(Well, sometimes Miriam and Katie helped Mommy with the garden, and sometimes your brothers but mostly what you remember is Mommy and you.)

  Spreading out sheets of newspaper on the ground so that you could kneel, as Mommy did. Weeding, pruning. Filling up a bushel basket to be dumped at the edge of the property. Compost. Where in a few inches of desiccated leaves and soil your brothers would one day bury the baseball bat they’d used to kill Hadrian Johnson, they hadn’t taken time to thoroughly clean.

  Until your arms ached, your vision blotched in bright sunshine and miniature suns and moons danced wherever you looked.

  So busy with the house and kids, Lula couldn’t get to the garden often enough. Hopeful in the early summer, planting seeds in methodical rows, putting in plants from the nursery, then in a few weeks weeds were choking everything, couldn’t keep the soil tilled, watered. Weeds, slugs. Japanese beetles. Every God-damned summer of her life, same thing.

  She wept. She cursed. Seven kids!—and the husband.

  Later, the grandfather would come to live with them. Complaining, leering at her legs in shorts that should’ve been slacks, the old sod had a foul mouth and such a bastard, almost you had to laugh.

  She’d laughed, mostly. Until she hadn’t.

  Early-morning Mom might sight a groundhog in the garden, a fat furry creature, surprisingly fast on its feet, scrambling to escape as she ran at him flailing her hands and screaming—Get away! God damn you!

  Cries of hurt, rage, incredulity as she discovered what the groundhog had devoured that morning.

  The little girl was distressed to see her mother so upset. Mommy in her garden appalled at the damage, tears streaming down her cheeks. Ravaged stalks of zinnias in bright happy colors—now just a few fallen petals on the ground. Ravaged tomato plants, just beginning to form green tomatoes round and hard as marbles. Some plants so ravaged and broken, you could not identify them.

  Mommy uttering words she could not (could she?) have meant—

  Can’t have anything! Not anything! Every God-damned thing I want is taken from me.

  The little girl knew to stand aside, at such times. To avoid Mommy’s swerving glaring eye seizing upon her.

  And you! All of you! God damn you . . .

  Truly, the little girl would not remember such outbursts. Angry shining tears on Mommy’s face, she would not remember. Years in exile seeing her own angry shining face in unexpected mirrors, sometimes in the very presence of strangers who did not and would never know her, even her name.

  Staring in a kind of exaltation. And you. All of you. God damn.

  OK, MOM. LET ME HANDLE IT.

  He’d laughed, it was something of a joke. Killing the groundhog appealed to Jerr, you could see.

  By this time we’d tried screaming at the animal. The little girl and the mother. And sometimes Katie. And sometimes Miriam. Clapping our hands, chasing it. With clumsy vehemence Mom had run at the panicked animal with a rake, bringing the rake down, hard. Grunting, as the rake leapt from her hands even as the groundhog escaped, easily.

  Running fatly, but fast. Disappearing into a burrow at the edge of the property.

  Jerr had this great plan, he’d heard from somewhere: drown the garden predator in its burrow. Sure he’d rather shoot the motherfucker to smithereens with a shotgun but he didn’t have a shotgun, not even a rifle, though Daddy had a rifle somewhere in the house unloaded and off-limits for his kids. Instead Jerr hooked up the longest lawn hose to a spigot at the back of the house, dragged the nuzzle to the burrow (which the little girl had pointed out to him), and turned on the water full blast as Mom watched from a little distance.

  As uneasily we watched. Katie and me. We did not want to see the animal drowned but we wanted Mommy not to cry and to be happy.

  At the mouth of the burrow Jerr squatted, peering into it as water rushed in. He wore a grimy baseball cap, reversed on his head. He wore a soiled black T-shirt, shorts. He was no more than thirteen or fourteen but already he resembled our father. In the boy’s sharp-boned face the hard, brutal male beauty of the father. Indifference, obliviousness to the pain of others.

  Water continued to gush from the hose and into the burrow, noisily. Either the water would drown the groundhog or “flush” it out so that Jerr could kill it by hitting it with a shovel—that was the plan. But after some suspenseful minutes water began to spill out of the top of the burrow, like vomit. No groundhog.

