Living With Sunshine

Child molesting

"... ashes to ashes, dust to dust," Aunt Josie mumbles as we watch a workman driving a backhoe. It's been sputtering and shaking in the background all through the funeral. As I watch through tearing eyes, he throws away half a cigarette and begins filling in the graves. I can’t take my eyes off that huge shovel, destroying my old life with every stroke, each one taking them farther from me.

We don't stay around to watch the entire process. Me and Aunt Josie, her boyfriend Freddie, and cousin Sunshine clasp heavy coats tightly around ourselves and leave the tent that has been set up for the funeral. I'm the only one crying. 

My parents have been killed in an auto accident. I'm about cried-out. Both had been drunk when Father hit the other pickup truck head-on. Actually, so had the other driver. 

Six of us are at the funeral, counting hired preacher and backhoe driver.

We didn't attend the other driver's funeral. I see it’s still going on, a long line of cars filling a distant parking lot, what looks like hundreds of mourning people milling around that tent. 

Sniffling, wiping tears on my coat sleeve, I clutch at Aunt Josie as we maneuver around cold headstones on our way to Freddie's Ford.

"Put it behind you, Alice," my aunt says, patting me on the head. "Life goes on. I don't know if there's a better place or not, but hope the f**k there is." 

Cemeteries smell funny, I notice, never having been in one before. They smell of the earth, greenery, and s**t. Why s**t? I don't know, but they do. 

"You'll never know, Josie, honey. You better worry about the other place, down below," Freddie quips as he unlocks the car. "Now what? We ain't got all day. Both you girls gotta work tonight."

"Not me, Freddie. Not after ... this. Please," Sunshine whimpers. "I'm not in the mood. Sides, it still hurts from the last time." She shudders, looking up at him.

"Get in the car, honey," her mother commands. "It's been arranged for weeks. We can't get out of it now."

"Inside, everybody. Where to, baby?" Freddie urges. The inside of the car IS a little warmer and does keep that cold wind out. Freddie starts it up and, as we hit the road and speed up, the heater blasts at my feet. I puff out my coattails to let warmer air inside. I look over at Sunshine, seeing her huddled in a corner of the back seat, head turned to look out a defrosting window. Her hand reaches up, drawing letters in the frost. The word shows as "F," "U," "C."  I turn to my own window, missing the "K."

I hear my aunt saying, "We better go to Alice's apartment first. They were behind in the rent and their landlord says he's gonna start cleaning it tomorrow. We got us today to get the furniture out. After that, he's tossing it." 

"We can't get too much in the car. Maybe we need a truck? I can get Eddie to meet us there, if he's still home. He's getting together with his source, sometime today." 
 
"I wish you'd get out of that business. Eddie's too damned stupid to deal dope. It's only a matter of time till we lose our money. It's a f*****g wonder he hasn't been ripped off yet." She blows her nose. "Damned f*****g cold. And when he is f*****g caught, he'll turn on us in a minute. With our kid s**t, we'll get life while he walks. That's what we're looking at."

"Eddie is family, honey. He'd never do that."

I hear them, but I'm not paying much attention. Tears blind me as I watch telephone poles whiz by, remembering how I used to count them when riding with my Mama and Daddy. We don't ... didn't have much money, but Daddy had enough for us to be comfortable. Unlike some of the kids at school, I have shoes and sometimes good clothes -- even if some of them came from the Goodwill store. At least Daddy has ... had a job, even if it was sweeping up at night. Now I have nothing ... nothing.

***

Our empty apartment is cold inside. The landlord already turned off the heat. It's both familiar and strange. Dishes are still in the sink, not even moldy yet. Automatically, maybe as a last try for normalcy, I turn on the tap to wash them. No water comes out. Aunt Josie calls out, "No f*****g electricity. That cheap b*****d."

My room! I run past them all. Cousin Sunshine is trying to pick up our small television set, the one my father saved for several months to buy. 

"It don't work," I hear her say.

As I run past her, I hear a crash behind me. 

"None of this s**t's worth hauling away," from Freddie. 

Inside my room, I slam the door and lock it, then throw myself onto the bed. All the pent-in tears come rushing out. Pillow over my ears, I try to imagine things back to normal ... but can't. I can still hear them yelling, arguing over what to take with them.

For long delicious minutes nobody bothers me as I wet the pillow. I clutch it with all my strength, arms shaking with effort in an attempt to squeeze the pain away.

