The Year 9/11 Happened. The Year I got Married (19)

I arrived at the Women’s Shelter that afternoon, I had never been to a shelter before and like I mentioned before, didn’t really understand the concept behind it or was aware of what kind of people stayed in a shelter, but I would soon find out. It wasn’t big or fancy, in fact, it had been there for a while but it was okay. It had several rooms on one floor, a few rooms, a kitchen and a living room type space in the basement level.

I walked into the front room, which was like the main living room, to the right was the office where the man in charge him was working. There was him and his wife who owned and ran the shelter and then there was another man who worked there with his wife. They were very nice people, who went to church and were very kind. The social worker explained to them why I was there and they quickly welcomed me there as they made arrangements for me to move in. The social worker left after making sure that I was okay being there and I would never see her again.

As I stood in the living room waiting for the director to get a few things lined up, I looked around the room. It was like a square shaped room, with couches going all around, a big television sat in the corner, a desk sat by a window on one side with a phone sitting on it. There was an entrance that lead to the two different floors of rooms, my room was on the second floor. My room was very nice and quaint, it had a full size bed up against a wall, a microwave and mini fridge in the corner, a huge dresser with a TV on it, a mini vanity with a sink on one wall with a closet. The room was white, with a window that had a fan unit in it and carpet laid on the floor. I soon found that my room was one of the nicer rooms there in the shelter and I considered myself very blessed to have such a room. The shelter elsewhere showed signs of age and wear but the director kept up with it the best he could. It was the responsibility of the ladies there to keep up with the cleaning of the shelter, the community bathrooms, the kitchen and the living spaces. I soon met some of the ladies there, they all were different, older than me, some were old enough to be my mom or grandma. There was a lady there who had children, boys, one was in his very early teens and the other one was young maybe 7 or 8 years old. I would soon get close with this little family, kind of taking the boys under my wing as their mother tried to work her life out.

All the ladies had a story, they were either dealing with legal issues, drugs, or alcohol, custody battles, job problems, yet they were all very friendly. They soon found out what my story was after several of the ladies had been convinced that I couldn’t be old enough to be there. I guess my physical attributes hadn’t quite matured with my mental maturity, I still looked like a little girl to most people and I would look like one for a few years.

Everybody there at the shelter pretty much knew each other and kind of acted like one small happy family, well as happy as they could be considering their troubling circumstances. The director and assistant director and their wives were very kind people and would talk to me when they could. I would explain further why I was there and how my journey which had started just a little over a year ago, led me to their doors.

While adjusting to life in the shelter, I did what I could to stay in church, a few of the people who I had become friends with, made it a point to stay in touch with me and help me when they could. Mrs. Linda Ritchie, was one of the ladies who lived near by and she would pick me up for church, usually after she picked up Mike. Mike was a cool guy, who had some issues. He was old enough to be my dad, but lived at home with his parents, he had lost his drivers license due to a DUI and because he couldn’t go anywhere, he was subjected to living in the basement of his parents house. Mike was a very kind person but he struggled with prescription pills which I guess fed his depression, something he really struggled with. But, Mike was faithful to church, and soon he and I became good friends, it was nothing weird or inappropriate. I guess I was good at being friends with about anybody really, and looking back, I guess I was just looking for friendship, because there was nothing else.

Soon, I was working the bus route at Shining Light, and then the pastor, Bro. Danny, asked me to work children’s church. I was good with the kids and I was able to do fun songs with them, and teach them a few Bible verses. It was a great thing for me to do and Bro. Danny and the others were very impressed with my abilities to relate to the kids and keep their attention. I was becoming very good friends with the people at the church, even some of the younger teenage girls.

So, while I was adjusting to my new life at the Women’s Shelter and at Church, my relationship with Jonsey was also growing, or at least I thought it was. We would talk on the phone as often as we could and he would send me packages and letters. I felt special, and really felt like he loved me, again, I thought so anyways. It felt nice to have someone love me, nobody else really did, not my family anyways. I hadn’t talked to the adopted mother since I left the Girls’ Home, by the time that whole mess was over, it was pretty clear that college life at Pensacola Christian was never going to happen, no thanks to lies and false promises. I would try to apply at Hyle’s Anderson College in Indiana, and would be accepted but soon realized that I had no way of getting there, no money to buy necessary clothes and it was just something else that didn’t work out.

