Me and my little brothers always called him Uncle Roy only he wasn’t our uncle, he was Ma’s. When I was in sixth grade he started to hang out in our trailer after he got off his construction gigs even before he took a shower. He’d come in and drink beers until Ma got back and then he’d get up off the sofa where he was watching games on TV. He’d stretch like a tomcat and go, Welp, guess I’d better be gettin’ on.
Uncle Roy was always dirty.
*
I’m twelve when Ma comes home from the diner. I’m on the sofa next to Roy and he has his arm draped behind my shoulders. He always smells just like a bucket of rusty nails. He’s got a basketball game on and I’m re-reading The Tell-Tale Heart for school. I don’t realize he’s looking right at my neck until I look up and see Ma notice it.
Do you have childhood memories you think back to a lot? Like maybe because when you’re grown it turns out that was an important part of your story even though you didn’t know it at the time? It’s like that for me. Ma opening our door that afternoon runs in slow motion through my head sometimes. In my imagination-memory I can see the afraid look on Ma’s face and the amused one on Roy’s and know exactly what he meant to say to her when she caught him looking at me like that. I think he smiled when he saw her look shocked. And then, I bet he winked.
*
The way I figure it, things must have been a lot worse for Ma than they were for me. Roy moved in with his big sister who was my Grandma and my mom and her little sisters after he got out of jail. His parents wouldn’t talk to him after that but seems like Grandma felt sorry for him. He was sort of her pet. She’d say, Roy’s done his time. Just you let him be. She must have known he was bad but she didn’t do anything about it even though probably it made her nervous. She couldn’t see him straight for the man he was. All this was back before Michigan had a registry for offenders, so Roy just did whatever he wanted. He was always right respectful when Grandma was around. It used to make me squirm seeing him act different around her. Roy was one hell of a bad character all the way up until he got into a fight outside a nightclub, got hit over the head with a crowbar, and never woke back up again.
Aunt Lucy told me how the only time she ever saw my Mom speak up it wasn’t for herself but for her little sisters when Uncle Roy was around. I was grown and drinking wine with Lucy at her place when she finally told me what I never figured how to ask. Lucy’s counters are always sticky and covered with crumbs, just like Ma’s. That sort of quiet mess gives me an uneasy feeling, like something’s not quite right in houses like that. Nobody’s taking care of things, I mean. Lucy gets crazed when it comes to getting the last bit of wine out of the bottom of the box after the spout won’t work so she was going at it with a pair of the kids’ scissors while I brushed crumbs into little piles.
Sawing away, she said, “I’ll never forget it, Heidi. Your Ma just popped off at Roy one day after school when Mama was out visiting. I’d say I must have just finished elementary school. I remember there were more beer bottles lying around than usual and it was hot as hell in there with flies banging all around. The rattle of that dusty old ceiling fan whirring over our heads. It wasn’t weird how he was acting, he was always queer as a two-dollar bill so Vanessa and I didn’t think nothing of it when he called from his room for me to come in there and help him with something. But your Ma, she done froze like a rabbit caught in a trap and her face turned red from nose to ears. That’s the only time I can ever remember anybody talking angry to Uncle Roy. Your Ma must have been in tenth grade, not long before she dropped out. She yelled around the corner, Oh like hell you do not, Roy. Like hell you do not. And then she dropped her backpack by the door, told me to stay put, and stomped right back there herself. Seems to me she was like that before you were born. Saucy. Talked back. After she got pregnant and your Dad disappeared she just sort of… went flat. After you came along she turned more to the inside of herself. Like, all she cared about after that was getting boyfriends and turnin’ ‘em into husbands.”
Do you know the expression, the nickel dropped by the pennies? It was just like that.
Like a few beats of my heart went by and then I knew exactly what it all meant about Ma and Roy and my aunts. How that all kept churning right along into my life. Lucy didn’t have to say another word because all the pieces came together and even though I always suspected Roy hurt Ma when she was a girl, now I knew for sure. And that Ma wouldn’t let Lucy go back into his room that afternoon when they were girls or any day after. She kept her little sisters out the Roy mess, but for some reason she didn’t protect me. Maybe because she wasn’t saucy anymore after I was born? One thing I know for sure is Ma always wanted me to take care of myself.
“What did you and Vanessa do? When Ma went back to the bedroom with Roy?”
“Well I remember it clearly so I must have known it was important in some way but Honey we didn’t do anything. Junie just stomped back to his room and slammed the door behind her and we could hear her yelling and him laughing back at all her hollerin’ and then we couldn’t hear nothing else so we just stopped thinking about it.”
