Telling Read online

  Telling

  Also by Marilyn Reynolds

  True-to-Life Series from Hamilton High

  Telling

  Detour For Emmy

  Too Soon for Jeff

  Beyond Dreams

  But What About Me?

  Baby Help

  If You Loved Me

  Love Rules

  No More Sad Goodbyes

  Shut Up

  Eddie's Choice

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  By Marilyn Reynolds

  Chapter | 1

  Chapter | 2

  Chapter | 3

  Chapter | 4

  Chapter | 5

  Chapter | 6

  Chapter | 7

  Chapter | 8

  Chapter | 9

  Chapter | 10

  Chapter | 11

  Chapter | 12

  Chapter | 13

  Chapter | 14

  Chapter | 15

  Chapter | 16

  Chapter | 17

  EPILOGUE

  Praise for the Hamilton High Series

  Sign up for Marilyn Reynolds's Mailing List

  About the Author

  About the Publisher

  By Marilyn Reynolds

  New Wind Publishing

  Copyright 1996, 2012, 2014 Marilyn Reynolds

  All Rights Reserved

  No part of this publication may be adapted, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without permission from the publisher. Like Marilyn Reynolds’ other novels, Telling is part of the True-to-Life Series from Hamilton High, a fictional, urban, ethnically mixed high school somewhere in Southern California. Characters in the stories are imaginary and do not represent actual people or places.

  Originally published by Peace Ventures Press in 1989 and Morning Glory Press in 1996.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Reynolds, Marilyn, 1935-

  Telling / by Marilyn Reynolds.

  Summary: After being sexually abused by the father of the chil­dren she is babysitting, twelve-year-old Cassie faces a difficult jour­ney before she finds the strength and insight to deal with the problem.

  ISBN 978-1-929777-08-2

  Child sexual abuse—Fiction. I. Title. II. Series: Reynolds, Marilyn, 1935- True-to-life series from Hamilton High.

  PZ7.R3373Te 1996 95-39149

  [Fic]—dc20

  New Wind Publishing

  Sacramento, California, 95819

  www.newwindpublishing.com

  To Century High School students, past and present. They also teach.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  To Gloria D. Miklowitz for encouraging me to write this story somewhere back around 1987, and to Peace Ventures Press for believing in it from the beginning, I am particularly grateful.

  For the opportunity to keep Cassie’s story alive as part of the True-to-Life Series, I thank Jeanne Lindsay of Morning Glory Press.

  I thank the readers who write or email to tell me how important this story has been in their lives. Their letters touch me beyond words.

  A special thanks goes to Terry Ahrens and Cathryne Ahrens, whose work has been instrumental in keeping Telling in print.

  Thanks also to Subei Reynolds Kyle for her insights and close reading of this manuscript.

  Marilyn Reynolds

  Chapter

  1

  My little brother, Robbie, made a flying leap onto my bed. I knew my Saturday morning sleep was over, even though I kept my eyes closed very tightly, hoping Robbie would disappear.

  “Get up, Cassie,” he begged, trying to open my eyes with his jelly-sticky fingers.

  “MOM!” I yelled. “Can’t you make Robbie stay out of my room?”

  “It’s time for you to get up anyway,” Mom yelled back from the kitchen. “I need you to help clean up around here.”

  I groaned and turned over on my stomach. Robbie straddled my back and bounced. “Giddy-up, Horsie,” he giggled.

  “Get out, Brat”

  “MOM! CASSIE CALLED ME BRAT AGAIN!”

  Mom stomped down the hall and filled my doorway with her worst frown. “I told you not to call him that, Cassie. It’s not good for his self-image. Now get up and make yourself useful around here.”

  Well, that’s the way it always goes. Robbie acts stupid and I get in trouble. Just because I’m twelve and he’s only

  five, he can get away with everything and I’m supposed to be perfect.

  As soon as Mom went back down the hallway, Robbie started chanting, “I know something you don’t know,” over and over again.

