Abuse: The Complete Trilogy (84 page)

“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an
understanding of ourselves.”

― C.G. Jung

~~~

Grant
Wilkinson

Something André
told me once, suddenly comes back to me.

‘You, your
mother and your siblings—each developed their own patterns of behavior in
response to the evils in the family, the pathology. You have told me your
brother, Alex takes nothing seriously. He makes jokes and is a cocaine addict.
Your sister—she is an alcoholic and is selfish and bitter. You, Grant, isolate
yourself from others, because you fear there is something very wrong with you.
And your mother? She is in denial. She ignores her family, giving all of her
attention and support to others, no?’

“You were always
the favorite,” Betty Jo accuses, glaring at me, “but you never appreciated it.
Angry and sullen—admit it, Grant! You were an asshole. Just like our father,
you never had time for me either.”

I say nothing,
but I consider these charges.

I
was
an
asshole when I hit my teens. That was when I began to understand that I’d been
tricked. What I thought was love, was in fact abuse. Betty Jo would’ve been
nine or ten years old back then.

My jaw tightens.
It wasn’t that I didn’t have time for my sister, or that I was ignoring her
specifically. I abandoned her because I saw myself as a monster and a pervert.
I kept away from
everyone
in an attempt to protect others from myself.

Betty Jo stands
and begins to pace, still facing me—still targeting me.

“After dad died,
then you were our mother’s ‘special child’ too!” she reproaches. “It’s ‘Grant
this,’ ‘Grant that.’ ‘Oh, Grant needs to marry.’ Well, I’m sick of it!”

My sister drones
on and on, ceaseless in her criticism of my every fault. Her condemnation is
vicious. I can’t deny how she saw myself in her childhood. I understand how
things looked. Yet, her blame is misplaced.

I lean back,
forcing myself to sit here and take it. I’ve suffered worse. In truth, silence comes
easily. It’s been one of my main defenses.

I take a minute
to study her. Renata told me our sister was one of the saddest, unhappiest
people she has ever known. I finally see it.
This
explains why Sally
Anne became Betty Jo’s friend. Naturally sympathetic, Sally Ann takes in lost
dogs, cats and injured animals. The champion of those who are bullied, she’s
always been able to recognize a lost and unloved soul.

I know what
unloved and unlovable feels like. I’ve been there.

No wonder Renata
and Sally Ann both feel sorry for my sister. Is that what they feel toward
me?

I take a deep
breath and shut my eyes for a moment. Our mother was too cold and withdrawn to
notice anything going on with her children. In my case, I was so unbearably conscious
of my own pain while growing up that I was unaware of the harm my little sister
suffered in the Wilkinson household.

Of course, Betty
Jo would have hidden any sign of vulnerability from me.

Hurt.
Damaged. Wounded.

Wounds are
strange things. Sometimes they’re clean. Put on a bit of antiseptic, cover them
up with a Band-Aid, and they heal perfectly well. Yet some wounds turn putrid
and need to be cut open. If you don’t let out the pus, they won’t heal. If
untreated and the contagion spreads, a wound can kill.

I guess through
this unrestricted purging of my sister’s hate, André is making an attempt to drain
the poison before it destroys her.

“Dad liked the
boys best—especially you, Grant,” Betty Jo snaps in her snide, angry voice, a
nasty tone she always uses when speaking to me. “As the favorite, everything
had to be done your way! No one gave a shit about me! Do you know how much I
hate even just the sound of your name?”

Disgust radiates
from her, lighting a spark from the embers of my fury.

My pulse
rockets, molten heat burns inside. My inner rage is back in force, but in truth
it never left. It’s difficult to listen to my sister blame me for
everything—especially since I once constantly blamed myself.

No shame. I
refuse to feel guilty anymore.

How can
I
be responsible? Even though I’m three years older than she is, I was just a kid
back then too.

“You were always
so selfish!” she snarls. “Such an asshole! You had to have dad all to yourself.
You and he had ‘special time’ together. It was all about you—his oldest
son.
‘Grant can shoot,’ ‘Grant can ride.’ ‘Grant is so clever.’ What about me? No
one
ever
thought of me—except as the house slave! Any shit job, I had to
do it or sometimes Alex. What did you have to do? Nothing!”

It’s the last
straw.

Before I realize
it I jump to my feet, pissed as hell. Chest out, chin up, my finger stabs
toward her.

“Oh yeah?” I
growl, my voice hoarse but clear. “You think I had it so fucking easy? Well let
me tell you something Betty Jo, we did have ‘special time.’ Dad took me to his
den where he abused me almost every damned day of my life. There I got to suck
him off, pull him off, or get sodomized. So don’t tell me how bad
you
had it growing up in our family—I had problems of my own.”

Sodomized
.
Ha. I never once said that word. Now I’ve said it twice in one day. It’s much easier
to say the second time.

Betty Jo recoils,
stepping back.  

The color leaves
her face, her expression draws inward.

“No,” she
whispers, but her eyes reflect the pits of hell. She had no idea what was going
on—but some inner knowledge or awareness takes away the blinkers.

I can almost hear
something ‘click’ in her mind. The puzzle pieces, scraps of her childhood
memories are all beginning to fit together. She knows I’m telling the truth.

No one says a
single thing.

The utter quiet
in the room makes my ears ring.

Her eyes soften
as she regards me, her lips press together as if she’s in pain. Usually, Betty
Jo looks at me with hate, disgust, or disdain. In our interactions she’s
underhanded, passive aggressive, outright aggressive or vindictive. I’m
equipped to deal with her bitchiness.  

Yet, up till now
I don’t think I’ve
ever
seen this… compassion in her face. I’m
unprepared for the ravaging storm of emotions it stirs.

How do I
respond to that?

“A sister is
like a mirror in which you can see a part of yourself reflected.”

— Joan Walsh
Anglund

