Aluminum Lies

A short true story about lies...

I read signs on billboards and see commercials on TV that repeat what I’ve heard growing up my whole entire life. They say “Stay in school”.  Those three little words make you believe that it’s a choice every individual must make on their own. Its sounds so simple, the option is yours to make. These signs and commercials are the biggest example of false advertisement that I have ever had the displeasure to experience.

          I understand that no one’s childhood is perfect, that each person has their own demons to face all on their own. Some kids had it worse than me, and some had it better. So I won’t go into the details of my whole young life. To make a long story short, I (of course) come from a broken home, my Father moved away and remarried and I stayed with my Mother and younger sister. My Mother was and still is an alcoholic who dabbles in the recreational drug or two. She is also highly paranoid and see’s conspiracies targeted at her from everyone she encounters. She’s a consummate liar (what alcoholic isn’t?) and can interagate someone so well that the government could learn a trick or two from her. Mental manipulation was her choice of weapon, and lies where her ammo of expertise. From “I’m dying of cancer” to “Your Father is gay and dying of aids.” The lies are endless and I have at one point or another believed my Mother only to learn latter, that it was all a complete fabrication made up in her twisted, merciless mind.

          The older I grew, the more I discovered how crazy she was and often refused to believe anything she said. The more I questioned her lies, the more she saw me as an enemy and would react with a vengeful streak that could put any story book villain to shame. When I was seventeen I told a guidance counselor at school a small portion of what I was going through at home, thinking she couldn’t repeat anything, just like the counselors on TV. When I got home, my Mother drunkenly answered my knock (I was never allowed a key) and told me that the counselor at school had called her and told her everything I said. Then she slammed the door in my face, locked the door, and I was forced to sleep outside and go to school the next day wearing the same clothes I wore the day before. Needless to say I walked around (almost every day of my life) angry and resentful because I knew, without a doubt, no one could or would help me. The next day, the vice principle called me into his office to discuss what happened the day before. My response at this point was a rude “Why don’t you go ask your counselor, she seems to have a big f*****g mouth!” and of course he yelled at me to “watch your mouth!” but I was still furious. I thought our conversation was confidential and what I really needed was to talk to someone, to tell the truth, to not live a lie. To have someone, anyone, believe me. The next day a social services man came to sit and talk with my Mom, but by the time she was done with him, he left thinking she was a model parent and I (who have become so angry and rude from years of manipulation) am the problem. He suggested that I should see a psychologist. At his prompting, she makes an appointment, but goes in before me and of course she lies to the therapist and tells her that I am a teenage drug addict. By the time I sit on her couch, the counselor is convinced. She asks me in a hundred different ways “What drugs are you on? What drugs have you taken? Are you on any drugs right now?” I am desperate; I tell her “No I’m not on drugs. I smoked a little pot when I was younger but I haven’t done it in years. I’ve never done any other drugs. No, I’m not on any drugs right now, would you care for me to pee in a cup? What can I say to make you believe me?” but, my time is up and still no one can see through her. I am the angry one, I am the problem.

          Now, you have to understand, the entire time this is all going on, she is yelling at me for betraying her and informs me that I will regret it. I am her enemy now and I must be contained and controlled, I will learn my lesson one way or another. I come home from school to get my uniform for work and she is already drunk and screaming. She tells me “No, you’re not going anywhere!” If I leave she will call the cops and tell them I am running away. I scream in frustration and she tells me if I don’t stop, she will call the cops and tell them I am on crack. This new tale shocks me to the core of my being. One, I have never been in trouble with the cops, ever. Two, I have never even seen crack and don’t really know much about it. I am so blown away by her statement that I reply “I would never stick drugs in my nose!” then she shakes her head and corrects me “You don’t snort crack you smoke it stupid.” And I come back with “Well there you go, even if I had the stuff I wouldn’t know what to do with it!” but I see that it doesn’t matter and I’m trapped. I walk outside, utterly defeated and tell my boyfriend “My Mom’s drunk and crazy right now and I can’t leave, I’ll call you later.” By the time I come back inside to face her it’s already too late. “I called the cops.” She says with a smirk of contempt on her face. I begin to cry and as the tears stream down my face I ask “Why? What did I do?” she calmly slurps the last of her Bush beer in a can with her favorite bendy straw and says “Because you’re a crack head.”

          I run to my room frantic and hopeless. I do what I haven’t done in years, I call my father. When he answers I am so upset he can barely make out my words. I say between hiccups “She’s framing me!” my Mother picks up another house phone and begins to talk over me, trying to convince my Dad that I am on drugs and out of control. I begin to scream over her “She’s lying Dad, Believe me, please just believe me.” My Mother didn’t count on the fact that he was married to her for 12 years and never forgot her lying and manipulating him for all that time and he calmly says “Get off the phone.” there was a little confusion on who exactly he was talking to but he says “Lisa (my mother) get off the phone right now!” she huffs and puffs and he says it again and she finally hangs up. I hurry to tell him what happened and beg him to believe me. But before I can finish my sentence I glance up to see two uniformed police officers standing over me, telling me to get off the phone. I tell my dad “I've got to go Dad, the police are here” all while impotent tears fall down my face. My dad asked to speak to one of the police officers and I pass the phone to one of them. The conversation is quick and I am left with the cops for the first time in my life and am completely innocent of what I am being accused of. In my head, from years of past experience with people believing my lying mother, I am doomed.