  “Do not,” I said.

  “Do too,” Robbie answered.

  “Not.”

  “Too.”

  “Not.”

  “Too.”

  I rolled over and looked at him. He had the grin he gets when he really does know something.

  “So what is it?”

  Last year, in English, we talked about the inner conflicts of characters in literature. I’d never thought that much about inner conflict before, but now I could see evidence of it on Robbie’s face. He wanted to keep a secret because it made him feel big, but he’s the kind of kid who also wants to tell everything he knows. I grabbed a foot and started tickling. He squirmed and squealed and agreed to tell.

  “You know the house where the mean lady used to live, where the weeds are all grown up?”

  I nodded.

  “Now Tina and Dorian live there,” he said. His blue eyes sparkled with the news.

  “So who are Tina and Dorian?”

  “Tina’s three and Dorian’s five. When school starts he can ride with us.”

  “Are there any kids my age?”

  “Nope. But there’s a dog, Smiley, and two goldfish, Swimmy and Floaty.”

  “When did you meet them?”

  “Just this morning. When they were emptying the moving van. Dorian gave me a donut but it was Tina’s so she cried but his mom gave Tina her donut so it was okay and they liked me. The dad has a great big motorcycle, too, and a helmet.”

  Even if he always gets me in trouble, I still like Robbie. In fact, he cracks me up. This family lives in our neighborhood for about half an hour and he already knows all about them. At least that’s what I thought then. Now I realize there was a lot about the Sloane family that we had yet to learn.

  It was afternoon by the time we finished emptying all the trash, vacuuming the whole house, and folding the laundry.

  “Thanks for the help,” Mom told me, as if I’d had some choice in the matter.

  My dad came in all dirty and sweaty from raking the leaves out back.

  “Let’s call it quits for the day, Helen,” he said to Mom. “The new Michael Caine movie is at the Cineplex. We could take in a matinee.”

  Mom looked around the kitchen. “I don’t know, Les.”

  “Let’s live a little,” Dad smiled. “I’ll take you out for ice cream after the show.”

  So that’s what they did, and I got stuck with Robbie. But it was okay. My friend Mandy and I usually go together on Saturday afternoons, and then spend the night together, too. But this weekend Mandy was visiting her father out in the desert, so I didn’t have anything else to do anyway.

  After my folks left, Robbie went over to the new neigh­bors to play with Dorian. He’d been gone an hour when I decided to check on him.

  I walked through knee-high weeds to the front door and called, “Robbie. Robbie.”

  A woman who looked more like a teenager opened the door. She was wearing jeans and a very large sweatshirt with rolled-up sleeves.

  “You must be Cassie Jenkins,” she said, smi
ling and showing perfectly white movie star teeth. “I’m Angie Sloane. Robbie’s told us a lot about you. Come in.”

  I stepped over a box of toys blocking the doorway and saw Robbie and his new friend sitting on the floor with about a hundred little cars strung out all around them. Each boy gripped an oozing peanut butter and jelly sandwich. The room was cluttered with unpacked boxes.

  “What a mess, huh? But our refrigerator’s hooked up. Can I get you a cold soda?”

  “No, thank you, Mrs. Sloane,” I said.

  “Oh, just call me Angie. I have a feeling we’ll be seeing a lot of each other, so let’s not be too formal. Do you ever babysit?”

  “Sometimes,” I said. Really, I didn’t babysit for anyone but Robbie, but I wanted to because I wanted to start making my own money.

  I couldn’t stop looking at Angie. She didn’t look like a mother at all. She was thin but healthy looking, and she had reddish hair that bounced lightly at her shoulder, the way the TV shampoo ads always made me hope mine would.

  A man came walking into the living room carrying a small table and lamp.

  “Where do you want this, Babe?” he said to Angie, then turned to me.

  “I’ll bet you’re Cassie,” he said, smiling. “We’re all enjoying your brother’s company.”

  I could tell big mouth Robbie had told everything he knew about me, and had probably even made stuff up. He loved to make up stories and pretend they were true.

