Chapter Four

HAPPY ... WOULDN´T YOU BE

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Boy! Did we have a lot of acquaintances! I didn´t recall knowing half of these people! I felt like I was in a side show. Every semi-stranger that appeared at my door was accompanied by at least two of his third cousins.

"Mother, you cannot parade all these people through my house at all hours of the day and night." My parents closed their store at 10:00 p.m. and then wanted to socialize. In her pride and excitement she stopped at nothing short of bringing the milkman, bread man and grocer. The part that surprised me the most was not that she wanted the whole world to see the daughter who had predicted her own twins, but that these people would actually accompany her.

Furthermore, they were saying I had ´wished´ my ovaries into releasing two eggs, instead of one. Also that I had subconsciously gone into labor on exactly July 16th. Mind over matter. This annoyed me terribly.

Sharon knew this circus was inevitable. She said if she could somehow struggle into her nurse´s uniform, she´d stand at the door, cap and all, explaining, ´Mommy is resting peacefully -- she´ll call you when she´s in dire need of company´. Sharon unfortunately was in the hospital with a few minor complications, in her last month of pregnancy. Boy, she would have set them straight! Mom was not getting the message. "Zandar´s coming for the weekend. She´s staying with us."

NO, GOD! NO! NOT HER! Just her name could still paralyze me with fright. Being a grown up woman and far beyond her reach did not minimize the terror of seeing this woman. My dear ´great-aunt´, who would stuff food down my throat till I threw up, then belt me for making the mess, was popping in for a friendly visit.

´She can´t come here. I won´t see her!"

"Donna, how can you say such a thing, after all the help she´s been to us., -- You´ll take her to the hospital so she can see my grandchildren." My mother continued oblivious to the fact that I wanted to forget the horrors of that miserable year -- not entertain them.

Tears automatically streamed down my face as I recalled the Easter Sunday I was five and a half. While Zandar took her afternoon nap, I was free to do as I pleased during those sweet hours. I perched myself on the living room window still, staring, as children do, out to a world I couldn´t comprehend; It was a city I didn´t recognize, except for the few blocks to my school, a school where no one spoke Croatian, only English.

How long will I be in this dreadful place? I thought back to the nursery school in Austria, recalling more congenial memories. I wasn´t allowed to play here. Zandar wouldn´t even let me color. A waste of time she said.

"MY MOTHER ! Zandar, ZANDAR, get up, wake up -- my mother´s here -- she´s come to get me -- now you´ll be sorry -- my mother´s here!" Joining me by the window, "Where´s your mother?" she yelled angrily.

"Look, see? Way, way over there by those lights. See that taxi -- way over there -- " I pointed, finger pressed to the glass. My ears rang from the blow across my head.

"Stop hitting her!" my uncle was grabbing for her arms. He always tried to stop her, but she still always hit me.

"She woke me up, the brat!" grabbing for me as I backed away.

"She IS coming, she IS! You´ll see." I was almost choking, I don´t know who was more surprised, her or me when, not more than five minutes later, my mother knocked at the door. She WAS in that taxi.

"Take me home, take me home, NOW! Get me out of here! I HATE her -- she beats me -- she set my hair on fire -- she ties me up, every day, she forces me to write and she squeezes my fingers. I can´t WRITE, I can´t even print. PLEASE! Take me home." I poured out all the grueling details as fast as I could manage to talk, without taking a breath.

"Your father won´t let me. There´s no one to watch you. We have to work. Maybe in a month or so."

"I´ll be GOOD. I PROMISE! P-L-E-A-S-E! No one has to watch me. Please!"

My mother cried all the way back to Toronto, on the bus, alone, without me.

How can you leave me here? She´ll kill me by the time you come back for me. I watched the bus pulling away from the terminal. I´m not going to ever see her again. Zandar´s going to kill me.

And now I was expected to entertain this woman? Serve her coffee? Laugh about the good old days? She´d mellowed greatly in her old age, yes, but no, no -- to see her would be to relive a nightmare.

My neck smarted from the stitches. The bandage pulled on the small hairs around my neck. This had been an opportune time to get my cyst removed, before the babies got home, only now I regretted making the decision.

