The thing I remember most about my childhood is my mom’s car.
It was a green Dodge with a long scratch on the passenger side and a big dent in the front fender. She got it used before I can remember—that car was older than I was. She used to tell me how my dad went with her to the used car lot and negotiated with the sleazy salesman to get her a good deal. My dad was a salesman too. That’s how he knew the tricks. That’s also why he traveled so much.
My dad bought a car seat for the back when I was a little kid. He used to make a big deal about strapping me inside. “You all snug and safe back there, sport?” he would say.
But when my father went away on his trips, my mother would get depressed. She didn’t give a shit if I was strapped in snug and safe. When we went out, she said to get in the back and gave me ten seconds to get my seatbelt on. If the seatbelt wasn’t on by then, too damn bad. You think I have time to wait the rest of the day for you to strap yourself in?
Mostly, she would take me to the grocery store. She didn’t take me to friends’ houses, playgrounds, or anywhere fun. Just grocery stores. Or the gas station.
When I was four years old, when my dad was out of town, she took me out in the car. I couldn’t get the car seat buckled on my own so I just sat next to it in the back, behind the driver seat. The strap on the seatbelt went over my neck and cut into the skin. I knew better than to complain.
When we got to the grocery store, I started to follow her, but she shook her head. “I just need to get a few things,” she told me as she hung her big purple purse over her shoulder. “You stay in the car. I don’t need you slowing me down.”
Then she closed the door to the car with me inside.
She had left me in the car before. Lots of times. But today was hot. Hot enough that everyone on the street was wearing shorts and wife beater shirts, and fanning themselves as they talked about how damn hot it was.
When my mom was in the car, the air conditioner was going. You could barely feel it in the back, but it was circulating. Unfortunately, after she killed the engine, the temperature in the car started to go up.
At first, it wasn’t too bad. Hot, but I didn’t mind hot. Then it got hotter. So hot, it was hard to breathe. You know why it’s hard to breathe when it’s hot? Heat causes molecules to disperse, so each breath takes in less oxygen.
I was suffocating.
She said she would be right back. As I waited, it became clear it wasn’t going to be a quick grocery trip like she promised. But if I got out of the car, there would be consequences. Bad consequences.
So I sat there, the sweat beading on my forehead. And my eyes drifted
shut.
I was jarred awake by pounding on my window. It was a woman about
my mother’s age. I lifted my head and blinked my bleary eyes. The woman was yelling. “Are you okay? Can you open the door?”
I didn’t know what to do. My mom would be angry if I opened the door. But this woman kept pounding on the window. My head hurt. So I unlocked the car, and before I knew it, the woman was wrenching the door open.
Even though it was at least ninety degrees outside, the fresh air felt good. I took a gulp of air.
“Oh my God,” the woman was saying as she unbuckled my seatbelt and pulled me from the car. I weighed very little, even for my age, and she lifted me easily. “Are you okay? Can you say anything?”
There was concern in her eyes. My mom never looked like that. Too bad this woman couldn’t take me home. I could be her kid instead. “I’m okay.”
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” My mother’s voice rang out across the parking lot. “What are you doing to my child?”
My mother and the woman started yelling at each other. The woman was saying I could have died. My mother told her to mind her own damn business. The woman said she was going to report my mother. Finally, my mom shoved me back into the Dodge and we took off before I had a chance to get my seatbelt buckled again.
“What did you unlock the door for?” she snapped at me. “It was hot.”
“Well, I hope it was worth it. Now she’s going to report me for being a terrible parent and you’re going to get taken away from us. They’ll put you in a foster home. You’ll never see me or your father again.”
The thought of never seeing my mom again? Not so bad. But the thought of never seeing my father again made me sick. So sick, I had to make her pull over so I could vomit.
