Halloween

Running down the apartment building stairwell to open the front door for my friend Siobhan, who was dressed in a homemade Crayola costume, I struggled to catch my breath. In my store-bought plastic costume and mask, I greeted Siobhan, hoping and praying she would not discover my mother’s craziness. This Halloween party that was candy and fun and pretend for all my friends, was a battle for me to contain my mother to keep the police and ambulances away, and to hide my shameful reality from my friends.

Perhaps her candle lighting fixation on the devil and spirits would be camouflaged by the creepy themes of the holiday itself. Maybe she would come across as a dedicated mother falling into character to entertain her daughters’ friends.

As the parents started arriving one by one to pick up their kids, I ran down to the door each time with each friend to say thank you and goodnight, keeping the parents from coming up and interacting with my mother. Tricking kids was one thing, but if their parents found out, they would never let my friends come over to my home again. They may not even let me come to theirs’.

The relief of making it through the party undiscovered was short-lived. When I came back in after the last successful pick-up, I found my mother reading the Bible, talking about the devil and Jesus. The burning candle fell over and lit a cloth on fire. My uncle used a pile of books to push the flames down and out, my favorite book at the time, Bread and Jam for Frances, singed with burn marks forever. The candle wax had spilled over onto the record player, leaving burnt yellow wax stains across the shiny black grooves of vinyl on my Grease soundtrack.

My mother quickly switched from her party mood to anger, yelling at us to go to bed. Younger sister crying, we three went to our beds. Too terrified to fall asleep, listening to our mother bagging up clothes, toys, books, many of our belongings. This year, throwing things away was her thing. As painful as it was watching our favorite things being taken away, it was better than watching her be taken away again.

I lay in bed, heart racing, jaw clenched, praying, praying so hard that she wouldn’t be taken away again and that my sisters and I wouldn’t be separated to live in three different relatives’ homes if she didn’t make it back to us this time.

When I heard her yelling on the phone at my grandparents, I knew time had run out. My grandfather arrived shortly. Then came the sirens, the flickering lights scattering across the darkened apartment. Then the heavy footsteps up the stairwell, into our apartment. My mother would always settle down once the police arrived. The manic highs, the rageful anger would quickly dissipate into a deep sadness. Sometimes tears, but mostly a sinking into herself in resignation.

The loud crackling sounds from policemen’s walkie talkies crashed through me. Hearing my mom beg her dad to not make her go.

Days later she would start calling us, telling us she loved us and she was very sorry.

Weeks later, she would return home looking numbed up and beaten down. Her extreme swings of joy squashed.  Ever so gradually she would come back to herself, and to us, in waves. Slowly replacing lost objects with her secretarial salary.

Over time, we would let our guards down, learn to smile again, breathe, and sleep a little easier.

Hot summer days filled with beach trips and freedom.

Then September air would roll in. My friends excited and nervous for the new school year. A subtle sense of dread would start to rise in me. Sleep becoming a little more elusive. Clenched jaw and muscles tight as a default.

Halloween decorations appearing in stores.

This year not as lucky as the last. Fixation on me. Twisting my ear, forcing me down to the linoleum kitchen floor, using the clothes on my body to dry the water spilled out from the washing machine. I pulled away and ran out of the apartment to the stairwell, only turning back when I reached the bottom landing. At the top of the stairs, she stamped her feet, smiling and laughing, “Runaway cockroach! Run away! Get out of here!”. Running through the streets crying, I reached my grandparents’ apartment building, chilled wet with no coat. Looking down in shame as the doorman let me in, I ran into my grandmother’s arms sobbing. My grandfather’s kind eyes. I’d made it to safety, but for how long?

One school day, our Catholic school principal called my grandfather to come pick up his daughter. She was pacing in circles around the school yard barefoot while school was in session. Later that day, as I was walking home from school, from half a block away I saw the police cars. Walking in slow motion, I could peripherally see all the kids from our school scattered along the Brooklyn sidewalks. Just as I arrived near the front door, out came two policemen escorting my mother with handcuffs behind her back.

I ran into the building, unable to bear looking around to see who had seen.

My friend Siobhan’s mother always picked her up from school, each and every day, to walk home together.