  Oh damn. God damn. It’s in there—I saw it . . .

  Mom dissolved in tears. Indignant, defeated.

  But one more time, another morning Jerr tried again with the hose, burrow, gushing water. And again no groundhog.

  (NEITHER HER BROTHER OR HER MOTHER KNEW: LITTLE VIOLET had—daringly—led Jerr to the wrong burrow.

  Several burrows in the backyard which were easy to confuse. Jerr never knew the difference between them and neither, it seemed, did Mom.)

  HOW’D MY BROTHER DIE? A PRISON GUARD SHOT HIM.

  It was claimed that inmates at Marcy had “rioted” and tried to take guards captive. But they were outmanned. Gunned down.

  Thirty at the time. Well—almost thirty-one.

  Strange to think he’d got that old—he’d been just a kid when I last saw him.

  What was he in for?—manslaughter.

  In bars entertaining men with tales of my family. My lost life. Easy to enthrall men if they are slightly older than you are. Never do I tell them that two of my brothers were incarcerated for the murder of a black high school boy. Never do I tell them my last name. If I tell them a last name it is not Kerrigan but Allyn. But usually, I tell no one a last name and usually, no one asks.

  Valentine

  EACH FEBRUARY I SEND A VALENTINE TO THE FAMILY OF Hadrian Johnson who continue to live at 29 Howard Street, South Niagara. It is a ceremonial gesture, I suppose. The money included is never much.

  I am not a worthless person, am I? This is proof.

  No one knows. There is no one in my life to know. Nor do the Johnsons know who sends the valentine since it is signed only Your Friend.

  However many small-denomination bills I have been able to put away in a drawer for the past twelve months, I include neatly folded inside the card for the Johnsons.

  Might be thirty dollars. Might be sixty-five dollars. This year ninety-two dollars. I am looking ahead to a time when it might be a thousand dollars. Five thousand!

  But that will not be for a while, I think.

  It is Hadrian Johnson’s mother Ethel who is listed in the South Niagara phone directory as the resident at 29 Howard Street. Probably other family members live with Mrs. Johnson, possibly the sisters who were named in the obituary, possibly one or more of the brothers. Could be a grandparent. Grandparents. Of course, I have no way of knowing. The obituary did not speak of a father.

  It is Ethel Johnson I envision, as I prepare the valentine. Hadrian’s mother I had seen on TV. Why would anyone want to hurt Hadrian who was so kind to everyone? Hadrian, who loved so many people . . .

  Shut my eyes and I see Ethel Johnson’s face stricken with grief. I see Hadrian Johnson’s young face.

  It is more of an effort to summon the faces of my brothers Jerome Jr. and Lionel than to summon these faces, of persons I’d never known. More of an effort to summon my own face that has grown hazy in memory.

  Is it a futile gesture, to send money to the Johnson family? Is it foolish, vain, self-deluding? Desperate?

  All these years since leaving home I’ve brought the obituary from the South Niagara Union Journal with me. I have no need to reread it for I’ve memorized it entirely. (Including the misspelling of Hadrian’s name.) I have memorized the face of the boy Hadrian Johnson, seventeen in the photograph.

  The clipping has become yellowed, torn. Though I keep it neatly folded and in an envelope.

  No other newspaper clippings. Nothing to remind me of that time!

  The (unmarked, plain) envelope containing the obituary, like the small-denomination bills I accumulate over twelve months, to send to Ethel Johnson, is kept in a secret place in anyplace I live for I do not want anyone to discover it.

  Like all my secrets, it is not likely to be revealed.

  The valentines I’ve sent to the Johnsons are homemade: construction paper, satiny crimson cutout hearts. Silver Magic Marker pen hand-printing HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY! Your Friend. You might think that a young person, possibly even a child, has made the (oversized) valentine which is so obviously the work of an amateur. You might think But why? Who is this? And why money?

  Mystified by the postmark which is not South Niagara.

  Probably the Johnsons assume (if they assume anything at all) that the valentine has been sent by someone they know. Someone who’d lived in the neighborhood but has since moved away.

  A girl who’d gone to school with Hadrian. Might’ve been in love with Hadrian but kept it to herself.

  Black girl, surely. Not white.

