“Okay. I believe you.”
When Danielle heard him say that, the fear she felt—and the protective shell she kept all around herself—broke wide open, and so did her tears.
“Hey, hey.” A hand gently patted her around the shoulders. “Hey, hey. You okay, girl. You safe, with me.”
At last. All the ugliness, all the vile bile she was carrying around inside could come out. Her mouth tasted bitter, though she hadn’t vomited.
Uncle Winston, a friend of the family here in Trinidad, sat back in his canvas chair and bit his lip, brows drawn together with worry. “You want something to drink?”
“Yes, please,” Danielle managed to choke out.
As Uncle Winston rose from his chair in the guest bedroom and went to fix her a drink in the kitchen, Danielle separated and twirled the white streak in her curly brown hair. A car drove down the neighbourhood street and a dog barked. She heard the tap run and the clink of ice against glass, then the murmured words as Winston made arrangements over the phone. Danielle put her head in her hands. Her sister hadn’t believed her. Her aunt had shaken her head, tight-lipped, and said nothing. There was no one she could turn to but her father’s friend.
Uncle Winston returned with a glass of sorrel with ginger and cloves with some sugar. Danielle took it gratefully and gulped it down, the ginger nipping at her tongue.
“Okay.” Uncle Winston sat back in his seat. “You Canadian, right?”
Danielle nodded.
“Well, up there yuh have more rights at sixteen. They can’t force you to live with anybody.”
Thank God. No one had been able to find her parents’ updated will. The old one named her mother’s brother, Uncle Eddy, trustee. Mistake. Big mistake.
“I talk with yuh Auntie Delia in Rio Claro, and we gonna get the money for a plane ticket to get you out of here to Canada. Only thing is; you are going to miss your parents’ funeral. And you can’t come back.” He tapped his hand on the arm of the chair, scowling out the window.
Danielle sat with her knees together, holding the cool glass on top, raging with disbelief at the unfairness of it all, on top of what had happened to her. Not rape. Not yet. But there was no way she could stay a moment longer with Uncle Eddy.
“Think about this.”
“I will.”
“Listen. I’m sorry about your parents’ car accident. You end up in a situation like this. It’s—” He shook his head, his lips pressed closed as if he held himself back from words he might regret. “We’ll . . . talk more about this in the morning. Lemme leave you so you can rest.”
She nodded.
He stood at the door. “Good night.”
“’Night.”
He closed the door.
Danielle put the sweating glass down, a little less than half full now, and and pulled off her outer clothes. She had nothing to sleep in but her underwear.
Nervously, she twirled her streak. She wouldn’t sleep. The vision of Uncle Eddy, who could project his emotions—and forbidden desires—into her mind, swirled back, over and over, despite her attempts to think about the future. About Canada. Everyone, everyone, except her—she had never met anyone like herself—developed a unique Gift come puberty. Uncle Eddy had used his to prey on her. More than once.
But now she didn’t have her parents to keep him from her. And she had nothing else to keep him from her either. It was only a matter of time before he got to her. All the way.
She shuddered. She lay her head down on the pink pillow. She didn’t have to wait until morning to decide what she wanted—needed—to do.
But she’d wait until morning to tell Uncle Winston.
The sky . . . the sky . . . the sky. Danielle had never been in a plane before.
She’d taken off her seatbelt and stared at the clouds outside the window for about ten minutes before she took a break and sat back.
What would snow look like, she wondered. She had a blurry, vague memory of having her picture taken when she was little while it was snowing, maybe back in 1975. But that was it.
Her mind turned to her parents’ funeral. The last two days had gone by in a rush, and the funeral was today. How many people would come? Would it be a good funeral? Her parents would understand, especially if they knew what Uncle Eddy had done . . .
What would her life be like back in Canada? Well, in a couple years, she could go to university. In Trinidad, she’d lived in a nice house, her parents had cars, she was smart, she’d been accepted to one of the best schools in the country when she did her Common Entrance exam. Living with Uncle Greg shouldn’t be complicated. He was her mother’s—and Uncle Eddy’s—brother, but he’d keep her safe.
A flight attendant stopped at her row of seats to offer her food and drink. Oh that was right, you could even drink wine if you wanted to! Probably in first class . . .
She strayed to the view outside the window again, and stayed there the whole trip.
“Danielle, dinner.”
She got up from the leather couch in the family room —there was a show on TV called Family Feud, she liked it—and took her seat at the polished table. She’d been living at Uncle Greg’s place three months, studying hard and connecting with new friends.
As usual her uncle poured a large glass of wine for himself and held up the bottle. “You sure you don’t want to try the wine?”
“No, thanks, the pop is fine.” She ate in silence. Uncle Greg was okay, but they’d run out of conversation after the first two days.
“How are you finding Toronto?” Same question every night.
“It’s nice.” She thought of something new to say. “I saw a snowflake! They’re like in the Christmas cartoons!”
Her uncle smiled ruefully. “You like the snow, eh? Wait ‘till you’ve been here a few years. “
He watched her eat. “The food good?”
“Yes.”