  “This is Fred. He’s the man of the house,” Angie said, laughing.

  Fred was about a head taller than Angie. He had curly, sandy-colored hair. His T-shirt was damp with sweat, and his arms were tanned and muscular.

  It all seemed natural, that I would stay and help entertain kids while Angie and Fred worked at putting things away, and that later when Fred ordered pizza there would be plenty for me and Robbie, and we would stay and eat with them, as if we’d always known them.

  After dinner, while Fred worked putting up shelves in the garage, Angie and I lined the kitchen cupboards with paper and put away dishes and glasses, pots and pans. As we worked she told me of their plans for the house, which they could only afford because it needed so much work.

  “I know we’ll miss my parents in Minnesota,” she told me. “But we wanted to raise Dorian and Tina in a place that’s warm and free. And Fred wanted to start fresh somewhere, too. And look at you and Robbie,” she smiled. “I feel as if we’ve already found family here in California.”

  I took Robbie home from the Sloanes’ about nine that evening, with promises to return the next day. He was so tired from playing all day with Dorian and Tina that he went straight to bed with no argument. That was rare for Robbie.

  “Tell us about our new neighbors,” Daddy said.

  I told them how nice the Sloanes were, and how young, and how messed up their house was. But it was a mistake to tell them how I’d helped Angie in the kitchen because Mom decided it was time for us to put in new shelf paper.

  “Now that you have some experience lining shelves, you won’t mind helping me do the same thing next Saturday.”

  I hoped she’d forget by next Saturday. I don’t know why, but working at the Sloanes’ had been fun. Working at home was boring.

  Sunday I went back to the Sloanes after breakfast. I hadn’t planned to stay long, but they were painting Tina’s room and Fred handed me a brush.

  “You’re lower to the floor than we are,” he said. “How about painting the baseboard?”

  After I did that, I painted some shelves white and I also painted Tina’s little baby rocking chair. It was finished by afternoon, and it looked great. While Fred and I admired our work, Angie brought in a beer for each of them and a soda for me, and a big basket of chips.

  “Do you play cards, Cassie?” Fred asked.

  “Some,” I said.

  “Gin Rummy? Hearts?”

  I shook my head. I was embarrassed to say that I mostly just played Fish and Old Maid with Robbie.

  “We’ll teach you,” he said.

  Angie smiled. “I have a feeling that card playing is going to be our major entertainment for a while. I don’t think we’re going to be spending a lot of money on fancy dinners and nightclubs.”

  So that’s how it went that summer. Almost every day I went over to the Sloanes’ and helped Angie with some project ― scraping old paint off windowsills or pulling tattered wallpaper off the dining room walls. Sometimes my friend Mandy would come over with me, but during August she stayed a lot of the time with her dad so it was mostly just me. About twice a week Angie would call Fred at work at lunchtime and tell him, “Cassie and I are tired of this working around the house business. We’re taking the kids to the beach.”

  We’d pack a bunch of sandwiches and soft drinks and towels, and I’d call my mom at work so she wouldn’t be worried, and off we’d go. The funny thing was that I felt like a grown-up with Angie and she said she felt like a kid with me.

  Almost every Tuesday night Angie and Fred and I would play Hearts. I got to be pretty good. On Saturday nights I usually babysat for Tina and Dorian while Angie and Fred went out to a movie or something. I saved my babysitting money for school clothes because I wanted to look right when I started Palm Avenue Junior High School. But I didn’t tell my mom I was saving money. I wanted to get all I could from her first, and then get extra stuff with my own money.

  Sometimes my mom would get mad at me and say, “You practically live with Fred and Angie. I think you like them better than your own family.”

  When she said that, I knew she wanted me to say back to her that I liked my family best of all. But I couldn’t. For a while I did like the Sloanes best. I felt important and older with them, and appreciated. They laughed at my jokes and they asked what I thought about stuff. They treated me almost like an equal, and at home I still felt like a little kid.

