Dark Places

Warning: Vague references to abusive relationships.

I could feel LeeLee’s gaze on me as I kept my own eyes steadily trained on the water cup in front of me. It was one of those textured brown cola cups that I remember vaguely from pictures of the 90’s. Either this diner has the oldest cups ever or they found a retro restaurant supply to help drive home their diner theme. 

Hugging a cold cup in my hands was something I liked to do to help me keep myself grounded in the moment. But I knew LeeLee wouldn’t let me drift away even if I wanted to. Even though I wasn’t looking at her, I knew exactly the look she was giving me right now. I’d seen it at least a hundred times before. Chocolate brown eyes that remained steady but soft. Her angular face mellow. It was a look that said, “Mac, I’m not going anywhere, so take as much time as you need to think.” Eventually I let my gaze travel up to her hands which were hugging a mug of hot coffee. I teased her once about drinking coffee at all hours of the day or night and she’d told me she doesn’t judge my coping skills, I shouldn’t judge hers. 

The silence between us hung for a long time. I’d gotten used to the fact that she was comfortable with silence and so I couldn’t just wait her out to get out of a tough question. But my mind had swirled around with so many thoughts since she’d asked her question that I could no longer remember what it was. As if sensing this, she spoke “Let me ask you this, what do you get if you stay in this relationship? Anything good?”

I inhaled deeply, we both knew the answer. It was time for me to say it out loud, “No. Nothing. Nothing good.” 

I could sense her nod. I had known her so long, I didn’t need to look at her to know her mannerisms. “You’ve always felt the need to take care of people. He is taking advantage of that. If you let him go, I promise you he won’t be homeless. He acts like a boy, but he is a grown man. Relationships should be reciprocal. You’re taking care of him, but is he taking care of you?” I shook my head. Her next question cut through me, “Don’t you think someone should be?” She paused then added, “If you don’t, I definitely do.”

She let another silence hang a bit.I kept my eyes on the cup. There were a million reasons to leave. It was weird how the shame this relationship caused, the shame that kept me from looking at LeeLee, somehow was part of the reason that I almost felt like I had to stay. 

After the silence dragged on a bit and I’d had ample time to consider her monologue, I could sense LeeLee lower her head closer to the surface of the table trying to draw my gaze. “I’ll support you no matter what you do, you don’t have to be ashamed to look at me.” It could be amazing and annoying how well she seemed to read my thoughts. I tapped my fingertip against my cup a couple times before gathering the courage to raise my eyes to hers. The expression on her face was the one I expected. A never ending well of care and kindness. 

“Someone should be taking care of you. And I really think that person should be you.” The faintest grin hinted at the corner of her mouth and she sat back against the red vinyl booth. 

“You know, I know you’re right.”

“Of course I do,” her smile grew a bit wider, “I usually am.”

I sighed but smiled as well “You’re really annoying.”

“Yes, I am that too.” Her smile faded slightly and she cocked her head at me with a contemplative stare.

“What?” 

She didn’t respond immediately but after a long moment, she nodded, more to herself it seemed, and then finally stated, “I think you’re ready.”

“Ready for what?”

“You’ll see,” LeeLee gestured to our waitress. She sauntered over casually in her red half apron. She had a look in her eye that said she didn’t love or hate being there. She nodded an acknowledgment to LeeLee but said nothing. LeeLee’s eyes were bright and her voice was airy and she spoke to the woman whose name tag said “Stella.”

“We’re going outside for a bit. I can pay for the coffee now if you’d prefer. But please don’t clear our table. We’ll be back.”

Stella looked at LeeLee, then at me, then a hard gaze again at LeeLee. Finally, she picked up a napkin, draped it over LeeLee’s mug and walked away. 

“I guess we have her blessing,” LeeLee started to inch over on her seat trying to release herself from the springy booth. I didn’t move right away so she added, “c’mon. I want you to see something.”

It was the kind of bright, shiny day outside that was opposite of my mood. Interesting how only a few short weeks ago, I would have been shivering outside in this t-shirt. To see the seasons change so quickly could be off-putting when my life seemed to stay the same. 

LeeLee walked purposefully toward a small white van. The kind where there were no side windows. “

LeeLee, how come I’ve known you for so many years and didn’t know you drive a murder van?”

She shrugged her shoulders lightly and glanced at me with a grin, “this isn’t a murder van.”

“There are no side windows.”

“True, but murder vans are loooonger,” her hands stretched away from each other in the universal gesture for long. 

We were stopped at the back of her tiny van. She was right, it was smaller than a traditional murder van. Maybe it wasn’t considered a van? It was definitely bigger than a car though.

“Open it,” LeeLee told me.

“What?”

There was a glint in her eye, “Don’t you want to see what’s inside?”

“I don’t know!” LeeLee could be so frustrating sometimes. I knew why she was cryptic sometimes, that whole you can lead a horse to water but can’t make them drink thing. But damn if it wasn’t annoying. Like maybe she should try and make me drink. Maybe sometimes if she tried to make me, I’d do it. And then it’d be simpler and easier.

I stared at her but she just looked back at me with that same face she always has. Her non-judgmental waiting face. I sighed and turned toward the tiny van, cupped my hand under the lever and pulled up. 

The door swung open. Of all the things that could have possibly been in that van, I did not expect what I found. Both windowless sides of the van were lined floor to ceiling with books. Books on little shelves that looked like they had been retrofitted to fit the exact slight curvature of the little van. Directly across from me was another shelf. This one only about two thirds of the way to the ceiling, leaving a long rectangular window. Probably so she could still use her rearview. This smaller shelf was also crammed with books. 

