—The SAMPLE PAGES for WILD HORSE GIRL ARE BELOW THIS PART, AND IF YOU WISH TO GO STRAIGHT TO THEM, JUST SCROLL DOWN PAST THE EXPLANATION--
WILD HORSE GIRL—An explanation: The title of this novel and the illustration on the front cover, can potentially be misleading, but if you pay attention to the back cover copy, and the cautionary note in the front matter, you will have a more accurate clue to the contents. (PARENTHETICAL NOTE: It is always my goal to create cover illustrations for my novels that accurately reflect the contents of each book. Even in this case, the cover is a faithful representation of an occurrence in the novel, but some of its imagery will only be understood upon reading the book. For instance, the bright yellow CAUTION tape in front of Amanda is symbolic to her and to the reader—proceed with caution. The way Amanda sits there in the cover illustration will hopefully convey an accurate feeling to the reader when they arrive at that part of the book. I also pride myself on demanding that cover blurbs on my novels truthfully reflect the story. I am always disappointed when I get done reading a book that was nothing like its cover.)
The narrative of Wild Horse Girl begins with a chance encounter in the first chapter. However, as the sixteen-year-old main character, Jenny, gains the trust of the young neighbor girl her family takes in as a foster child (Amanda), the disclosures build upon one another. The account of slappings and beatings is gradually overlaid by the depiction of complex, multiple, incestuous relationships, and on top of that comes the revelation about the probable murder of the child’s mother and brother.
WHY DID I FINALLY CONSIDER PUBLISHING THIS NOVEL? Originally, this story was written as a cathartic exercise with no intention of ever publishing it. Three factors coalesced to prompt me to change my mind. First, a promise I made several years ago to the mother of a molestation victim. Second, a friend of mine, knowing my background in child and family therapy asked if I had considered writing anything about this subject, and I told him I had already completed it, but was reluctant to consider publication. Third, the book Hunger Games was released and, to my knowledge, no one vilified its author, and readers seemed to survive reading it just fine. The portrayals of physical violence in that book are more graphic than any revelations of abuse that I include in mine, since I allow the child to reveal the abuse without explicitly depicting either the violence or the incest. A large part of my reluctance to consider Wild Horse Girl’s publication was my concern that it might traumatize readers. I now believe most readers can handle this information, and the others will simply choose to read something else.
WHY DID I ORIGINALLY WRITE THIS NOVEL? I had become so incensed by the treatment of some children whom I worked with, and especially when I realized that actually getting them help was at times impossible. I discovered early on that I could not promise children their lives would get better. The end results of abuse reporting were out of my control. Police and child protective service agencies have many constraints, and at times it can be heart-rending to watch things develop in ways that seem to be unhelpful for a child. As just one example, there is evidence in the abuse literature that emotional abuse can be more detrimental, long-term, than either physical or sexual abuse. But emotional abuse is difficult to prove in court. I was told multiple times by abuse screeners that the DA’s office would not take those cases to trial because chances of actually winning were negligible.
One of the most challenging things for me personally was to have a child who had just disclosed what sounded like abuse—and at times they had begged me to get them help—only to find, for various reasons, that the desired aid did not materialize.
To put it simply, I wrote this story to help myself cope, and later I went back and revised it to make it be more beneficial to molestation survivors, their friends, and their families. And to give a better understanding to typical readers with no personal experience of things like sex abuse, incest, or the complexities involved in such circumstances. My goal was to portray an incest situation in an accurate manner (knowing that no two occurrences are exactly alike, but that there may be similarities between them in some respects). I tried not to gloss over the behaviors exhibited by a child who had been molested. Such behaviors, I might add, are unlikely to endear her (or him) to people who might otherwise want to help. Whether I achieved that goal, only time will tell. Another overriding purpose of mine was to create a story that people want to read. Even though the subject matter can be grim, I crafted the plot’s details to engage the reader in positive ways, and the feedback I have received thus far suggests I may have met that goal.
IS THE INCEST SURVIVOR IN WILD HORSE GIRL (AMANDA) BASED ON A REAL PERSON? Absolutely not. I have never known a child who could exactly fit this description, and yet, I have known dozens who might be similar in one aspect or another to what Amanda experienced. None of the characters in this novel are based on real persons, alive or dead.
