All Memories are not Good

In the early 1940s having a child our of wedlock was strictly taboo. A woman and her baby would be labeled for life.  As a result when the young woman got pregnant she would go to live with a relative or friend in a different city or state.

Such must have been the case with my great Aunt Dessie when she found out she was pregnant.  I am not sure of the details but she ended up marrying a man named Shaeff, and they had her baby, who was named after him, Hubert Larry.  Her baby was 10 years older than me.  Larry was a very brilliant student.  All who knew him thought him an outstanding person.....except me.

My great aunt and uncle lived in a yellow brick house on Amburn Road.  It seemed like an old house to me.  I always thought it was kind of a strange old house.  The house was yellow brick but the garage had yellow and red brick.  I asked why it was different and my dad told me that the garage had been a part of another house.  The other house had burned down.  When they built the new house they only had the yellow brick.

My parents frequently visited with Aunt Dessie, Uncle Shaeff and Larry.   Aunt Dessie had been instrumental in finding out about the opening at Union Carbide for my dad shortly before my parents married.  My dad was forever grateful to her for her connections and for suggesting him for the job.

Larry, who was 13 would always lure 3 year old me out of earshot of my parents, with a book or some candy.  Once away, he would try to restrain me.  When I would try to pull away he would hold me even tighter.  When I would start to protest he would put his hand over my mouth and nose until I was struggling to breathe.  Then he would remind me that everyone loved him, and thought he was very smart.  He told me that no one would believe anything I said because I was just a little kid and little kids were always stupid liars. I quietly complied and tried to stay as close to my father and mother as possible during the visits.  I protested whenever they said they were going to go to Aunt Dessie's house but my protests fell on deaf ears.

By the time I was 5 my mother had started to work on one of her master’s degrees.  I stayed at Mrs. Hudnall’s house during the school year while my parents worked,  but since it was summer, my mother had to find someone else to keep me.   That was how I ended up being at my great aunt’s four days a week for half the summer.  Larry was always there, when my great aunt was there he didn’t pay much attention to me.  Sometimes she ran errands and would take me with her in her big pink 1955 Buick Special. I enjoyed getting to ride in her big old car.  Sitting in the middle of the seat, the radio was just at my eye level.  She would let me tune the radio to the station I wanted to listen to.  

One day she had to meet my uncle for lunch.  Anticipating getting to go, I was devastated when she told me I would be staying at the house.......with Larry.  I cried and begged her to let me go.  She sternly told me ,”No”, that it was rude to ask to go somewhere you had not been invited.  I wanted to tell her...I wanted to go because I was afraid of Larry....but remembering he had told me that adults thought little kids were “stupid liars, “ I just curled up on the couch at the other end of the kitchen and cried.

She had only been gone a few minutes when Larry came into the kitchen.  He told me that his mom had been making me doll clothes for my favorite doll, Toodles.  I couldn’t believe my ears.  He told me they were in the bedroom and he would show them to me. I eagerly jumped up and started to run towards the bedroom where she kept her sewing machine.  There, on the sewing machine table were the clothes, each outfit spread out to see.  They were in beautiful bright colors and just the right size for my beloved doll. How I wished I had brought her with me.  I scooped the clothes up, clutching them to my chest to carry them back to the kitchen, when turning,  saw Larry, leaning against the closed door.  I knew he was about to do something to me.  I dropped the clothes, started backing away from him, crying.  He grabbed me by my arms and told me how my arms would be bruised if I pulled away from him.   Then he asked me what would I say to explain the bruises?  As I screamed he pushed me, put his hand over my mouth and nose, and as I struggled for air, he pushed me down on the bed....

When he finally let me go, I ran as fast as I could...out the front door...down the steps... all the way across the front yard, past the big tree and around the garage with the yellow and red brick.  There I fell down behind a shrub, in the tall, cool grass and sobbed.  

I cried for what seemed like forever.  I was so alone, no one knew where I was, my mother wouldn’t like him doing those things to me or my being left alone.  As I cried, in the shadow of the bush, I felt something scratchy wipe across my face.  Scared it was Larry, playing some horrible trick on me, I barely peeked up. I looked into the green eyes of a big spotted cat.  As I lay there on the grass...the big cat looked at me and started once again to lick the salty tears from my cheeks with her tongue.  I started to stroke her soft fur.  She laid down and cuddled by my side.  As the sobs slowly left my body, I could feel the rumble of her purrs against me. I put my arms around her and held her tight.  I thought about all the beautiful doll clothes I had left behind.  I was determined to not go back into that house again. Larry didn’t call for me, I hoped he thought I had run away for good.

I heard my aunt’s big old car pull up, the car door slam, her heels on the sidewalk, the squeak of screen door as it opened, the slam as it closed.  A few moments passed then I heard the squeak of the door, the slam, the heels on the sidewalk again and her calling my name.  

I waited until she had called me several times before I answered.  She didn’t seem alarmed that I was there alone and said, “Oh I see you found the cat.”  Aunt Dessie had to have seen my tear stained face.  Then she said, “Let’s go, your mom will be home soon. I told her I would bring you home.”  I didn’t reply, I just got up and climbed into the car.  I didn’t scoot over to the middle, in front of the radio like I usually did, instead, I stayed close to the door.  We rode to my house in silence.  

When we got to my house, Aunt Dessie greeted my mom and presented all the beautiful doll clothes she had made me for my beloved doll, in a little round blue suitcase.  I took them reluctantly. My mother, I could tell, was embarrassed by my ingratitude.   I tried to smile...it had been such a horrible day.  I took the little blue suitcase to my room. I felt dirty just putting the clothes on my precious doll.  

For the rest of the summer, whenever my aunt left, I ran and hid until I knew Larry was no longer looking for me. Had it not been for the old cat waiting for me behind the garage...I would never have been able to keep the horrible secret to myself.  The old cat, always waiting for me, seemed to know what I was going through.

Finally one day on the phone, my aunt told my mother that she had a few errands to run and, “Would it be okay to leave Jan with Larry for a few minutes while I am gone?" When Mother told me, I immediately started begging Mom not to let her leave me with Larry.  She asked me why.  I told her I didn’t like him, that he was mean to me, that I was scared of him.  She was upset.  Her classes were over for the summer, Mom decided to take me with her while she got her classroom ready for the first day of school.  I did everything she asked me to.  I emptied trash cans, swept, and tried to be the best helper she had ever had.  Other teachers even commented on what a great helper I was, to not even be in school yet.   I never stayed with Aunt Dessie and Larry again.

When I was fifteen, about ten years later, my aunt came to our house with a baby in her arms.  Larry had married several years before and the baby was his little girl.  I was so outraged.  I took one look at the baby and told my aunt, “I hope Larry never does to her, what he did to me," and I walked out the door.  Later my mother confronted me. I told her the whole story.  She just looked at me and cried.  

We never talked about it again until she told me my Great Aunt Dessie had died, I was 30 years old. Mom told me how sorry she was over what Larry had done to me, but until that moment, I had never been sure if she had thought I was terrible or him.  When she was growing up, she said every family had a dirty old uncle that every girl in the family knew to stay away from, they just didn’t talk about it.  She said she had not known what to do, except to never go around them again.