~~~

Grant
Wilkinson

“Alex repeatedly
said our dad was a bastard,” she murmurs quietly. She stares hard at Alex. “You
always prattled on about how you were going to kill our father.”

He shrugs. “I
hated him.”

Something primal
in her eyes flares to life. “I
never
wanted to kill my dad. I never
hated him! I just wanted him to love me, but he never loved me!” she gasps, her
voice as heartbreaking as an abandoned child. “You can understand that, can’t
you?”

I nod, silenced
by the agony in her gaze.

“I read Alex’s
Journal, I studied his absurd plan for murder,” she says, her voice very low. “But
the idea grew on me. I took the scopolamine he’d bought. I tried it on myself,
then later I tried it on Alex.”

“What?”
Alex interjects.

She laughs, a muted,
unnatural chuckle. “You didn’t notice, Alex. You’d been drinking, but that scopolamine
acted exactly like truth serum. The things you told me you’d usually never
say.” She shakes her head with disgust. “Mostly stupid ‘I love her’ details
about your wife. Anyway, I decided I’d try it on dad the day of his party, on
his fiftieth birthday.”

Betty Jo stares
at us with empty eyes. Her mind is focused elsewhere, looking at something,
somewhere in her past. “He was so drunk. I put the drug in his drink. About a
half an hour later, when he got up to go to the toilet, I guided him out on to
the balcony.”

She bites her
lip, her brows drawn down in concentration. “I just wanted to know why I meant
nothing to him! I needed to know. So, I asked…” she takes a deep breath, “I
asked him why he didn’t love me. Why wasn’t I good enough?”

Unshed tears shine
in my sister’s eyes—I’ve never seen her so vulnerable. For a moment I close my own
eyes, shutting out her intimate, unspeakable pain. When I open them again, it’s
like witnessing someone’s last moments as they pass away. Something inside of my
sister is dying.

I don’t want to watch,
but I can’t look away.

“Do you know
what dad did?” she asks, her voice high-pitched with emotion. “He laughed! He
laughed at me! Then he said the most terrible thing.” She breaths in and out,
in short and shallow breaths, her expression is a dark well of sadness.

“He said—” she
pauses as though she can’t repeat the words, “My father said to me,
‘Why
would I be interested in a silly little cunt like you?’”

Her chin lifts
suddenly, her eyes flash. “He only loved his boys. I was so angry! I’ve always
loved him—I worshiped him, but I hated him for that! It happened so fast—I
didn’t even think. I grabbed him by his shirt collar and shoved him over the
edge. It was easy. I killed him… I killed my father. But he called me a cunt. A
cunt! He
never
loved me. He
never
loved me
just because I’m
just a girl!”

Jesus H.
Christ. Betty Jo murdered our father.

I can’t believe
it. The astonishment I feel plays over my brother’s face, while shock and pity registers
in his eyes.

To my absolute
horror, although I’ve never once seen her cry—Betty Jo suddenly bursts into
tears. My sister doesn’t cry like a grown woman. Instead she weeps with
shattered innocence—keening like a child who suddenly finds themselves in
unfamiliar surroundings, completely alone… utterly lost.

My protective
instincts kick in. For the first time in my life I want to comfort my sister,
but I hold back. Why would she accept comfort from me? It’s far too late for
that.

