The first few weeks with Mother were absolute misery. She had moved me, Christian, Abbeygail, and the youngest, Brinly, into a two-bedroom Vilano Beach condo. The rest of my siblings were living with other families and it was hard to keep track of who was where.
It was a long haul from the condo to Nease High School, or so Mother made me believe, so when I first moved back, I missed days of school. Every morning, we’d battle about me going to school. She refused to take me. Clutching my backpack with one strap over my shoulder, I begged her to drive me to school.
“If school is so important to you, find your own way,” she insisted. “I need to get to work. You’re too stupid for school anyhow. You’ll never amount to anything. Give up already.” Her eyes were cold as she walked past me and out the front door.
One evening, Master Chief called her on my behalf. I was so thankful. She agreed that if I could find my own rides to and from school, I could keep going. My education, or my well-being, for that matter, was never a priority for Mother. She put me in charge of all the household duties and caring for my youngest sibling as soon as Mrs. Violet dropped us off. Whatever Master Chief said to her that changed her mind about taking me out of school again must have been a miracle.
Praise the Lord! Truly!
Was it a constant battle to get her permission to compete in cross-country meets and ROTC drill meets? Yes, it was a nightmare, but somehow between the phone calls from Master Chief and First Sergeant, I was able to keep going to school. And thankfully my friends were still willing to drive the long haul to take me in the morning and then bring me back home.
Right away, I noticed that Mother had changed since I had last been with her. She was weepy. Chaotic. Unhinged on a whim. I’d never seen her this way. Cruel was her norm, but this time, she was full of despair because Herman broke up with her again. This time, he took both their children to his parents’ house and refused to let her have any visitation. She was almost broken. She lost the man she traded her family for, and I’m sure her heart was hurting. At least, that’s how I saw it. I found myself feeling very sorry for her.
She was alone.
This invited a new kind of chaos, and it was a nightly event. She would summon Christian and me out of our bunk beds and ask us to sleep in her bed with her. In a state of delusion, she told us how our father was in the bushes, coming to kill us in the night. Every creak, every faint noise, every movement, was an attack to kill us. She would only let us speak in her bathroom, because she said the house was bugged and that any information gleaned would be relayed back to our father. On some of her worst nights, she gave my little brother her revolver and me her Ka-Bar knife. She made us keep watch for intruders throughout the night while she slept. As a result, we’d both go to school dog-tired. If she heard too many noises after 9 p.m., she’d run all of us outside to her old BMW so we could get away from whomever she feared had been sent to kill us. She drove us all over St. Augustine, only parking for a few moments at a time until the sun came up. She was convinced at any moment we’d all be murdered.
The sleep deprivation started to wreak havoc on my body. I’d be sitting in class, mid-lecture, passed out on my desk. Learning at school had become such a joy for me, but now, chains bound me once again. I was unable to learn at school. Running at practice or doing drills after school became torture. I was exhausted.
Never once did I believe my father was out to hurt us. But after a few months of this routine, I did become fearful that someone was going to break in. I had nightmares that never allowed for a restful night. Mother had unraveled to the point that her abuses were a mix of physical beatings and this new psychological torment I’d never experienced before.
My second semester of my freshman year was dramatically different from the first. All of my teachers saw it, and they asked me pressing questions, just like Mr. Langston had done in middle school. Since my punishment for talking then was being yanked out of school for two years, I wasn’t going to make that mistake twice. As the questions poured in, I became reclusive. First Sergeant noticed my new demeanor right away and called me Miss Stone-Cold. No laughing, no weeping, no emotion. I just did what I had to do to make it through each day of school. It was like standing at attention for hours. Except I wasn’t called to attention. I was just browbeaten from the chaos that had been allowed back into my life.
My friend Matt drove me home many nights after school. If it hadn’t been for him, I would’ve never completed my sophomore year. One evening, I got home really late, about eight o’clock, and noticed that Abbeygail and Christian had gone somewhere—I assumed to Grandmother’s house for dinner. It wasn’t unusual for them to go without me—I wasn’t allowed over there after they found out about Talmon. I walked into the bedroom and saw Brinly lying on our bunk bed, drawing in a few books. Grandmother was no fan of toddlers, so only the older kids were welcome at her house now. I saw Mother’s BMW out front, so I assumed she would be home, but there was no sign of her. The house was abnormally quiet.
I tended to Brinly for a few moments before I made my way upstairs to Mother’s loft. Her room was a mess, but that was nothing out of the ordinary. Her purse was on the floor, confirming she was home. As I looked into the bathroom doorway, I saw Mother. She was in her pink lace nightgown, slumped on the floor against the cabinet sink. Her eyes were bloodshot red, and streaks of mascara ran down her face. She had a clove cigarette in one hand that was so long, it was a stick of ash. The bottle of liquid Vicodin in her other hand was almost empty, and there was a glass of red wine at her side. Some of the red wine from the bottle had spilled onto the tile. Ashes from her smoked cloves had formed piles on the floor.