  The first time I sent a valentine to the Johnsons I tried to compose a note of explanation. I did not want to seem rude or mysterious sending strangers a valentine signed just Your Friend.

  I knew Hadrian in school. I think of him and still miss him. I am so very sorry what happened to him and I hope . . .

  Threw this away. Tried again.

  I was not in Hadrian’s class at school but I saw him play basketball and . . .

  No. I had not gone to school with Hadrian Johnson, I had never seen him play basketball. I had never knowingly seen him at all.

  I did not know Hadrian but everyone who knew him admired him so much. I have prayed for your family. I hope that you and your family believed that there has been some “justice” . . .

  No. No prayer. No justice.

  Giving up, then. For there are no words.

  And what consolation could it be to the Johnsons, that some sort of “justice” had been done. Four (white) boys convicted of manslaughter, sent to prison. If Jerome Jr. and Lionel had been sentenced to life in prison, or executed, that would not have brought back Hadrian Johnson . . .

  Guessing that the Johnsons took no pleasure in knowing that their son’s murderers were sent to prison. No pleasure in learning that the elder Kerrigan boy, the one who’d (allegedly) wielded the baseball bat, was killed in prison; or that the parents of the murderers are deeply unhappy, their lives irrevocably altered.

  The Johnsons are Christians, I’m sure. Unless Hadrian’s death undermined their faith in God.

  Yes I did pray for Hadrian Johnson and his family and for my family too. For my brothers. At the age of twelve no longer really believing in prayer or in God listening to prayer or even in God (most of the time) guessing that God was just another adult trick to make you behave as others want you to behave.

  If you are wondering who I am, and why I am writing—I am the sister of the Kerrigan brothers Jerome Jr. and Lionel. I am the one who told police about the baseball bat. I am the “informer”—the “rat.”

  But I can never write these words. I have no way to speak in my own voice.

  Since there is no return address on the envelope containing the valentine, Ethel Johnson will never write to me, to thank me. If she had an inclination to thank me.

  In this way I can never feel slighted or hurt.

  Or maybe Ethel Johnson would return the money if she had my address. Perceiving that it has been sent by a (white) person with a guilty conscience. Thank you but we are not in need. Please do not write to us again.

  AS SOON AS I MAIL THE VALENTINE TO THE JOHNSON FAMILY THE air around me becomes brighter.

  It is February eleventh. Bitter cold here in Watertown, on the Saint Lawrence River near the Canadian border, with a wind that brings temperatures to below zero.

  No more than two days should be required for the valentine to be delivered to Howard Street, South Niagara. In time for Valentine’s Day.

  As usual I have been careful to affix not one, not two, but three first-class stamps to the envelope which is oversized and noticeably thick stuffed with bills.

  How airy I feel! A panel seems to be opening in the bleak sky.

  I am made to feel light, effervescent. The leaden sensation drains from my limbs.

  I am most alive at such times. I am hopeful. My vision is almost too sharp.

  I notice things that would otherwise pass in a blur of distraction—gorgeous neon-orange graffiti scrawled against a building like a hieroglyphic, black-capped birds on a wire with feathers puffed-up to twice their natural size. Above the river frothy horizontal clouds of the kind called cirrocumulus. The sound of wind in the trees—soughing.

  Faces of strangers startling and beautiful.

  Eyes of strangers startling and beautiful.

  Other days are muffled and blurred and pass as if underwater. Must drag myself through them. Force myself to breathe.

  Keeping myself alive is the goal. Today, I feel this is possible.

  Keeping Myself Alive

  TAKING MONEY FROM A MAN. THERE’S NEVER EXACTLY A first time.

  For at the start, it might be (merely) a tip. Then, he’s paying for drinks. He’s paying for a meal. He’s paying for tickets. He’s paying for gas, or to park his vehicle. He’s pressing bills into your (not unwilling) hand.

  Later, he’s giving you a present. This is formal. An escalation, a declaration. Watching your face as you unwrap the crinkling gilt paper a salesclerk has wrapped for him and imagining the pleasure he is providing you which becomes pleasure flowing in his veins like liquid fire.

  Oh thank you . . .