I watched Lucy’s eyes but I didn’t say anything. I was trying not to cry because crying in front of Aunt Lucy always turns into a whole thing.
“Awe Honey I know. I know all about it. Nessa and I weren’t stupid we were just ignorant kids, thanks to your Ma. And your grandma didn’t never say nothing about Roy so there was no way to start a conversation. That’s just how people talked back then. Shit, how we didn’t talk, I s’pose. Now, my kids, hell no! Ain’t nobody acting fishy around my kids, I’ll tell you what. And your Ma kept you safe from Roy too, I expect? I was always a little fidgety about when he was over at y’alls place when you were young.”
The look I gave her said more than whatever words I had and for once Lucy stopped talking. I got up to wash my glass so I wouldn’t have to say anything and I thought, What’s so great about learning to take care of yourself?
*
I’ve always had a lot of super close girlfriends and teachers who were women. Becky Hill and I have been best friends since the second grade when her family moved into the trailer across the street from ours. We met on the street, took off together on our Big Wheels and have been riding around together through life’s adventures ever since. It was Becky’s idea when we were in middle school that I should do my homework at her place instead of at home where Roy was. Becky knew he gave me the shivers. Roy gave everybody the shivers. It worked great. I just didn’t go home until his car was gone. By ninth grade I had figured out that Roy was likely to leave me alone when I wasn’t dressed cute. Sure, he’d make nasty comments and call me dyke but I didn’t care as long as he wasn’t touching my hair or patting my bum or trying to get me alone. I’d rather be put down by Uncle Roy than be petted by him.
I gained weight between middle and high school and stopped curling my hair and ratting up my bangs with AquaNet like the other girls. While my friends were all crowded around the mirror it was easier to hang back, and then it became a habit. I just stopped looking into mirrors. Looking at my frumpy self made me feel squirmy so I just didn’t do it anymore. At first I only wore sweatsuits when I was around Roy but then I guess it became a habit because I didn’t want attention from the boys at school either. The boys my friends liked weren’t creepy but I just thought the whole point of flirting was to get to the petting… like what Roy did. I pulled my hair into a low ponytail and brushed my teeth and left the house. Fastest girl through the bathroom in the history of the universe, Becky’s mom always said.
Me looking frumpy’s what got Roy to leave me alone. I know that much. You keep telling me I can’t say that looking sexy is the only thing men care about but I’m damn sure not looking good protected me from Roy.
*
Ma’s been attached to one man or another her whole life. Acts different around them too, real flirty and sweet but she never aimed anything sweet at us kids. She’d either ignore us or tell us exactly what to do, but never in an emotional way. Not in a lovey-dovey way or so we’d think she cared one way or another what happened to us. But with the boyfriends, boy watch out, she was light and sweet as carnival cotton candy and they always ate her act right up. My mom was the most gorgeous woman you ever saw. There’s no denying that. Long shiny dark hair and skintight jeans and back rubs and batting eyelashes and can-I-get-you-another-beer-sweetie? Those guys lost their dang minds when she was reeling ‘em in. It always made my tummy flip over watching her pour out her nicest self to everybody else. How quick and easy they went along with her sexiness made it so I didn’t trust boys and I don’t trust men. Men have terrible judgment when it comes to women. And if I’m telling the real truth, I think romantic love is totally fake.
*
I’d bet my bottom dollar Grandma knew she ought to be protecting Ma from Roy but she never did. Same for Ma looking after me. Even after all the years of thinking about it, that’s the bit that still tangles my brains into knots at three in the morning. I know what I’d tell a friend who was thinking through the evidence pointing to her not being a person worthy of love and protection but I can’t get that sort of common sense to soak into my own head. Or, into my own heart, I guess.
A couple times after I became a social worker and I knew all the things that should have been different in my childhood I tried to talk to Ma about Roy, but she just wouldn’t have it. One time Ma and I were talking at Grandma’s place back when Grandma had cancer the first time. She was asleep and there was that loud whirring machine she was hooked up to. The house still had that same old lady smell, all mothballs and dusty doilies with the windows shut tight only now it had a hospital smell about the corners too. Since Grandma might be dying I thought maybe Ma would be open to real-life conversations.
“Enough with your fancy-talk-therapy-bullshit, Heidi. People are just people and you can’t go back and change what’s already happened so best just leave it alone.”
“Ma. He’s gone and he can’t hurt anyone anymore. But you and me, we’re still right here.
