Greetings from Hollywood- Part 2 Memoir

EXCUSE ANY FORMAT PROBLEMS SOMEDAY I WILL GET THIS SYSTEM

This is part 2

The story so far,
Roxanne has been in foster care her whole life. Two months before her High school Graduation, She receives a letter from a brother she has never known existed. She is excited that she finally has some family of her own. He is coming to visit. She is hoping he can tell her something about other family members. The only other family she has ever connected with is a mother she met when she was eleven years old. they met for one hour then her mother never contacted her again and Roxanne has never known why.

The PLAYERS THUS FAR...
ROXANNE- 17years old-Foster child-Preparing for Prom, Graduation and college, works part time in Voter Registration Office.
MA-Foster mother- 65 years old, Widow, Immigrant Italian with 5 grown children and 15 Grandchildren.
DAWN-Roaxanne's best friend, high school senior, African American, works Part time parents convenience store.
BOBBY- Roxanne's four year old foster brother.

Thanks for your help!
All comments are welcome

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CHAPTER FOUR


After school, I went to work and told the women in our office about my brother and his letter. They seemed to share my excitement. That’s when they explained that their office also recorded the city census. They showed me how to trace family members. One of the women suggested that after I met my brother, I might have enough information to find out more my father and other missing pieces of my life. This was all moving too fast and hard to think about. I tried to keep the thought of a father or any other family members aside. I wanted to concentrate on George. I didn’t want my meeting him to turn out the way it had with Harriet. I had to make sure that my brother would like me and be glad that he had found me.

I picked up Dawn after work and we had a great time shopping at the mall. I filled her in on my plans on where my brother and I could go to lunch. I found a red sweater on sale and a pair of low cut bell-bottom jeans. I still had eight dollars left and treated Dawn and me to Pizza for dinner.

“We’ll have to hurry it’s almost seven and you have to get home.” Dawn said.

“It’s okay, Ma yells a lot but she doesn’t punish me. She’s a lot of bark but has never had any bite.” I replied

“It seems she is always hollering about something,”

“What, like your sister?” I asked. Dawn knew I didn’t mean anything by it, her sister was nice, just a pain sometimes.

“My sister is just a witch”

“Ma has no one else to argue with. I think she likes it. I’m used to her, she’s not a problem.” I took a bite of pizza. “I think George is gonna like this sweater. He wears glasses like me; do you think he is going to like me?” I asked.

“I don’t know why you’re so eager to make him like you. What if you don’t like him? He looks kind of geeky in that picture.”

“Well it’s two a two-year-old picture. Why wouldn’t I like him, he’s my brother?”

“I don’t like my brothers.” Dawn said. “Are you really sure he is your brother? "He’s so white”

“I guess Ma is right, I am white.” I laughed, “Your mother won’t be happy.”

“She always knew that. Does your brother have a picture of you?” We finished our pizzas and headed for the car. “How come he’s just calling now, what does he want?”

“What could he want from me? I don’t see how he could have a picture of me.” Then I realized he has no idea what I looked like. This filled me with dread. What if Harriet hadn’t told him I looked black? Would he never call me again just like Harriet?

“It just seems weird that after all this time he’s calling you. He must have known about you, he lives with your grandmother.”

Why had she put these thoughts in my head? I wondered if Dawn wasn’t as happy for me as she appeared. I drove her home.

I pulled into to driveway and found Ma sitting by the window waiting for her precious un-dented green Nova.

“You’re late” she bellowed, with her arms folded and stern face she wanted me to believe she was angry. I knew better, it was only 8:20pm. “Did you eat?” Ma said as I handed her the car keys.

“Pizza at the mall” I took my new sweater and spread it out over my chest. “What do you think?”

“Neck is a little low,” Ma said. When she didn’t scream, I took it to mean the sweater was okay. We were never going to agree on any clothes but, if there was no screaming, it was just fine. I took my new clothes to my room and hung them up. “Donald called, said he’s home” Ma shouted down the hallway.

“Okay, thanks.” I said running to the telephone. Donald was my kind-of boyfriend. We had known each other since fourth grade. He was more friend than boyfriend. He quit high school the year before and started hairdressing school. After his classes, he had a job in a hair salon and didn’t get home until after Ten O’clock sometimes. I couldn’t call him the day before to tell him about the letter. “Hey, guess what,” I said, complete excitement filled my voice.

