These Things Hidden. Heather Gudenkauf
may have that bond with Gus. He’s the one who taught her to ride a bike, how to multiply fractions, the one who sat in the audience and blinked back tears when she walked across the stage to receive her high school diploma.
Everything Charm has learned about being a good parent, a good person, she learned from Gus. One thing she knows for certain, when she gets married and has children, she will be there, day in and day out. She won’t leave when things get hard or sad or just plain boring.
That’s something her mother or her brother never learned.
Brynn
It’s my first class of the term and even though I know all my teachers and most of my classmates, I’m nervous. A familiar feeling creeps into my chest like thick dust rising and settling on my breastbone. I try to take big, deep breaths, like Dr. Morris said I should, and it does help.
I’m looking forward to my classes this semester; I’m taking Animals in Society and Humane Education with Companion Animals. I also get to do an internship off campus. Since I already volunteer at the animal shelter, I think I’m going to request that I get to work on a horse farm. I’ve never ridden a horse, but I’ve read that horses have been used to help people who have behavior problems, eating disorders, even autism. Despite what most people think, horses are incredibly intelligent. In the late 1800s there was a horse named Beautiful Jim Key who traveled the country with his trainer, Dr. William Key. Beautiful Jim Key could identify different coins and use a cash register to ring up amounts and give the correct change. He could also spell, tell time and was said to have the IQ of a sixth grader. I don’t know if that is actually true, but I’d like to think so.
I hear my cell phone vibrate and I dig around in my purse to find it. For a second I think Allison has gotten my cell phone number from someone, but I haven’t even given it to our parents and I know Grandma wouldn’t have given it to her. I smile as I look at the display. It’s my friend Missy. I flip open the phone and bring it to my ear. “Hi, Missy, what’s up?”
“Party tonight, my place, eight o’clock,” Missy says.
“What’s the occasion?” I ask as I pull my car into a spot in the parking lot of Prairie Community College.
“Just a back-to-school gathering. Can you make it?”
“Sure,” I tell her as I grab my book bag from the backseat and make my way to the Animal Science building. “I work until nine. I’ll come right after.”
I met Missy the November after I moved to New Amery. I came to live with my grandmother in September. I was so sad and lonely; I spent the first two months in New Amery sitting in an extra bedroom in my grandmother’s house, crying and sketching in my journal, and trying not to kill myself. Finally, my grandmother had enough. She couldn’t stand to see me like that anymore.
“Come on, Brynn,” she said, coming into my room and sitting on my bed. “It’s time to get up and start living your life.” I peeked up at her from beneath my covers but didn’t answer. My grandmother was so different from my own father; at times I couldn’t believe she’d given birth to him. “I want to show you something,” she said, pulling the quilt off of me.
“What?” I asked grumpily. All I wanted to do was pull the blanket back over my head and sleep. Forget that I was such a failure, a loser, a no one.
“Come on, you’ll see,” she said, holding out her hand to help me up. My grandma herded me into her car and drove through the streets of New Amery until she pulled up in front of a long, squat metal building. Outside was a large sign, with the words New Amery Animal Shelter painted in bright red letters.
I sat up straighter in my seat and turned to my grandma. “Why are we here?”
“Come on, I’ll show you.” She smiled at me and I reluctantly followed her into the building. We were greeted by a friendly black lab and a girl my age wearing a red vest, with a name tag that said Missy. She was standing behind a tall counter holding a small orange kitten. I heard the muffled yips and whines of dogs being kenneled in another part of the building.
“Hello, ladies,” the girl said brightly. “What can I help you with today?”
My grandmother looked at me “What can she help you with today, Brynn?”
“Really?” I asked in disbelief. “Grandma, are you serious?”
“Go on and take a look.” She nodded her head toward the kennels. “There is some little critter in there, waiting for you Go find him.”
“Come on,” Missy said. “I’ll show you the way.” Missy opened a door and we were met with yelps and barking that echoed against the walls. The long, narrow room was lined with kennels filled with all kinds of dogs—a beagle, an English setter, labs and lots of mixed breeds. I stopped in front of a puff of reddish-brown fur that looked at me with bright, pleading eyes.
“What kind of dog is this?” I asked Missy.
“That’s Milo. He’s a mix of German shepherd and chow chow. Two months old. He was found out on a gravel road south of town. Poor thing was starving and dehydrated. He’s a busy little guy, but a sweetie.”
I looked at my grandma. “Can I have him?” I asked her, not daring to get my hopes up. He was only a few months old and already had huge paws, and Missy had said he was busy. “I think he needs me.”
“Of course, Brynn. He’s yours,” she said, sliding her arm around my waist.
It was through Missy that I became a volunteer at the animal shelter and learned about the Companion Animal program at the community college. I’m still not sure why pretty, fun-loving and free-spirited Missy befriended safe, boring me, but I’m glad she did. I remember when I was thirteen, my mother made me go to the same sleep-away soccer camp that Allison attended. I was terrible at soccer and screwed up every single time the ball came my way. Allison didn’t acknowledge me once that week. Whenever I tried to talk to her, whenever I tried to join in with her group of friends, she completely ignored me. When I finally couldn’t take it anymore and started blubbering like a baby, Allison rolled her eyes and laughed. I ended up spending the rest of camp in my cabin insisting that I sprained my ankle.
Having a friend, especially one who loves animals as much as I do, is such a relief. I drop my phone back into my purse and my hand grazes the bottle that holds the medicine I’ve been taking for the past year. I haven’t taken my dose for the day. Didn’t take it yesterday, either. I’ve been feeling better. Stronger. Even the news that Allison is out of jail doesn’t bother me as much as it would have a year ago.
Maybe it’s time to stop taking the pills. Maybe I’m ready to try things on my own for a while.
Allison
I look down at the baby doll, its lifeless eyes looking up at me, and I feel weak. It’s been five years and one month and twenty-six days. She would have been five years or sixty-one months or 269 weeks or 1,883 days or 45,192 hours or 2,711,520 minutes or 162,691,200 seconds old. I’ve been keeping count.
Many of the women at Cravenville had children. Some even gave birth to their babies behind bars. I used to run circle after circle around the prison courtyard, my tennis shoes pounding against the cement, the air heavy in my lungs. “Where you running to, Baby Killer? You running from yourself?” I would hear this from a corner of the yard and then a cackle of laughter. I ignored them. When they weren’t calling me baby killer or bitch or worse, they didn’t talk to me at all. They looked through me as if I was just a part of the putrid air on our cell block. Those were women who themselves were killers; they murdered their husbands or stabbed their boyfriends or shot a clerk in a robbery. But I’m worse. A helpless baby, a few minutes old, was tossed into the river to be swept away with the current, to be battered against the bank.
The women at Gertrude House are no different than the women at Cravenville. I have never felt more alone than I do right now. I know how hard it has been for my parents to witness how far I’ve fallen.