I’d feel better if we finally talked about Roy. And I think you’d fight with your boyfriends less if you were open with him too. Like, maybe most of your relationship problems have to do with you growing up with Roy the way that you did?” Talking to Ma always makes me sweat. I try so hard to get through to her without making her defensive but it never works. Her mohawk is up. She gets up so she can look down at me. Before she even starts hollering I curl down into myself on the sofa and get a stomachache.
“That’s some bullshit, Heidi. You’re just trying to find a way to dress me down for all the shit that’s wrong in your life. How many times did I try to teach you you’ve got to live your life in the here and now? None of that old crap is pretty and it ain’t relevant no more neither. Go on and stare into your belly button just as long as you want to, see how far it gets you. I don’t see you in some fairytale marriage, now, do I? Crying to a handsome husband ‘bout your ole Ma letting you sit on her Uncle Roy’s lap when you were little? You’re all alone. You’ve got nothing figured out, girl.” She’s acting like she’s super pissed off but I see tears dart down along her nose. Sometimes when she gets upset like this it works up a cloud of yesterday’s alcohol. The stink stings my nose and makes me feel like I’m a little girl again.
Nothing makes us kids more uncomfortable than when Ma gets sad so I try to cool it down. “Oh my God, Ma. I’m not trying to fight with you. I’m trying to help.”
“At least you didn’t get knocked up when you were a kid. At least as a mother I got that right. I know for damn certain that’s the worst thing a girl can do to her life, now, don’t I? You’ve got it so good compared to me and still you don’t appreciate none of it, always pissing your own bed and tryna make me come lay in it with you.”
My mother has always known what to say to shut me up.
She stops talking and it looks like maybe she’s feeling bad about some of what she said. She sits down and lets out a big sigh. “You can make those sad people you work with tell you their sorry stories all you want but I don’t care for none of that. Leave it be, Heidi. Leave. It. Be.”
*
Maybe Ma’s whole plan was that someday I’d stand up to Roy myself. Eventually, he did leave me alone but I don’t know if it was me that figured out how to stop him. It messes with me a little bit; like, did I take care of myself or not? I’d like to know the answer to that, for real I would. I want to believe I’m a strong person and that I did right for my little brothers. I wanted to fix some of Ma’s effect on us so things could get better. Generational trauma and all that. Maybe Ma stood up to Roy for me and that’s why he left me alone after ninth grade. I’d really like to think that’s the truth. It’s possible that’s what happened. Sometimes it can make you feel better to just decide to believe something’s true even if you don’t have any proof to back it up.
*
I’m fourteen years old and I’m having so much fun. The five of us girls, The Ponytails, are all over at Lisa’s house for a sleepover. We’re singing and dancing and walking like Egyptians and we cut up magazine pictures to decorate the inside of our lockers. The whole room smells like Hubba Bubba and it’s nice and cool at her house even in the summer. Everyone says I look like Alyssa Milano and so Corey Haim is my boyfriend. I’m going to put up a picture of him I cut out of Teen Beat. Lisa’s mom is really loving. She’s set up a whole table full of ice cream and toppings so we can make our own sundaes and we get to eat as much as we want.
The thing about the Ponytails is that we’re nice girls. In movies popular girls are mean but my friends aren’t like that. Julie can be bossy sometimes and Tina gets a little bit rude when she’s hungry but we can joke about it, even the real stuff that’s hard to talk about. I can’t imagine living without people who look out for me, especially since my brothers and I don’t get any of that at home.
Something big happens after lights out while we’re in our sleeping bags on the floor playing with flashlights. It’s all about how Roy leaves me alone when I’m not done up cute. I can tell they’ve all been talking about this before they bring it up with me and that makes me squirm a little. Everybody’s quiet and there’s whispering. Out of the quiet dark room with our constellation of flashlight shooting stars streaking the water-stained popcorn ceiling Julie says, “Heidi. My mom thinks I should tell you that you smell bad and you should take showers every day with soap and shampoo.” I don’t know who but somebody whacks her over the head with a pillow and there’s a chorus of Julie! That was so rude! Ohmygod!
My gut clenches up tight and I’m thinking I might puke. I’m ashamed because of course it’s true. I know I look bad and shouldn’t be surprised that I smell bad. I’m not taking care of myself anymore. I guess I wanted Roy to stop looking at me so bad that I stopped looking at myself. Maybe it’s important to care about myself, too.
