Page 3 of The Dominator

Dad seemed like he wanted to try a few times – he’d go long periods of time without seeing me and then he’d turn up for a visit, tell me he was doing better. Sometimes, he would even do a visit two months in a row, but inevitably over the past nine+ years, the more common pattern was for him to get my hopes up and then let me down and disappear for months at a time. I stopped having expectations of him a long time ago. Becoming a ward of the court made it simpler. They stopped trying to make him try.

This foster home has been, by far, the most nurturing of all. Not only do they go out of their way to make their home a real home, but whatever isn’t provided that me or the other girls need through the “system” they take out of their own pockets.

Three years ago, Rose and Cal bought bicycles out of their own pockets for Christmas gifts for all of us. Two years ago, they took us to Disney World on their dime. They are amazing people and they’ve helped so many girls get their lives together. I hope to repay them someday. Karma is definitely on their side.

Rose, a sweet round woman with a heart of gold, tells me all the payment she wants is my happiness and success. And for me to continue to be a part of their family. Come for Christmas; come for special dinners on my birthday when I don’t have other plans. Have them at my wedding someday. Think of them as my family.

They have one son and one daughter. Their autistic son is one of my favorite people in the world. Their daughter, Ruby, is my best friend. She still has a year left of high school, otherwise we’d just get a place together.

I’m starting college next Fall for social work, to make a difference in the lives of other kids who might otherwise fall between the cracks. So many do, and many blame the system. I’ve had a great social worker all along who has always cared about my safety and happiness. I aim to follow in her footsteps.

I wouldn’t say I’ve been the perfect student or foster child. I make mistakes. Boys. Partying. Skipping school. But, for the most part, I try to be responsible. I know what I want from life and I’m grateful for the blessings I have.

Of course I miss my mom. I wouldn’t say she was a happy person and clearly her unhappiness ran deeper than I knew. I also wish Dad could’ve pulled his life together. While he was never all that responsible before she died, he was really, really messed up afterwards.

Although I don’t know how often he checks messages, I’ve sent him a Facebook message to tell him about high school grad and left a ticket at the office with his name on it. I’m not counting on him making it, he’s never made it to any school plays, birthday parties, or anything else I’ve asked him to attend. When Dad shows up it’s generally very random. Some wonder why I bother to go out of my way, but I guess I’ve never given up on him. I’ve always wanted to believe that people are redeemable.

2

Graduation day! It was the day for me and two of my foster sisters, so mayhem at the Crenshaw house, but in the best way. I was ready, my hair in a sleek updo that everyone said makes me look like a pin-up model. Bright red lips, smoky eyes. Rose told me I look twenty-five instead of nineteen. I feel like I’m older, anyway; always have, probably partly due to being almost on my own for the better part of a year at nine years old.

After Mom died, Dad would leave me alone for hours at a time, sometimes overnight, while he nipped out to run his errands. I learned how to make simple meals at that age, to cook and clean up after myself. I even paid the electric bill once after finding a disconnection notice taped to our apartment door. It was a rare occasion that my dad’s wallet had been full of cash, so while he slept off a bender, I walked the three blocks to the bank and paid it.

Social services hadn’t looked too kindly on that explanation, though when I was interviewed and told them I could get myself off to school, make my own breakfast, pack my own lunch, and that I’d even paid bills at the bank with money from Daddy’s card games.

Yeah, that had gone over so well that they hauled me into care. It didn’t help that they found me at home alone with almost no food in the fridge other than some dried out Chinese take-out, but a case of beer in the fridge and nothing but some saltines and beer nuts in the cupboard. The green mat had still been on the dining room table from a poker game Dad had hosted two nights before. It was littered with crushed beer cans and overflowing ashtrays. He’d always told me to stay in my locked room during those games and touch nothing on that table if his poker stuff was left out. The games were often on school nights.

Dad turned up drunk in the middle of the social services meeting and blubbered like a baby. Mom’s death ruined him, and I felt like I had to take care of him for her. Lord knew he couldn’t take care of me. I guessed that was what made me an old soul, the fact that I had to be.

Anyway, here I was, wishing my parents could see me get handed my diploma, graduating on the honor roll. I doubted Dad would make it. Rose, Cal, and Susie (my social worker) would all be there for me and that was enough.

After the ceremony, we’d have a celebratory meal at Rose and Cal’s and there was a school dance planned after that. My ex-boyfriend Nick had been lingering all week and I wasn’t looking forward to seeing him tonight but knew he’d be there.