“LeeLee, why do you drive a murder van full of books?”

She chuckled, “for when people need them. Like you do now.”

I could feel the frown settling on my face at her answer. It was clear these weren’t just any books. I recognized some of the titles. They were some of the workbooks that me or some of my peers had to do back when I was in treatment. Which was where I met LeeLee. But there were other books too. Some real books. But there were a lot of leather-bound books that looked like journals. They were all about the same height and width. But different colors. They were clustered together on various different shelves. 

LeeLee turned her back toward the open van and perched herself on the floor of the open vehicle, legs hanging, toes just barely grazing the gravel below. She waited and after a moment I sat too. “You know,” she started, “I knew you’d keep calling. Even after I resigned from Evergreen Treatment. I knew you’d call me forever if I let you. The trust I earned with you was hard fought. You keep calling me because I am one of the few people in your life who have never violated that trust. It’s not because people like me don’t exist often. But because you don’t know how to find people like me. And unfortunately, that is true for so many people I met at Evergreen.” She was staring out at the diner, but it felt like she was looking past it. I’d seen this look before too. I was fairly certain she was picturing every kid she’d ever worked with. “There were good books at Evergreen. I bought some of them,” she gestured somewhat aimlessly behind us, “for when you or someone else called.” She took a deep breath, “But I always felt like what many of you needed was the actual stories. You know, the stories or the people who hit their rock bottom and climbed out. The stories of the people who were dragged to dark places but did not stay there.” She looked back at the collection of books, “I call this ‘Survivor Library.” 

I allowed my gaze to follow hers back towards the collection of books and journals. She hadn’t worked at Evergreen for some years now. I wasn’t surprised that she still stayed in touch with other kids besides me, but I was surprised that she would dedicate a vehicle to something like this. “LeeLee, we literally talk so much, how come I didn’t know about this? Why are you keeping a secret library if it’s here to help people?”

Her whole face broke into a grin as she cocked her head at me, “well it’s not exactly a secret. But it’s my money that bought these workbooks. And more importantly, my time and energy that went into finding the people for these journals. Not to mention that these are people’s very personal stories. These books,” she gestured grandly, “have the power to help a lot of people. But they won’t help you until you’re ready. I have to protect them until then.”

“And you think I’m ready now?”

“Yep.”

I gazed again at the mini sea of books, “Are they all for people in abusive relationships?”

“Oh no,” she pointed toward the left wall of the van, “that’s pretty much all of these, but I have stuff on chemical dependency, self-love, depression… most things.” She leaned back and started running her finger over spines of the cluster of journals on the left wall of the van. It was hard to imagine she knew what she was looking for, there were no titles on any of them. While all the journals were the same size, there were lots of colors. Mostly jewel tones. Her finger passed over a topaz one, a ruby toned one, and emerald shaded one and then came to rest on a sapphire one. She pulled it out. Opened it about a third of the way through. Scanned it, turned a couple pages and then seemed to find what she was looking for. “Here it is,” She turned the open book around and handed it to me, “Jenna’s story.”

“Who is Jenna?”

“You’ll find out what you need to know about Jenna as you read it. But I think you’ll be able to relate to what she went through. What you should know right now is, I’m still in touch with Jenna, and she’s doing great.”

I looked down at the journal, the opening sentence was, “At my darkest moments, I opened my eyes every morning hoping I wasn’t alive.” She certainly hadn’t always been doing great. 

“I looked back up at LeeLee, I could feel tears in my eyes, “You think I’m ready for this?”

“If you weren’t ready, you wouldn’t have met me here. This is your dark place. You are ready for something different, you’re just scared that somehow it will get worse. I don’t think it will get worse, I think you’re in the worst of it, but even if it does get worse, you need to know that some people have been brought to the very depths of hell and were able to claw their way out. And you can too. I wouldn’t be here if you couldn’t. You have a fire in you. Mac, girl… LET THAT FIRE BUUURRRRN!” 

LeeLee climbed into the van and reached over the short bookshelf into the front seat. She pulled out a pack of tissues and a charcoal colored collapsible sports chair that soccer moms have. “Here’s a chair if you want one. You can read whatever else you want in here after Jenna’s story. Take as much time as you need. I’ll be inside drinking my coffee. After you’ve discovered what you need, there will be a piece of pie waiting for you inside.” She climbed out of the baby van and gave me a soft look. Then she turned and walked back to the diner. 

I hadn’t moved since she put that journal in my hands. I stared into the diner and watched her chat with Stella and lift her coffee mug to her lips. She was right about most things per usual. I was scared. Also, I was probably more ready than I’d ever been to leave. But I wasn’t so sure I was ready to read Jenna’s story though. Was I ready to know the story of someone else’s story like mine? To know this pain was inflicted on someone else?

I looked down at the journal. It must of taken a lot of strength for Jenna to write this. And she wrote it for women like me. If she had the strength to get out, I probably did too. Mentally, I knew that. I think that’s what LeeLee wants me to know. She could only give me so much advice and she knew that. That’s why she’d given me this book, so that I could learn what to do from someone who lived it. 

I let my gaze travel over all the books in this microlibrary. LeeLee had clearly collected them, organized them and apparently memorized them with so much love. I allowed that love to warm me as I looked back down at the journal. 

“At my darkest moments, I opened my eyes every morning hoping I wasn’t alive.” I took a deep breath and read on.