I was just drained, and even more so with the threat of Zandar´s visit this weekend. My dad convinced me to wash the kitchen ceiling since all his family were coming for inspection. I had not done much heavy housework while pregnant. Instead of catching up on my rest, to be ship-shape for when the boys came home, I was doing spring cleaning. For what? My friends couldn´t care less if my ceiling was clean or dirty. The important thing was to get my dad off my back. Housework somehow seemed easier than arguing with him.

I was in the ´executive office´, with a breast pump and wearing only a small towel wrapped around my waist. Every time I would start to pump milk, which would be taken to the hospital for the boys, the phone would ring. Maybe this was the ´million dollar´ service call. I had to answer that phone. Therefore, I´d assemble all the apparatus and baby bottles on the desk (we had a desk in there now -- a chair too) by the ´executive phone´. If it rang, I could easily take the call without too much disruption.

I heard our front door open. It couldn´t be Darko, I´d just hung up with him before I started this procedure. Couldn´t be any of my friends, they´d ring the bell.

"Who´s there?" I yelled after hearing some commotion, trying desperately to cover a naked body with something not much larger than a face cloth. I heard the sound of doors opening and being closed again, closer and closer, indicating this door was going to open next. "Don´t come in here --" Too late. There was my very old, nearly deaf, great-uncle, peering through a five inch opening, hoping he wasn´t waking anyone.

Horrors, that someone should see me like this! What would he imagine I was doing? I could see his mind trying to unravel these ´strange´ circumstances. This also meant that Zandar was somewhere close behind. I went hysterical. Unless locked in my ´too small´ bathroom, I had absolutely no privacy. None. In my own home. Was it so hard for Darko to take his key and lock up as he left? Why hadn´t I checked the door? It was too early, that´s why, my MOTHER wouldn´t be here for hours yet.

"Gordana," Zandar was surprised! "Why are you so upset?"

"Upset? No. No. I´m not upset. I´ll be fine, as soon as everyone either LEAVES or PASSES me some clothes." Shut the door. Get out of here. Who else did they have in the hall?

I´m going to move out into the country some day. Miles from these daily calamities. Somewhere quiet. PRIVATE. Going to get two large dogs. One for each door. -- I can´t do that, I´m even terrified of pups. But, what about the burglars that prowl these desolate areas? Smarten up -- burglars are okay. They come and quickly slip out before attracting any notice -- it´s THE RELATIVES I have to worry about! They appear out of nowhere, PARASITES, devouring, destroying anything which lay in their path.

Finally doctor "D" and Astronaut "M" are ready to come home. Five pounds, eight ounces. Both of them.

The out-law wants to come along when we bring the babies home today. No bloomin´ way lady! You couldn´t come to the hospital for three days to see your grandkids till you´d rested from your trip overseas, you AIN´T gonna intrude, not today. Funny how her ´appointments´ never jive when it´s incompatible with HER personal comfort.

Standing in the nursery, filled with amazement and wonder, finally taking a baby (babies) home from a hospital, I realized I was being torn in two. My heart and soul functioned on two levels.
Love, warmth, compassion, sensitivity, concern, joy, when I revolved around ´the Prince, Doc and Astronaut´. Hurt, hate, more hurt, resentment, hurt and disgust, when in the presence of all these related ´well wishers´.

My long awaited dreams, now presently being fulfilled, were continually snuffed and quelled by these imposing, break-down-the-door, snoops.

"Donna, you´ve been up for more than twenty-four hours. Get some rest, hon." Darko said with concern in his voice.

"Later, Michael has to eat again in about twenty minutes."

"Why do they have to be fed so often?" This was all new to pops too.

"Their tummies are too small to hold more than a couple of ounces of milk and their weight HAS TO increase as soon as possible." By now, I really sounded like I knew as much as the physicians. Even more.

I wished he could feed Danny while I breast fed Michael. That would leave me two hours and fifteen minutes, that no one was feeding, to sleep.

