick house on Erie Street that was so much tidier and quieter than my family home, and no one had written to me, and if there had been telephone calls between Aunt Irma and my mother, I did not know about them.

  Furiously my mother hissed in my ear—They look down their noses at us. People like that. Don’t tell me.

  Often in my new life I had to shake my head to clear it of my mother’s admonishing voice. It was a dread of mine, that others might hear these hissing words as one might hear a radio whose volume has been turned very low.

  And often I was slow-witted, sleepy. My eyelids were heavy. I watched the mouths of others (adults) to try to determine the tone of what they were saying for I did not always comprehend what they were saying. By the time a question came to its end, I had forgotten the beginning.

  Vaguely I shook my head yes.

  Or, might’ve been no.

  I had forgotten what my aunt had asked me, that was so urgent. My heart beat quickly in anticipation of danger, or of a sudden undeserved surprise.

  Reluctantly Aunt Irma surrendered the letter to me. It was clear that she did not trust me—of course, no one in the family could trust me. But Aunt Irma seemed to like me, and to wish (it seemed) that I might like her.

  Childless, my mother’s younger sister was. Whispered in the family. Like a curse.

  “Thank you, Aunt Irma.”

  It was an effort to speak clearly. If you are sleepy your words have an inclination to go soft, slur. Often bizarre dream-figures crowded near to observe me with unnatural interest like piranha fish approaching their prey with caution. So intensely did these creatures listen to what I managed to say, trying to determine the degree of my alertness, and my ability to defend myself against their attack, that I often lost the thread of what I had myself said.

  She expects you to open the letter in front of her. She wants to know what is in it.

  But I would not satisfy my aunt’s curiosity by opening this precious letter in her presence nor would I speak of it afterward for I could not share the small allotments of “news” of my life with anyone—there was so little of it. Instead I went away, upstairs into the room designated as my room, which had a door without a lock but which door could certainly be closed, firmly; and there I read Geraldine’s letter eagerly, tears flooding my eyes so that I could hardly make out the neat schoolgirl handwriting of my closest friend.

  Dear Violet,

  I miss you. I am sorry that you are so far away . . .

  It would be a mystery to me how Geraldine had acquired my address in Port Oriskany. Eventually I would ask my sisters but neither Miriam nor Katie claimed to know anything about Geraldine Pyne.

  My mother? This did not seem likely.

  I might have asked Geraldine herself but I did not. Though I cherished her letters, of which there would be just three, and have kept them all these years moving from one place to another, I did not reply to her—not once.

  I began letters to my friend but never finished them. Oh, why? Why not?

  Eventually Geraldine ceased writing, and I lost her address.

  Of Geraldine’s three precious letters it is the last that is the most beautiful and which I have read, reread, memorized. Often I hear Geraldine’s words, in Geraldine’s voice, in my ears; it is comforting to me as music I have heard many times.

  Dear Violet,

  I miss you! I wish that you would answer my letter(s).

  Are you going to school there? Your desk is empty in homeroom and in all your classes and your locker is empty. Ms. Micaela has asked about you but no one knows what to say except you are “gone.”

  I asked Mom if you could live with us because there is plenty of room in our house. We could share my room or you could have your own room. But Mom said she guessed that might not work out though it was a “very kind” idea. I asked why it would not work out, and Mom said, “Violet has her own family. They will want her back. They will love her again.”

  I am praying for you, Violet. That this will be so.

  Your friend forever,

  Geraldine

  Exile

  IN THE FIRST YEAR OF BEING DISOWNED I SENT HOMEMADE birthday cards to my family. (I remembered all their birthdays!) The pleasure was so intense it was almost painful, carefully writing out the address—388 Black Rock St., South Niagara, New York.

  Even my brothers who were incarcerated at the Mid-State Correctional Facility at Marcy, New York, received cards from me. At least I sent cards. Of course, they did not answer.

  Eventually I gave up making cards. There was such childish hope in these cards, I began to feel pitiful even to myself like a dog whose tail is thump-thump-thumping long after everyone has abandoned him.

