In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.
—ALBERT CAMUS
It was a chilly Sausalito day, and the sky was gray. Bruce, who was five years old, asked if he could go outside to play with his new Christmas gift, a scooter board. “Okay,” I said, “but just in the driveway.”
As parents, we relive every mistake we make over and over in our minds, endlessly chastising ourselves. This one stays with me to this day. I was just about to take a bath when I heard the most terrible screech outside, and then a hard, frantic pounding on my wooden front door, and a neighbor screaming, “It’s your little boy.” I looked out the window, and there was Bruce lying in the middle of the road, with blood running down the hill. In front of him was a car with the door open. He was alone. He had lost control of his scooter board and it had shot out into the street just as a car was coming over the crest; it ran over him.
As parents, we relive every mistake we make over and over in our minds, endlessly chastising ourselves.
I grabbed my robe and ran outside. I lifted his bloody little head into my lap. He looked up at me and said, “Mommy,” then passed out, or at least I prayed he had passed out. An ambulance arrived, and suddenly we were in the ER, and everyone had snapped into action.
“He’s going to need surgery,” the doctor said. “It looks like his spleen has been crushed, and we have to operate to see what other damage might have happened. His head has been badly injured. We have to go immediately.”
“Is he going to live?” I asked, terrified.
“He’s got a fifty-fifty chance,” and then the doctor took off.
They wheeled his motionless little body past me, and I sobbed as I’ve never sobbed before in my life. I prayed and begged God to save him, to please save him. I sat outside the operating room for what seemed like hours, like years really.
Then the doctor finally came out. “He’s got some very bad injuries, but we were able to save his spleen. He has a concussion, and we stitched up his head. From what I see, he’s a very lucky little boy. We need to keep a watch over him, so he’ll have to stay in the hospital for quite some time. And then you’ll have to keep him quiet and inside for a while. Watch for dizziness, watch for anything out of the ordinary.”
I would have done anything for him. I would have traded my life for his at that moment.
After surgery, Bruce was wheeled into intensive care. Twenty-four hours later he was taken out of ICU and put in a hospital room, but he was sedated and in a deep sleep. I sat next to his bed, touching him, reassuring him and myself through that touch, hoping he could hear.
The nurse said to me, “Mrs. Somers, I think you should go home and get some rest and change your clothes.”
I looked down. I hadn’t noticed until then that my robe was covered in Bruce’s blood. I had no shoes on. I also realized I had no car. So I called a friend to come and get me, and I called my parents to come to the hospital and keep watch until I could return after cleaning up.
All the way home I was lost in my thoughts: I kept asking myself, Why, why, did I do something so stupid? It brought me back to my childhood, when my father told me over and over during his drunken rages that I was “stupid, hopeless, worthless, nothing, a big zero.” I knew in that moment, I was all those things. My life would fall apart without Bruce. It was us against the world. From the day he was born, at every moment of every day, I had been preoccupied with him and what he needed.
Bruce survived, but it was a long recovery. He needed constant attention, and I was more than willing to give it to him. I loved taking care of him, and I was deeply grateful to see him gradually getting well. I would make him delicious dinners and bring them to him on a tray, and I would sit with him while he ate. I prepared all his favorites, anything to make him happy. I made his room perfectly tidy and organized, because that was how he liked it. I wanted to do anything that would provide him with healing calm and peace.
His cousins visited often, friends came by, and I warned everyone to keep him quiet and not get him too excited. I gave him a bath every evening before dinner, but in shallow water, always careful not to get his wounds wet. Then I’d rub his arms and shoulders to help him go to sleep. He couldn’t sleep on his back because of his head wound, and he had a scar on his stomach that went from his chest to below his navel. Finding a comfortable position for him was challenging. I changed the dressings several times a day. I did everything I could to get him well and recuperated.
After weeks of recuperation, Bruce finally went back to school. He was getting back to normal except for the continuing nightmares. Every night he would wake up screaming and shaking reliving his accident over and over in his dreams.
Kids need to feel secure, but for Bruce, the accident had taken away that security. It created a deep emotional trauma for him. He learned early on that life is fragile and that what seems solid can be split in two. That’s a lot for someone so young. Even though his little body was healing, his dreams were terrifying. He would wake up every night shaking with terror, reliving the horror over and over again.