Becky probably realizes this mess is all on purpose, but she doesn’t say anything about it until we’re all together. She loves me, they all do. Even though I look different than the rest of the Ponytails, I’m one of them. They had to tell me I’m dirty.
“This is about Uncle Roy, isn’t it?” Lisa asks shyly, like she doesn’t want to say his name out loud.
I must have started crying because there’s a sudden shuffling of blankets and sleeping bags and pillows and now there’s a puppy pile of girls all over me and everybody’s crying.
“Have you talked to Mr. Alcala about Roy? Or that CPS lady who goes over to your place to check on you and Robbie and Chad?” Everybody knows I have to talk to the school guidance counselor every week ever since the third grade after Ma showed up to conferences drunk. Everybody knows I’m a basket case but I didn’t know I smelled like a garbage can in July. My hair’s greasy and only sweatpants fit me now. My Holly Hobby pillowcase has a smudge in the middle even when it’s clean. It looks gross and embarrassing. I am embarrassing and gross.
“No. It’s not really bad enough anymore that I have to talk to anyone about it or report him or anything.” I snarfle out a laugh and whisper in a villain voice, “I’m keeping him away with the power of my B.O.” Well that makes them all laugh hysterically and kick at each other until Tina whisper-shouts, “I think I just PEED!” At which point Lisa’s dad comes around the corner and turns on the bright overhead lights so we shriek even louder and he says rubbing his eyes with one hand and holding his robe closed with the other, “Girls. We have been over this. If you want to keep sleeping here like a pack of hyenas (another burst of hysteria at that), we all agreed that you’d be quiet after midnight. Quiet. Like, silent. Please, girls. It’s lights out for The Ponytails. Let’s save some madness for the morning. I’ll make chocolate chip pancakes if you will just please for the love of all that is good go to sleep now.”
“Sorry, Daddy,” Lisa says.
He flips the switch and shuffles back around the corner and I’ll admit we giggle for a few more minutes before calming down. But we don’t talk about it again. No need to. I got the message. I’ve got to stop being a disgusting person in general just to avoid attention from Uncle Roy.
It would be decades before I truly understood that looking good as a woman is not an open invitation to men. Or, it’s not supposed to be, but it is, to men like Roy. It’s unlikely that I’ll ever be comfortable as a traditionally attractive woman and I’m fine with that. Sexy was Ma’s thing, not mine.
*
Saturday morning cartoons are on. I’m eleven and there’s a light summer breeze coming in through the screens, but because of all the holes, bugs are coming in too. The boys make me watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles but I want to see My Little Pony even though I’m too old for it. We all like the Smurfs. It doesn’t matter what comes on, we three lay on the scratchy carpet right in front of the TV on our elbows eating dry cereal out of the box in our pajamas. Robbie is two years younger than I am and Chad is five years younger, he’s in kindergarten this year. This is the last time we will all be at the same school because I’ll move up to middle school next year. I love seeing my little brothers around school. I’ll miss that. I like to keep an eye on them because they’re always getting into devilry.
Uncle Roy pushes the front door open and stomps his boots on the mat and shakes the snow off of him like a muddy dog tramping out of a puddle. “What’s happening in here, you scoundrels?”
“Uncle Woy!” Chad scampers up to greet him and I realize I never got him out of his bedtime pull-up.
“Yo, Roy.” Robbie tries to be very cool around Roy. Except for Ma’s boyfriends, Roy is the only man around here and so I think Robbie tries to be extra manly. I ask Robbie for advice sometimes, or let him make decisions like what’s for dinner because it gives him more confidence and that’s what Ms. Gornbein his teacher told me he needs to work on this year. I had her two years ago too and she’s really nice. She’s the lady who invented the name The Ponytails.
I keep my eyes on the TV and dig my hand back into the Cocoa Puffs. I’m starting to feel weird around Roy. He still wants me to sit on his lap but I’m too big for that. Becky says it’s absolutely creepy and I should stop doing what Roy tells me to do. I should have said good morning to him though. I think I hurt his feelings.
“Now, Sugarbutt, don’t I even get a hullo from you this morning?” Roy glances quick toward the empty kitchen and then back at me. I’m trying to ignore him. I feel super weird about it.
“Where’s your ole Mama this morning? She at the Big Boy already?” He’s rubbing his palms on the front of his jeans.
“Yup! We’re having Cocoa Puffs for breakfast, except without the bowls and spoons and milk! Heidi says it’s ok, just not all the time,” Chad chirps, bouncing up and down and pulling on Roy’s pant leg. Roy smiles down at him and ruffles his hair and asks, “Is that right, kiddo?”