[Final note: the fact that I was occasionally disappointed with the results of abuse reporting is not meant to malign law enforcement personnel, the courts, or child protective workers. The overall amount of good that they do is astounding, and without these resources, I shudder to think what life would be like for countless children. I see in current literature that the percentage of documented molestation cases has declined in the last decade. Although I hope this is accurate information, I strongly suspicion it is not.
EAB]
Wild Horse Girl- Sample pages
WILD HORSE GIRL
By E.A. Bundy
Chapter One: The Reluctant Neighbor
“Mom could’ve given us a ride,” Patrick said as they approached the school bus stop on foot. Jenny and Jeff Miller chose not to answer their younger brother, enjoying the sunshine instead. Oregon’s beautiful Hood River Valley felt more like mid-summer than late spring. Standing off to one side was a small girl bundled up in a hooded sweatshirt. Strange, Jenny thought, the girl was dressed too warm for such a nice day.
Patrick said, “That’s her…the snotty one.”
“Knock it off,” Jenny said, reflecting that her youngest brother seldom chose his words carefully. She moved ahead of her siblings and approached the girl. “You live up the road, don’t you?”
There was no verbal response and the girl’s head lowered even more.
“My name’s Jenny, and these…”
The girl’s head rose slowly. Her eyes peered out from the shadowy hood, piercing into Jenny’s—then looked away in what Jenny took to be a dismissal.
“See!” Patrick’s taunting remark drew a withering look from his sister.
“I’m almost fifteen,” Jenny said, thinking the girl was at most ten. The back of the girl’s sweatshirt promptly turned toward Jenny.
Patrick’s loud snicker cut off when Jeff’s elbow jabbed his upper arm.
“What’s your name?” Jenny asked.
The sweatshirt stretched tight across the girl’s back.
Patrick rushed beyond reach, jeering as he went, continuing past their neighbor, and looked down where the big culvert came under the road. It carried the brook from the Miller place into the fork with the upper creek.
Jenny stepped toward the younger girl, thinking, you aren’t going to get off that easy. “We don’t usually ride the bus.” Jenny persisted even though she did not receive answers. “I think I’ve seen you around. Funny we never met.”
The girl shuffled noisily through the gravel to the very edge of the road, with the steep ditch below. The stream still ran high and the loose gravel where the girl stood worried Jenny, because the slight figure might slip into the rushing water.
“What’s that smell?” Patrick’s nose curled up in disgust. Jenny, thinking he was making fun of their neighbor, glared at him. She might have to take it to the next level with Patrick—give him a little refresher course in humility.
“Hey! Look at all that toilet paper.” He yelled, “What’s going on?”
Jeff and Jenny walked down the road toward Patrick.
“Yuck,” Jenny said, appalled at the scene before her. “How’d that get there?”
“That’s illegal.” Jeff noted.
Patrick shifted back toward the other two. “We better tell the sheriff.”
“No!” The command came from the neighbor girl, now standing just behind them.
Jenny glanced her way. “Why not?”
“My old man’ll get mad.”
Patrick asked, “How come?”
“Just will.” She closed her mouth tight, as though she would say no more.
Jeff looked away from her, back along the creek where toilet paper scattered through the brush—apparently left from the high-water runoff. “We’ve got to tell.”
The girl hunched over and cried out. “You can’t.”
“Why?” Jenny moved closer.
Words leapt out from the cover of the hood. “He’ll beat me.”
Jenny tried to touch the girl’s shoulder reassuringly but the other shied away, fending off contact. The boys stood in silence. Jenny’s eyes shot a warning to her brothers. “Maybe we don’t have to tell.”
Patrick’s mouth was beginning to open, but closed with a snap—his sister wasn’t fooling.
The girl crouched down and huddled near the ground, hugging her knees, rocking forward and back.
Jenny bent nearby but not as close to the girl as before. “What’s your name?”
“Amanda.” The small face remained concealed.
“If I get my brothers not to tell, will you sit and talk with me on the bus?”
Amanda nodded as the yellow Wy-East school bus pulled to a gradual stop with squealing breaks.
“Must have a little pebble in the brake,” Jeff said as he and Patrick climbed up into the bus.
Jenny let Amanda get aboard first. The strong smell of diesel exhaust assaulted their nostrils just before the door closed behind them. Jenny said, “Pick one of the seats in the middle where nobody sits…so we can talk.”