I didn’t know what to do. I would rock him and hold him and stay with him through the darkness of the night. I would take him to my bed to soothe him back to sleep. But the weight of all of it was getting to me. I was strong, but I felt overwhelmed with so much responsibility. I realized he needed help I was not able to provide.
His father mentioned to me that the community mental health center might be the place to find help—they charge you according to your ability to pay. I called the clinic, and they encouraged me to bring Bruce over the next day.
At our first meeting the therapist, Mrs. Kilgore, said she felt she could help him but in order to work with him she would also need to work with me. It would require that I also come in once a week. “Of course,” I told her, “I’d do anything for Bruce.” It never entered my mind to go to therapy for me. I’m sure I didn’t feel I was worth it.
Little did I realize the life-changing effects these visits were going to have on both of us. Bruce’s weekly visits with the therapist would help Bruce come to terms with the accident and the night traumas and allow him to start believing again that his life was safe. She was truly our angel—she worked so lovingly and intelligently with him.
She charged me only a dollar a visit. This was good, as I was swamped in debt. Bruce’s doctor bills amounted to twenty thousand dollars. I had no insurance, the woman who ran over him had no insurance, and his father had no insurance. So the bills came to me, and along with the bills came bill collectors. The phone was constantly ringing with collectors harassing me for money that I didn’t have.
I had to get some work.
Back then money was always my issue: I never had enough. I was always late on the rent. I never received child support, and most months I just wasn’t making enough money to get by, so my checks bounced regularly. It was a dangerous survival mechanism that was going to get me into trouble. I’d go to the grocery store and pay by check, crossing my fingers that a modeling check I was expecting would come in time. Most times it worked out, but when it didn’t, I made up lame excuses (lies) and hoped I would be believed. It was a terrible cycle that further eroded my self-esteem.
To keep the police away, I had to regularly go to the Sausalito bank and make nice with the manager, a married guy with a big crush on me. I didn’t mean to manipulate him, but I was a survivor, and survivors do what they need to do. I smiled and talked to him and asked him about himself. I never let it get to the point I could tell was coming; dinner, drinks, anything? I always left before he could get up the nerve. I needed him to be understanding about my checking account and that I always got the money into it somehow but was often a little late.
My agent called one day, again showing no particular enthusiasm for me. I was used to it. Her tone was dry, matter-of-fact, bored: “I have a modeling trip for you. You’ll fly to Baja Mexico to shoot a brochure for Mexican Airlines. It’s three days. It doesn’t require any talent. They chose you from your picture; all you need to bring are your bikinis. It pays fifteen hundred dollars.” She gave me the time and place to show up, then hung up.
Wow! Fifteen hundred was a lot of money. Three days later I boarded a rickety-looking twin-engine Cessna with a crew of three (plus the pilot), the photographer, and his two male assistants. The plane was jammed with equipment.
As we flew over Baja, I looked down at a vast wasteland of dry, hot desert. I noticed a car being pushed by two men. Obviously, they had car trouble, but I could see what they couldn’t, that ahead of them was…nothing. As far as my eyes could see, there was nothing. I hoped they had water and food with them, otherwise I didn’t see how they would make it. How terrible to be stranded in that wasteland, I thought to myself.
We arrived at Puerto Vallarta, which was beautiful. I had never really traveled, so I was thrilled. A rickety taxi drove us to wherever it was that we were staying. It was then that I realized my agent probably hadn’t vetted anything about this trip. Here I was in Mexico with four men I didn’t know, flying in a run-down plane, and now riding in a run-down taxi. I had very little money with me, and a checking account that was barren. I had a credit card, but it was maxed out; when I tried to use it, red lights and beeps came on at the register alerting to all that I was a poor risk. I thought of Bruce. I was desperate for money, and because of that, I had allowed myself to be put in a potentially dangerous position, with no power.
One advantage of being a child of an alcoholic is that you learn to be adaptive; another is that we possess a “radar” that allows us to constantly assess a situation to see if it’s dangerous.