“Ma said you went to the mall, you got your prom dress?” He said.

Donald called her, Ma, just like me and most of my friends did. Ma’s title used to vary between, “Mrs. Roxanne’s mother” or “Mrs. Thomas” which was her last name. Occasionally someone would come out with, “Mrs. Derby,” which was my last name. That totally made Ma crazy, when someone called her “Mrs. Derby,” A last name with no origins. Ma couldn’t stand to hear me say my last name. Other people saying it to her was intolerable. I introduced her as “Ma” so that’s what everybody called her. It made life easier when you just didn’t have to explain every name and every relationship. Ma was Ma to me and everyone else.

“No, I have a brother” I said

“Oh a new one, How old?” He asked. He was as uninterested as Dawn had been.

“This is my real flesh and blood brother,” I sang. I filled Donald in on receiving the letter, going to the mall and buying new clothes and my plans for my meeting with George. Donald seemed thrilled for me.

“Do you want me to do your hair?” He asked. I had become Donald’s favorite guinea pig. Every new phase of his hairdressing course left my hair in various shades, lengths and frizz. Since he didn’t have his hairdressing license yet, he wasn’t allowed to practice on actual customers. Ma asked if I was gonna have any hair left for prom. “I learned how to mix colors today. I could do a real cool shrimp color on the front.” I wanted to be excited for his new talent, but my news was just so much better.

“No crazy colors.”

“How about eggplant?”

“What the heck is that? I asked. Almost afraid of the answer.

“It looks like a very dark brown or mahogany and when you go in the sun it will look like a deep purple.”

“No I don’t want my brother to think I am some kind of a freak.”

“Hot pink, or how about red, I could mix something to match your new sweater.” He was almost pleading. I agreed he could come over and dye my hair, just to practice. I made it very clear I wanted my hair back to its original color when George arrived. Donald and I had fun changing my hair but I had to admit Ma’s fears were becoming mine.

Donald was going to take me to the prom and I hoped he didn’t have any crazy hair plans for that day. I didn’t actually ask him to take me to the prom, he just kind-of assumed we were going together. Since no one else asked me, and it should have been his prom too if he hadn’t quit school, we were going together. We talked a longtime; He gave me no reason to think there would be any problems with George. Maybe I was worrying for nothing.

I walked into my room and found an unpleasant surprise. “Ma” I shouted. “He did it again” My radio was no longer in its usual spot next to my bed. Instead, it was in the middle of the bedroom floor in a few dozen pieces.

“I sent him to bed, he’ll put it back together tomorrow,” Ma, shouted back. Bobby had a terrible habit and unique ability of taking things apart. I wasn’t angry with him. That’s just what Bobby did. At least he had a talent, more than I ever had. I liked bobby. He was a cute little kid but I kept an emotional distance. I learned a long tome ago, foster kids leave. It’s best it if you don’t get too close emotionally, ‘cause they all leave eventually, all except me. Sometimes I worried. Bobby was nearing that “too old for adoption” age. I had come to realize that six or seven was about the limit. If you didn’t go by then, you probably weren’t going to be adopted.

I don’t know why I wasn’t ever adopted. I was always being asked uncomfortable questions. Whenever I met someone and they found out I was a foster child, they would ask the oddest questions. “Where are your parents, Why weren’t you adopted when you were a baby, How come you were never adopted.” I always wondered did they expect me to say something like; I have no idea who my father and my mother didn’t want me. It always amazed me how little the average regular person knows about foster kids. Even more laughable, how much they think they do know. Did regular people think there was a weekly update on why I wasn’t adopted? Most foster kids don’t even know their adoption status. It’s a subject not discussed with kids. So many regular people don’t even know about a PRT (parental rights termination). A child is not eligible for adoption until all parental rights have been terminated, that sometimes took years to get through the court system. In the meantime, the kids just get older until no one wanted them. Being in foster care does not mean a child can be adopted. Maybe when someone asked me those uncomfortable, insensitive questions I should’ve just told the truth, “Nobody wanted me.” I thought giving that answer; it would certainly have shut them up.