  Instead I sent postcards. Chautauqua Mountains in autumn, Lake Ontario in winter, Niagara Falls shrouded in mist like ectoplasm. Staring down the steep nightmare sides of the Erie Canal at Port Oriskany where I was sent to live with my mother’s youngest sister Irma and her husband Oscar who had no children of their own.

  Why did I continue for years, more years than I would wish to admit, to send cards that were never answered?—no one would ask this question who’d been disowned.

  Because you never give up. You never stop hoping.

  In my case hoping that Daddy would notice one of my cards sent to someone else in the family, to Katie for instance, and take time to read it as (I had to assume) he wouldn’t take time to read one of the cards addressed to him but would rip up the card at once; and, having read it, been moved, or impressed . . .

  Never stop hoping because if you do, what remains?

  Imagining the first words they will say to you—We are so sorry! We did not mean it.

  Or—We did not understand.

  . . . all a misunderstanding.

  Careful schoolgirl handwriting on the cards. Careful not to say anything that might possibly offend. Each message very brief. Naive, innocent. Unaccusing. Yes, each card was an appeal but (I hoped) not an obvious shameful appeal. Each card was matter-of-fact, casting no shadow. The hope was that, asking for no sympathy, no pity, both sympathy and pity might be extended to me, who asked for so little. (Vain) hope of making my parents feel sorry for me and regret having sent me into exile; to make them consider (I wanted to think) rescinding my exile and inviting me back to the house on Black Rock Street where (I wanted to think) there was still a room for me, the second-floor room I’d shared with my sister Katie from which, in time, Katie herself would move and leave vacant . . .

  How is the weather there in South Niagara? Here it is all snow—6 feet outside my window.

  Or, Here it is terribly hot. Not even July & many mosquitoes!

  Rarely, I might venture a timid fact. Starting 10th grade. Have to take the bus, it’s too far to walk. (Two miles.)

  Aunt Irma was in the hospital for four days (gallbladder). But she is doing well now & says hello.

  (Did my aunt ask to say hello? Certainly not. I would never have told her that I was writing to my parents.)

  Eventually I would write on the back of a postcard of the Horseshoe Falls in jubilant sunshine Graduating on June 15, will be giving valedictorian address at Port Oriskany High & have scholarship for St. Lawrence U. in fall.

  Of all the cards it was this card I’d hoped might merit a response. For here was something for which the Kerrigan family might be proud. But my parents did not write nor did my mother call her sister (my aunt) to inquire.

  It’s so, my sisters did send me cards a few times. The plainest, least expensive thank-you cards signed with just their names—Miriam, Katie. As if they were afraid to write anything more. Afraid to sign Love.

  All these years I’ve made sure that my parents have my current address. Telephone number. Thinking that one day Daddy will decide it’s enough, his little girl has been punished enough, impulsively he will call the number he currently has for me, and if I fail to answer, he will never call again (for that was Daddy’s way, he took offense when you least expected it) but if he calls, and I answer, Daddy will say in his loud happy voice—Hey-yyy—that you, Violet Rue ? Been missing you like hell.

  Sleepwalker

  IN THE SCHOOL LIBRARY IN STUDY PERIOD FEELING MY HEAD grow impossibly heavy, eyelids drooping so that the print of the page blurs and swims. Laying my head on my arms, on the table. And the librarian Ms. Schaeffer wakes me gently, pityingly.

  Kerrigan, Kerrigan. As killers can.

  But this one is a RAT.

  But no, Ms. Schaeffer’s mouth moves differently. She is saying something else, words I can’t comprehend.

  “Violet! You can’t sleep here.”

  Immediately my head has lifted from the table. My eyes have snapped open. I am sorry, I try to explain to whichever adult this is looming over me and finding me an annoyance. In my voice is the weak appeal Forgive me!

  Suddenly, I have to go to the restroom. Badly.

  Panicked, my need to urinate comes so quickly. A seizure between my legs. Stammering to the startled librarian another apology, and limping away crouched over as if my back is broken.