I had no choice but to take this job. My enormous medical debt, coupled with the bill collectors who were constantly hounding me, had me seriously stressed all the time. Bruce needed his medicine, and now the hospital had turned me over to credit agencies. It was terrible and stressful with strangers constantly calling my number, and then they started showing up at my house, humiliating me for being a deadbeat. I was too proud to take welfare, and I didn’t qualify for unemployment. My family had no money, and we grew up being told that after eighteen we were on our own, so I never even bothered asking.
We pulled up to a gorgeous Mexican villa on the sea, and I thought, Well, maybe this is going to be okay after all. I was shown to a beautiful room that had two twin beds with mosquito netting around them. The doors were wide open to the sea; it was just stunning. I started unpacking my things.
Then the photographer walked in. “We’re bunking together,” he said cheerily.
“Aren’t there other rooms for you to stay in?” I asked, alarmed.
“No, there are only three bedrooms. So this one is for you and me. Don’t worry, I’m not going to bother you.”
It didn’t feel right, but I didn’t know what to say. I was very bothered to be sharing a room with this photographer, a huge hulk of a guy.
“Okay,” I said half-heartedly. I talked myself into feeling safe. He’s not going to do anything. I’m sure this is a reputable advertising agency who has hired him.
I wished I could go home.
That night dinner was served in a picturesque dining room by live-in local servants. The food was great and authentic Mexican. One of the servants kept looking at me creepily. One advantage of being a child of an alcoholic is that you learn to be adaptive; another is that we possess a “radar” that allows us to constantly assess a situation to see if it’s dangerous. As a girl, I could determine the level of my dad’s intoxication just by looking at the back of his head. Now, my radar was on high alert about this guy. Something about him bothered me.
I delicately questioned everyone about where they were from, trying to garner as much information as I could. There were no cell phones at the time, but my agency in San Francisco must have known who the ad agency was. Right?
I had my first margarita. Geez, these drinks go straight to your head. All the men were drinking heavily. Everyone was laughing except me. I was in a strange house with four drunken men, plus a creepy servant. I was overcome by alarm.
“I’m going to turn in,” I announced. “I know we start shooting early, and I need my beauty sleep, so good night everybody.” No one seemed to notice my departure.
It was boiling hot and sticky in my—our (gulp)—room. I liked to sleep nude, but no way was I going to do that here. I’ll be fine, I reassured myself. That margarita made me so sleepy, I soon drifted off, wrapped in a cocoon of mosquito netting.
I awoke at dawn to the sound of clicking. The photographer guy was taking pictures of me sleeping. The blanket was pulled down, and my breasts were exposed.
“Wow, you have beautiful tits,” he said.
“Just sit up for a bit. I see nude women all the time. Sometimes I photograph for Playboy magazine. I shoot nudes for them. With your body, I bet I could get you a centerfold. They pay fifteen thousand dollars, plus all the side benefits. Some girls walk away with tens of thousands of dollars.”
I grabbed the sheet to cover what had been my exposed breasts. Had my nightgown and the covers slipped off naturally? Or had he uncovered me? How creepy. I was a jumble of nervous feelings. Fifteen thousand dollars—that would get me out of debt and free me from my noose of always being broke. But nude—oh my god.
“Just look away and let the blanket drop to your waist. Make it look like you don’t know the camera is shooting,” the photographer encouraged me.
I slowly dropped the blanket as the click, click of the camera took picture after picture.
“These are great. You should see the light—it’s blue and beautiful. These are fantastic. Your tits look great from the side. They are so firm and young—beautiful. I bet they’re going to love these at Playboy. We’ll take more later, at the end of the day. Maybe find a waterfall, and you can sit nude in the water.”
Without consenting, I had consented. My insides were torn up. The small-town good girl in me was pulling against the reality of the money that could set me free. What would Alan think? He wouldn’t like it.
We shot all day for the airline brochure: predictably, the pictures featured the blond girl in the bikini. She was sipping an exotic drink with a little umbrella, smiling and happy, sitting in a chair in the water, running on the beach, lying next to a local male model. These pictures would make anyone stuck in a Connecticut blizzard want to pack up and take a vacation.
At the end of the day, the ad guys left, and the photographer and I continued to do what was hoped to be the Playboy test photos. He did find a waterfall. At first I couldn’t bring myself to be completely nude, so I wore a flowy top over my naked body and let the water fall, cling, and reveal. The look on my face was nervous and shy, not the come-hither come-get-me photos we are so used to today.
