Sylvia- An American Crime

The Baniszewski's

It was June of 1965 like Daddy said, and I lowered down to tie Jenny's shoes for her.
"Do you think we'll make some friends?" She asked me, and I looked up at her whilst continuing to finish my bow.
"Sure we will." I said and stood up.
"Well, maybe there will be some cute guys this time?" She smiled, I blushed.
"They're supposed to be cute!" Jenny cried, before mama came up from behind us.
"Come on girls, you don't want to be late for church." Mama pulled us along and towards the street, and we ran into Daddy who was leaning by the car.
"Hey!" He raised his hand up and walked towards us.
"Daddy?" I said.
"Hey Jenny." He waved at Jenny.
"What are you doing here?" I asked him.
"Well, I missed you girls." He says, then wanted to talk to Mama so I backed away.

I heard Daddy and Mama talk about us, and the fair.
"I told you Lester I can't do it anymore, not with the girls." I heard Mama say.
"Betty.." Daddy said, and I opened my ears while poking my head out the corner of the building.
"Mama?" I interrupted, but I was so curious.
"You two, go on ahead and catch the church gus home." Mama told me.
"I gotta settle things with your father." Then she looked over at Daddy, but I just found Jenny and did what Mama told me to do as I always did.

Once we sang our first song at church, Reverend Bill began his service so we sat and listened.
"We are called children of God.." He said, but then we heard a baby cry.
"And so we are!" Bill got louder, because this baby wouldn't stop making noise.
There was a woman trying to comfort this baby, and was sitting with five other kids. Eventually, she had enough of her baby interrupting the service. But once standing up, the baby dropped their rattle, and I could hear the mother sighed before picking it up and finally leaving the church. When the woman walked past us with the baby, I just looked over at Jenny and smiled because it was a little entertaining.

After church, me and Jenny got on the back of the bus whilst everyone else boarded. Soon, two younger girls that sat with the woman and the baby sat in front of us and turned around to talk.
"What happened to your leg?" The blonde haired one asked.
"That's not nice, Shirley!" The brown haired girl scolded her for asking so I just calmed the situation.
"It's alright, she's used to it." I grinned nervously.
"So what is it?" Shirley asked.
"Polio." Jenny said.
"Polio? Does it hurt?" She said, but the brown haired girl intervened.
"Our mama is sick too." But then the woman that was holding the baby interrupted.
"All right girls!" She tried to usher them away.
"We gotta go." Brown-haired girl said, and I nodded in agreement.
"Can they come with us?" Shirley asked her sister before leaving.
"You wanna come?" The other girl asked.
"We've got some friends coming over, and you can meet our older sister." I looked at Jenny for assurance.
"Let's do it." She whispered.
"Sure!" I shouted happily, and all five of us got off the bus together. Me, Jenny, Shirley, the other girl, and their mama.

When we got off, we ended up at East New York street with the address 3850. It was a tall, white, combined house with a little white mailbox by the front door. While making it to the steps, I couldn't walk up them yet before a red-headed girl walks out.
"Guess who got stuck with an extra shift at work?" She folded her arms.
"Did you get paid?" The mother asked, and she said yes.
"Got a little extra for dinner." She walked up the steps with the baby and gave it to her Daughter.
"Where'd they come from?" She glanced over at us while she took the baby.
"We invited them to stay and play!" Shirley excitedly says.
"We'll be quiet." The other girl added.
"All right, make sure of it." The woman said, and we all went into the house and the girls lead me and Jenny upstairs to their room.