My mind was trying to sort out a schedule. Michael takes forty-five minutes to feed (he was still very slow and difficult to feed from being accustomed to milk being dumped into his stomach). Fifteen minutes later, it was Danny´s turn. Nipples and bottles either ran too fast or no milk seeped through. He´d take another forty-five minutes, at least. Total time consumed feeding them: one hour and forty-five minutes. In thirty minutes I would have to feed Michael, and the whole cycle started again, round the clock. Again and again. Till they were at least nine pounds. That could take months! I couldn´t go months, sleeping only thirty minutes every two hours, much less washing diapers and preparing meals!

PANIC!

I HAVE TO GET SOME HELP. WHERE? WHO? Darko´s working sixteen hours a day trying to catch up on the bills. I couldn´t afford help even for a couple of hours a day. We were overdrawn more than $1,000 at the bank. Think. Think.

I picked up the phone, dialing relative after relative.

Relative ´A´ -- "Sorry, Donna, I have a shower to attend tomorrow, wish I could help."

Relative ´B´ -- "Oh no, couldn´t sleep over, hubby would never hear of it."

´C´ -- "Have to get my hair done tomorrow. Maybe next week."

´D´ -- "You´ll manage somehow. YOU´RE YOUNG."

"You only managed because you had your mother living with you. You had your babies one at a time. Your babies were full term. Yours didn´t need to eat every two hours. Yours could suck properly." I screamed and pleaded in desperation.

My panic intensified. Three days later, I had gone four without sleep and was too overwrought to eat in all this time. I tried again, but X, Y, and Z all had the same excuses. I couldn´t believe it. They were the same people whose income tax forms, unemployment forms, compensation and old age forms I had filled out for all these years. I´d registered their kids in school, accompanied or driven them to get marriage licenses, driver´s licenses, passports, and visa´s. Guaranteed jobs for THEIR friends and their relations, people we had never even met. I had been a social service, an information center, a chauffeur, a non-profit organization for years to these ´folks´. It was expected. It was owed. We were family. Then! Now I´m talking life and death; mine!; and they have to get their HAIR DONE!

Day five: "Dana, where do you keep the salt?" ... "Dana don´t you have any shortening?" ... "Dana, I can´t find a large enough pot." ... "I´ll never be able to cook Darko a good meal in this place."

"PLEASE, don´t wake me up unless it´s feeding time. I HAVE TO SLEEP TILL THEN."

In-law, out-law, whatever she was, just continued: "Who dirtied all these dishes? It´ll take me all night to clean this mess."

"Never mind the dishes. I´ll do them NEXT MONTH. MYSELF."

I tried to eat but my stomach had shrunk so much it rejected food and I would chuck it up.

Day six, 5:00 a.m.: I had not needed or even thought of food. Must eat something. I feel weak. What if I drop one of the babies? I´m so dizzy. So weak. Then I remembered Sara. Sara! She´ll come. I just know it.

"Sara? Remember? We met a few weeks ago. I´m the one with the twins. This is an emergency. Please come over, right now. It´s their feeding time and I´m too weak to pick them up."

She arrived within minutes, in her nightgown and housecoat. Took complete charge of both boys. Fed, powdered, changed, made new formula. I now had NO milk, for either one.

I watched here efficiency. I was like that, just a few weeks ago. What happened? Why am I IMMOBILIZED? I see what she´s doing. I CAN do what she´s doing. But I´M not. WHY NOT? What am I going to do when she leaves? What about tomorrow?

"Couldn´t your mother help, dear?" She was so-o-o concerned.

"She says she´s afraid of them, never having been near a baby. That´s why my grandmother took care of me. She´s afraid she´ll drop one. There´s no way, after a proclamation like that, that I could sleep while she fed them."

"What about a girlfriend?"

"I couldn´t impose on my girlfriends for help. They have small babies and young families of their own. Most are experiencing similar turmoil. I expected family to help. I expected it without even having to ask for it. I haven´t asked anyone, anything, till now. The rest of my highschool friends have moved far away. Darko´s sister is in Vancouver. There´s NOBODY!"

