Chapter 3 My Earliest Memories

Life trots on for a few years, not many. We have moved before but we now live in the first house I can remember. It has a chain-link fenced backyard with a swing set. The front yard has two tall trees by the street, one of which is perfect for climbing. The other has whirly birds that float down to earth to become new trees. It is middle class heaven. We have two old ladies on one side of us and a family with three girls on the other. Everyone is normal.

One day an electrician comes to the house to fix something and mom invites him to stay for dinner. He has chisled features and a slim build. He is to become my nightmare. She marries husband number 3. He is a strict father figure doling out whippin’s from his belt. Occasionally my brother and I have welts on our back, bottoms, and legs.

I am about eight the first time he touches me. About this time is also when I first remember seeing them having sex in their bedroom with the door open. I found pictures they took of each other naked.

He convinces my mother I should have a mini bike and they buy me a Yamaha 90. I don’t have many friends. I don’t seem to know how to make any. Most of the kids I go to school with are black which puzzles me now since my neighborhood was definitely white. I’m thinking that kids will like me if I have a mini bike and I can’t wait to learn how to ride it.

I have to give him a hand job to convince him to take me out to the field and show me how to ride. I don’t remember him telling me not to tell anyone. But I didn’t tell anyone.

As a family we used to go up in the woods and ride motorcycles and shoot guns. He had a son from a previous marriage but I don’t recall that causing many problems. The boy was slightly older than me and we basically ignored each other. He live several hours away and I remember long boring drives to get him and return him.

The man became more and more perverted, coming out to raise the garage door for my mother totally naked in broad daylight. They often fought and he would hit her. Mom started hanging out at a garage with a man that had hit her years before. She made us swear not to tell the electrician. Meanwhile, he continued to torment me. Anything and everything became favors that would have to be returned upon his request. The end came in the middle of the night, mom packed us a bag and we went to stay with a friend of hers until she could get him out of our house and file for divorce #3.