Amanda complied without comment and turned her head toward Jenny, who was seating herself. The girl’s hood slipped back and the morning light shined revealingly on her face. Jenny noticed dark areas on the girl’s left cheek and tried to quell her startled response. Was the girl’s face simply dirty or was she badly bruised? The shift of her hood didn’t seem accidental. Jenny was unsure what to say—how to begin. She finally jumped right in with, “You know how that toilet tissue and stuff got in the creek?”
Amanda said, “Septic backed up…ground froze…my old man couldn’t dig it out. Couldn’t afford to get it pumped.”
“So?”
“Had to go–you know what—in the woods down by the creek. When high water come… mostly washed away.”
Jenny screwed up her courage. “Will your Dad beat you if we tell about this?”
Amanda nodded. In the clear morning light, her fearful eyes reminded Jenny of a motherless fawn. “But why?”
“He’ll say it’s my fault you found out…and told.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“Won’t matter.”
Jenny said, “Patrick just happened to wander down the road.”
“Don’t matter…” She kept looking at Jenny. “Promise you won’t tell.” The fingers of her left hand sought out a small hole in the vinyl cover of the seat before them and yanked hard, creating more of a tear.
Jenny could not help herself. “I promise.”
“Everything’s my fault.”
Jenny asked, “Why?”
“Just is.”
They rode in silence and Jenny hardly noticed the occasional lurches in the ride as the bus picked up more passengers. “I don’t get it.” Jenny finally said.
“He controls everything. But if anything goes wrong…it’s my fault.”
“Your dad…has strict rules?”
The girl nodded.
“Like, what does he control?” Jenny asked.
The girl whispered. “What I wear.”
Jenny thought about the hooded sweatshirt, how it had concealed Amanda’s face. She looked down at the nondescript sweatpants, noticing how dirty they were. Amanda’s drab, soiled clothes were quite a contrast to Jenny’s bright shorts and sleeveless top.
“Washer’s busted.” The girl seemed to guess Jenny’s thoughts.
Jenny replied, “Our washing machine broke once. It was awful.”
Amanda nodded.
Something inside Jenny told her Amanda’s broken washer was not a temporary condition. She tried to smile at the little girl. “How long have you guys lived up the road from us?”
“Three years—since grandpa died.”
“How come we never met before?”
The girl shifted uncomfortably. “Don’t go nowheres. Got no friends.”
“I’ll be your friend.” Jenny reached out to touch Amanda’s arm but it jerked away.
“What else does your Dad control?”
“Every...thing—” The finality of the statement held Jenny’s questioning at bay for a while. She struggled to understand but couldn’t, and eventually asked, “Like…?”
“When I go to bed. What I wear. No friends.”
Since her initial opening-up, it seemed Amanda was beginning to trust Jenny.
“You never go on sleepovers?”
She glared at Jenny. “Nope.”
“He wouldn’t let you come over to our house to visit me?”
“No.”
“Not even if my Mom or Dad went over and told him it was okay and drove you to our house?”
Amanda looked stricken. “No!” She turned half away, looking afraid.
Jenny said, “But he can’t keep us from sitting together on the bus.”
Amanda’s silence was unnerving.
“How would he even find out?” Jenny asked.
“Got to tell him…every-thing.”
“Us finding the toilet tissue wasn’t your fault.”
Amanda just looked at Jenny.
“How’s it your fault?”
“Stole it from school.”
Jenny asked, “You don’t have toilet tissue at home?”
Amanda shook her head.
“What are you supposed to wipe with?”
“Leaves.”
“Your septic backed up in winter…there’s no leaves in winter.”
Amanda was silent.
Jenny knew she couldn’t conceal the stricken look on her face. She turned away, glancing down the aisle of the bus. For the first time, she heard the drone of other voices, occasionally punctuated by laughter. If she weren’t sitting with Amanda, her chatter would mingle gaily with the rest. Jenny turned and looked at her small companion again. The hood had slipped even more, clearly revealing discoloration—definitely bruising.
It hadn’t fully registered when Amanda shared about being told what to wear, or when to go to bed—since those seemed fairly normal. The part about not having any friends was more concerning. However, not having toilet paper and using the woods all winter as an outdoor bathroom—those facts made a strong impression in Jenny’s mind. But the obvious bruising on Amanda’s face and the wearing of concealing clothes in warm weather had the most impact.