“Mm, mm.” He nodded and continued eating. “The wine’s good. You’re old enough; it’s okay; c’mon try the wine.”
She smiled and shook her head. “Nah.”
“Okay.”
Danielle finished her plate and rose to put it in the sink. She remembered her glass and turned back to get it.
Uncle Greg was staring after her ass.
Just for a moment. The way a guy her age would. Then his head was down busy studying his plate.
Cold washed down through her gut.
She said nothing but returned to the kitchen to wash her plate, her fingers trembling.
Uncle Eddy, back home.
Something pulled at her. In her bed.
At first, in the wooliness of waking, she thought . . . Finally! Had her Gift come? Late, like some girls’ periods?
No. It was a bare arm near her face.
Holding her.
There was someone in her bed. Her uncle.
He was naked, pulling her to him, muttering, trying to lift her nightgown.
“Uncle Greg! Uncle Greg!” She struggled, panicked, but his grip tightened.
He reeked of alcohol. He’d been out drinking.
“C’mere . . .” he fumbled at her clothing. “’s just us, you don’t have to worry.”
“You’re drunk!” She slapped at his hands, kicked.
“No. It’ll be fun. It’ll be ‘kay.” He took an armful of her and pulled her to him, one hand going for his member.
“No . . . stop . . . you’re drunk! Stop it!” She pushed, kicked him. Hard.
“No!” He was really rough now. He ripped her nightgown, climbed on top of her, handling his member. The bitter, boozy taste of him flooded her mouth . . . “No!” She stretched her face away from his. “Nono nonono! NO Uncle Greg!”
He stilled, his weight heavy on her. “Hm? C’mon? Hm?” He shook her with each word.
“No . . .” She was in tears now.
“Okay.” He got off her, slid off the bed.
Danielle clutched the covers to her as he stumbled toward the door.
Almost at the door, he turned around, staring at her for a while. Then he shook his dick at her. “What’m I supposed to do with this? Hm?”
Danielle stared at him, shaking her head, her heart thudding in her chest.
“Hm? C’mon?” He shook it again.
“No. Go to your room, Uncle Greg. Go to sleep.”
He stood there for a while. Then he shuffled off.
She waited, muscles rigid, watching the dimness of the open door.
After a long while, she heard the faint click of his bedroom door closing.
She bolted out of the bed to lock the door. Then she flew to the computer beside the bed and let her fingers fly across the keys, hunting through glacially slow screens to find that youth shelter she saw in all those subway ads downtown. ‘Get out of the cold’.
Get out.
Get out.
It ran in the family.
Danielle huddled in the subway seat with her yellow bag, a bag her mom made herself, with her meagre belongings, and the torn nightgown. What the hell happened to her uncles as boys that they’d ended up like this? Her mother had never wanted anything to do with her brothers—at some point she’d cut them from her life —but Danielle’s father had encouraged her to keep some contact.
It just struck her. Dad didn’t know. Mom had never told him.
Had they tried this on her mother? What if . . .?
Danielle shuddered under her black sweat top. She had told the subway ticket booth man that she was heading to a hostel, a youth shelter, that’s what they’d told her to do, and he’d let her in, just like they said they would.
She stood up in her faded black jeans. This was her stop.
It was a mild night. Late. It had snowed a week ago but the temperature hadn’t stayed that low.
She stopped in front of the hostel glass doors; she knocked.
A black woman in a fuchsia dress top and a black skirt opened the door and let her in. “Hi. My name is Mavis.”
“Danielle.” She could feel the magic of this woman, brushing against the inner walls of her mind. She stepped back.
“It’s all right, Sweetie,” the woman said, and her voice was low and soft. “I won’t intrude. Not unless you ask and need help with something, okay? You have nothing to be afraid of here.”
Danielle blinked, unsure.
The woman stood back from the door and gestured for her to enter. “It’s okay.”
Danielle took a tentative step inside.
“How . . . do you keep people from . . . not harming others with their Gifts here?”
There was a click and Danielle turned. A security guard behind them had locked the front door and gone back outside.
“Reinforced magical walls,” the woman said, gesturing around. “It keeps the random Gifts of all here in check. Almost as if they had none.”
“Like they had none?” Danielle couldn’t help the tone of her voice at that. It would make them like . . . her.
“Well. Minimal.” The woman smiled, and her smile was gentle. “There’re warning systems and reporting systems in place.”
Danielle nodded, reassured, but still . . . uncertain.
“Someone will take you on a tour during the daytime. Follow me. We have to do intake.”
She followed the woman—Mavis—further into the building, past stairs that most likely lead to sleeping quarters, into an office.
“Okay, do you have your OHIP and SIN card?” Mavis asked, preparing a new file.
It was then Danielle realized she had nothing. Haltingly, she explained her situation without details—the hasty departure from the Caribbean, the awkward arrangements staying with a relative she barely knew, and the fact she was a Canadian citizen but hadn’t lived in Canada so she had almost no ID.
Almost.
“Oh, I have my passport.” She fished it out and gave it to the woman.
“Aah. That’s good.” Mavis took it and wrote into Danielle’s new file.