  In September, when school started, the Tuesday night card games stopped because my parents wouldn’t let me go out on weeknights. And of course the trips to the beach stopped, too. I had a lot of homework, and Mandy and I were both on the soccer team, and we had to practice a lot after school. But I still saw the Sloanes on weekends, and we were still almost like best friends ― until that night in January, when everything changed.

  Chapter

  2

  It was just after New Year’s. I was at the Sloanes’ house, standing in the living room, waiting for them to leave for the movie. Angie was in the bedroom getting dressed. Tina and Dorian were watching TV in the den. Fred walked into the living room. I thought he was going to make a joke or something. He had this strange look on his face. He walked right up to where I was standing, and then he grabbed me with both hands, pulling me hard against his body.

  I tried to back away from him, with my fists pushing at his stomach, but he was so strong, holding me so close, that I couldn’t even move. He forced my head back with his chin. His mouth was so tight against mine and his tongue was strong, pushing into my mouth. Then, as quickly as he had grabbed me, he let go and turned away from me. In the next instant, Angie came into the room.

  “We’d better go, Fred, if we’re going to catch the beginning of the movie.”

  “Sure, Babe. Just waitin’ on you,” he said with a grin, glancing over at me. “Huh, Cassie? Just waitin’ around. Waitin’ around.”

  Angie laughed. “It’s about time you waited for me for a change ― I wait on you all the time.” Then she told me, “The kids are bathed and fed. All you need to do is get them to bed. Try for around 8:30.” She looked at me then, really for the first time since she’d walked into the room. “Are you okay, Cassie? You look a bit flushed.”

  “I’m fine,” I mumbled.

  “We should be back by 10:00 ― right Fred?”

  “Yep, unless we decide to park on a dark street for a while before I bring you home,” Fred said, winking at me as he opened the front door for Angie. I watched them out the window as they walked to their car. Fred had his arm aro
und Angie and they were laughing. They were both wearing jeans, kind of tight, and they really did look like something you might see on a commercial. They seemed a lot younger and more “with it” than my parents. But watching them out that window, was I ever mixed up! I mean, they looked happy, and like they were still even in love, and Fred, the same guy who was now opening the door for Angie, had just a few minutes ago been doing this movie style kissing on my mouth. Everything seemed strange to me, like I was in a daze or something. I think I went kind of numb.

  I watched the Sloanes’ green Toyota van as it turned the corner. Then I went into the bathroom to wash my face. Tina, the three-year-old, was right behind me, pulling at my pant leg. I soaped up my face and scrubbed hard with warm water, all the time with Tina pulling at me and yelling, “Cassie, Cassie! Play the game with us, Cassie! Play the game.” Then Dorian came in and started pulling at me, too.

  “Yeah, Cassie! The game! The game!”

  I didn’t feel like playing with them at all, but I didn’t feel like listening to them beg, either. I picked Tina up and carried her to the den, with Dorian running along beside me. I dumped Tina on the big couch and began the expected, traditional, belly button search. I was just going through the motions to quiet Tina and Dorian. Pretty soon though, I lost some of my numbness and began to give it some enthusiasm. I sat on the couch next to Tina and put her on my lap.

  “Poor Tina. Poor, poor Tina,” I said, pretending to cry. Then I told Dorian in a loud whisper, “Dorian! Help! Some­thing terrible has happened! Tina’s lost her belly button!”

  “No!” Dorian screeched. “Look at her tummy, Cassie!”

  Tina giggled and squirmed while I checked each of her toes. Dorian pulled up Tina’s pajama top. “Look, Cassie! It’s right here!”

  “Well, I’ll be . . . It’s a belly button all right. But can’t you see? That’s another belly button. That’s not Tina’s. Oh, this is awful!”

  We carried on like this for what seemed like forever. Then finally, predictably, I let myself be convinced that all belly buttons were in their rightful places, and the three of us settled into the big, pillowy couch to watch TV.