How many times had Amanda ridden this bus? Yet, no one had a clue how she was treated at home. Jenny stared at the bruises. Why hadn’t the teacher noticed?
Amanda seemed to read her mind again. “I sit in back.”
“Back of the class?”
“Yeah. Keep my head turned—good side toward her. Wear my hood at recess.”
“Isn’t your dad afraid to let you come to school with bruises?”
“Nope. Picks my clothes. If face too bad marked…stay home.”
Jenny shuddered as she glanced at the covered limbs. How many hidden bruises did the clothing conceal? Moreover, how could Amanda talk about this with so little emotion? “Why did he let you come to school this morning?”
“Still hung-over. I left before he woke and he’s going to be real mad…cause he’ll be late for work.”
“Why didn’t you stay home and wake him?”
“He’d of beat me…for bruises on face.”
Jenny’s voice raised, “But he put them there.”
“Don’t matter. I’m s’posed to duck so’s he don’t get my face.”
Jenny’s mouth hung open. She couldn’t believe what she’d heard. What could she do? She became aware of her left hand resting on her thigh. Her right arm extended to the seatback in front and she felt like a mannequin, unable to move.
Jenny looked down in surprise to find Amanda’s small hand resting reassuringly on her own. A tear slid down Jenny’s face and she buried her head in the crook of her right arm so others would not see. She felt the warm hand patting her gently…
* * * * *
Jenny swore her brothers to secrecy after they all got off the bus, which was not easy. It required major threats of bodily harm and the assurance they would talk to their father about it when they got home that afternoon.
“Dad!” Jenny’s voice reverberated through their apparently empty farmhouse later that day. Her younger brothers were still running along the driveway, far behind her, trying to catch up. She had to be the one to tell her father, and wasn’t taking any chances on her brothers messing things up. She’d worked too hard in getting her relationship with him back to its pre-horse-logging state.
“Dad!” You just have to be here, she thought. Walking into the living room from the kitchen, she heard a sound behind her and turned in time to see her father emerging from the basement stairway.
"Hi, Jen.”
She flew into his arms, nearly knocking the two jars of canned fruit he was carrying onto the floor.
He asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Amanda…our neighbor. Her Dad beats her. What are we going to do?” She had not told her brothers the part about the battering, although they might have heard her say that before the bus arrived, and anyway, they probably would just think it meant spankings. The porch screen squealed open and then gave a repeating squeak before banging shut. Her brothers filed into the kitchen, breathing hard against the background noise of dogs growling and barking playfully out in the yard.
“Everybody sit down.” Their Dad pulled a chair out and followed his own advice. “Tell me what’s going on.”
Jenny and her brothers started talking all at once.
The words “Toilet paper” and “creek” repeated multiple times.
“Jenny, why don’t you tell some, and then each of you can add your parts.”
“Aw,” Patrick whined. “Just cause I’m youngest, I never get to go first. I'm the one who found it!”
Mr. Miller’s hand rose slowly in the air, signaling Patrick to be silent. “Jenny.” He looked at her expectantly.
She said, “Let Patrick tell what he saw; then I’ll tell what she said on the bus.”
Patrick didn’t have to be told twice. “Well, that stupid neighbor girl…”
Jenny cut in, “Her name’s Amanda.”
“Yeah— she wouldn’t talk to Jenny this morning. She wouldn’t even look at us until I found the toilet paper down by the creek. It smells like shit down there.”
“Patrick.” His dad’s voice rose.
“Well, it does. It’s everywhere. That…and the toilet paper hanging in the bushes.”
Mr. Miller’s eyebrows rose uncharacteristically high. “Where was this?”
Jeff said, “Down—just past the bus stop.”
Patrick added, “In the creek bottom, across the road…after the two forks come together.”
Their dad asked, “There was human feces and tissue paper in Tildon’s creek?”
“Yes,” the three answered together.
Mr. Miller looked at the floor and then toward Jenny. “What did you say about her father beating her?”
“She told me on the bus that her Dad would beat her if we tell anyone about her family using the outdoors for a restroom…and it getting washed downstream.”
Her father asked, “They go to the bathroom outside?”
“Yes…and not in an outhouse. They have to go in the woods down by the creek. When the big runoff came…most of it got carried away. But there’s still a bunch in the bushes by the stream—past our bus stop. Amanda says they didn’t have money to get their septic pumped so her Dad made them go outside. They don’t even buy toilet tissue…and their washing machine’s broken.”