“Well,” she said, after handing the passport back, “we’ll get into more detail tomorrow, once you’re settled. We can help you to make a plan, either going to school or finding work, and we can help you find housing if you need it, a group home or a rooming house to make it easier on yourself, or you could live by yourself. But all that can come to a halt if you don’t have the necessary documents. Do you have your school records up here yet?”
“N-no, I don’t think so. I’ve been attending this school but they put me a year behind.”
“That may be fixed once your school records arrive. Who is getting your school records?”
“Um, I think Uncle Winston in Trinidad. He was supposed to send them up. He went to see my principal.”
“Your principal back home?”
“Yeah.”
“Ah, okay. This Uncle Winston is someone we should talk to. He could probably help. You know his number?”
“Yes.” Danielle gave her the number.
“Okay. Well you should know you can’t be forced into Children’s Aid because you’re sixteen. So you’re a young adult. Do you think you might want to look for work?”
She had to continue school! What a question! Where would she end up if she didn’t have an education . . .? “School.”
“All right. We’ll get things in order in the next few days. In the meantime, don’t give out the number to this place; there are some young men and women here who don’t want their whereabouts known, and it’s a privacy and safety thing. For you too. Do you trust anyone to know you’re here?”
“No.”
“So, you see. Okay, I’ll need you to put your hand on this,” she pointed to a metal orb. “What’s your Gift?”
Panic spiked Danielle’s insides. “None.”
“Sorry?”
“I have no Gift.”
“And you’re sixteen.”
“Yes.”
“Put your hand on it, please.”
Danielle complied. The orb was attached to a machine with a keyboard, and Mavis entered something. And again. This time whatever she did was more thorough.
“Hm.” She sat back from the keyboard. “Huh.” Mavis looked at Danielle. “No trace of any Gift, not even lurking negative potentials like what people call ‘Sudden Imaginary Friends’ or ‘Poltergeists’ where it’s suppressed for whatever reason, and can suddenly emerge at any time.” She waved her hand. “Just absolutely no Gift.”
She studied Danielle. “I have never seen anyone like you. I mean, I’ve heard rumours, but . . .”
Danielle shrugged but had no answer.
Mavis stood, straightened herself. “We’ll have to look into that more in the morning. For now, let’s get you some sheets and some essentials and we can take you to your room. You’re lucky, you don’t have a roommate right now.” The woman smiled. “Well, this turned out to be an interesting evening.”
After all Danielle’s basics were provided for, she was left to put the comforter on the bed and settle in. The room was spare. Two beds, two chests with very narrow drawers; probably they didn’t expect anyone coming to have much. Danielle looked to her yellow bag; she put it under the bed. Changing into the torn nightgown was too much for her tonight; she took off her sweatshirt and lay down in her shirt.
Alone, lit by nearby lamplight, and safe. Where she could put her guard down.
The floodgates opened. Tucking her forearms under her head, she let the healing tears come.
The morning staff at the shelter had a series of questions for Danielle, and she had to sign a form.
“Try and keep the fact that you don’t have a Gift as quiet as possible,” she was told at the door to another office. “Some of our other residents may not bother you, or even care, but some may try and . . . bother you. Make things trying.”
“Okay,” Danielle said softly, head bowed.
She had nothing to do until the afternoon, when she was to meet with a counsellor—she forgot which one—to start her school and housing plan. She drifted into a common room where a group of kids her age were watching television—it was the weekend—and sat with a few others watching hockey.
“No way,” a guy said.
“What?” said a girl.
“One of the commentators is actually named Bob McKenzie.”
“That’s so Canadian, my head wants to explode into red, white and beer.”
Everyone broke out into laughter. Danielle didn’t get the joke.
“Bee-auty.”
“Take off, eh?”
“Hoser . . .”
More laughter.
Something biting cold brushed the back of Danielle’s neck. She reached back to flick it away and felt a breath. Startled in her seat, she looked around.
“Yo.” A black guy stood to his full height, chuckling. “You look sweet.”
What was funny about intruding on her space?
“Wassup?” He took a swig at a cup of coffee. He seemed to have thought he’d started a conversation.
Danielle didn’t know what do to. She turned back round, joining the others watching television.
“Yo. Yo.”
Danielle took a deep breath and tried to concentrate on the television.
“Yo, fucking bitch. Yo.”
Danielle’s hands clamped together. Her palms became sweaty. She didn’t know what it was like in this place yet; it was her first day. She didn’t want a conflict.
But, someone seemed to have smelt the new on her and came picking for one anyway.
“Yo, fucking bitch.” A kick thumped the back of the sofa for emphasis. “Yo.”
Someone pushed herself in between Danielle and the sofa. A black girl, sporting a long, unstyled mohawk in a fan of fractionalized colours. “Yo make some space, I wanna sit.”
Danielle moved as much as she could.
The colours in the female’s hair changed, coruscating frantically. The girl turned around to the back of the sofa. “Darien, what you doing standing there? Ain’t you got some bush to lift your leg up on or something?”
“Shut up, man.”
“Don’t you dare tell me to shut up. You know what happened last time.”
Finally, a staff seemed to ken onto what was happening. “What’s going on over there now?”