“Mother, what’s wrong? What are you doing?” I was at her side, attempting to comfort her.
“My. F—king. Life. Is. Over. I want to kill myself. I f—king hate you. This is all your fault. Herman took our babies and left me.” She slurred every word with bitterness. Then she wept. She was desperate for another swig of the Vicodin, but I blocked her hand from her mouth. While she was pushing against me, she knocked over her glass of wine. The white lace trim that edged her silk nightgown turned red. She took her fiery clove and put it out on my skin, the singe digging deep into my arm.
“Mother, you just burned me!” I started crying. It was extremely painful. She looked up and laughed. It was the evilest thing I’d ever heard. But even as she was sitting there in all her ugliness, in all her mess, I loved her. And she still looked so beautiful to me.
“That’s what you get for being a whore,” she giggled. I put my arm under the faucet and turned on the cold water, trying to ease the burn.
“Mother, it’s going to be okay. He will come back. He always does. You can’t kill yourself. What would the babies do?” I pleaded with her. I grabbed a washcloth to wipe her face. I sat down on the floor in front of her and wiped her tear-stained cheeks.
How do I convince her not to kill herself?
She screamed out of nowhere that her .45 was ready, and she was going to shoot herself in the mouth tonight when we were all sleeping. I became dreadfully afraid. I grabbed the Vicodin out of her hand and grabbed the wine bottle from the floor.
“What do you think you’re doing, you little bitch?” she snarled as I rushed out of her bathroom. I ran downstairs to the kitchen sink. As I poured the medicine and wine down the drain, I exhaled with relief.
Thank you, Lord! Mother is still alive.
When I came back upstairs, I found Mother nearly lifeless, completely laid out on the bathroom floor. I knew she was barely conscious to begin with because her words were slurred, but I didn’t think she was that bad off. I shook her and tried to wake her up. Nothing. Not even a cuss or a threat.
She just lay there, lifeless.
Terrified, I called 911 and grabbed the .45 from under her mattress, hiding it before the ambulance came. I cleaned up all the mess before they came to ensure that she didn’t get taken away. When they arrived, I told them she accidently took medicine that made her this way. I didn’t dare tell them she tried to kill herself.
After the overdose, Mother promised she’d pick me up on days she didn’t work late. This was either to keep me quiet or because she felt some guilt for the way she treated me. Rides were hard to come by, so this was especially exciting for me. As I sat on the sidewalk after drill practice, like many days before, I was the last student on campus. Nearly all of the teachers had left for the day, and the school grounds and parking lots felt like a ghost town.
Waiting for Mother after school always filled me with shame. For hours, I watched parents load up their kids with love, eager to get home. Pickup after pickup. Knowing that Mother hated me hurt my heart.
Why can’t she love me like all the other parents love their kids?
Most nights she said she would come get me, she forgot. This left my teachers to find a remedy, like giving me a ride or paying for a taxi to take me home. The only other student who stayed until dusk was Tim Tebow, the most popular boy in school. Waiting for Mother, I’d sit on the sidewalk and watch him practice football with his dad and the football coaches on the field across the parking lot. They gave him extra one-on-one coaching. Every girl in school talked about him, and every boy was his friend.
Every time I see this boy, his father is with him.
I knew this boy’s father loved him very much, as if he were a treasure to be protected. He was always standing close to coaches as they directed him. Watching from the distance, I dreamed I was like him.
That I was special—like him—and that Mother loved me.
As I drifted off into daydreaming, I was abruptly interrupted.
“Young lady, what are you doing out here? Everyone has gone home.”
Startled, I looked up. Tim’s father had walked all the way across the football field through the parking lot and up the sidewalk to ask me this very firm question. I was intimidated, to say the least. I sputtered out, “Yes, sir. Mother sometimes forgets me, but I know she’ll be here soon. I just wait here until she comes.” His face went from a stern, concerned expression to one of complete sorrow.
He looked me in the eyes and asked, “Can I pray for you?” I nodded my head in acceptance and hastily lowered my head. As he prayed, my heart saw a glimpse of hope. It was something I had lost, but now found once more. There are some things we all need to be reminded of, and hope is one of them. It can be misplaced for days or months or even years. Hope is a daily necessity for a thriving life.
Mr. Tebow’s son was there after school because he was special; I was there after school because I was an afterthought. I felt so much shame every time Mr. Tebow prayed for me, and I wished I could be like Tim. Maybe Mr. Tebow saw something in me that no one else did—not even myself—and that’s why he took the time to pray for me.