I had been in foster care my whole life. Nothing I had ever had was my own. I never found out why my mother never called me again. I finally had someone who was my very own brother. He wanted to see me and I would make him glad to meet me. I wanted to know about the grandparents that he lived with and why I couldn’t live with them. There were so many questions. I had spent seventeen years wondering why no one loved or cared about me.

I felt guilty sometimes, thinking like that. I wasn’t being fair, I know Ma loved me. She told me she treated me better than her own kids. That was the problem. Ma always said things like, “my own kids.” I know she meant well when she said it but it just reminded me that I didn’t belong to her or anybody else. Every time I got in trouble, she’d say, “My kids never did anything like that.” No one seemed to understand that I didn’t want to be just as good as or better than someone’s “own kids”; I wanted to be their own kid.

I went to the kitchen for a paper bag. I carefully picked up all the pieces of the radio and placed them in the bag. I didn’t want any pieces to get lost. If there were a piece missing, Bobby would get flustered; he was only four. I was lucky I could put the batteries in; I certainly couldn’t take a radio apart and put it back together.

Bobby managed to put my radio back together while I was in school the following day. It was spring and the ice-cream truck just started to make his nightly rounds. Bobby started to squeal when he heard that insane tinkling music playing over and over through the neighborhood. I scooped him up and ran outside to wait on the sidewalk with the other neighborhood kids. I treated him to a Popsicle from the ice-cream man, which was better and fancier than a popsicle from the freezer. Ma said I shouldn’t reward him for taking things apart. Last week it was her alarm clock, but he managed to get it back together.

“I’m rewarding him for having a talent and showing he has an interest in something.” I told her. I was pretty amazed at his talent at such an early age. He couldn’t even write his name, but give him a screwdriver and he was king. Ma didn’t understand. If Bobby could grow up with a talent and something that interested him, it would keep him distracted from how empty life could be when no one had an interest in him.

CHAPTER FIVE

The week before, the third term report cards were issued; it was time for the quarterly Parents’ Night. This was the night when parents came and took home fine works or art, English term papers, or marveled at science projects that their fabulously talented offspring had created. Ma had never attended any Parent’s Nights. The first reason was, well, they were at night. Ma didn’t drive at night. Second, because all her children were foster kids and leaving soon. It wasn’t that she didn’t care about the kids. I think it was because, if their report card was bad, she didn’t want to look like a bad parent when she had only had the kid for a few months. If the reports were good, she didn’t want to take credit for someone else’s hard work.

Foster kids were different from most kids. They had to be smart and emotionally tough. Many foster kids had such disruptive lives just the fact that the passed their classes should have been considered an achievement. I guessed teachers had never thought about it. How could a kid write a paper on some ecological study when their parents had just done something stupid and landed the kid in foster care? Most foster kids had more important things to think about. It was common for a foster kid to have less than perfect marks, so why should Ma go and see the teacher. If she wasn’t going for the other kids, then there was no need to go for me. I think it wasn’t until I was about thirteen that Ma realized the phone wasn’t going to ring for me and I would never leave.

I had never seen the importance of Parent’s Night. Some parents like Dawn’s came to gloat and listen to the praise at how wonderful their child was and what a fine successful person they would be one day. Even more came to hear how rotten their kid is and complain about their kid’s lousy grades. Since Ma had never visited the school on parent’s night, I always signed up as a hostess. It was my job to show the parents to different rooms direct them to coffee and answer any general questions about the school.

It was funny to hear how parents reacted to their children’s project. At the refreshment table you would hear, “That kid of ours better not be thinking of being an artist cause that painting was crap.” The same parents would quickly change tunes again when confronted with the neighbors, “Oh Billy did the most wonderful impressionist painting, he has such a command of colors and texture.” ” Parents are like kids, full of bullshit, always trying to make themselves and their kids seem better than they are. Ma wasn’t like that, if I brought home something lousy, she would just say it was. Ma said you shouldn’t ever try to be better than you are.

Ma didn’t like people who were phony. She didn’t know that I was the biggest phony of them all. I never told anyone what I really thought or felt. Maybe, because before George, my thoughts and feelings were all Iall I had that were exclusivlyexclusively mine. Now, I have a brother and he was truly mine.

