This is the part of the story that starts getting ugly

The honeymoon period at Frank and Nikki’s (I’m not even trying to lie about these pieces of shyts names) was over as quickly as it started. Immediately we were informed what our chores were to be. Therein lies the reason to “adopt” children, little household workers. At this point I believe I was still 5, as I remember a brief period in Kindergarten. Frank was my mother’s cousin and, unknown to me until later in life, my mother and Aunt knew a secret about Frank that should have precluded him from ever getting custody of children. But I’ll get to that later.

My brother was, as was often the case, not wanted in this house. Nikki wanted a daughter (I suppose to pass on the abuse suffered by her at her own mother’s hands) but my brother and I were a package deal. She could barely hide her disdain so this trouble boy would only be getting more troubled.

But, moving forward, we were already nervous, unsettled kids but this new environment profoundly affected my brother making his ADD behaviors run rampant. He was frequently beat with a brush, belt or, on a good day, hand for things that later in life would fall under the diagnosis.

Our chores began at 6:30 - mine were to make the bed, dust my room, vacume my room, dust the house, clean the bathroom then, if done, eat breakfast and go to school. My brother’s list was the same except he had to vacume the house rather than dust and do any dishes they used after we did the dinner dishes the night before. After school it was picking up dog shit from the back yard and folding any laundry that had been done. Homework and then outside to practice sports. This was the routine and we were forced to adhere to it very strictly. I remember that feeling in my stomach when we would get home after school and hear footsteps upstairs in our rooms, or we would walk in and she wasn’t in her usual spot on the sofa watching soap operas. That meant only one thing, that she was inspecting. And with each inspection there came the inevitable beating when Frank got home. Sure she would slap us around a little - but the real beat down came after dinner. I can’t count how many nights we sat silenly, shaking, trying to force ourselves to eat what was in front of us knowing that once I finished washing the dishes, and my brother finished drying them, we would have to go upstairs to get beat. As an adult I find that I get that feeling when it comes to disciplining my children or my pets. I can’t abide their getting hit - when my ex-husband would hit my son for something I would have to leave the house I became so physically ill. But I digress.

Besides chores we were expected to excel in sports. Spring and Summer had baseball and fishing, fall had football which carried into winter where it was hockey. Neither my brother and I cared for playing because it was never for fun - it was honest work.  When we played well, we were left alone but when, in any way, we failed, it was followed by exhaustive workouts and beatings.  We were embarassing him.  By the time I was about 9 I was asked to join the region’s all-star team (softball).  On the day of the first game I was benched, not enough practice and being the youngest one on the team.  I was so afraid of what would ensue following the game that I protested not playing by standing on the third base line and refusing to move.  That was my last day on that team.  On another occasion the foster father was playing a little two on two with a friend of his and his son against he and me.  When I had to hold the ball so he could kick he kicked my finger causing some helluva pain.  When the next time came around for me to hold the ball I kept dropping it, kind of like Lucy does to Charlie Brown.  He got pissed and said I had to stop being a coward and just hold it.  I turned to him, in front of his friends, and told him that if he was so brave maybe HE should hold the ball while I kick it.  He laughed it off, until later, and that was one of the worst beatings I had ever gotten in my life.  To this day marks remain to remind me to hate playing football, to not trust things like falling into arms or holding a ball, and how to fear and hate with such ferocity that I could, when provoked, do enormous damage.

As for our chores, they were never, in Nikki’s eyes, done right. But one particular time stands out. I was doing dishes before dinner since they were piling up during a home made, day long, cooking of tomato sauce. As I was doing this some Palmolive dish soap, that green old school one, went flying and landed in the pot where the sauce was simmering. At that Frank went crazy and started beating me in the head, landing blows on my arms and stomach, but … on this occasion he had a fork in his hand. The fork stabbed me from my shoulder halfway down my forearm. I was, at that time, in fifth grade so I guess about 10. This was just a few months before it hit the fan - when, everything completely fell apart.