No Steps in this Perfect Family of Three

I never dreamed of being married or having children. But here I was twenty one years old, married to a man old enough to be a father to me with a step daughter young enough to be my sibling. In a matter of minutes I went from a teenage girl to a full time Mom and wife.  There was no preparation time to ready myself for motherhood.  Worm was ten when she lost her mother and gained a step mother, all within eleven months.  She did not have an opportunity to grieve her own Mother before her “Daddy” brought a new woman into the Henshaw Household.

Worm was a cute little girl.  She was the spitting image of her Mother and she also carried the burden of having a weight issue like her Mother. Killer did not care for fat people, he considered them weak. He was naturally thin.  He could eat like a herd of Boars and not gain an ounce. He wasn’t a man who exercised; he was just blessed with a perfect metabolism.

He had high expectations for children and on more than one occasion would inform any one that children were to be seen, not heard.  Worm was not allowed to be like other children. She was not allowed to wear jeans or casual clothing to school.  She wore dresses and skirts with knee high socks and dress shoes.  She was allowed to wear jeans and tennis shoes on weekends, but only when she was doing chores. She was not allowed to have friends over nor was she allowed to go play with her friends. Killer did not want anyone inside the house especially children!

Worm was troubled as only one could expect.  She had had a life thus far of being a lonely child, in addition to being an only child. She would be holed up in her room with very little contact with others who shared the house. She had many rules to obey. She was to address Killer as Daddy, nothing else was acceptable except for Sir, and in response to a question she may have been asked. She was very well mannered similar to a private just graduating from basic training, but her training lasted much longer than six weeks.

She was not allowed to speak unless she was spoken to by Killer for the most part.  She had impeccable table manners that were taught to her by Killer Daddy but not necessarily practiced by him.  After each bite, she was to sit her fork down while she chewed her food, picking the fork back up when her mouth was empty. She too was instructed on the standing up straight as well as sitting very erect at a table if she were ever invited to sit at one or was fortunate enough to be allowed to come with us when we went out. That was very rare though as Killer did not believe that children should have such luxuries.

Her bedroom was rather blah for a young girl.  Nothing in the room announced a child resided in this space except for a few stuffed animals and her Leopold, a bear that she apparently carried with her constantly from an early age.

The first summer we were married, Worm was taken to Alabama for the summer to visit and spend time with her Mother’s relatives.  Her Mother was a southern woman who had fled to the north when Worm was quite young. That summer, I convinced Killer to let me decorate her room so that when she returned she had a room that she could enjoy spending time in.  At this point I had come to realize she spent a tremendous amount of time in her small bedroom and if she was not there, she was doing chores or attending school.

I painted the walls pink and I hung white curtains at her picture window that overlooked the back yard.  I bought a pink and white checked bedspread with white eyelet ruffles and painted her built in shelves white.  It was cute and a far cry from the drab walls and bed covers she had before. It was fresh and bright and welcoming to this little girl who returned at the end of summer to another year behind her bedroom door.  She was so surprised when she opened her door on her new room. But painting the walls and putting new curtains and bed covers on did not change the memories that lingered in the confines of that small little bedroom that she could call all her own.

She had gained weight when she was down south for the summer and Reggie was livid.  She wasn’t fat, she was just like any other child who was growing, but in his eyes, she was fat. He insisted she diet and lose weight, but Killer had never dieted before so in his eyes, dieting meant starvation, not moderation.

Worm would spend hours in the kitchen doing dishes but she also was sneaking food as she did not get enough to sustain a gnat at meals.  She was not allowed to eat breakfast and she was not allowed to carry her lunch or buy a lunch.  In Killer’s mind, she only needed to eat once and that was at dinner.

Again, Killer’s rules applied to everyone but Killer.  He had breakfast everyday with his cronies at the local Sambo’s Restaurant.  He ate lunch while playing cards with his co-workers and he had a snack when he came home before dinner, dinner and a snack before he went to bed.  Killer did not go hungry but he was the “King” and we were his servants.

There came a point that he required me to track all the food in the kitchen.  An inventory was taken, jars were marked to show where the food may have fallen in the jar, every time milk was poured, I had to mark the container to reflect the new level of milk now resting in its plastic jug. This was not a task for Killer; he did not serve himself or help himself to food.  If he wanted something to eat or drink, either Worm or I were summoned to prepare it and bring it to him.

He made it very clear to us in the beginning that we were not “steps.” I was not her step mother, I was her mother and she was not a step daughter, but I was to refer to her and introduce her as my daughter. Appearances were very important to Killer.  I am not sure where this stemmed from but whom he appeared to be in the public eye was not the person we knew behind closed doors.

Worm was not aware that she had been adopted by Killer when he married her mother. She was around two years old when he married Molly Belle and he did not want this child to attend school known as a Smith, but living in the household of the Henshaw family so he made arrangements to adopt her. He claims as a child he knew children that were ridiculed because they came from broken homes, but Killer was born in 1944 and grew up in an era that divorce was not approved of in society.  We lived in the 1980’s and divorce was no longer a taboo subject experienced by few.

Killer drilled in this child’s head that she was a Henshaw and she was to be proud of this heritage that she was blessed to be born into. It was not until she was fifteen years old in a heat of disappointment over something that she had done that was not to his satisfaction did he allowed the words to spew from his mouth, “you are not mine” and proceeded to inform her that the life she had known was all a lie.