I woke up in a hospital. I had passed out while Sara was there. The doctor was saying, "Exhaustion. Sheer and simple exhaustion. You´ll be fine in a day or two. You just need some nourishment and a couple of nights´ sleep."

"I´ll be back in a week. I can´t cope."

"Of course you can´t. Who expects you to? Get some help."

"Easier said than done, doctor. I´ve got a little problem in that department."

Six days after I was admitted, I was back home. STRONG. DETERMINED. CHANGED.

A Red Cross homemaker arrived. She came not only to help me cope and let me sleep through an occasional night, but to also get it through my head, for my own good and the good of the babies, to be forceful and put my foot down when people showed up at 11:30 at night or 8:00 in the morning to socialize. She had never in her life seen so many people. "I don´t care who they are. Throw them out. If they´re not here to wash diapers ... Slam the door."

Good idea. Finally I had someone actually backing ME.

"Sorry, I don´t want company." PERIOD. "No you can´t see the twins. Come back in six years, I´ll let you register them in school, like I did your son."

"How am I doing? How are the boys? -- Just fine. Why don´t you come over when they´re old enough to learn how to drive. I´ll let you teach them, like I taught you. Remember?"

"Oh, so you think I should have a christening party for at least 70, maybe 80. GOT TO HELL! Don´t show up at my door, ever again."

"What´s wrong, Donna? What´s happened, Donna? Why are you angry, Donna?"

"Angry? Me? No. No. I´ll be fine, just as long as you stay out of my life. Call ONLY if you need your fuses changed or your rec room wired, BUT ONLY IF YOU´RE PLANNING TO PAY next time. We´re not family A-N-Y-M-O-R-E!":

"Cica, our pet name for Darko´s sister Maria, had arrived back from B.C. She was just three months younger than me. A real knockout. Long, blond naturally curly hair. Blue eyed, petite, tiny thing (if you can imagine anyone closely related to ´humungous Darko being described by the adjective ´PETITE´). She could really stop traffic, and I don´t mean with muscle, like her brother.

She was crying. "Why didn´t you notify me? I would have come, immediately. In an instant. You know I WOULD."

I knew she meant it from the bottom of her heart. Maria had never had a problem telling people what was on her mind, and she couldn´t care less what people thought of HER. She wouldn´t offer help unless she could give her ´all´.

She loved the boys, and was thrilled at becoming an aunt.

"I can´t imagine ME being anyone´s aunt." she laughed. "It sounds so matronly."

She was only 22, yet sadly bitter, knowing life had somehow shortchanged her. Now she wanted it all at once.

"Donna, I´m not ever going to have kids. I could never contemplate having kids. Who needs the hassle? I have too much living to catch up on."

Over the next few years she traveled the world. Worked her way from one corner of the globe to the other. We hardly saw one another. When we did, we were the sister that each had longed for while growing up. We were complete opposites, with the exception of our mutual gift for gab. A year´s worth of catching up could be accomplished in one evening. Next year, we´d continue, same time, same place, like there´d never been an interval.

"Hello, police department. Have there been any reports of wolves in this neighborhood?"

"Wolves, Ma´am? Well, there is always a possibility."

"I´m certain that there´s a pack of three, in my backyard, tearing apart someone´s chicken."

Well now, the wolves didn´t get too big a response but ---

"A chicken? A dead one? What´s a chicken doing in your back yard?"

"It´s dead now, officer. Everyone around here has chickens, pigeons, you name it. Right in the middle of this suburb."

"We´ll send someone right over."

Now "I" was watching from behind the curtains. In minutes, two cruisers pulled up, and two officers, guns drawn, cautiously entered through my gate. The first one walked over to one of these ´wolves´, tilted his cap high on his head, as his eyes searched for the window I was positioned at. Now I´ve done it. I answered the door, embarrassed and blushing down to my toes. "They looked like wolves to me."

"Ma´am, are you by any chance frightened of German Shepherds?"

"Did you see the chicken? They tore it apart." I exclaimed.

"Yes. Now that´s a different story. Something that you should definitely be concerned about. They WILL attract wild animals. We´ll make a report. Find out who´s keeping them and how many. Have a good day."