  Is that her?—Kerrigan.

  Rat!

  It is true that I am slow-witted in this new school. It is true that I am often lost. Sleepwalking with eyes open. Wandering corridors in the wrong part of the school. Ninth grade? Eighth grade? After weeks still confused where the gym is, and where the cafeteria is. Sleepy-headed. Also, hearing-impaired.

  “Violet? Violet! The bell has rung, you should go to your next class now . . .”

  (Not asking Is something wrong?—they all know that something is wrong.)

  Though usually I arrive at a classroom just as the final bell rings and so I am rarely marked tardy.

  Once I am in the correct room, and in the correct desk, and if I can stay awake long enough I am a “good”—“attentive”—“industrious” student. (Noted on my report card by all my teachers.) My grade on quizzes ranges from 97 percent to 44 percent. My homework grades are more reliably high—most of my waking life in my aunt and uncle’s tidy beige-brick home on Erie Street is consumed by homework which is much harder here than it had ever been in South Niagara, like shoveling wet sand endlessly on a beach stretching to the horizon.

  It’s worth it, I am sure. Whatever effort. Perseverance.

  For high grades will impress my parents, and shorten the period of my exile.

  (I have no doubt that Aunt Irma reports on me to my parents, or at least to my mother. Can’t believe that my mother refuses to hear such prideful news of me, that reflects well on the Kerrigan family, or that my father whom I adore will not even hear my name spoken, that the very syllables of my name are a blade in Daddy’s heart. Can’t believe that no one cares about me really. As it is said we can’t imagine the world without us.)

  In the new school there are black students who regard me impassively, at a distance. If they have heard murmured taunts it is likely that they are utterly perplexed. Why? Why her?

  Certainly, I have no black friends in Port Oriskany. But then, I have no white friends in Port Oriskany either.

  A sly voice murmurs alongside my head. Drifting off to sleep standing upright I am wakened with a start.

  “‘Ker-ri-gan’—that’s your name? Yes? D’you have a relative who’s a politician? In Niagara Falls?”

  One of the adults waylays me in a corridor. Ninth-grade math teacher with wiry hair and eyebrows like steel wool notorious for his sarcasm.

  “Or was it—a trial? Some politician, maybe a mayor, state congressman, on trial? Guilty? Sent to prison?”

  Blocking my way. Smiling at me. Something cruel and greedy in his suet-eyes.

  “No? You’re sure? Well, the name is familiar, for some reason . . . Maybe there are a lot of ‘Ker-ri-gans.’”

  Pushing past the jeering man, frantic to escape. Suddenly I am wide-awake.

  The Iceberg

  SOMETIMES, A FIST IN MY HAIR.

  Girl! Wake up.

  And when I awakened whoever had closed his fist in my hair had retreated, whispering and laughing.

  More than one of them. I would not want to see their faces.

  It was nothing personal, I wanted to think. I had read of chickens rushing at one of their own stricken with illness, scabs. The fury of the healthy for the unhealthy. How weakness cries out to be devoured.

  That phrase, with words meant to be ugly and harsh acquired nonetheless a strange tenderness. For what I was being accused of was love, loving. I would wonder if I deserved it.

  IT WAS THE NEW YEAR. AND THEN IT WAS LATE WINTER, THE FIRST thaw in April and melted ice water rushing frenzied in gutters, spilling across rooftops.

  News came to me, my brothers who were incarcerated in the prison facility at Marcy were appealing their convictions.

  Or rather, the new lawyer my father had hired to represent them was appealing their convictions

  It would be argued that the baseball bat belonging to Jerome Kerrigan Jr. had been illegally seized by South Niagara police. Its whereabouts had been disclosed to police officers by the (juvenile) sister of the accused who’d been led into ratting on them by a police officer without benefit of a parent or a guardian. If the bat is excluded, DNA evidence acquired from the bat must be excluded. The case against the Kerrigans becomes circumstantial, the convictions must be overturned.