“Get to the beating part,” said her dad.
“She said if we told and her old man finds out, she’ll get beaten.”
Mr. Miller said, “Maybe she’s just blowing things out of proportion.”
“No. She had bruises on her face. That’s why she wears a hood.”
Jenny’s brothers sucked in their breath. Jeff frowned. “We hardly see her, because we don’t ride the bus that much, but she usually wears a hood.”
Patrick confessed, “I’ve said mean things to her about the way she dresses.”
“I doubt they even have a clothes washer,” Jenny added, “but she said it’s broken. Her pants were filthy.”
With that revelation, Patrick’s eyes dropped to stare at the table. “I didn’t know.”
Mr. Miller looked at Jenny. “You saw bruises on her face…and her father caused them?”
“Yes. She said he wouldn’t have let her go to school except he had a hangover. She let him sleep and snuck anyway. If she’d wakened him, he would have beat her again for letting him bruise her face.” Jenny saw red color come into her Dad’s cheeks, something that happened very rarely. His eyes burned into hers. It was all she could do to keep from looking away.
His voice had a strange softness to it. “There’s shit and toilet paper in the creek, and she’s going to get beaten if anyone finds out?”
Jenny nodded. “She says she stole the toilet tissue from school. That’s what gave them away. That’s mostly why she’ll get beaten up.”
Their father rose slowly, pacing out into the living room. His children did not move. Jenny knew her dad could get angry, although he never laid a hand on them. She recalled hearing how he’d stuck up for Brandy as a small girl—when her father had slapped her in public. Jenny worried what he would do now, hearing about Amanda.
“I don’t like the sound of this,” her Dad said, returning to the kitchen, “I think I better call and talk to the sheriff or his deputy, old Tom. One of them ought to know what to do. They must’ve seen this sort of thing before.”
“Dad,” Jenny’s voice sounded hesitant.
He looked at her silently, the air heavy with expectation, so she continued. “Why don’t we call Mr. Bridger—over in The Dalles—and see what he says. Because if the sheriff goes out there, she might just get beat worse.”
“Yes,” Patrick said, “Mr. Bridger’s cool and he does counseling at school…”
Mr. Miller looked at his children. “I guess that wouldn’t hurt.”
Website copyright © 2011-2013 by EA Bundy. All rights reserved. None of the text, photographs or illustrations may be used without the author or publisher’s—Singing Winds Press—written permission. (Please note, Singing Winds Press is closed to submissions)
By E.A. Bundy
Chapter One: The Reluctant Neighbor
“Mom could’ve given us a ride,” Patrick said as they approached the school bus stop on foot. Jenny and Jeff Miller chose not to answer their younger brother, enjoying the sunshine instead. Oregon’s beautiful Hood River Valley felt more like mid-summer than late spring. Standing off to one side was a small girl bundled up in a hooded sweatshirt. Strange, Jenny thought, the girl was dressed too warm for such a nice day.
Patrick said, “That’s her…the snotty one.”
“Knock it off,” Jenny said, reflecting that her youngest brother seldom chose his words carefully. She moved ahead of her siblings and approached the girl. “You live up the road, don’t you?”
There was no verbal response and the girl’s head lowered even more.
“My name’s Jenny, and these…”
The girl’s head rose slowly. Her eyes peered out from the shadowy hood, piercing into Jenny’s—then looked away in what Jenny took to be a dismissal.
“See!” Patrick’s taunting remark drew a withering look from his sister.
“I’m almost fifteen,” Jenny said, thinking the girl was at most ten. The back of the girl’s sweatshirt promptly turned toward Jenny.
Patrick’s loud snicker cut off when Jeff’s elbow jabbed his upper arm.
“What’s your name?” Jenny asked.
The sweatshirt stretched tight across the girl’s back.
Patrick rushed beyond reach, jeering as he went, continuing past their neighbor, and looked down where the big culvert came under the road. It carried the brook from the Miller place into the fork with the upper creek.
Jenny stepped toward the younger girl, thinking, you aren’t going to get off that easy. “We don’t usually ride the bus.” Jenny persisted even though she did not receive answers. “I think I’ve seen you around. Funny we never met.”
The girl shuffled noisily through the gravel to the very edge of the road, with the steep ditch below. The stream still ran high and the loose gravel where the girl stood worried Jenny, because the slight figure might slip into the rushing water.