"Sharon, we have to get away from this neighborhood."

"The only way I could get hubby to move is if his entire family would agree. Oh-h-h! I have an idea! You´re really going to love this one."

"What?" She really had me curious.

"Still got your OUIJA board?"

"Yeah."

"Well, if I were to speak strictly Portuguese during a seance, and everyone knows YOU don´t speak a word of PORTUGUESE, dumb Canadian that you are, and if ´OUIJA´ answered all my questions correctly, it would have to be a spirit, right?"

"I LOVE IT! HOW?"

"Easy. We´ll practice, I´ll teach you the key words, such as ´move´, ´house´, and so on. If I say ´Oh, Ouija´, the answer will be ´yes´. If I only say ´Ouija´, then the answer will be ´no´."

Needless to say, we scared them out of their skins. But, yes, Sharon would be moving too. With their blessings! ***

***Just in case even one person puts down this book and runs out to buy a Ouija board and have some fun, before reading part two of this book: WARNING -- THIS IS NOT A GAME. IT IS NOT A TOY. IT IS DANGEROUS BUSINESS. YOU WOULD BE DABBLING WITH THE OCCULT. I will discuss this topic further in part two.

We quickly developed the hang of having some real fun, bored housewives that we´d become. Another brain storm over coffee one day. The caffeine was to blame for this one; we were definitely over-stimulated when we came up with it. We needed something to keep our minds and spirits alert. We´d start our own business.

"What, telling fortunes?"

"No, they´d catch on too quickly if we did it too often. A store maybe. YES! A boutique. Everyone´s into GO-GO watches and mini´s and maxi´s."

"You think we could talk the guys into giving us some money to start?"

"Sure, it´ll keep us out of their hair and we don´t need much anyway."

We were both surrounded by relatives who negated our every move. We needed an identity of our own. This just might be it.

All the work and typing and bookkeeping for Darko´s business kept me busy. But that was all WORK. This was going to be FUN. Our only prerequisite was that the store had to be large enough for three playpens.

Since Sharon was born on November 3rd and I on November 6th, we naturally named our boutique "Scorpio". We hit the front page of the local papers, with a half page article and a picture of me modeling a black lace, see-through, mini dress. I was dreadfully shy and the photographer had to do a lot of ´hide all the peek-a-boo´s.

The babies were on the floor at my feet. The Newspaper piece read as follows:

SCORPIO OPENS

A mother of six month old twin boys who opens a mod boutique has to be a superwoman.

That´s Donna Martonfi, who is selling mini dresses and plastic chairs while twins, Daniel and Michael, play in the back room.

Mrs. Martonfi, and co-partner, Mrs. Sharon ...... , a housewife and mother of a five month old daughter, are operating Scorpio on Lakeshore Road.

Neither had previous experience in business when they decided to open a shop while drinking coffee one day.

"Our husbands probably think we´re crazy, but they helped us finance it," said Sharon.

The girls christened it Scorpio because that is their zodiac sign.

The gear sold in the shop, formerly Fowler´s Real Estate, includes peek-a-boo umbrellas and raincoats, wet-look skirts, inflatable chairs (in future); maxi coats, slacks and imitation snakeskin coats, from Mr. D.

The Scorpians want to provide inexpensive popular clothes for office girls and teenagers."

Sharon could not be talked into having her picture taken. She had even a lower self-image than I did. "I´m two feet taller than all my relatives."

"Sharon, your relatives are Portuguese. Exceptionally short one at that."

"No way. Beside the babies I´ll look ten feet tall, whether in a mini or a maxi."

Needless to say, it was a disaster. When all the rug crawlers in the playpens became mountain climbers, our dresses had to be suspended from wagon wheels which were attached to the ceiling. The spokes substituted for racks. With three babies, it was no use. I gave up long before Sharon. At least I had the latest wardrobe, and when we parted in business, boxes of belts, jewelry and dresses were stored away as my share of the investment.

Months passed, and I was really catching on. Raising babies was all I had hoped it would be, and even more. Not only were we happy and healthy, we prospered to the point that the $1,000 overdraft was allowed to climb to $3,000. No questions asked.