After a while, he convinced me to remove the top and then the bottom and let the water flow over my naked body. To do this, I had to go somewhere else in my mind, and I felt myself leave my body. It was another survival mechanism: escape to that place in the brain that allows terrible situations to occur without it seeming out of the ordinary. These pictures would be my ticket out of my terrible debt. I just sucked it up; I didn’t know what else to do.
At dinner that evening, I felt more than a little depressed. I didn’t feel like drinking with these strange men, so I quietly left the table and walked down to the pool area. I was lying on a chaise longue looking at the starry night, wanting to go home, missing Bruce, worried about him. He wasn’t healed yet, and leaving him for this trip had been traumatic for both of us. I had explained to him that if I hadn’t needed this money so badly, I would never leave him. I explained that his favorite babysitter was going to stay with him day and night. If there were any problems, she would call my mother, his grandmother. Also, his father promised to visit him as often as he could. I knew he would keep his word.
I also missed Alan, as I lay under the stars in the warm balmy air, thinking of what it would be like if he were lying here with me.
Suddenly, my thoughts were shattered by the creepy guy from the villa, who came from…where? Had he been watching me? Had he followed me down here and been hiding somewhere?
He sat down next to me—too close—and asked if I wanted a drink.
“No, thanks,” I said nervously. I wanted him to leave.
“You want some weed?”
“No thanks,” I said, uncomfortable.
He then moved farther in on my chaise longue and sat down right next to me. He reached for me and tried to push me down. I could smell alcohol on his breath. He started kissing my neck and reaching for my breasts. “You are very beautiful and very sexy. I like to look at you.”
I furiously tried to push him off me, but he was strong and insistent. He had come for what he wanted. Luckily for me, he had had so much alcohol that his balance was off, and I was able to throw him to the side.
I ran upstairs screaming, but no one was around when I got to the dining room. They had all gone to a nightclub in town. So now I was alone in this villa with a guy who was clearly intent on raping me. I went to a dark corner of the vast living room and hid behind a large stone sculpture. Trembling, I heard him walk intently toward my room. Where can I go? Where can I go? I hid in the shadows for what seemed an eternity, listening to him go from room to room calling, “Susan, come here, Susan.”
I prayed he wouldn’t find me. I prayed I wasn’t going to end up getting raped or, worse, killed by this crazy man. If I went down on the beach and he found me, I feared I’d never be seen again, and my family would never know what had happened to me. He could kill me and throw me into the water.
Finally, I heard sounds signaling that the group had come back. Not that they were going to be much help. What did they care about me? I heard them call for creepy guy to open the bar and serve them yet more drinks and bring food to them.
What had I gotten myself into? I was terrified that I would get raped by any of them. No one here cared about me or would protect me. I felt anger welling up that my agency had sent me on this trip with no regard for my safety. They, at least, owed me that.
I slept fully dressed that night, with one eye open, and by the time dawn came, I was packed and ready to leave. I just wanted to go home.
I was still unnerved as we piled into the rickety plane, and I noticed that the pilot was high. He smelled like liquor. I told the rest of the group, but they said, “Oh, he’s fine.” It was laughed off. I was terrified. As we flew up the Baja coast, I looked down at the spot where I had seen the two men pushing the car on the way in. I didn’t see their car anywhere. Someone must have rescued them.
I looked over at our pilot. He was asleep! I shook him violently and yelled, “Are you crazy? You can’t sleep! None of us knows how to fly a plane.” For the rest of the flight, I watched him like a hawk and shook him if his eyes started rolling back into his head. Imagine!
The idiots I was traveling with were sleeping off their hangovers, oblivious that the pilot was drunk and the plane was old and probably not well maintained, and that at any moment we all could die. When the plane landed, I wanted to cheer. I certainly never wanted to see any of these people again. The photographer waved goodbye and said, “I’m sure we’ll see each other at the shoot.” I smiled a half smile, not sure how I felt about any of it.
As I drove across the Golden Gate Bridge toward Sausalito and home, I could feel the stress leaving my tense body. I walked through my front door, and there was Bruce, his happy little face and smile, with his arms outstretched for a big hug. For the moment, everything was okay again.