          The two cops actually hear me out “She’s framing me! I’ve never even seen crack! She's an alcoholic, check our vegetable drawer in the refrigerator, it’s full of beer! It’s always full of beer; we’ve never had vegetables in that drawer!” I’m hysterical at this point. “Please, I’ll take a urine test right now if you want me too! I’m innocent, please. I’ll take a lie detector if you want. ” They tell me to stay where I am and head to the living room where they start to question my mother and her lies start to surface. One of the cops cut her off to ask “How many beers have you had today Miss’?” I hear her reply “Seven or eight but I’m fine, that’s nothing.” I begin to laugh hysterically at this point because she’s messed up, because even the lie “seven or eight” seems like nothing to her but it’s still quite a bit for normal people, especially at four o’clock in the afternoon. After the cops yell at me to “Shut up, stop laughing” they tell her that I don’t seem to be on any drugs at all. That I only seem upset because of what she’s doing to me. My Mother starts to get angry and the police come back into my room. They ask me “What do you want to do?” and I say “I want to leave, I want to live with my Dad back in Florida. If I tried to before she always lied and blackmailed me, she needs the child support money he sends her for me. I can’t take it anymore, I want out.” The cops explain to both of us that “In the State of Georgia, at the age of seventeen, you are considered a legal adult. If we can arrest and convict you as an adult, then you can leave this house as an adult.” My Mother is furious, her plan has completely backfired and now I am free. I start to cram my meager clothes into a garbage bag faster than I have ever done anything in my life. I hear her in the living room arguing with the officers. “She’s running away and you’re just going to stand there?” They repeat there earlier statement, that I am an adult now and I can leave whenever I want.  She starts coming up with new scenarios in which she could get me arrested, she desperately wants me in jail “Well, what if she comes back, can I have her arrested for trespassing?” The officer sounds bewildered “Well, she can come and get her things if she wants to…” She cuts him off for another question “What if she starts braking things? Would you arrest her for that?” I picture myself coming back for more than my clothes and her smashing her own things just to have me arrested. Before the police can answer her, I loudly say from my bedroom “I will never come back, ever!” I walk out of the house with nothing but a black garbage bag filled with whatever clothes I could shove in there and leave everything else behind. I start to think ‘I’m free, I’m finally free! She can never hurt me again!” How I could’ve been so wrong I’ll never know. I should’ve seen it coming, I was her enemy and she’s vengeful and I would pay for it one way or another…

          Soon after that, I was on a bus from mid Georgia to south Florida. It was a long and uncomfortable trip that I would never recommend to anyone, but I was free. Free from the alcohol and the parties, the conspiracies and paybacks, the rotating Daddy door that was her boyfriends and lovers, the manipulation, lies, and abuse. I was free from what I had pathetically referred to as our “aluminum life”. At one point on the bus I was robbed of all my money and identification at a stop somewhere in Jacksonville. A Florida patrolman shrugged and  said there wasn’t anything he could do and didn’t even write up a report, but I was still free so I excepted the situation and continued south on the bus. My Dad was at the station to pick me up when the bus finally made it to its final destination. As he drove me to his house I told him everything I went through, every lie that she told and made me and my sister tell.  I tried to get it all out, to feel clean with my honesty, to finally tell the truth without repercussions. He understood and believed me; he told me some truths of his own about her. I had never felt so relieved in my life; I truly thought she could never hurt me again.

          I slept on a couch in a red brick room adjacent to the kitchen at my Father’s house. His new wife had just had a baby and they were putting me where they could. Our first step was to register me in the local high school. I had just finished the eleventh grade up North so I only had one more year to go, I would’ve been a senior. At the time, In Georgia, you needed less credits to graduate then Florida. So even though the school didn’t have my records they let me sign up for summer school. Close to the end of summer we learned that my Mom had struck again. I and my Father were called to the counselor’s office where she informed us that “In the state of Georgia, whoever signed you into school (My Mother) has to sign you out. Otherwise the school can’t release your records.” My Father was furious and we went home and he called my old school to find out any information he could. He called both state’s school board of education; he called everyone he could think of before he finally called my mother and asked her to release my records. To which she replied “F**k you!” and hung up on him. I continued to go to summer school with the slim hope that she would eventually release my paperwork. Finally, on the last day of summer school, the guidance counselor called us in once again. She said she too had made some calls but the situation was the same. Without my mother’s consent, there was no possible way she could enroll me into the high school. At one point, with a bewildered expression on her face, she said “In my entire career I have never seen this situation before. Usually it’s the student who doesn’t want to finish school and the parents who want them too. This is the first time I’ve ever seen a student want to go and a parent stopping them. I’m truly sorry; if you can change her mind, please let me know.” Me and my Father drove home in silence, when I got home I sat at the counter starring at the phone trying to build up the courage to do what I swore I would never do again. I picked up the phone and dialed my Mother’s number. When she finally answered, my heart dropped and my palms starting sweating in dread for what I was about to do. I took a deep breath and calmly said “Would you please, please, please release my school records so I can finish school and graduate?” I held my breath for her answer. She laughed once and replied “You want to live with your Dad? Well, let’s see how far in life you get.” Then she hung up on me. I put the phone back on the wall and sat there for a long time. My Dad finally asked me what she said and when I told him, there was a lot of cussing and stamping of the feet but in the end we were both powerless to stop her.  I was her daughter, I was her enemy, and I would never be free from her aluminum life.

          As an adult, on job applications and random conversations when people who ask me if I graduated or if I have a diploma, I always say “I wanted to, but I wasn’t allowed.” I always feel like an idiot, but what else can I say? I see the signs and commercials that say “Stay in School” and I hate them, because I know that those three little words are the biggest lie of all…

 

Reviews

[Teri B]

There is so much pain here. It's good that you have taken away from the experience something to grow you and make you better.

[Vinod Kumar U K]

Interesting page, contemporarly important, the growing root captured the organic manure from the origin and transplanted the other destination and its tragic and sentiments.... all are nice to read, matured page.