“Just Darien bothering people again,” the female said.
“Darien, you have enough warnings already.”
“Yo, miss, I wasn’t talking to this bitch . . .”
“Language.”
“Yeah, go an’ get yourself kicked out of here again.”
“Fucking bitch,” he muttered under his breath. “Stupid bitch,” he said, kicking the sofa lightly and backing away.
“Mmmhm. Icebreath,” the black girl said. “With all that coffee you drink, fucking bad breath. Who gonna kiss you with that mouth?” She turned around, sucking her teeth and adjusting her leather jacket. The colours in her hair calmed, undulated more smoothly.
She looked to Danielle and put out a hand. “Hi.”
Danielle took her hand, shaking it.
“Danielle.”
“Penny. You know, as in ‘Penny for your thoughts’? My mood kinda shows up in my hair.”
“Ah.”
“Nice white streak in your own hair, by the way.”
“Thank you.”
“So, what’s up with you?”
Danielle thought of what Mavis said about revealing she had no Gift, but she was warming up to Penny. “Nothing.”
“What you mean, nothing? Everybody’s got something. Not gonna be as obvious as mine,” she gestured to her hair again, “but something.”
“Nope, not me,” she said. “Nothing.”
“Fucking freak.” It was Icebreath, still sulking behind them.
Penny turned around. “Excuse me?”
Darien did not reply.
“Don’t worry with him callin’ you a freak.” Penny turned her back pointedly on Darien. “Girl, you can do so much better anyways.”
“Yeah, yeah. Thanks,” Danielle muttered. Why did she open her mouth? She was lucky Penny was dealing with him.
Penny’s eyebrows raised, then she nodded, thinking. “Huh!”
“Yep.” Danielle steeled herself.
“I never heard of that happening. Somebody without a Gift. You’re special, eh.”
“Can we talk about something else, please?” Danielle hunched down into the couch, turning back to the hockey game.
“Okay. I’ll shut up. Watch this . . . hockey.”
Danielle smiled. “Thanks.”
Bedtime came. Televisions were turned off, snacks were grabbed, last-minute smokes were taken outside.
“Had a smoke already,” Penny said. “I gotta get soap and toothpaste and stuff. See ya tomorrow!” And she bounded up the stairs past everybody.
Danielle closed the door to her room, undressed to her T-shirt, and went under the covers.
Sometime later, the door burst open.
Uncle Greg was shaking his dick at her. “What’m I supposed to do with this, hm! Hm? C’mon?”
The air left Danielle’s throat. She gasped, bolting upright.
Penny stepped inside, silhouetted against the hall light with her comforter, soap and other essentials in her arms. “Oh, I got your room! That’s so sweet!”
Danielle shook her head.
“You okay?” She turned on the light and closed the door.
“Yeah.” Then Danielle smiled. “Yeah, I am.” She watched the colours on Penny’s hair coruscate in smooth fractals; her smile widened. Looked like Penny really was happy.
“This is awesome. We can have some girl talk time and everything!” She dumped her stuff onto the floor and flopped backwards onto the bed, arms out. “Ah, a bed! A nice, soft bed!”
Danielle had slept on softer. “Why do you say that?”
“After being on the streets? Aaah . . .!”
“Oh.”
Penny hung up her leather jacket in the closet, undressed to her bra and panties, pulled out a shirt from her black backpack and put it on.
“You can lock up your stuff in the lockers they have here,” she told Danielle.
Danielle looked at her sparse belongings. “Nah, I don’t think I have anything valuable to steal.”
“You have a passport on you?”
“Oh yeah!” She searched the bag. “Still here.”
“Well, that’s good,”
Danielle sighed in relief.
Penny lay back in bed, and pulled the comforter over her.
They lay in comfortable silence for a while. An ambulance screamed by.
Then Penny spoke up. “What brings you here? What’s your story?”
Danielle tensed. “Family shit.”
“I hear ya. First time here, huh? Real different from home. They try, but . . .”
“Yeah.” Part of her wished Penny would turn off the light. In the dark, talk came easier.
“People thinking that all black people are poor. Or like Icebreath. My father and mother are well off. But fists flew in that house all the time. See this scar on my cheek?” She turned the other side of her face to show Danielle.
“Yeah.”
“That’s why I left. Streets are better than living in that hellhole. Do you know what it’s like to beg?”
Danielle suddenly saw her uncle Eddy before her, her on her knees, him telling her to beg him to please her. When she didn’t comply, his hands closed around her neck.
“You gonna throw up?” Penny said. The patterns in Penny’s hair changed. “You okay?”
Danielle caught herself. “No . . . no, I’m . . . okay.”
“Sorry. Looks like I almost literally brought something up.”
“No, ‘s all right.”
“Okay, I’m a shut up. I’ll read something until I go to sleep.” Penny pulled out a comic book. “Ever seen this?”
Danielle stretched her neck out to see. “No.”
“It’s Tank Girl. They made a movie about it. I didn’t like it. But I keep reading this. I’ll lend it to you when I’m done. Don’t mess it up though.”
“’K.”
