I do not
remember moving to “The House” a.k.a the rooming house my father purchased and
the house where I lived until I was 18. I do remember that both my father and
Maeve decided they were qualified interior decorators. Maeve hired an interior
decorator to come to The House and she helped with the wallpaper selection.
When it came time for flooring, Jack put his foot down and selected all floor
covering for the apartment. The apartment ended up having carpet in every
single room (bathroom and kitchen included); none of the décor was
complimentary – because neither of them understood how to compromise.
When you
walked through the heavy fire door at the top of the stairs of The House, there
was one bathroom to the right, a storage closet on the left; then you walk thru
a hallway with five rooms, a payphone, and another toilet before reaching the apartment
door. Once you reach the apartment, immediately
to the right is a large laundry room lined with several floor to ceiling
closets, moving down the hall there is a long rectangular shaped living room on the
left, a small office (Jack's) across from the living room, and a bathroom for
the apartment next to Jack's office.
The hallway
leads to a large commercial size kitchen with another small room off the
kitchen (mommy’s music room), behind the kitchen, at the back of the apartment
are two bedrooms. The back door leads to the cement slab with a fire escape and
the laneway. There is no back yard, but the building has two basements. The
House is 7,000 square feet and the first basement is for storage while the
second basement has a separate entrance leading to a 3-bedroom apartment. The
hallway wallpaper was a glossy finish, light pink with silver peacocks (à la 1980s) while the carpet was a red and black checkerboard pattern. The kitchen
had the same brown carpet as in the living room and bathroom. the bathroom walls were covered in more peacock wallpaper.
I remember it
was forbidden to go upstairs because men who meant me harm lived there. In
fact, I remember being specifically told to stay away from a certain gentleman
because not only was he a suspected pedophile, he was also a suspected Nazi war
criminal from Poland. I also remember being told all the people upstairs were
alcoholics and drug addicts.
My father
registered me for third grade at the local school 2 blocks away - my 3rd
if anyone is counting. The Convent ran this school, which was located across
the street. I remember my father introducing me to the school’s Principal and
then asking the nun to show me the strap that was used on disobedient children.
Jack expected the nun to go along with this little ‘inside joke’ but she loudly
informed him that children were not disciplined that way. I now know her expressions was one of shock and disgust but she quickly recovered; as a kid I saw this as deceitful on her part and I walked the straight and narrow.
My stepmother
made friends with a couple of the men who lived upstairs; two brothers.
Eventually, one of the brothers was tasked with walking me to school. Ron
seemed nice enough, but he always smelled like a brewery, his clothes were
always dirty and he could not walk a straight-line to save his life. I always
felt humiliated that he was the one who walked me to school everyday. I was
worried people would think he was my dad. After a week of him walking me to the
front door, I started ordering him to follow me instead – he was to walk behind
me and not speak to me or acknowledge me whatsoever. Our arrangement worked.
Fortunately, Ron thought this was hilarious and he was not offended in the least. Once
I reached grade 4, I was allowed to walk to school by myself.
One night, I
remember my dad waking Roxanne and me up when it was really dark out. It felt
late in the night. He led Roxanne and me upstairs and told us he wanted to show
us the consequence of using drugs. He took us to the second floor, near the
back door, and on the floor was one of the roomers overdosing. His body was
writhing, he was foaming at the mouth and his eyes were rolled back in his
head. I was absolutely traumatised seeing this - this vision has been seared in
my memory ever since. I think Roxanne thought it was theatre, she was much
younger and she asked for popcorn to watch the show. If I was about 9 then she
was not yet 7 years old.
Right around
age 7, Roxanne also started to feel the wrath of Maeve. I remember Maeve
screaming at Roxanne to “shut up it sounds like diarrhea coming outta duck’s
arse” or “shut up before I shove this broom stick right up your ass.” Maeve
would also threaten all our friends with the same if they were over and she was
bitchy, which was 30 days out of every month. Maeve was only ever happy when
everyone around her was miserable. Soon we stopped inviting friends over. Many
of my classmates were not allowed to come to The House because it was a rooming
house and deemed inappropriate for children.
In the spring
of 1983, Ron spent much of his time working with Maeve in the basement. After
the tenants who rented the apartment moved out, Maeve and Jack had started an
antique furniture refinishing business to help with their cash flow. The early
80s saw very high interest rates and Jack, being incredibly cheap, would often
skimp on repairs or completed maintenance cheaply and usually only
half-assed it meaning that when the problem resurfaced it cost much more to repair
or replace. Jack is a jack-of-all-trades and definitely a master of none. One
time he repaired a frozen (broken) water pipe with duct tape.
After a year of living at The House,
our little dysfunctional family fell into a groove of normalcy. What was normal
for us was the following: Maeve and Jack would scream at each other nearly
daily, usually about Jack’s children or French people, or Natives (First
Nations). Maeve hated them all. Roxanne and I would hide in our room hugging
each other tightly worried they would murder each other. I remember feeling deeply troubled, wondering who we would live with if daddy died. Then for about two to
three weeks, Roxanne would be the Golden Child; she was taken shopping, out for
restaurant lunches and generally spoiled. During that time, it was my turn to be
yelled at, belittled and bullied. Once she grew tired of Roxanne, I was the
Golden Child who went shopping; out for lunch and dinner while Roxanne was
belittled and bullied by mommy. We got used to her trying to play us off one another but
Roxanne and I had been thru so much together already that this little play on
Maeve’s part never worked; Roxanne and I pretended to play the game while
keeping the other informed on exactly what mommy said or thought of the other.
We got used to being loved then hated. It was just the way normal was.
Roxanne and I
spent all our time together, playing board games on the floor outside our small
bedroom, or playing hide and seek, or riding our bicycles all over town if the
weather was nice. I do not think we were asked where we went or what we were doing;
I remember feeling like no one cared as long as we were not underfoot, and made it home at the time we were told.
One winter,
Roxanne came down with the chicken pox. On the third day of her absence from
school, Maeve was the one who answered the call from the school for the absence
reporting. When Maeve was asked about Roxanne’s whereabouts, Maeve responded
with her usual rudeness that they should obviously do their jobs better because
she was IN CLASS. As she proceeded to argue with the school about Roxanne’s whereabouts,
Jack came out of the bathroom, told Maeve that Roxanne had been home sick since
Monday with the chicken pox, and “how did you not notice she was home?” Jack
actually thought it was funny that Maeve had no clue. Funny.
By the end of
grade 4, I remember praying every single night with my dad and Roxanne that we
could “sell the business and get rid of “her”” and the three of us would live
happily ever after. In the meantime, on the weekends, daddy would take us on
rides to the bush, often just the three of us, other times it was the four of
us. In the summer, we would go fishing or exploring the forest and dad would teach us how to track or put down snares. I am not really
quite sure why Maeve came along since she seemed to really hate the outings and inevitably an argument would break out.
At the end of
1984, I would need to register at a new school, again (school transfer #4). The elementary school I was
currently attending only had grades kindergarten thru to four. I would be returning to
the first school I attended near my grandparents for grades five and six and
then I would have to transfer to another school for seven & eight. This
would turn out great because I will be able to see my grandparents every day at
lunch.
Up until
1984, Maeve and Jack seemed to be in a constant power struggle with one
another. Despite praying with Jack and Roxanne on a nightly basis, the house
was not put up for sale. Jack would frequently remember that Monique left him
and then would lament that the only reason Maeve is in the picture is because Monique left us and he would not have won custody without a woman living in the house to raise his girls. Therefore, only Jesus and/or God could help us now.
Read from the beginning
Prologue : Family
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