The rest of that week went pretty much the same assame as every other, school and work, with the addition of thinking about meeting George. I know Dawn and Donald were getting a little tired of my enthusiasm. They had brothers and sisters and couldn’t understand my excitement.

Dawn, finally fed up with my talking about meeting George, told me, “shut up, I am sick of this subject, talk about prom like everyone else” I” I wasn’t offended, I still prattled on ,on, ignoring her rolling eyes and blank stares. “George is a dorky name, you know,” she said. I didn’t care. I knew she was irritated. There would only be a few more days, she and I could stand my giddy behavior.

I spent a lot less time with Donald than Dawn. He didn’t mind listening. “So he didn’t tell you much, I wonder why? I wonder if he is older or younger than you.” Donald asked. He had to get used to idle chatter if he was going to be a hairdresser.

“I can’t tell by the picture, he looks like about the same age, if the picture is two years old.” I said. Donald kept, cutting, coloring, blow-drying and styling while we talked endlessly about George.

That was until the night before we were to meet. I was in a frenzy, waiting for Donald to come and change my hair back to its normal color. The past few days I had had a kaleidoscope of colors woven through my hair. It was almost 9pm and he hadn’t arrived. The salon closed at 8pm and he should have arrived by then. That’s when the phone rang.

I ran to the phone expecting to scream at Donald for being so late, when I heard an extremely deep voice say, “Hello, Roxanne?”

Floored, I stammered, “Yes, this is me.” I felt sick; I started to breathe hard and fast.

“I’m George, your brother,” he said.

My stomach lurched. I felt dizzy. It was real. The past few days, I had gone through a whirl of emotions. At first, I couldn’t believe it. Then I was angry I hadn’t known about him sooner. I was thrilled and excited for most of the time, all the while somewhere deep down I couldn’t totally accept the whole thing was real. It was! I have a brother and he has a voice, a very very deep manly voice, I thought. Crap, what an idiot, of course he has a voice, duh! I did I say this out loud?

Gosh, I can’t wait to meet you, he said.

“Me too, how old are you, Where should we meet?” My mind raced and the questions spilled out so fast I couldn’t stop. “Do you have a car, what time, how tall are you?” With each question, my excitement grew and showed in increasing volume. “Are you coming alone, where have you been, tell me about our grandmother, what do you want to eat?” I pushed the questions at him.

Donald walked in; he never rang the bell when he knew he was expected. Ma hearing so much noise came running in to the kitchen. Donald and Ma listened to me shouting questions into the phone. “Do you like pizza, I know a great place. Do you drive, you must. How did you get here from Florida, you didn’t drive the whole way?” Donald grabbed my arm to get my attention. He motioned with his palm, moving in an up down motion for me to be quiet and slow down. I clamped my hand over the receiver and said, “It’s him, my brother,” I stupidly pointed at the phone.

“Really, I couldn’t have guessed.” Donald said laughing. Letting go of my arm, he began to unpack his hair coloring supplies. Ma seeing all was well went back to the living room. After Donald had managed to get my attention, George finally got to say a few words.

“I’m nineteen. I’ll pick you up at your house. What is a good time?” he asked.

“Oh any time. Where are you staying?”

“I flew up here and rented a car, I’m staying at a hotel in town. I’m in the navy.” He said. “I got out of basic training; I have to report to Groton in a week.”

“Where?” I asked.

“Connecticut, there is a submarine base there. I will be away on a submarine for six months and I wanted to meet you before I reported for Sub duty.” He said

“Wow” was all I could say.

Donald looked at me quizzically. He whispered, “What did he say that made you speechless?” He pulled the phone and me over to a chair. Donald draped a cape around me and started sectioning my hair. I swatted him and his snide remark away with my hand.

“I can’t talk right now, my friends and I are going out but I wanted to call and see if eleven o’clock is okay with you?”

“Sure, that’s fine.” I said.

“Great, we’ll talk then.”

“Bye, uh…George.” I handed Donald the phone. He wiped off some hair dye that splotched the receiver and hung it up. Wow, I spoke to him. He is real.