“’Night.”
“’Night.”
Danielle watched Penny’s hair colour change when she was silent, when she murmured words, when she laughed.
Eventually she fell asleep.
“Wanna come talk with me while I smoke?” Penny asked her when they were downstairs the next morning.
“Sure.”
They headed outside and stood a little way down the side of the building.
“Hey, Danielle,” Icebreath called out at the entrance to the hostel; two guys with him started to chuckle.
Danielle turned her back on them.
“Hey Danielle, me and the guys, we came up for a name for you last night, since you’re so special and all. We decided on Superfreak.” The guys broke out in laughter; some others nearby smiled and shook their heads. “Yeah, Superfreak. Superfreak!”
Despite herself, she turned to look at them.
“Don’t pay him no mind,” Penny said, frowning, putting a protective arm around her.
Icebreath walked off with his friends, laughing. “Yeah, Superfreak.”
For the next few weeks, Danielle hung out with Penny after school along Yonge Street and the business district, Queen Street West. Many kids who lived on the street were system-shy, and preferred the cold and danger of living outside to potential systemic abuse. They came from a variety of backgrounds: rich, poor, black, not; but what they all had in common was abuse of some sort, and to a lesser extent neglect. None were out there because they hated their curfew; those two percent who were doing that ran straight back home.
They all talked; Danielle was not alone. The abuse could be physical, emotional or sexual or a combination; some had siblings who weren’t abused at all, and they were the focus of all the abuse; some had siblings who participated in the abuse, like the one girl who had been abused by her brothers.
Penny even took Danielle inside a squat, visiting friends. She disparagingly told of Icebreath’s nickname for Danielle.
“Well, the joke’s on him, you know,” a guy with a short teal mohawk with black roots said. Sean.
“Huh?” Penny made a face. “Why?”
“There was a song in the 70’s with that name. How come you didn’t know?”
“When I was like, what, ten?” Penny rolled her eyes.
“Well. Like I said. It ain’t no insult, really,” Sean said. “I mean suppose no one had Gifts. Anyone with a Gift would be a called a freak. Like someone with superpowers. A Superfreak. Well, that’s all she is,” he finished, pointing at Danielle.
“So, like, own it,” Penny said, a smile starting.
“Yeah!” Sean said.
For the first time in a long while, Danielle felt a smile creep over her face. A real smile.
“Fact, next time we go by the hostel, we’ll do one better, turn it on him,” Sean said. “Call you that as praise.”
“Superfreak!” Penny said, punching the air with one closed fist.
Superfreak. Yeah.
In the ensuing weeks, the shock of her experiences began to wear off, and Danielle started to feel something besides fear.
She began to feel angry.
There were moments when she wanted to smash something to bits, or scream to the heavens.
“You should charge him,” Penny said more than once when they talked at night.
In her increasingly frequent moments of anger, she felt that she should.
But in her more sober moments, or moments of fear, the gravity of doing so shook her. Send Uncle Greg to jail? Cause ruction in the family? That was serious business. And she would cave in, she would waver.
But, she thought one night, while she lay awake after Penny had fallen asleep, what they did to her was serious business, too. They were hurting her. Look where she had to live now. She shouldn’t be silent and just take it.
In the morning, Danielle knocked on the glass door to Mavis’ office.
Danielle had never been in a police station before. She could imagine the walls and corridors vibrating with wards and power. But, she didn’t have to go down there and face it all alone. The police came to the hostel.
“Nervous?” Mavis asked her.
“Yeah.”
“Don’t be.” A reassuring squeeze on her shoulder. “We’re here.”
The downstairs of the hostel was empty; it was a weekday. Time seemed infinite.
Then the police car pulled up and parked by the front door.
“There they are.”
A few moments later, a white man and a black woman in uniform entered the foyer.
“I’ll be right back.” Mavis went to meet them.
“One of your wards is being worked on,” the male officer said. “Probably so they can sneak out or smoke through the windows.”
“Oh really? Which one?”
“I’ll show you.” They walked out of sight.
The female officer introduced herself. “I’m Anna. That’s David. How are you?”
“Kind of scared.”
“Don’t be. We’re here to help. Ah, here they come now.”
“Let’s go into the office,” Mavis said. “It’ll be more private.”
David stood behind her chair, while Mavis sat opposite her. Anna sat down next to her.
Silence.
“Miss . . .?”
“Yes?”
“Are you ready to make your statement?”
“Y-yes.”
Retelling the traumatic incident with Uncle Greg was one of the most harrowing things Danielle’d had to do in her life.
She added all the sexual abuse at the hands of her other uncle, Uncle Eddy, while back home.
She ended to a solemn silence.
“And you have no Gift.”
“No . . . I don’t.”
“That makes you vulnerable. This will go on record.”
“And your Uncle Eddy . . . his gift was to project his emotions into your mind . . .”
“Yes.”
“And your other uncle, Greg. . . . He had some very mild persuasive ability. But you didn’t lose your own sense of will.”
“Yes.”
Anna let out a long sigh. “I’m sorry for everything that’s happened to you. But, you’re safe here. Any problems and you go to staff.”