  If this was so there would be new negotiations with the prosecutor. Why would any of the four boys plead guilty even to manslaughter, without DNA evidence linking the Kerrigan brothers to the bat? No murder weapon in evidence, anyone might have harassed and beaten Hadrian Johnson that night on Delahunt Road with any weapon.

  The single eyewitness might change his account. All he’d need to say was It was dark, I can’t be sure what I saw.

  Through a rushing sound like a distant waterfall these possibilities came to me. Not meaning to eavesdrop I would hear my aunt Irma and my uncle Oscar speaking together in lowered voices.

  Poor Lula!—Irma murmured. What a terrible time this has been for her . . .

  And Oscar would say dryly—Well. It’s been a pretty terrible time for the family of the black boy, too.

  There was no doubt in my uncle’s mind that my brothers had killed Hadrian Johnson. Or, one of them had killed Hadrian Johnson and the other had assisted. What my aunt thought wasn’t so clear.

  Within families, it’s best not to think at all. Just—not at all.

  When I’d first come to live with Aunt Irma and Uncle Oscar, Aunt Irma had tried to hug me often in the (mistaken) assumption that because my family had cast me out, and my mother no longer hugged me, or would even speak with me on the phone, a hug from her, my mother’s sister, would be welcomed. And if I didn’t hug back but stood stiffly, holding my breath, eyes downcast, this did not entirely dissuade her. Violet is very shy. Violet is—what’s it called?—“traumatized.”

  I cried often. I am ashamed now to recall. As if tears have ever helped anyone. Even Aunt Irma cautioned me, I would make myself sick if I cried so often, and so hard.

  Aunt Irma too was easily moved to tears. She liked to speak of the many times she’d spent with me when I’d been a little, little girl helping my mother with child care, staying overnight in the bustling house on Black Rock Street. Many times she’d bathed me, sprinkled my tender little bottom with talcum powder and given me a fresh new diaper. Pushed me in a stroller along the sidewalk where there were cracks so the ride wasn’t so smooth but bump bump bump that made me giggle. Did I remember?—Irma asked hopefully.

  Vaguely I would nod, smile. As a doll might nod, smile. Though I did not remember I would not want my aunt to know how little she mattered in my life then or now.

  My uncle Oscar was not so sentimental. He’d given in to his wife’s pleas that they take her sister’s daughter into their household but often his eyes wandered over me baffled—who the hell was this awkward girl, this stranger at mealtimes eating his food, limping up the stairs, shrinking from him in the hallway and in the vicinity of the (single, second-floor) bathroom, avoiding his eyes. There was no question of Oscar Allyn hugging me to comfort me when I burst into tears. In Oscar’s presence I was not inclined to burst into tears. At an accidental touch both of us would have leapt away, affrighted.

  You are not my father. Go away!

  Between us there was established a kind of understanding. A little distance. But between the woman and me, not sufficient distance.

  You are not my mother. Go away!

  I could not bear to see myself in the mirror. Learned to observe myself sidelong. And then with half-shut eyes. Where the scab at my hairline had fallen away there was a soft, creepy, lurid scar of which I was ashamed and which I tried to hide beneath wispy bangs.

  The injured knee was not so swollen now. My aunt took me to a clinic where someone alleged to be a doctor examined it briefly and said it would “heal” if I did not run or strain it.

  Yet, I had to run. The yearning to run was very powerful. Sometimes when I was outside and alone a sudden need came to me, like a sudden thirst, that I might run, and run; a fierce joy overtook me, like flames; I ran until my heart thudded in my chest and my knee did begin to ache, my legs grew weak.

  Rat, run! Wait till we catch you.

  It was a matter of fascination to me. Like the lyrics of a song trapped inside my brain. Over, over and over hearing. Over, over and over seeing how Lionel had come up behind me silently, stealthily to push me down the icy steps. So vivid the scene had become, I saw both of us clearly—the girl taken by surprise, the tall boy behind her pushing. It might’ve been a scene in a movie—I was sure that I had seen it.