I’d dumped him a month ago, because I found out he was selling drugs from his gas station job. His customers would buy gas and when they came in to pay, he’d slip them dope. I wanted no part of that. I had no desire to build my future with a guy who would put his future in jeopardy. He was a loser. I didn’t like to think of my dad as a loser but in reality, that’s what he was. I wasn’t about to get tied down with a loser of a boyfriend, too.

Nick was a twenty-two-year-old gorgeous, long-haired, tattooed, and leather jacket-wearing bad boy. I was attracted to the look and the swagger of bad boys for some reason, but when it all came down to it, they’d get dumped as soon as they showed me their true bad boy colors. While I was attracted to them like a moth to a flame, it didn’t last. I didn’t want to waste my time on someone going nowhere but downhill.

As I got dressed for grad, I thought about the guy that had come into the ice cream parlor I worked at the other day. He came in while I was working my last shift and he was well-dressed, as sexy as a movie star, and carried himself with confidence. He was so tall and strong-looking. A hundred percent grown-up male and very different from Nick. Older. Somewhere near thirty, and he gave me tummy flutters like I’d never had before. What would it be like to date a man who oozed sex appeal and maturity?

As me and my foster sisters got ready for our big day, they were giddy and giggling. I was deep in thought about the guy I’d been thinking of as the ice cream parlor hottie. I barely stopped thinking about him the past two days and nights. But, as that had been my last day at that job the chances of seeing him again were small. He flirted with me, but I behaved like a deer in the headlights. I wished I was older, more confident, and that I’d given him my phone number. I was so over guys that were like Nick.

I knew Nick was trying to get my attention because he knew that tomorrow I’d be moving into my own apartment. He wanted alone time with me. He and I had done the alone thing plenty of times and I didn’t need to go down that road again. It wasn’t exactly symbiotic.

Nick wanted to attend the graduation ceremony, but I only had a limited number of tickets to give out and since I had no one but Dad, I’d given my extra tickets to the other girls who had guests.

I was ready for new things. A new place, college in the fall, and new opportunities. Maybe a new guy, too. One who was ready to be a man, not a boy living in a one-bedroom apartment shared with two other guys who rotated using the bedroom when they had girls over (with the never-innovative sock on the doorknob as the clue that the room was “in use”. Gross.).

We’d done it in there once and… never again. We’d done it a few times in his car, but it was certainly not very fulfilling! Neither the car nor that bedroom had been cleaned in months. He undoubtedly saw my upcoming apartment as an ‘in’. Wrong. He’d already texted me today, trying to get me to agree to ‘talk’ later tonight.

* * *

As I walked up on the podium to receive my diploma, I had the surprise of my life. Dad was in the audience, a big smile on his face. He was seated beside Rose, who was chatting softly to him while snapping pictures of me. Nick was sitting directly behind my dad, dressed up and smiling at me, too. I avoided his gaze, tried not to think about how handsome he looked. Looks weren’t everything. Why was he even here? I bet Ruby found him a ticket; she’d been trying to get us back together for days like it was her mission in life.

After the ceremony was over, I was in the school’s courtyard for photos, and Dad rushed to me. He looked good. I’d only ever seen him in a suit once, at Mom’s funeral, and this was that same suit. He had his dirty-blond hair gelled back and he smelled like expensive cologne. Seeing him like this reminded me of how he sometimes was before Mom died. His green eyes sparkled. He was good-looking for his age. Everyone said I had his eyes. He’d never been perfect, but we did things together. He taught me to cook, I’d hang out with him while he tinkered with his car. When I was small, he’d hold me high in the air with an airplane ride to bed. He’d read bedtime stories with such effort and emotion, doing different voices for every character. He wasn’t the perfect father or husband before she died but after she died, he was a shell of a man who tried to drink and gamble away his pain. Seeing him here today, trying for me, I felt a burst of affection for him.

He swung me around in a giant hug, making me squeal. “Athena! I’m so proud. You look all grown up. Look at you. Someone take our picture!” He called out to the rest of our group and Rose hurried over with her camera.

Susie, my social worker, eyed my dad warily. I knew she’d lost patience with him over the years. Getting me to agree to be a ward of the courts made her life so much easier because she didn’t have to continually try to reach him to find out what was what with him, to get him involved in decisions that needed to be made, and so forth. When he lost his parental rights, it had been eleven months since he’d made contact. He always managed to miss birthdays.

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