“What’s that smell?” Patrick’s nose curled up in disgust. Jenny, thinking he was making fun of their neighbor, glared at him. She might have to take it to the next level with Patrick—give him a little refresher course in humility.
“Hey! Look at all that toilet paper.” He yelled, “What’s going on?”
Jeff and Jenny walked down the road toward Patrick.
“Yuck,” Jenny said, appalled at the scene before her. “How’d that get there?”
“That’s illegal.” Jeff noted.
Patrick shifted back toward the other two. “We better tell the sheriff.”
“No!” The command came from the neighbor girl, now standing just behind them.
Jenny glanced her way. “Why not?”
“My old man’ll get mad.”
Patrick asked, “How come?”
“Just will.” She closed her mouth tight, as though she would say no more.
Jeff looked away from her, back along the creek where toilet paper scattered through the brush—apparently left from the high-water runoff. “We’ve got to tell.”
The girl hunched over and cried out. “You can’t.”
“Why?” Jenny moved closer.
Words leapt out from the cover of the hood. “He’ll beat me.”
Jenny tried to touch the girl’s shoulder reassuringly but the other shied away, fending off contact. The boys stood in silence. Jenny’s eyes shot a warning to her brothers. “Maybe we don’t have to tell.”
Patrick’s mouth was beginning to open, but closed with a snap—his sister wasn’t fooling.
The girl crouched down and huddled near the ground, hugging her knees, rocking forward and back.
Jenny bent nearby but not as close to the girl as before. “What’s your name?”
“Amanda.” The small face remained concealed.
“If I get my brothers not to tell, will you sit and talk with me on the bus?”
Amanda nodded as the yellow Wy-East school bus pulled to a gradual stop with squealing breaks.
“Must have a little pebble in the brake,” Jeff said as he and Patrick climbed up into the bus.
Jenny let Amanda get aboard first. The strong smell of diesel exhaust assaulted their nostrils just before the door closed behind them. Jenny said, “Pick one of the seats in the middle where nobody sits…so we can talk.”
Amanda complied without comment and turned her head toward Jenny, who was seating herself. The girl’s hood slipped back and the morning light shined revealingly on her face. Jenny noticed dark areas on the girl’s left cheek and tried to quell her startled response. Was the girl’s face simply dirty or was she badly bruised? The shift of her hood didn’t seem accidental. Jenny was unsure what to say—how to begin. She finally jumped right in with, “You know how that toilet tissue and stuff got in the creek?”
Amanda said, “Septic backed up…ground froze…my old man couldn’t dig it out. Couldn’t afford to get it pumped.”
“So?”
“Had to go–you know what—in the woods down by the creek. When high water come… mostly washed away.”
Jenny screwed up her courage. “Will your Dad beat you if we tell about this?”
Amanda nodded. In the clear morning light, her fearful eyes reminded Jenny of a motherless fawn. “But why?”
“He’ll say it’s my fault you found out…and told.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“Won’t matter.”
Jenny said, “Patrick just happened to wander down the road.”
“Don’t matter…” She kept looking at Jenny. “Promise you won’t tell.” The fingers of her left hand sought out a small hole in the vinyl cover of the seat before them and yanked hard, creating more of a tear.
Jenny could not help herself. “I promise.”
“Everything’s my fault.”
Jenny asked, “Why?”
“Just is.”
They rode in silence and Jenny hardly noticed the occasional lurches in the ride as the bus picked up more passengers. “I don’t get it.” Jenny finally said.
“He controls everything. But if anything goes wrong…it’s my fault.”
“Your dad…has strict rules?”
The girl nodded.
“Like, what does he control?” Jenny asked.
The girl whispered. “What I wear.”
Jenny thought about the hooded sweatshirt, how it had concealed Amanda’s face. She looked down at the nondescript sweatpants, noticing how dirty they were. Amanda’s drab, soiled clothes were quite a contrast to Jenny’s bright shorts and sleeveless top.
“Washer’s busted.” The girl seemed to guess Jenny’s thoughts.
Jenny replied, “Our washing machine broke once. It was awful.”
Amanda nodded.
Something inside Jenny told her Amanda’s broken washer was not a temporary condition. She tried to smile at the little girl. “How long have you guys lived up the road from us?”
“Three years—since grandpa died.”
“How come we never met before?”