“I know.”
“Okay,” Anna said standing up, “We’ll commence with the charges. Thanks, Mavis.” She and David shook the counsellor’s hand and left.
Mavis stood. “You want to head up to your room? Or do you want to go to school?”
“I wouldn’t be able to focus if I did,” Danielle said.
Danielle’s palms were sweaty.
It was a week later. The courtroom. The dark polished wood, the carpeting, the silent waiting, the solemnity of it all.
Her lawyer, a white woman, reassured her, saying everything would be fine.
She sat for a long time on a hard wooden bench. Then, it was her turn. Her lawyer stated her case, the judge nodded, the court reporter typed.
Then her lawyer turned to her. “Now, relax. Do you need to hold my hand while they do this?”
Danielle swallowed. “Yes, please.”
The first truthseeker approached her. This woman had undergone rigorous testing and training. She would probe Danielle’s mind for the specific memory, and extract it, in a manner of speaking, for the others to see and record.
Danielle felt hands gently rest on the top of her head, and something inside her mind, probing, searching . . . then landing. Memories engulfed her. Danielle closed her eyes and averted her face.
“Just one more time,” she heard her lawyer say when that woman was done.
Tears streaked down her cheeks.
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” her lawyer said, rubbing her shoulders. “You are brave to do this. Many grown women would not endure this, but it is necessary to get to the truth.”
Again. Memory. Fear. Shame.
Then it was over.
A brief lifting of the second truthseeker’s eyebrows. “It was conclusive.”
“I’d say so,” the judge said, all grave tones. “We’ll have to search the uncles’ own memories, but I think it’s pretty clear what happened.”
Outside the courtroom, on slightly less hard seats, her lawyer took Danielle’s hands into her own. “How are you? A bit shaken?”
Danielle nodded.
She rubbed Danielle’s hands in hers, and a warm glow started. It spread up Danielle’s arms and spread throughout her body. Instantly Danielle felt better. She felt angry, at her uncle, but she felt like crying a bit right now.
“It’s part of my Gift,” her lawyer said. “I’m licensed to use it. I can soothe. How you feel after, is up to you. You have a spark in your eyes now. You’re sitting up straighter, like the world isn’t beating up on you. But your eyes are teary. Am I correct?”
“Yes.” And Danielle could hear determination in her own voice.
Her lawyer heard it too, and nodded. “Well, I’m glad that strength’s always been under there. It’s what’s kept you going. What are you going to do with the rest of your day once I drive you back to the hostel?”
“I’ll meet Penny at the Eaton Centre by the fountain,” Danielle said. “I got the day off school.”
“How’s school going?”
“The other kids don’t really want to have much to do with me,” Danielle said, her voice soft now, sad. “But I tell them to call me SuperFreak, and I have other friends outside school.”
“That’ll take some time. That’s one hell of a nickname.” She smiled. “You should have counselling; I think last we talked, you wanted me to help you find a counsellor?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“Okay,” she said, standing, “let’s go.”
Danielle called Trinidad collect the next day. “Uncle Winston?”
“Danielle! My dear, how are you doing?”
She wanted to tell him. She wanted to. But hearing his voice brought an unexpected constriction to her throat and the words would not come.
“That bad, huh? You still with your Uncle Greg?”
The mention of his name made her wince. “No.” She filled him in.
“Oh, Jesus Christ. I thought it was just Eddy. I didn’t know it was both of them. So that’s why your cousin Harold beat Greg’s ass up. Your uncle looking to charge him, from what I hear. You remember Harold from when he used to visit from Canada, right?
“Yeah.”
“Where yuh staying?”
“At a hostel for youth.”
“Nah nah nah, you shouldn’t be staying in a place like that, you don’t know what kinda people yuh gonna find there. You should be staying with family . . .”
“You gonna say that after what happen to me at Uncle Greg’s? I’m fine. I have a new friend. Her name is Penny.”
“Penny?”
“Yeah. She’s helping me. She makes sure no one messes with me.”
“Okay . . . I really think you should consider staying with Harold. To my mind he done prove he could be trusted by going after that bastard of an uncle. He’s looking for you right now. Yuh want me to tell him where you are?”
A thrill of fear went through Danielle’s stomach.
“Just to talk, until you start to trust him.”
“Okay . . .” But what if . . . “I can’t give out the phone number. Give me his and I’ll meet him some place. Until I’m ready.”
“You goin’ to school?”
“Yes, Uncle Winston. How YOU doing?”
“Well, I almost went to jail. Your uncle Eddy was furious after he came home from the funeral. Your uncles are something else, yes.”
“Yes, they are,” she growled.
Mavis called out. “Danielle, you need to get off the phone soon.”
“Uncle Winston, I have to go. Thank you for helping me to get my school transcripts and stuff. They’d had me a year behind.”
“You’re welcome, my dear. And you can call me collect, anytime. Take care.”
“I will.”
Kids could only stay in the youth hostel for three months, and while they were there, they were expected to find a place to live; Danielle found a house without being pushed, because she was eager to be on her own.