  Not just gratitude the man wants but evidence that you are surprised, startled, shaken as if he has reached inside you with his fingers.

  . . . thank you I didn’t expect—this.

  Like lovemaking when he raises himself on his elbows to observe your face. Alert and jealous needing to know what you are feeling, what is happening to you, what he is causing to happen to you that is exciting to him, thrilling to him because it is he who is causing it, the male penetrating the female, the female impaled upon the male, helpless in subordination to the impassioned and driven energy of the male, extinguished, annihilated.

  . . . love love love you.

  BUT ALSO, THE CLIENT PAID ME FOR MY LABOR. THROUGH THE Agency, I was in his employ.

  HERE Y’ARE, HONEY. FOR YOU.

  And—Keep the change, honey.

  And—Smile, honey! That’s better.

  I was a university student. I could work only part-time. Usually at the minimum wage, or below.

  Favoring those kinds of (unskilled) jobs that involve tips. Waitress, counter girl, clerk.

  These were natural jobs for young females. Inevitable jobs. Not a servant but yes, servile. Sometimes, you wear a colorful uniform with an insignia embossed on your right breast. Sometimes the uniform is flattering, sometimes not-so.

  Sometimes you wear a low-cut jersey top, short skirt of a shimmery fabric that barely covers your buttocks. Legs encased in dark stockings. Or, bare legs kept fastidiously shaved, gleaming-pale in the dim light of the restaurant/cocktail lounge like slow-swimming fish.

  The (male) hand coming to rest at the small of the back. Or, a series of light, avuncular pats at the small of the back.

  Tips depend upon the generosity of customers. To a degree, the sobriety of customers.

  However it is true that if the customers are male, and if you can lighten their hearts with a smile, or stir their genitals, they may reward you.

  Here’s for you, honey. Thaannk you!

  WHAT YOU LOSE IN DIGNITY YOU GAIN IN TIPS.

  Or, what you gain in tips you lose in dignity.

  EVENTUALLY IT IS SUGGESTED TO YOU THAT HOUSECLEANING will pay more than waitressing. Much less interaction with the client.

  It’s a different category of female labor. Harder physically though not what is called unskilled. If you are signed up with a reliable agency and if you can work swiftly and yet efficiently, you won’t do badly at all.

  You swallow hard, considering. There would seem to be, in housecleaning, a kind of security, home. The clients will be known to you beforehand, not like the random customers of a restaurant or cocktail lounge. The clients will be, you want to think, guaranteed to be trustworthy

  MAID BRIGADE AGENCY OF CATAMOUNT COUNTY. Their billboards of cartoon house-maids are so charming!

  As a part-time university student you attend classes in the evenings. Long after the scholarship (of which you’d been so proud: hoping your parents would take notice) has ceased since you’d transferred to another university.

  (And why did you transfer from St. Lawrence University?—surely not to sabotage your own university career?)

  (Seeing too many familiar faces at St. Lawrence. Shrinking from their startled smiles, stares. Abruptly one day unable to remain in the place where you are but desperate to leave, to move, to begin again, in the place where you are not-known.)

  In this way swaths of time have been lost to you. Semesters begun, abruptly ceased. Months when you could not bring yourself to re-enroll at any university. Minimum-wage jobs, or no job at all.

  But now, another university: Catamount Falls. Another chance.

  Hope like a helium-filled balloon drifting.

  An urban campus bounded by tall pines to the north, to the south the thrum of the Thruway. Where you’ve (tentatively) felt at home. Knowing the particular melancholy of dusk on such a campus, as day students depart and evening students begin to arrive. As incandescent lights come on.

  Here we are! We belong here, too.

  You have surrendered the possibility of being a full-time student. It is likely that you deserve a lowered status, more in keeping with that of an incarcerated person awaiting parole.

  This university schedule leaves weekday mornings and much of the afternoons free for (manual) work. You sign up at the Agency for work when you can get it, hoping for work at least once or twice a week.

  Because you are new, and inexperienced at housework, and exude an air of plaintive desperation inadequately masked by a brave stoic smile, the Agency will pay you off the books, in cash and not by check, as they pay most of their staff. In this way the Agency is not required to deduct taxes from your wages and aren’t required to pay you benefits if you get sick or are injured.