Mr. Tebow may have forgotten about that broken little girl sitting on the sidewalk late in the evening, but I will never forget his willingness to offer prayers for me. It still blesses my heart to this day. It reminds me to heed the call to pray for others.
In the middle of my sophomore year, Mother and Herman got back together again. He wanted to take Mother on a trip to celebrate, a luxurious adventure to Turkey. She began doling the kids out immediately. I was sixteen by this time, still living and breathing ROTC, dreaming of the days when I would serve in the greatest fighting force known to mankind. Master Chief told me that if I told Mother I disliked taking orders from him, she would let me stay with him while she was away.
Genius.
So I learned the art of reverse psychology. As instructed, I started making comments about how Master Chief was hard on me, always giving me more work than other cadets. When Master Chief made a call to her a few days later, he had miraculously convinced Mother to let me stay with him while she was away.
Joy!
This was going to be so awesome. I was staying with Master Chief and Mrs. McFarland for two weeks! Endless double chocolate chip cookies were all I could think about. At school, she always made them for the cadets—and she always gave me a secret stash to take home. She was one of the best ROTC moms. At every drill meet, every practice, every event, this woman made our lives so much better. She tended to each of us like we were her own. I loved her.
Master Chief had pulled it off. Finally, I’ll get to be with two people who cared about me, dare I say loved me, for a few days. Plus, I wouldn’t have to worry about school rides or whether I could compete in the upcoming drill meets, because Master Chief was running the show!
Just glorious relief.
Right before I was going to stay with Master Chief, he went to the hospital for a bump on his head. It turned out to be stage 4 skin cancer.
I was shattered at this discovery. We all were. First Sergeant and his wife, Mrs. Calhoun, agreed without hesitation to take me into their home. First Sergeant was a father figure to me too, and Master Chief was his best friend. They lived just a few houses from each other, so this was a painful time for all of us. A few months later, I’d hold Master Chief’s hand one last time as he lay in his bed, dying. Up until this point, I had never lost anyone to death. I cried for days. Weeks on end. It was a pain I had never experienced before.
Different. Deep. Permanent.
With my vast knowledge of different types of pain, I thought I was equipped to deal with any amount or form. But some pain cannot be prepared for. In an instant, it crushes one’s heart—a heart that can only be made well again through much weeping and time.
When I was staying with First Sergeant and Mrs. Calhoun, Mother made no attempt to contact me. Instead of leaving me at their house for two weeks, as agreed, I was there for two and a half months. Every attempt by First Sergeant to contact Mother failed. But I’d grown comfortable being where I was. After the second week of having my own bed, three meals a day, and two parents who loved me, I broke the cardinal rule: keeping our family secrets secret. I told First Sergeant and Mrs. Calhoun everything. Every last detail.
They told me they would never let anyone hurt me again and that they loved me. They promised to keep me away from Mother. First Sergeant confessed he already knew I was being abused. He said he and Master Chief had been working on a plan to get me out alive.
That Thanksgiving, I was in the kitchen helping Mrs. Calhoun clean up and wrap all the food we had prepared. It was glorious to be in the kitchen doing normal things and listening to holiday music! I loved her very much. She was a great mom to her kids.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Why was someone knocking so ferociously on the front door? I could hear it all the way from the kitchen. First Sergeant quickly answered the door. To his surprise and mine, a Jacksonville police officer greeted him.
Here we go.
I knew this was about me. I grew up with the thin blue line always knocking on our doors. Walking to the front living room, I could hear the officer tell First Sergeant and Mrs. Calhoun that Gale Smith—Mother—had reported her daughter Christina as a runaway and that she had run away to this address. He was here to take her back to her mother.
First Sergeant and his wife had looks of complete disbelief. I wasn’t taken aback in the least.
First Sergeant replied with firmness. “What are you talking about? Her mother left her here over two months ago, saying she was going on a work trip for two weeks, and we haven’t heard so much as one word from her. I think you should sit down, sir, and listen to what is going on here.”
The police officer and First Sergeant sat down and talked for more than two hours. By the end of it, we were all filling out affidavits. Meanwhile, another group of officers showed up. This time, Mother was with them. She came with one of Herman’s friends from the St. Augustine Police Department. She demanded that I come home and insisted that I had run away.
The Jacksonville police officer told me if I was brave enough to write down what I had told the Calhouns about my family in the affidavit, I would never be hurt by Mother again. I could stay with First Sergeant, and he would make Mother leave the premises. Afraid I was going to get killed for what I was about to do, I took the officer’s pen, held First Sergeant’s hand, and wrote down as best I could what Mother had done to me during the past sixteen years.
Thanksgiving that year was a disaster.
But it was also the year I was finally free from Mother and Herman.
“Be strong and courageous.
Do not fear or be in dread of them,
for it is the LORD your God who goes with you.
He will not leave you or forsake you.”
Deuteronomy 31:6 ESV