Danielle was interviewed by the residents of the rooming house with one of their staff members present, and everything seemed fine. One of the residents knew people at the hostel, and he’d been happy to vouch for her.
But things were different when staff were there and when they weren’t.
She only found this out after moving in.
One of the residents gave her a jacket and it was on her forearm before he revealed that it’d belonged to someone who had died in the house, in her room. He laughed.
Beer bottles abounded, and it was supposed to be a “dry” house.
And . . . she was the only female in the house with four males. But it was when the other residents realized she wasn’t going to go along with their way of bending the rules that sealed it.
She had to move out.
Talking to Mavis in the intake room to the hostel, her belongings in a series of black garbage bags, she cried. “I feel like a failure.”
“Don’t feel that way,” she said. “That’s what we’re here for,” Mavis soothed. “For if things don’t work out. You can try again.”
Single rooms were expensive, and small, or run down. Welfare only paid for some of the expenses; after rent there wasn’t much left for food. Finally, she got a room at a supported residential house. But the other hostel residents still found ways to bully her when staff weren’t looking.
Then one day, one of the staff said she had a visitor. Her heart convulsed; was it Uncle Greg. She knew it. Wanting to take her back. Promising nothing would happen like that ever again, he was just drunk?
“He says he’s your cousin,” one of the staff said. “Harold?”
Harold. Not Uncle Greg.
It took her a minute to catch her breath. She almost laughed aloud.
Danielle’d first met Harold when they were really small, when he’d visited Trinidad from Canada. He was a bit older than her. She remembered running with him on the beach, playing in the sand.
She went to the door and saw him. Tall, with dreads. He looked like someone who could handle himself.
“Danielle?”
“Hi.”
“It’s been . . . years.” He grinned, and his teeth were even and white. “Do you remember me?”
“Yeah. You’re the guy who beat up Uncle Greg.”
His face went hard. “Yeah.”
He stood on the stoop, offering nothing more.
“What did you want?” Winston must have told Harold where she was, after all. Jesus. How could he do that? “Why did you come?”
“I heard you were in trouble, and I wanted to help. Can we talk?”
But Winston must have thought Harold was okay. And if Winston trusted him, she guessed she could give him a chance. “Let me tell staff what’s going on.”
“Okay. In fact, can I talk to them?”
“Sure.”
She watched them talk at the door.
“Okay, Danielle, you’re going with your cousin for a bit?” the staff asked. “Should I save you a dinner?”
“No, I’ll take care of that,” Harold said.
“All right then. See you later.”
“So.” Harold, still standing on the doorstep, raised his collar against the spring chill. “Allen Gardens is right across the street, wanna talk there? Maybe the greenhouse, since it’s kinda cold outside?”
“Sure.”
They crossed the street to Allen Gardens. They found chairs inside the greenhouse.
“This is nice, isn’t it?” he said. He was soft spoken.
“Yes, it is,” Danielle said warily.
“Okay, first off; everyone calls me Samson now.”
“Samson?”
He flicked his dreads. Not pretty and twirled individually like North Americans liked to do, but his hair had grown out as it would, untouched, like back home.
“Your hair?”
“Is my strength, like the original Samson—cut it and I’m weak?” he grinned.
“Oooh. Well, I’m Danielle . . .”
He nodded.
“But I am starting to tell people to call me SuperFreak.”
He threw his head back and laughed. A rich, deep voice.
He held out a hand. “Pleased to meet you.”
She took it. “Pleased to meet you too.”
“So . . .” She was tired of the game of silence her family played. “Why did you beat up Uncle Greg . . .?”
“Why do you think?”
Danielle lowered her head.
“You think you were the only one? After I asked him why you ‘left’ and how you tried to beat him up . . .” He made a snort of derision. “I asked him if he tried anything with you, to make you leave. He got that look, and I had a truthstone with me that I bought, and I figured it out. You think you’re the only one? He tried that shit with me too.”
Danielle’s gut twisted in disgust.
“Let him try and charge me. I hear you’re charging him.”
“Y-yes.”
“Look,” Samson said, turning bodily to face her, “I have a proposal. And, I know you don’t know me well—it’s been some years—but I’m willing to take you in. You can stay with me.”
Every inch of her being froze with apprehension.
“I know you’re finding it hard to deal with people because you have no Gift, is that right?”
Danielle nodded. She was safe. She was safe. She had a safe house. With staff.
“Right, so you have no Gift. Family will accept you. I accept you. And I’m offering a safe space. Where you can trust me.”
Like she had trusted Uncle Greg.
“You can check my place out before you decide; I heard you had a rough time at a rooming house and had to move out.”
Winston trusted him. She had to remember that. Not every male in her family was bad. Not every . . .
She took a breath and closed her eyes. “Yes. I want Penny to come with me.” She swallowed. “When I come to see your place.” She’d promised herself. She’d give him a chance.
“Fair enough. So we’re okay?”
She closed her mouth and nodded. She hadn’t agreed to move in. Only to look.
When Penny saw the tall, muscular man, she eyed him up and down noticeably before she said, “Hello.”
“Hello,” he said back, grinning.
Oh, really now? So Penny liked him? That was good.