"Hey! You, in there. Pack a suitcase, box or something. That's all we have room for in the car. I'm f*****g freezing. We're gonna leave, with your a*s or not. Now hurry the hell up." It's Josie's voice. She sounds like she's in a good mood. Why not, I think, since she's taking what remains of my life with her. At least what she can stash in that Ford.

Forcing myself, I stand back up, looking around to see what I can take. It's my life, and I'd like to box up the entire room ... but can't. Wiping my eyes on the dry side of the pillow, I drag a suitcase I still have from summer camp a couple of years ago out of the closet.

In go a few clothes, a torn teddy bear, a few books, my clock radio, my school stuff. At fourteen, my mother doesn't let me have cosmetics, so that's not a problem. Well, I do have a lipstick hidden under the mattress. I suppose I should take it, though I'll probably have to hide it from Josie. 

Shoes! My good shoes go in. I almost forget underwear. It can be stuffed in all the corners. On top, I spread out posters torn from the walls. I have to sit on the case to close it.  

Oh, my gosh! I forgot my jewelry. It's all cheap stuff, but I fill my pockets with it and every small but familiar object I can find, even a half-pack of Marlboros and lighter from the top corner of my closet. I guess I can be called a closet smoker. Sometimes I hide in there with a flashlight and magazine, letting it fill with smoke until I can't see to read. Then, I'll dash out and slam the door, keeping the smell inside. 

*** 

"Where do I go to school, Aunt Josie? Sunshine won't say." 

"You don't. I teach you girls at home. Home schooling, it's called. You have to take some tests at the end of the year, is all. At the courthouse. Leave those f*****g books on the table over there. I'll look them over later." 

I've heard of home schooling, but would rather go to a real school. I imagine staying in her apartment all day can be boring, though it is a large place, a three-bedroom one and I have my own room. It doesn't have any lock on the door but I can get one. I like privacy and sometimes Freddie gives me the creeps, the way he looks at me. 

Sunshine is twelve, a year or so younger than I am, but seems like a hard tenth grader. She often talks about boys and sometimes cusses. Her mother lets her do both. If she's been schooled at home, I wonder how she knows so much about boys so, as she helps me unpack, I ask. 

"Are there a lot of guys around here? Boys, I mean?" 

"Only one that I know of, and he's eighteen. Too old to be interested in me. Sometimes I see Johnny, like in the laundry room in the basement. He's friendly, just seems so juvie, you know?" 

***

I wake up real early and can't sleep, so I go out to the kitchen and make a sandwich. I turn the television real low and sit on the couch to eat it. I don't like to get crumbs in my bed. After that, I go back to bed. 

In the morning, Aunt Josie comes in to get me for breakfast. It isn't much, only a bowl of cereal and toast, but I am hungry. A funny thing, though. While I'm sitting there, a strange man comes into the room, shoelaces untied and fixing his belt. 

"Your father around?" he asks. "Well. Where you been, little girl?" He has big eyes, looking me up and down like a cat with a mouse. "I haven't seen you here before." 

"I -- I just moved here. I don't have my parents anymore. And Freddie isn't my daddy." 

"Mr. Johnson," Freddie says from the doorway. "Stay and have a cup of coffee." 

"I don't have time this morning. Let's settle. I've gotta get home." 

"Sure." They both go into the living room. 

While I get up to put more bread into the toaster, I can see the man giving Freddie some money. When the toast pops up, I go back to finish my breakfast. 

A few minutes later, Sunshine comes in. She's still yawning and must have slept late. I notice she's rubbing her butt. Sunshine smiles and sits across from me. 

"You feeling better this morning?" she asks, fidgeting on her chair. "I get my allowance today.  We can go downtown and screw around. Okay? It'll be fun."

I won't say that I changed overnight, but even the most extreme sadness has its limits. I realize I can't spend the rest of my life in a shell. “Sure. I’d like that.” 

*** 

I've never been in this part of town before. My old apartment was in the suburbs and I had to go to school all day. Sometimes Mama would take me shopping and sometimes we'd go to a doctor's office or something, but I'd never just walked around uptown. Without an adult along, that is.

Sunshine and I have fun walking around and looking at people and in windows and stuff. We spend an hour in a pet store, looking at the puppies.

"Alice. Look at that one. It likes you."

"It likes anyone that might get it out of that cage. Wouldn't you?" I smiled. "What are those two doing, one riding the other one?"

"Making more puppies. You don't know anything." We both watch the two humping doggies. "And they're not very good at it, either." She laughs. “Look how the boy keeps falling off.”

"I suppose you could do it better?"

"I sure could," she says soberly, changing the subject with, "Let's look at the fish."