"Darko, I´d save a lot of time if I had a washer and dryer and didn´t have to run to the laundromat. You think you could swing a set?"

I should have stressed the part about ´one set´. The same day, I ended up with my own laundromat! Darko pulled up in a moving van.

"Donna, I bought forty-three washers and dryers!"

"Forty-three?"

"No eighty-six in total."

"I don´t have that many diapers. ARE YOU KIDDING?"

"No, Listen, NONE of them work. I´ll repair them. You put an ad in the paper. We´ll sell them from the basement. We´ll be able to pay off the overdraft in no time.

Some months later, after purchasing a carpet, I should have known better than to ask for a vacuum cleaner. NINETY! Yes sir . . . instantly, I was in the vacuum cleaner business. Never, NEVER will I ask for another appliance. My $15.00 refrigerator will just have to go to the grave with me. When the kids get old enough to walk I´ll never be able to find them in this mess.

Since we had a ´mess´ of washers, dryers, vacuums, belts, buckles, you name it, we decided we would try our luck at a flea market. Get rid of some of this junk, especially since we were going to move. Maybe we could move our inventory a bit quicker, in greater volumes, than one by one through ads.

It was only early September but a dreadful, bone-chilling day. I was really getting cold. "Darko, I´m freezing. Let´s go."

"We´re just starting to sell. How can you be COLD? Put on my jacket."

It didn´t help. A vendor nearby noticed that my lips had turned blue and brought the sheep skins he was selling to bundle me up. It was too late. I couldn´t stop shaking. Nobody else was cold. Just me. Darko took me home and I climbed into bed telling him to look after the boys for the rest of the day and send the baby-sitter home.

I had hot and cold chills. A fever so high I was perspiring, yet shaking, from cold. Darko made some hot tea with honey and wrapped me in a thick quilt, tied around my waist so I couldn´t uncover myself overnight. He didn´t know I put the boys in a cool tub when they had a fever. I was in no shape to realize anything. All night he called doctor after doctor from the phone book. Nobody made house calls anymore. "Take her to a hospital," they replied, "if she´s that bad." By the time he reached the ´F´s´ he located a sweet doc who came within minutes.

"She has pneumonia. Her fever´s so high we´ll have to take her to the hospital. You should have kept her cool."

"She was freezing, I didn´t´ want her to catch pneumonia. We´ve got nobody to look after the babies. She´ll never stay in the hospital unless she can bring them along."

"Okay, fine. I´ll leave her till morning. If there´s no improvement she´ll have to go in."

Darko had left in the morning to do a quick emergency call. He had put the playpen and the kids by my bed after feeding and changing them, and told them not to move. "Stay there and watch TV until I get back. Don´t wake mommy. She´s sick."

When I woke up I had big red spots all over my body. ´The fever´s made me delirious´, I thought.

Just then Darko walked in. "WHAT ARE THOSE SPOTS?" He ran to the bed.

"Do you see them too?"

This sweet doc was always there when you needed him. "Don´t panic. I´ll be right over."

He took one look at me and said, "She´s allergic to penicillin and "STOP SMOKING."

I couldn´t even sit up, but I COULD smoke. I quit until 5:00 p.m. but didn´t feel any better. I couldn´t feel any worse, s-o-o-o since I slept for most of the night and day, the few I snuck couldn´t hurt.

My mother had faced the humiliation of not being around when I needed her the last time and now had talked my dad into lettering he come every day. She sat on the corner of my bed crying, sobbing, howling.

"What are you going to do? Who´s going to bring them up? You´re going to die. I told you to eat more. You and your stupid diets. See what´s happened. Why are you still smoking?"

I had to use a bed pan because I had become too weak to go as far as the bathroom. I would bend over and change one diaper and then have to lay back, heaving and gasping for air, before I could change the other. She was sitting far away so that I couldn´t get at her, ten hours a day, just crying.

"Why don´t you change a diaper?" I had to take three breaths between each word. "Either help or get out!"