The girl shifted uncomfortably. “Don’t go nowheres. Got no friends.”
“I’ll be your friend.” Jenny reached out to touch Amanda’s arm but it jerked away.
“What else does your Dad control?”
“Every...thing—” The finality of the statement held Jenny’s questioning at bay for a while. She struggled to understand but couldn’t, and eventually asked, “Like…?”
“When I go to bed. What I wear. No friends.”
Since her initial opening-up, it seemed Amanda was beginning to trust Jenny.
“You never go on sleepovers?”
She glared at Jenny. “Nope.”
“He wouldn’t let you come over to our house to visit me?”
“No.”
“Not even if my Mom or Dad went over and told him it was okay and drove you to our house?”
Amanda looked stricken. “No!” She turned half away, looking afraid.
Jenny said, “But he can’t keep us from sitting together on the bus.”
Amanda’s silence was unnerving.
“How would he even find out?” Jenny asked.
“Got to tell him…every-thing.”
“Us finding the toilet tissue wasn’t your fault.”
Amanda just looked at Jenny.
“How’s it your fault?”
“Stole it from school.”
Jenny asked, “You don’t have toilet tissue at home?”
Amanda shook her head.
“What are you supposed to wipe with?”
“Leaves.”
“Your septic backed up in winter…there’s no leaves in winter.”
Amanda was silent.
Jenny knew she couldn’t conceal the stricken look on her face. She turned away, glancing down the aisle of the bus. For the first time, she heard the drone of other voices, occasionally punctuated by laughter. If she weren’t sitting with Amanda, her chatter would mingle gaily with the rest. Jenny turned and looked at her small companion again. The hood had slipped even more, clearly revealing discoloration—definitely bruising.
It hadn’t fully registered when Amanda shared about being told what to wear, or when to go to bed—since those seemed fairly normal. The part about not having any friends was more concerning. However, not having toilet paper and using the woods all winter as an outdoor bathroom—those facts made a strong impression in Jenny’s mind. But the obvious bruising on Amanda’s face and the wearing of concealing clothes in warm weather had the most impact.
How many times had Amanda ridden this bus? Yet, no one had a clue how she was treated at home. Jenny stared at the bruises. Why hadn’t the teacher noticed?
Amanda seemed to read her mind again. “I sit in back.”
“Back of the class?”
“Yeah. Keep my head turned—good side toward her. Wear my hood at recess.”
“Isn’t your dad afraid to let you come to school with bruises?”
“Nope. Picks my clothes. If face too bad marked…stay home.”
Jenny shuddered as she glanced at the covered limbs. How many hidden bruises did the clothing conceal? Moreover, how could Amanda talk about this with so little emotion? “Why did he let you come to school this morning?”
“Still hung-over. I left before he woke and he’s going to be real mad…cause he’ll be late for work.”
“Why didn’t you stay home and wake him?”
“He’d of beat me…for bruises on face.”
Jenny’s voice raised, “But he put them there.”
“Don’t matter. I’m s’posed to duck so’s he don’t get my face.”
Jenny’s mouth hung open. She couldn’t believe what she’d heard. What could she do? She became aware of her left hand resting on her thigh. Her right arm extended to the seatback in front and she felt like a mannequin, unable to move.
Jenny looked down in surprise to find Amanda’s small hand resting reassuringly on her own. A tear slid down Jenny’s face and she buried her head in the crook of her right arm so others would not see. She felt the warm hand patting her gently…
* * * * *
Jenny swore her brothers to secrecy after they all got off the bus, which was not easy. It required major threats of bodily harm and the assurance they would talk to their father about it when they got home that afternoon.
“Dad!” Jenny’s voice reverberated through their apparently empty farmhouse later that day. Her younger brothers were still running along the driveway, far behind her, trying to catch up. She had to be the one to tell her father, and wasn’t taking any chances on her brothers messing things up. She’d worked too hard in getting her relationship with him back to its pre-horse-logging state.
“Dad!” You just have to be here, she thought. Walking into the living room from the kitchen, she heard a sound behind her and turned in time to see her father emerging from the basement stairway.
"Hi, Jen.”
She flew into his arms, nearly knocking the two jars of canned fruit he was carrying onto the floor.
He asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Amanda…our neighbor. Her Dad beats her. What are we going to do?” She had not told her brothers the part about the battering, although they might have heard her say that before the bus arrived, and anyway, they probably would just think it meant spankings. The porch screen squealed open and then gave a repeating squeak before banging shut. Her brothers filed into the kitchen, breathing hard against the background noise of dogs growling and barking playfully out in the yard.
“Everybody sit down.” Their Dad pulled a chair out and followed his own advice. “Tell me what’s going on.”
Jenny and her brothers started talking all at once.
The words “Toilet paper” and “creek” repeated multiple times.
“Jenny, why don’t you tell some, and then each of you can add your parts.”
“Aw,” Patrick whined. “Just cause I’m youngest, I never get to go first. I'm the one who found it!”
Mr. Miller’s hand rose slowly in the air, signaling Patrick to be silent. “Jenny.” He looked at her expectantly.
She said, “Let Patrick tell what he saw; then I’ll tell what she said on the bus.”
Patrick didn’t have to be told twice. “Well, that stupid neighbor girl…”
Jenny cut in, “Her name’s Amanda.”
“Yeah— she wouldn’t talk to Jenny this morning. She wouldn’t even look at us until I found the toilet paper down by the creek. It smells like shit down there.”
“Patrick.” His dad’s voice rose.
“Well, it does. It’s everywhere. That…and the toilet paper hanging in the bushes.”
Mr. Miller’s eyebrows rose uncharacteristically high. “Where was this?”
Jeff said, “Down—just past the bus stop.”
Patrick added, “In the creek bottom, across the road…after the two forks come together.”
Their dad asked, “There was human feces and tissue paper in Tildon’s creek?”
“Yes,” the three answered together.
Mr. Miller looked at the floor and then toward Jenny. “What did you say about her father beating her?”
“She told me on the bus that her Dad would beat her if we tell anyone about her family using the outdoors for a restroom…and it getting washed downstream.”
Her father asked, “They go to the bathroom outside?”
“Yes…and not in an outhouse. They have to go in the woods down by the creek. When the big runoff came…most of it got carried away. But there’s still a bunch in the bushes by the stream—past our bus stop. Amanda says they didn’t have money to get their septic pumped so her Dad made them go outside. They don’t even buy toilet tissue…and their washing machine’s broken.”
“Get to the beating part,” said her dad.
“She said if we told and her old man finds out, she’ll get beaten.”
Mr. Miller said, “Maybe she’s just blowing things out of proportion.”
“No. She had bruises on her face. That’s why she wears a hood.”
Jenny’s brothers sucked in their breath. Jeff frowned. “We hardly see her, because we don’t ride the bus that much, but she usually wears a hood.”
Patrick confessed, “I’ve said mean things to her about the way she dresses.”
“I doubt they even have a clothes washer,” Jenny added, “but she said it’s broken. Her pants were filthy.”
With that revelation, Patrick’s eyes dropped to stare at the table. “I didn’t know.”
Mr. Miller looked at Jenny. “You saw bruises on her face…and her father caused them?”
“Yes. She said he wouldn’t have let her go to school except he had a hangover. She let him sleep and snuck anyway. If she’d wakened him, he would have beat her again for letting him bruise her face.” Jenny saw red color come into her Dad’s cheeks, something that happened very rarely. His eyes burned into hers. It was all she could do to keep from looking away.
His voice had a strange softness to it. “There’s shit and toilet paper in the creek, and she’s going to get beaten if anyone finds out?”
Jenny nodded. “She says she stole the toilet tissue from school. That’s what gave them away. That’s mostly why she’ll get beaten up.”
Their father rose slowly, pacing out into the living room. His children did not move. Jenny knew her dad could get angry, although he never laid a hand on them. She recalled hearing how he’d stuck up for Brandy as a small girl—when her father had slapped her in public. Jenny worried what he would do now, hearing about Amanda.
“I don’t like the sound of this,” her Dad said, returning to the kitchen, “I think I better call and talk to the sheriff or his deputy, old Tom. One of them ought to know what to do. They must’ve seen this sort of thing before.”
“Dad,” Jenny’s voice sounded hesitant.
He looked at her silently, the air heavy with expectation, so she continued. “Why don’t we call Mr. Bridger—over in The Dalles—and see what he says. Because if the sheriff goes out there, she might just get beat worse.”
“Yes,” Patrick said, “Mr. Bridger’s cool and he does counseling at school…”
Mr. Miller looked at his children. “I guess that wouldn’t hurt.”
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