Alex takes her
in his arms, pats her on the back awkwardly. I raise my eyes to my brother,
we’re both painfully aware of her anguish. Exposed, right to her soul, I feel
as though I’m intruding on my sister’s private, hidden self.

Betty Jo’s tears
become a wail of grief, a long, high-pitched cry. What a testament to the
tragic life of a poor little rich girl. My sister, Betty Jo. Stunningly
good-looking, perfectly dressed, she’s a beautiful, wealthy young woman who
appears to have had it all.

If people only
knew.

Her soul
starved for love, what chance did she have?

Distraught, she
spins away from Alex and flees, racing from the room. Her heels echo on the
marble tiles of the front entry.

Alex starts to
follow her, but André steps out in front of him, stopping him with a touch from
his hand. We hear the sound of the front door opening and closing.

Betty Jo is
gone.

Our sister
murdered our father.

“Leave her to
me, if you please,” André says calmly. “Much good has been achieved here this
day, I thank you.” He bows slightly. “For now, entrust her to my care
s'il
vous plaît.”

He turns on his
heel and strides purposefully out of the room, following in Betty Jo’s wake.

Stunned, I no
longer view my sister as the sharp-tongued, nasty bitch I’ve known all of my
life. Not anymore. I can’t.

Now I can’t help
but feel sorry for the unwanted, unloved child.

Betty Jo
murdered our father. But what should we do now?

“I have found
that the process of discovering who I really am begins with knowing who I
really don't want to be.”