My dad had phoned dozens of times, upset over the fact that she wasn´t at the store, helping. He couldn´t close the store to take his afternoon nap (he couldn´t make it through the day without one).

"What is she doing over there? How much cleaning is there?" he yelled.

"She´s NOT scrubbing pots and washing diapers! She´s NOT helping. I can´t even get her to get a baby bottle from the fridge, which I DO need. Don´t let her come. I don´t want her here. Keep her home. She´s driving me crazy sitting on the edge of my bed crying all day."

I was throwing things at her. Pillows, diapers, anything I could reach to get her out of my room. The boys thought it was a game. I had a whole day´s supply of diapers, water, juice, anything I might need. Anything that wouldn´t damage a wall or break a mirror, I threw at her. She hid behind the door and continued, "What´s going to happen to those poor children when you die?"

"Mother, you´re going to die as soon as I´m strong enough to get out of bed. GET OUT OF HERE!"

I was determined I was going to get better quickly, just so I could strangle her. She´d always leave before Darko got home. He would phone my dad and insist that he not allow her to come again.

Next morning I picked up the phone and called the hospitals, the police station and the fire department, explaining if someone didn´t come to get her, I would get worse, not better.

"Ma´am, unless she´s a physical threat to the life of you or herself, there is nothing we can do."

"But if I could reach her, I would kill her."

"Sorry, Ma´am. We can´t help you."

Now, realizing that I was serious, she was threatening to throw herself under the next train that went by.

"Good, do it! Just get out and don´t come back."

My guilt was unbearable. She wouldn´t do it. She was too much of a catholic. I felt like a monster, but I had to think of myself first. I had to. I had enough to cope with, without being a nursemaid to her.

Why did I feel so guilty? She left me to die on top of the Alps. My uncle told me, many times, if it hadn´t been for him, I would still be three and a half years old, frozen to death on top of a mountain. I was too heavy for her to carry. It was either both of us, or me. She chose to leave ME. When my uncle realized what happened, he carried me, in a nap sack, into Austria. She left me again, with Zandar. Why do I feel as if I owe her, to feel sorry for her? Why?

Who care? I have to get better.

Having the boys right in my room, beside me all day, they quickly learned how to say many words. They´d point at the TV and say ´GOOK´, meaning look; ´WALU´, meaning water. In the five weeks it took me to recuperate, they really grew. In more ways than one. Talking to them, singing songs, teaching them games, I enjoyed every minute.

Nancy, a girl that was one of my regular sitters, showed up at the door one morning. "Donna, could you drive me to work?"

"I´m sorry, I´ve got pneumonia."

"You just have to drive me." she persisted. "I have to go to work."

"I can´t, I´m too sick. Take a taxi.´

"I can´t afford a taxi. You just have to drive me."

"Don´t you understand?" I was absolutely furious! "I´m sick! Besides, I don´t work. I have to support a car, the license plates, the insurance and the upkeep, so I can drive everyone on the block wherever they have to go. I have become everyone´s taxi, taking them to jobs where they are earning wages! You can´t afford a taxi but I suppose I can afford to be everyone´s free taxi."
I slammed the door. People still took me for a doormat.

The next day I had a ruder awakening. I walked the few doors to Shirley´s house, to retrieve my iron which I had leant her five weeks before. She came to the second floor balcony and bluntly exclaimed, "You can´t have it back today, I have to iron Mark´s pants."

"Shirley, I have to go to the doctor´s and I have to iron my pant suit."

"Mark´ll be furious if his pants aren´t ironed."

"I don´t care Shirley, you´ve had it five weeks."

"I´ll bring it to you tomorrow."

I couldn´t believe the gall of her. "It´s my damn iron, bring it to me NOW!" I had to beg to get my own iron back! Wasn´t anyone normal?

By the time I got to the doctor´s office I thought my blood pressure would be through the roof. The doctor couldn´t believe my X-rays. "The way you smoke Donna, and pneumonia as well, I really expected the worst. But your lungs are as healthy as a newborn´s."

He shouldn´t have told me that, not if he ever wanted to see me quit smoking. At least I found a flaw in this man; otherwise he´d be a perfect human being

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