Beautiful Child: The story of a child trapped in silence and the teacher who refused to give up on her. Torey Hayden

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      Venus’s home was not a house but a trailer set back on an empty lot. It was old and fitted permanently to a concrete foundation. The screen door was hanging open, and a man sat on the doorstep. I parked the car and got out.

      He was a skinny, small-built man, probably two or three inches shorter than I was. His hair was that nondescript color somewhere between dark blond and light brown and it was rather wavy, rumpled almost, as if he hadn’t bothered to brush it when he got up. He had a thick growth of stubble and a very hairy chest showing through his unbuttoned shirt. He sat, smoking a cigarette and watching us come up the path to the front door.

      “Hello, I’m Venus’s teacher from school.”

      “Well, hi,” he said in a distinctly lascivious manner that made me very grateful for having Julie along.

      “Is Venus here?”

      He considered this a moment, as if it were a difficult question, then smiled. “Could be. You want a seat?”

      “Is she?”

      A slow, rather insolent shrug. “I reckon.”

      “Venus didn’t come to school today. I’m concerned about her. It’s very important that Venus come every day, unless she’s ill. So, is she here?”

      “Why? You want to see her?” he asked, but before I could respond, he leaned back and called over his shoulder, “Teri? Someone here about Venus. Teri?”

      There was no response.

      The man smiled at me in a casual way.

      “Are you Venus’s father?”

      “You think all these black bastards are mine?”

      A woman, perhaps in her late thirties, appeared in the doorway behind him. She had shoulder-length hair, corn rowed neatly into small braids, and looked as if she just woke up, despite it’s being three-thirty in the afternoon. She blinked against the late summer sunlight. “Who are you?”

      I explained again who I was and why I was there.

      “Oh fuck,” the woman said wearily. “Wanda?” she shouted over her shoulder. “Wanda, what the fuck you done? Didn’t you take Venus to school again?”

      Wanda stumbled to the doorway.

      The woman turned. “What you done, you lamebrain. Why didn’t you take her to school today?”

      “Beautiful child,” Wanda said and smiled gently.

      “Yeah, I’ll ‘beautiful child’ you one of these days. Why didn’t you take her to school?”

      “Her no go school,” Wanda replied plaintively.

      “Yes, her do go school, you big fucking idiot. How many times you got to be told? You’re good for nothing.” The woman raised her arm as if to hit Wanda, but she didn’t. Wanda scurried off. The woman turned back to me. “Look, I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”

      “Are you Venus’s mother?”

      “Yeah.” She ran her hands through her hair, pushing the braids back. She was a rather pretty woman in a tired sort of way.

      “Could I talk with you a moment about Venus?”

      “Why? What’s she done?”

      “She hasn’t done anything. I was just wondering … could we chat a moment? I was hoping you could fill me in a little on her background.”

      The woman rubbed her face in a weary fashion and backed aside. “Yeah, come on in, if you want.”

      I stepped gingerly by the man, still sitting in the doorway. Julie, who was wearing a skirt, pressed it to her legs as she edged by. The man grinned up at us.

      Inside there were two teenage girls and a boy sprawled over the furniture in front of the TV. Beyond, there was a built-in table with bench seats on either side. Wanda sat on one. She was doing nothing but staring at her hands.

      “Get out of here, you guys,” the woman said. “Turn off that fucking box. I told you half an hour ago to turn that off.”

      “Shut up, bitch,” the boy said. He must have been about twelve or thirteen.

      The woman raised her foot and kicked his leg none too gently. “Get moving.”

      He muttered crossly, got up, and went outside.

      “Teri?” the man called from the doorway. “Get me another beer while you’re at it.”

      “Get it yourself,” she replied.

      “Frenchie? Hey, Frenchie, get me a beer.”

      I didn’t know which one was Frenchie, as there was no response from any of the people in the room.

      “Wanda?” he called. “Wanda, get me a beer.”

      Lumbering out of her seat, Wanda plodded to the refrigerator. She yanked the door open so hard that cans of beer tumbled out and went rolling across the floor. Teri swore at her. So did the man.

      Heaving a discouraged sigh, Teri flopped down on the couch. She gestured for Julie and me to sit. “Just don’t tell me you come about problems,” she said wearily, “’cause there’s nothing I can do. I got too many problems to deal with already. You can see that just looking around. So please don’t say you’re here about problems.”

      I could sense she was telling the truth there, that she really didn’t have the resources to cope with much more. I felt sympathy for her then.

      “Is Venus here?” I asked.

      “Dunno,” Teri said. She was obviously tired. She rubbed her hand over her face again.

      “Do you suppose we could find out?” I asked. “I’d like to see Venus.”

      Teri lifted her head and scanned around the trailer, as if perhaps she’d overlooked the child. Then she turned her head and looked back at Wanda. “Wanda? Where’s Venus?”

      Wanda ambled out of her seat. She wandered down the narrow corridor and into one of the rooms at the end of the trailer. Several moments passed in expectant silence. Julie and I had our necks craned to see where Wanda had gone. Teri leaned forward and removed a cigarette from the pack on the coffee table. She lit it and took a long, slow drag, giving a relieved-sounding sigh at the end.

      Wanda meandered out of the back room carrying something. As she came up to us, I could see it was the plastic doll, wrapped in a receiving blanket. It had been dressed in old baby clothes. Wanda smiled shyly at me and cuddled the doll. “Beautiful child,” she said and smiled again.

      “Wanda,” Teri cried in exasperation when she saw the doll.“Venus, you asshole. I said go get Venus, not your fucking doll.”

      But Wanda never did get Venus. Indeed, we never managed to see Venus at all. Instead, Wanda wandered off with СКАЧАТЬ