―
Alcoholics Anonymous

~~~

Grant
Wilkinson

Alex and I are
at a total loss, with no clue of what to do. Fuck, I feel absolutely shredded,
yet I'm also oddly supercharged, full of nervous energy. I repeatedly clench
and release my fists, while my jaw is so tight that it aches.

Alex made a
lengthy, rambling and detailed journal of his plans to kill our father. He
planned to push him to his death, but mostly this was an ongoing fantasy. Alex
even went so far as to buy Scopolamine, the hypnotic drug he found out about
while watching CSI.

In the end, however,
my brother never got up the nerve to actually kill the man.

Betty Jo knew
all about these plans, probably initially as Alex would have gotten drunk or
stoned and told her, like he told both me and Stanley Huber. As Betty Jo worked
with Alex, she had access to his journals and the Scopolamine.

Our sister
claims she didn’t intend to kill our father, and yet, she did. Will she confess
to her crime?

The police
will never believe it.

I can’t sit
still, so I pace. Adrenaline thrums through my veins. I need to do
something
—but
what
? I feel as though I could crawl right out of my skin.

Neither of us
speak.

What is there to
say?

I keep seeing
the look of wretched devastation carved into Betty Jo’s face. The words my
father said to her echo in my mind. ‘
Why would I be interested in a silly
little cunt like you?’

When Alex’s wife
and baby return home, I take off like a scalded cat. In my current funk, I can
barely tolerate my brother. Jumping into my car, I drive aimlessly, trying to
make a decision. What should I do now?

Maybe a twenty
mile run would overcome my anguish and rage? If I went to a redneck bar, I
could pick a fight with someone. Or shall I break down and get shit-faced
drunk?

The ‘getting
drunk’ option is mighty tempting, right now. There’s way too much on my mind.
My brain is fried. I need oblivion, but I’m too restless and wired to sleep. My
nostrils flare with fury. I’m so ready for a fight.

My sister
murdered my father. It should have been me!

It’s suppertime,
but I’m not hungry in the least. What I crave is the comfort that comes from
swallowing a glass of Scotch—the taste, the soothing burn, the sensation of
relief it provides. My mouth waters as I remember the delicious, soul numbing
oblivion that comes out of a bottle.

Why can’t I
have just one drink?

When faced with
temptation I’m supposed to call my AA sponsor. Bobby would remind me of the
First Step—that I am powerless over alcohol. He’d tell me I’m doing the right
thing by seeking help, and I must stay away from the first drink. Alcoholics
never
stop at just one.

The trick is not
to start.

If I called him,
my sponsor would drop everything and arrange for us to meet immediately. But
what could I say to him? How could I explain?

I can hear
myself now,
Bobby, I have this problem. As kids, my baby brother and I were
sexually abused for years by our father. The bastard died through an accident
three years ago. Recently, the police discovered our father had actually been
murdered. I thought it was the result of his involvement with a powerful
pedophile cabal. Unfortunately, the police arrested my brother for the crime.
Alex is innocent, despite all the evidence that points to him having committed
murder.

Oh, I should
mention that originally, I was the one arrested for our father's murder, but the
police couldn't make the charges stick. Then, more recently, I was framed for
assassinating a cop. I was damn lucky whoever framed me was sloppy about it and
screwed up. I’m not sure who did it, or if they’re still out to get me.

Sure, those
things might be enough to justify anyone taking a stiff drink… or maybe twenty,
but that's not all. Tonight, practically out of nowhere, I discovered that our
father was actually killed by our sister. Now that we know Betty Jo committed
the crime, we have no clue if she'll admit it to the police. Will she let Alex
take the fall? I’d ask her, but she’s disappeared and won’t answer her phone.

Why did she
kill our father, you ask? It seems the asshole ignored the poor girl all of her
life because she was born with a vagina—he preferred penises, you see. The
dipshit foolishly called her a ‘silly little cunt.’ I guess that was the last
straw. So, Betty Jo killed him, which is exactly what he deserved.

You ask if I
ever did anything to help my little brother or sister while we were growing up?
No, sorry, I was far too self-absorbed. In fact, although I loved my brother, I
was selfish enough to be relieved to have an occasional break from constant
molestation. And as for my younger sister, I never even liked her. Ignored by everyone
in the family, she grew up to be a hateful bitch. I wasn’t mean to her, but I
wasn’t nice to her, either.

The cruelty
she’s suffered makes me furious.

Meanwhile,
Betty Jo left with my counselor whom—I found out tonight—appears to be some
sort of sex addict. I discovered this when discussing sodomy, a long term
sexual fantasy and mortal sin I’ve never acted upon—well at least not
consensually or as an adult, to date.

How exactly
did I find out? Oh, my fiancée told me my counselor enjoyed anal sex with her.
It turns out André Chevalier, my therapist, my mentor, my trusted and loyal
friend, had sex with my fiancée, my sister, and he may have even wanted to have
sex with me. With the history I have with my father, you can imagine how this
is disturbing.

To add to
this incredibly large, steaming pile of shit, I walked out on my fiancée this
evening, and she threatened not to be there when I returned. Losing her would
finish me completely. Will I arrive home to an empty house?

It’s all too
much.

Too much for my overwhelmed
brain and aching heart to process.

I can’t say
any
of this to my AA sponsor. If I did, he’d probably reply,
‘The hell you
say? Damn buddy, that’s some fucked up shit. Let me pour you a drink. Son of a
bitch, I need one too!’

I’m so furious
about everything that’s happened, starting with our cluster fuck of a father.
Tension burns in my body; my guts are twisted into a heated knot.

Right now, I
want to kill someone, or bring my father back to life so I can kill him again.
Either that, or I need to get rip roaring drunk.

I can’t decide
what to do.

Pressure builds
in my head, gathering like a storm. Vivid impressions and flashes of memories
batter my thoughts—they’re relentless as waves upon the shore.

So many fucking
memories.

I can hear Betty
Jo’s nine-year-old voice echo in my mind as Alex and I go to the shooting range
with our father. “Can I come too? Please? Please,
please,
daddy?” she begs
pathetically. Life has taught her she’ll be excluded again.

“Next time,” our
father says.

“Promise?” she
asks.

“I promise,” he
lies effortlessly, as he closes the door behind us, shutting her up. Shutting
her out. Betty Jo was never more than a nuisance to him.

The image shifts
as time passes. I see a lonely child waiting at the front door, full of
excitement, longing to be included. The expression on my sister’s face is full
of hope, her eyes shine with anticipation.
This
time her dad will pay
attention to her. This time he’ll love
her
too. Then, shoulders slumped,
the crushed look when our father breaks his promise and her innocent heart
again
.

How could I
forget this? How did I not see what was happening?

No wonder my
sister hates me. The part of me that feels responsible, hates myself. Back
then, as a child I felt special. I
wanted
to be alone with my father. I
wanted him to give his love and attention only to me.

Monster!
Pervert!

Somehow, I find
myself pulling into the lot at
Beverage Depot.
It’s as if my Cadillac
drove itself here. I park the car, sit blankly for a few moments, and then read
the notice of daily deals. I can hardly believe my eyes.

‘Today Only!’
the poster boldly proclaims, Lagavulin 16 Year Old Scotch has been reduced in
price.

I get out of the
car, close the door and hit the remote lock. All the while my mind sings with a
perverse kind of joy. Lagavulin’s on sale.

Hallelujah
and praise the lord! It’s a God damned sign!

Just like that, my
decision is made. No one has to die tonight, that’s how I justify my behavior.
It’s a better excuse than countless others I’ve used to get wasted before. I’m
not going to kill anyone.

Instead, I’m
going home to get drunk.

I can hardly
wait.