The Summer Of 1993

Life In The Trailer Park

     I had officially moved in with Steve.  He bought the trailer but lot rent was costly.  We would stay at Madison Trailer Park until it was sold in 2006.  Then we would move  to Colorado Blvd until 2011 when a gorgeous new home, which was my great uncle's who moved or Florida's but he wanted something we could look forward to. However, I was in a very cold, very thin trailer. It was a cold winter at first. I was so depressed but didn't know it. It was near Linda's so I could have Maddie there in no time. While my sisters were graduating and finding jobs, I was working a promising career at Arby's. By then I had gained twenty pounds, I wore sweats all day, and was so depressed I didn't know it. Steve kept promising the ring, but it eluded me.

My mom bought us furniture for the trailer straight from E.D Woodfield Department Store on Valentine's Day. It WAS my Valentine's Day gift.    I did it get the ring but an angry man who did not make dinner reservations who took me to a sports bar.  I cried to myself the next morning before work.  He worked 8-4 shifts.  I hated being HIS GIRLFIEND.  Some women didn't like me.   However, that day, Steve gave me the day off and the girls mom, aunts, Maddie and I went shopping. We found Maddie a lot of cute outfits as she was growing again. She was going ti be three. Steve was a good dad to her, but to me, he was sort of a dick. He got pissed because I never came during sex and he punched the walls one night. I felt that was all I deserved. I loved shopping with the women in my family and eating at the cafeteria with them. That was where I wanted to go after I had our baby's aborted, but we waited until we got back in town and ate then. It was all about Steve, but sadly, I felt that was all I could get, and he wasn't attracted to me. One night when I went to dinner he said, "You are getting fat, Why din't you look like you did when we met?" I cried when I got home. I was sure he was flirting with Rachel, a new girl. He had flings, but mentioned marriage.  "If I adopt her, we could get some money back," he said. 

A few weeks later, we weren't to the movies. Maddie still fit on my lap, so we went to "Donny Brasco". He scheduled us a day off on a Saturday and we went to the mall in the balmy, not quite yet, spring air. The mall was busy. Arby's knew we were dating, but he lied and said we were engaged so we could work together. He had corporate snowed. He wouldn't scream at me at work but at home, he took it out on me,He got angry when guys hit on me. He made me make food for a week and clean the lobby when that happened, then when I got home he would scream at me about "flirting". He would shove me away and I wished Johnny would have fought for me, All I had was Maddie and in the evenings he worked, I took Maddie to my parents. One, for a good meal and two, to walk in a neighborhood that was not cold and cruel. I walked Maddie one day and the people in the old houses, looked out art us but did not greet us. I loved the old lady who hung her white sheets out on the line in a very "Silence Of The Lambs" home. I wanted to go home so badly. I was homesick.  

At the mall, Steve went and bought five or six new outfits. I got Maddie one. I felt insignificant. I saw the pretty girls, getting to fit into everything, but I was getting a belly from the comfort eating I was doing. We went to a chain restaurant ate everything.

"Leave something on your plate. Your eating is out of control,". He told me.
"Oh."
"Maddie is going to be just like you. You feed her too much." I looked at her. She was a bit roly poly.  "And you both kind of stink."
"Is there anything else I don't do right?"
"I am just correcting you. If I didn't care, I wouldn't correct. Oh, I got tickets for'Donny Brasco'."
"Oh."

I sat there in my stained and dirty clothes, not wanting to go. Seeing Johnny in the movie made me cry. I missed him. "Why didn't he fight for me?" His face was beautiful. I remember that face kissing me, that body loving me, and conversations that weren't one sided. It was also sex where I was pleasured. I remember always coming under him. I remember how that used to set him off as well. I remember my first one was the one where I set Johnny off. He was so passionate. I think there was the beginning of Maddie. Maddie, the best thing to happen to me. I wished he could meet her. She talked well. She told me "Steve is mean" more than once. She always ended up in bed with us as the gnarled tree scared her. As I watched the movie, I cried into Maddie's, long, curly hair. She was asleep. During the credits, I wiped my face. We went home and had a night in.

As I looked out into the dark,,windy night, I wondered why Johnny didn't fight for me. I went to bed early, and cried myself to sleep. Donny Brasco had an effect on me. I still loved Johnny.