Robbie makes a big show of rolling his eyes at Chad who is apparently being extra immature. Roy drops his coat right there on the floor and walks over to the sofa and sits next to my spot on the floor. I can feel he’s got his eyes on me. Now it’s really weird. I’m not saying anything and so even though Becky said to ignore him I keep my eyes on the TV and say, “Morning, Uncle Roy.” He’s sitting too close and still staring at me and so I decide that very minute I need to call Grandma and see what she’s doing. I hop up like nothing’s weird, hand the cereal box back to Robbie and walk over to the phone in the kitchen.
I take one quick look back at Roy and the expression on his face is super confusing to me. Sometimes he looks like a shy little kid even when he’s acting awful. He’s this big ugly monster but if you look right at him, you might think for a second… he’s shy? Or like maybe he’s afraid of something you can’t even imagine. Something not there in the room. He has this childish little laugh he does when people look right at him, he looks down and away instead of at the person who’s talking to him.
I know five phone numbers by heart plus our own: Becky, Grandma, Julie, Tina’s, and the boys’ dad Emmett. I dial Grandma’s house and it’s ringing and ringing but she doesn’t pick up, but Roy doesn’t know that. I’m twirling the cord around my finger and walking away but making sure everyone can hear me. “Hullo, Grandma! Yes, we’re just watching TV and Ma’s at work and Roy just got over here. Uhuh. Oh, that’s nice.” I’m paranoid Roy can hear the ringing all the way from the sofa so I squeeze the receiver harder to my ear. “Oh, okay! That will be so fun. Thanks
Grandma, see you soon.” I walk the phone back over to the wall and hang up. I’m not a liar so I’m guessing I’m not a good liar and I can feel my palms sweat and my face where the receiver was getting hot pressed against my ear feels cool and wet now. It made a suction-pop when it came unstuck.
Roy is still watching me and he’s crossing and uncrossing his legs. He’s smiling but only with the right side of his mouth. He reminds me of Becky’s cat Coonie when he’s got a mouse by the tail and he’s watching it try to get away while smacking his tiger-striped tail back and forth with a thud on each side. I know just how those mice feel. Coonie swallows them in three gulps once he’s tired of playing. Then he’ll hack up three organs and a pile of blood for Becky.
“Yer Grandma’s home this morning, huh, Baby?” Roy is smiling with his whole mouth now.
And just like that, the frightened boy is gone and Roy is all monster. No more breeze and I’m fully sweating.
I’m pretty sure I’m caught so I hesitate but then I dig in. “Yep and she’s going to come on over here now to check on us kids.” The horse in my chest really starts galloping when I say that.
“Well now that’s a funny thing since I talked to her an hour ago and she was heading over to Lucy’s place to watch the kids.”
“Well.” I can’t think fast enough and I can hear my heart in my ears and maybe I’m going to throw up? Something’s wrong and it’s my fault. I’m a liar now. “Must be I misunderstood her. Or maybe her plans changed,” I stutter out.
“Maybe so.” Roy gets off the couch and starts walking back toward Ma’s room. His wet boots are leaving craters in the carpet. “Sugar, I’ve been up a long time this morning and I need a catnap. Why don’t you come back here and rub my shoulders for me like a good girl?”
Now, Roy’s been having me rub his shoulders for as long as I can remember but this time my heart is going off full-steam like the big red firehouse alarm on Tom and Jerry. Inspector Gadget came on and now the boys are bickering about whose turn it is to get up and switch the channel. And Ma’s at work and Grandma’s not coming and I hear the coils creak as Roy’s gets onto Ma’s bed and I’m all out of choices.
Can you remember what it was like to be a kid and not get any say over what happened to your own self? What a roller coaster it was to be ten years old and have my body and my mind telling me opposite things to do.
My legs follow Roy into Ma’s room in my Strawberry Shortcake nightgown and bare feet while between my ears, a great big NO is jackhammering away.
“Shut the door behind you, Sugar.”
Shirin Abedinirad, House in the Wind, 2017. Land art, Marrakesh, Morocco. Created in collaboration with Nikon and BMW Mini, the work imagines the desert as an open studio where, in the artist’s words, “my studio has no walls, no roof, and no borders.” With sky as ceiling, horizons as walls, and wind, mirrors, clouds, and sand as collaborators, the installation becomes a meditation on nature as partner, sanctuary, and boundless space of belonging. Artwork courtesy of featured artist Shirin Abedinirad.
