probably from going over to my father's last weekend. Figures. Or
maybe not...it does seem to be making the rounds here. Cough, cough,
cough.
One of the ladies I work with at Eviljob is dealing with a dying
mother. I haven't talked about Crystal here before, but she is someone
I care a great deal for; she's accomplished a lot with her life,
considering her bad start -- her mother raised her around addicts and
dealers, and she apologises for being 'slow' (she's not that bad), and
explained to me once that when she was born, her mother was on
heroin...and that's why she's 'slow'. Crystal's even been on America's
Most Wanted. Seriously. When she was seven, the piece of filth that is
her father abducted her and took her off to molest for weeks until he
was captured. So really, it was her father on AMW, but Crystal said
that when she came back, she felt like eveyone knew about what had
happened to her because it was on TV. I could go on, but...she's ok
now. And I like her a LOT. And her idiot mother is dying, demented
from the cancer that started in her liver and has spread to her brain.
Her mom abandoned her several years ago to move to the UK, chasing
after...wait for it...a man. Crystal finished high school practically
homeless, started at the bottom at Eviljob, and has tried her best to
carve some tiny piece of Normal out for herself. She touches my heart.
Her mother came home, to die, several weeks ago. 'Home', of course,
meaning Crystal's home. The home that Crystal made for herself; the
home that Crystal has tried to keep clean of mess and insanity. And
her mom brought her boyfriend from the UK...let's call him Robert.
This guy -- according to Crystal -- was ok. Helping out with Hospice,
pitching in with guard duty (a difficult task as the cancer progressed
in her brain and her behaviour became more erratic, complete with
hallucinations, laughter, rage...you name it), and so forth. Last
week, Hospice warned Crystal and Robert that the end, as they say, was
nigh. On Sunday, Robert married Crystal's mother, with no advance
warning to Crystal. Crystal accepted this, figuring it was Robert's
way of demonstrating his love...even if her mom wasn't coherent enough
to understand anymore, even if Robert had strung her mother along for
a few years in the UK, refusing to marry her.
Robert, incidentally, is Crystal's mom's fifth (or so) boyfriend since
moving overseas...so it's not as if she was lacking opportunity to
come back and be a fucking mom to Crystal, or anything.
butsoanyway.
So this week, her mother has been getting worse, with inappropriate
acting-out behaviours that I am sure can be imagined, and does not
need to be described here. I have listened to many of them from
Crystal because I know she needs to unload; it is hard to see someone
you care about disintegrating, losing even the most basic of human
dignities and modesties.
Then yesterday, when she came home from work, Crystal found a used
condom in the wastebasket by her mother's bed.
Yeah. Honeymoon.
Don't feel bad -- Crystal didn't see that coming, either. Same for me.
Robert had stepped out, so Crystal tore through the trash and found
more, put them in Ziploc baggies, and phoned the police and Hospice.
A few hours later, some division of the police department that deals
with shit like this had 'interviewed' her mother (and agreed with
Crystal and the Hospice nurse that she was 'gone' mentally, and
probably has been for long enough that Robert was an abuser, not a
husband/boyfriend) and declared it rape and some kind of abuse (I
forget...like invalid abuse), and intercepted Robert before he could
get back in the house. Stupid fucker.
So now Crystal has to finish helping her mother die, assist with
prosecuting this creep, get the marriage annulled, and get an attorney
or something to find out if this fucktard took out a life insurance
policy on her mom as her husband, or something. And so on. And look
behind her, cos as he was being taken away, Robert (who sees NOTHING
wrong with what he has done, by the way) was threatening her, and
claiming that as her husband, he has more 'rights' to her than
Crystal.
fucking unbelievable.
I listened to Crystal the whole time I was at Eviljob today; I wish I
could do more. But this disturbs me, and it's not often that something
really upsets me...but this did. And it is stories like this that make
me wish I were religious, so that I could tell Crystal that I would
pray for her. And her idiotic, negligent mother, who never did a
single thing when she was in her right mind to deserve someone as
wonderful as Crystal...whom she threw away.
Life is strange...as are the people in it. Just plain strange.
.
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