"What you mean? People don't do that with puppies." She doesn't say anything, only going over to a row of large fish tanks.

Then we stop at a clothing store. Sunshine surprises me by taking money out of her red purse. She buys us both new bathing suits.

"I like the beach," she says, holding up a swimsuit, "cause it makes me feel so good and clean."

"I have skinny legs, and those things are so short," I tell her. "But I like walking on the sand."

*** 

That night, after supper, we're all sitting in the living room watching television.
 
"Let's see you girls in your new bathing suits," Freddie says. He's drinking whiskey and seems a little drunk.

"Okay. Mine's red. My favorite color," Sunshine says, grabbing me. "Come on, Alice."

When we get back, Aunt Josie and Freddie are arguing, just a little. They don't seem angry, though.

"We gotta do it sooner or later, baby. She's an asset, you know?"

"Let her get over it first, Fred. It's too--"

"Now, honey," he says in a low voice. I can hardly hear him.

Both of them smile as Sunshine comes bouncing in, dressed in her red bathing suit. I look down at my own, and my skinny legs, thinking she looks better.

"Come here, girls. Let me see you real close, you little dolls." Freddie opens his arms and Sunshine jumps on his lap. 

Aunt Josie seems more interested in the television as Freddie rubs the material on Sunshine's bathing suit. His hand doesn't stop there, pinching her bottom and rubbing her leg while she clutches him around the neck.

I stand, maybe a little too close, as he grabs the top border of my suit, pulling the material out and forcing me closer.

"What's this?" He laughs. "Honey. This little girl has b***s already. See?" He pulls my top out and looks inside, while Aunt Josie ignores us. 

Both he and Sunshine grab me, four hands running up and down my body, tickling and squeezing from neck to feet, me being forced onto his other knee. They seem to be having a lot of fun while I'm only feeling uncomfortable.

"We always do this," Sunshine whispers into my ear. "We're a feelie feelie family." 

I dunno, I think, noticing her hand inside his belt. Somehow, it doesn't seem very nice to me, though I can see how it might be if a person grew up that way. Aunt Josie, though, doesn't want to join us.

"Tell you girls what we'll do tonight," Freddie says, kissing me on the neck. "Sunshine. Why don't you take this cute little girl to my and Josie's bedroom and set it up for a Quality Night? She seems too sad since her parents died. We'll introduce her to our family. Go on, girls. We'll have a lot of fun."

"Oh, boy. You'll like it, Alice. We get to drink real beer and have fun all night long." She jumps down and grabs me by the arm. "We gotta work first, though, to get it ready."

Almost before I know what's happening, we're in the other bedroom. Sunshine gets out a blowup mattress and plugs in an electric pump that comes with it. While I watch the bed inflate, she's fiddling with several cameras she takes out of a bottom dresser drawer. I don't know anything about those things, but she seems to.

"It's full."

"Let me see." She comes over and jumps up and down on the rubber bed before pulling the plug out of that wall. "Put this back in the closet, Alice," she says. "In that little box in the corner."

As I bend way over to reach the box, Sunshine pulls on my thighs, kissing me on the butt through my bathing suit. "Just practicing," she says.

"Practicing what?" I ask, pulling away.

"Tonight, silly. We'll all play then sleep together. Me, you, Mommy, and Freddie. First, though, we'll drink plenty of beer, smoke real cigarettes and do all those sex things ... together. You'll like it. Then," she pauses, getting a more serious look on her face, "you'll probably have to go to work ... like I do. It's not so bad, and I only have to do it once in a while. Not all the time."

"Work?" I'm young, but not dumb. "You mean doing that stuff with men?"

"Uh, huh. Help me push these tables around so they don't get in the way. Most of the guys are nice, like Mr. Johnson. He's an important judge, you know? And he gives me things, like the money for those clothes we bought. See?" She holds up a large teddy bear, much bigger than my old one. "He brought me this."

"Doesn't it ... like, hurt?"

"Not much, and you'll get used to it. Mommy told me not to tell you before, but it's probably all right now. Here. See this big diaper. Freddie likes me to wear it." She giggles. "Aren't big men silly?"

I try to imagine her, then myself, wearing that homemade diaper. Then Sunshine opens another drawer, bringing out a paddle with holes in it.

"When I wear my diaper, Freddie likes me to sit on his face and hit his nuts with this, while Mommy holds his knees apart. He jumps around but can't throw me off. It's like riding a horsey."

The mental picture makes me shudder. And they want ME to do the same thing? How, I think, did I get into this?

"No!"