Up in their room was actually pretty nice, considering how small their home was. We later found out that they were the Baniszewski's, so the brown-haired we were talking to was named Marie, of course Shirley, and then the red-haired girl was Paula. Turned out, their older sister Paula was only a year older than me so we bonded right away. Marie decided to put on the record player because it was getting too quiet, once placing the needle on the vinyl we got to chatting.
"I really like this song." Marie said before doing Jenny's hair, and I picked up a magazine from the bed.
"What's your dad do?" I asked Paula, because I knew she worked but I wanted to know if her father did to.
"He's a cop, they're divorced." She fixed her hair in the mirror.
"Do you miss him any?" I asked.
"Nah, I just miss his money." She said.
"Paula!" Shirley or Marie cried.
"Well, it's true!" She shouts, and begins to explain whilst buttoning up her shirt.
"Maybe if he's more regular with his support, mom wouldn't be so sick, and I wouldn't have to work so hard!" Paula looked to be getting angry.
But before she could say anything else, Marie added to the conversation.
"Little Kenny's got a different daddy." She continued to do Jenny's hair while I watched with the magazine on my skirt.
"Who's little Kenny?" Jenny asked.
"The baby, but we're not supposed to talk about that." Shirley replied, and got smacked on the arm by Marie.
"Ow!" She exclaims.
"Finished!" Marie excitedly says to Jenny in the mirror after doing her hair.
"Wow! You should do this for a living!" Jenny shouts, and Paula walks over to the bed to sit next to me.
"Yeah if she was old enough." Paula says.
"You want me to do yours?" Marie asks Paula.
"Uh, no, thanks." She said.
"Yeah, she's the pretty one." Marie said sarcastically to Paula.
"Yeah, she's got nice hair." Paula agreed.
"I'm pretty too." Shirley glanced and smiled over at Paula.
"The hell you are!" Paula shouted and rolled her eyes.
I looked up at Paula, as she seemed to want to talk to me and I was right.
"I'll tell you what? Let's go get a coke." She went on to explain that her boyfriend works at the liquor store and can get him to buy us some soda and I just agreed.
"You girls behave!" Paula said, and Shirley stuck her tongue out at her before we darted out the bedroom and then downstairs to where I saw Gerdy, doing laundry in the living room.
"We're going to the groceries!" Paula yells for her mom to hear while she's folding clothes.
"Tell Andy he owes me for little Kenny." Gerdy says.
"And don't be wasting time on that bag-boy!" She yells, and Paula opens the door.
"He ain't a bag-boy mama!" She cries, and we exit the house finally.
"She doesn't like my boyfriend." Paula touches my arm as we walk out.
"Yeah I can see that!" I agree. Then see Paula look over in the yard at Johnny with the dog.
"Hey Johnny! Quit it!" She yelled, making the neighbor glance over at her.
"Sorry Mrs. Doyle." She apologized, but she just went back into her own house. That was before her sister Stephanie and her boyfriend Coy Hubbard pulled up in their car.
"Hey!" Stephanie yelled out the window.
"You weren't at church today." Paula tells her.
"Coy and I are heading over there now." Stephanie explained.
"Yeah, you better be." Paula said without certainty, making Stephanie roll her eyes and whisper to Coy before driving off.
"That's my sister Stephanie, and she's a big help around the house when she isn't wasting time with her boyfriend Coy." Paula says as she guides me while we begin to walk.

Minutes later, we are walking down a short alley when I saw a dark-haired guy drinking and smoking a cigarette while leaning on the wall.
"Oh God.." Paula sighed with sass.
"Hey, Paula." He grinned.
"Mama's asking for her money." She said with her hand on her hip, as she simply continued walking.
"I bet she was." He said, before he said something else that caught my attention.
"Who's your friend?" He asked Paula.
"Sylvia, but she doesn't talk to trash." She put her arm around me as we walked, and what she said just made me laugh.
"Excuse me." I heard him say in the distance.
"That's my mama's ex-boyfriend, and he's only six years older than me." She whispers in my ear.

When we made it to the liquor store, I was about to open the door to go in before Paula stopped me to just stare while she pointed out her boyfriend.
"That's him, that's my Bradley!" She excitedly whispered, and I wasn't gonna lie.
"He's real cute." I said while watching closely.
"We both gotta be real careful though." She said.
"Why?" I asked, and she looked over at me.
"Because he's married." She says, and she laughs while I'm shocked.
"I'm not even shitting you! No!" She began to try and convince me that it's true.
"Paula!" I said out of being startled.
"Don't tell me you've never had a boyfriend." She stopped laughing.
"Ah well, there was this guy in California but.. I guess it was nothing." I sighed, thinking about the time that I was in California at one point with the carnival.
"Well, at least you did more than just kiss right?" She asked, and I didn't know how to answer that because we didn't do more.
"Well aren't you just so damn pure!" Then she chuckled.
"Oh c'mon." I blushed.
"Let's go!" Then we both finally went inside the store.

I don't have any memory of what happened the next day, until Daddy took the stand and told how I got in the care of Gerdy and her kids.
"So, you'd never met Gertrude Baniszewski before that day?" Bill asked.
"No, sir." Daddy said, looking sad and I just wanted to hug him one last time.
"But, you were willing to leave your children with a complete stranger?" Bill asks, making Daddy look stressed. In the end, he explained that he thought Gerdy would take care of me and Jenny as if we were her own. Little did he know, little did I know.

Now, I am back in the Baniszewski house with my parents. Thanks, Daddy.
"Okay! Here's twenty now." He handed Gertrude her first twenty dollar bill of many.
"You'll have the next payment in a week, Thursday." He says, and she smiled.
"I'll need that money." She grasped the bill a little tighter.
"You will have it." He promised her.
"Johnny, bring the box upstairs." Mama gives him the boxes and she calls him a sweetheart for doing so.
"I don't want you to go." I said stressfully while looking up at Mama, but still having no clue what was about being my own personal prison sentence.
"The circuit will be down and done by the end of September." She reassures me.
"That's only two months." I say under my breath, if only I still had some.
"And I promise I will be back to get you girls then." Mama whispered to the both of us, also having no idea.
"Okay, kids." Daddy said while grabbing his stuff.
"Goodbye Jenny." He kisses her.
"Cookie." Then kisses me, as I was his Cookie all my life.
"You be good!" He says and leaves, but I was already homesick. Apparently now, that feeling will never go away.
"You girls make sure you get everything you need." Gerdy tells us.
"Thank you." I said.
"Well come on! We'll help you unpack!" Paula breaks the silence happily, and us girls all run upstairs to have some fun. Marie turns on the record player again, with what started as unpacking turned into a full-on pillow fight. And I hadn't had a pillow fight since Middle School at one of my old Schools.