“So, what do you have to say for yourself to make me think you’re good for SuperFreak over here?” Penny said. With a teasing tone.
“People say I speak softly and carry a big stick,” Samson said.
“What’s your name?”
“Samson.”
Penny’s eyes almost bulged out of their sockets; Danielle had to stop from rolling her eyes.
Samson got serious. “She says she wants you to come along when she checks out my place, to have someone with her.”
“Sure, I’ll come,” she said.
“So, when, Danielle?” Samson turned to her.
“How about now?” Penny said. “We have time before curfew.”
It was three weeks later, when Danielle, Penny and Samson were having dinner—again—at his place, when he asked. “So?” He turned to Danielle as she put her fork into a slice of chocolate cake. “What do you think?”
She knew what he meant without asking. His place was clean, spacious, and well attended. He was a bouncer at an expensive club. He did all right. But it wasn’t that.
She and Penny had spent most evenings with him, and a lot of time on the weekends. They’d watched videos, gone skating, taken walks, shopped at the mall. Danielle had—finally—let herself be alone with him and they’d talked family until past curfew. Talked about family secrets. Confessed fears and anger. Laughed over family stories. She’d gone home to worried staff and lost privileges and gained new eyes for the contempt in the gibes of her roommates.
She put her fork down. “Yes.”
His face lit up. Penny squealed.
“Yes. I’ll do it.”
Samson nodded. “That’s good, that’s good . . .” he smiled. “Welcome.”
“We need to talk to Uncle Winston,” she told him. “And Mavis.”
“Oh, I know him.”
“Oh, awesome!”
“How you think I find out? And I can help you find legal aid.”
They sat in comfortable silence for a moment.
“A celebration,” Penny said. “Superfreak, I am so happy for you!”
Samson grabbed some sorrel from the fridge, poured everyone a glass. “To new beginnings. And things finally getting off on the right foot.”
They toasted.
“How are your nightmares?”
“Why are you asking me?” Danielle asked her therapist.
“It may be my Gift to know how you are feeling, but you still need to talk it out.”
It was three months later. Danielle still had hang-ups about talking to people about things.
“The dreams always catch me unaware,” she said. “Sometimes it’s me and Uncle Eddy; last night it was me and Uncle Greg again. I could feel his mind pushing against mine like some itchy blanket. I was afraid that if I was drunk, like he was . . .” She shuddered. “Suppose I gave in?”
“That’s what you most fear . . .?”
“Yes . . . yes . . . yes!”
“Okay, Danielle, you’re not there anymore,” she soothed. “It’s not happening to you now. You are safe. You are with me. Do you trust me?”
“Somewhat . . .”
“Okay we’re working on that. We’ll deal with that another time,” she said. “What do you feel in your body?”
“Panic. I feel it in my diaphragm . . . it’s making me twitch my feet, I can’t breathe right . . .”
“What are you thinking?”
“Oh my God, oh my God, Oh my God, why, why . . .” Tears streaked down her cheeks.
“Okay. You’re safe, Danielle, you’re here, not there. . . . Okay, try breathing again. Better?”
“Yes.”
“What’s it like living with your cousin?”
“It’s . . . safer.”
“What do you mean? You don’t feel totally safe there yet? Has he tried making you feel safe?”
“He’s very nice, and I feel safer when he’s around. But sometimes . . . I look at his arms and feel afraid he’ll force . . .”
“Force himself on you?”
“Y-yup.” Danielle nodded, wiping her nose with the back of her hand.
“Here.” Her therapist picked up the box of tissues on the coffee table between them and handed it to Danielle.
“Thank you.” She blew her nose.
“We should do a CBT sheet next week on your feelings about living with your cousin. Is that okay with you?
“Yes.”
“When was the last time you talked to Winston?”
“Last week.”
The therapist nodded. “When are you planning to go back to the Caribbean to deal with your parents’ estate?
“In the summer, in a couple of months.”
“Good. All right, let’s end here for today. I’ll see you next week.”
Danielle left the therapist’s office. Penny and Samson were in the reception room.
Danielle stopped in her tracks. She stared.
Samson stood. “’Sup, SuperFreak?”
Danielle peered at him, coming closer. “What did you do!”
“Just cut my hair.”
“But why?” She reached out a finger, as if to touch the close-cropped curls.
“He did it for you,” Penny said, standing, her hand coming to rest on Danielle’s shoulder. “He wanted to surprise you.”
“I figured, how else can I make you feel safe? Then it occurred to me. My hair. I talked about it to my boss and he’s cool with it. It’s not like I don’t have a black belt or something.” He grinned.
“Thank you.” Danielle hugged him.
Samson startled at her touch, then wrapped her in a big, soft hug.
“You’re very welcome. Penny likes it, anyway.”
“Yes, I do.” She grinned.
“So,” Samson said as Danielle pulled back. “The usual? Movies and pizza tonight?”
“I can stay overnight,” Penny said. “So, movies galore!”
“Yes,” Danielle murmured as the three turned to go, arm in arm. Her heart swelled. With hope. For the first time since she was in Canada, she felt safe and secure. “Home.”