She jumps across the bed, reaching out to pull me in with her. "You gotta. You just gotta. Mommy's been dating men all her life, and Freddie helps her ... us. He makes sure nobody hurts me or Mommy. It's how we pay our rent and get food, Freddie says."

"But they're adults. They can do this stuff, not us kids."

She kisses my lips, trying to feel me in a secret place. I push her hand away.

"I just started last year. A guy was with Mommy and mentioned he'd pay more for me than to kiss her. So we had a Quality Night to try things out and decided it was all right. Mommy said I'd have to start anyway, in a few more years. That it might as well be now. You'll really like Freddie. He's good at it, and says I’m getting better, too."

We work for another half-hour, preparing the room. I wait while Sunshine runs out to tell the others that we're ready. While she's gone, I look out the window, seeing it's a long way down. I want to run, to jump … but can't. I'm afraid that if I try they'll stop me.

While I wait, I hear a very loud knock on the front door, even as the buzzer buzzes. Sticking my head out of the bedroom, I see Josie opening the door. Oh, my God, I think. I hope it's not a strange man. Just thinking it makes my face feel hot. 

No! Not one man, but two. The second is a policeman, wearing his blue uniform. Do policemen do this, too?

Freddie comes into view. He's wearing a towel around his waist. "I was in the shower. What you want?"

"We're from the police department, Mr. Travis, inquiring as to whether you've seen this little girl.” He's holding a piece of paper. “She seems to have run away after her parents’ funeral. Nobody's seen her since then.

"Your wife here is her aunt, and we thought she might know something, but she says not. You wouldn't know anything about it, would you? Were you two at the funeral, and did you see anything or anybody suspicious?"

Freddie looks at what must be a photo. "Can't say that I have. What's going to happen to the kid, anyway?"

"Her grandparents have arranged to take care of her. They have a farm upstate.

"Well, sorry to have bothered you folks. Good evening."

At first undecided, not wanting to get Sunshine or my aunt in trouble, I finally come out.

"Is that me?" I ask.

***

"That's my doggie. Grandpa gave it to me. See? It likes me more than you." I cuddle up to the collie, averting my face as its tongue flicks my cheek.

"Did not. You can have the cat. I get the dog." Sunshine grabs me from behind, pulling me away. In seconds, all three of us, including the dog, are wrestling on the front lawn.

We're much happier here, though we both miss our respective parents. Josie, Freddie, Mr. Johnson, and a dozen others are in jail, and I hope never to see them again.

The End 
Charlie

Reviews

[hvysmker]

Correct, Christoph. I was never molested as a child. I have talked to quite a few girls that were, though. The ones I've talked to were all adults, with the experiences behind them. Getting their stories over stiff drinks isn't the same as personally. From my early twenties until mid-forties, I hung out with and cohabited with mostly prostitutes. So I've sat and listened to hundreds of hours of truth and bullshit.

[Christoph]

This was a really fine read most of the way.

There's a cool juxtaposition of maturity and childishness in the early scenes, something like a Holden Caulfield, the way I read it. And anyone who's lived in moments like that would know this is the reality of it, the quiet banality of cleaning up after Life's Big Events.

It's entertaining to read, relatable, and you build the atmosphere well.

By the end of it I wasn't quite sure, though. The early bits, up to about the pet store, all flow into one another perfectly well, following this girl as she's learning to handle adult concepts, she's growing realistically.

The line "What are those two doing, one riding the other one?" just doesn't seem like it would be spoken by a human being, even a child. And it keeps happening from there. I suspect you're trying to get to the revelation, the nature of these girls' work, and it feels kind of forced and unnatural.

Once we're actually experiencing mild glimpses into child molestation ("mild", I say, and then I wonder how I might mean that), it just gets further and further away from reality. I can't make myself believe these perspectives.

"Freddie likes me to sit on his face and hit his nuts with this, while Mommy holds his knees apart. He jumps around but can't throw me off. It's like riding a horsey."

No way. Children might not fully grasp everything that adults do, they might not know exactly why this is wrong or how to talk about it, but they're not stupid. She would know, and she wouldn't be able to describe it cutely.

Or, maybe she could, if it had been going on long enough, if she'd been sexualized so severely that she had to harden herself and grow up quick. But if that were the case, the childishness would be gone.

I called it a "cool juxtaposition" in the beginning. And it was, and it's fairly well written. But the same thing--the contrast between one girl's childish side and the part of her that has been forced to grow up--it just stops working when things get that heavy. It just can't be that basic.

Though, hey, it's probably a good thing that you don't have enough experience with the subject matter to write it realistically. In this case. And the rest was ace.