The only money I had was the $200 that the social workers had forced Mr. Dave to pay me. That was it. So, I had to make it work. After being at the Shelter for almost a month, the directors helped me look for a job. A job. I had never had one of those before, never applied for one, and had no clue how that worked. But, I would just do what I could and go with it. If I remember right, the first place I applied for was a Burger King. It was on the other side of town, up a hill and I would walk up that hill to the restaurant and fill out an application, I would go to the Ingles grocery store there in the shopping plaza too and fill out an application there. There were a few other places I applied for and I would wait to hear back from them but wouldn’t really get a response unless I called them and followed up on application, only to be turned down. But, I would follow up on the application at Burger King and would be told to come in for an interview. I was so excited, even though I didn’t know what to be excited about exactly but I was nervous too. The directors told me what to do and what to expect and they kindly told me not to be nervous and to just be myself.

So, I walked up the hill that day in late August and sat down with store manager whose name was Becky. Becky was a sweet lady, very outspoken, but, very friendly. As I sat down we talked, we hit it right off when she found out my name was Jessica, she too had a daughter named Jessica and after asking me a few questions, she was very surprised that I had manners; in fact she was rather impressed. Of course, the question came up as to what I was doing there in Marion, North Carolina and I briefly told her how I ended up there. The professional interview became more like a friendly conversation and Becky was just surprised that I was there and somehow had a head on my shoulders. She told me that day I was hired and that she looked forward to working with me. I left Burger King so excited that I had gotten a job, surprised mostly because I didn’t think I could get a job. The directors were very excited for me and even treated me out to dinner to celebrate and I’m guessing part of their excitement was that I was now going to be getting a paycheck and I was going to have to start paying something to live at the shelter.

Working at Burger King was really easy and I soon made a friend there, her name was Karen. She trained me from day one how to do everything I knew how to do. I guess having some kind of work ethic from working my whole childhood, had spilled over into my work at BK, within a week I had went from the first training station to working the registers. I was learning quick and it really surprised the managers. I soon found that most people who started working there never got past their training stations or at least for a while. But, I was doing everything and I was making the managers proud.

Karen and I soon became very close friends and whenever her mamma would pick her up from work, usually I was getting off at the same time and they would give me a ride to the shelter. I didn’t mind walking around town, it was just that, a town. It was beautiful living there and I was starting to feel like I had a life now, a life to call my own. My friends were the people I worked with, the people from church and the ladies and directors at the shelter. That was it. I didn’t know anybody else. I had no way of finding friends back home in Houston, I didn’t have phone numbers or anything. I had no grandparents or aunts or uncles to look up, there was nobody and yet there was a part of me that just wanted to be loved and the only thing that looked like love was Jonsey. He was calling me frequently from the Roloff Homes and we would talk about the future. He had convinced me that I was the one he wanted to marry but he hadn’t proposed. I wasn’t sure what would happen between us, if I was in N.C. and he in Texas, but that started working itself really quickly, the day 9/11 happened.

I will never forget it. It was my day off and I had been sleeping in but I remember dreaming very vividly and in my dream, it was kind dark and there were military helicopters flying around a city, and they were flying low. I don’t remember much about the dream except that in the dream something was wrong and that’s why the helicopters were flying around, something bad had happened but I didn’t know what. I woke up around 9:00, and after getting washed up and dressed for the day, I went downstairs to the living room. A lot of the ladies where sitting there and directors were standing around and everyone was glued to the TV. As I looked at the TV, I saw along with the rest of the world, the second plane hit the second World Trade Center. Some of the ladies screamed, some covered their mouths in disbelief and you could hear a few saying  out loud ‘Oh my God’. Of course I had to figure out what the World Trade Center was, I had never heard of it before and when I found out I too was in disbelief. We all sat there watching the news unfolding, soon, we would hear about the plane hitting the Pentagon and then the news turned to the fourth plane that was in real time being hijacked in the air over Pennsylvania. It was just too much. Those broadcasting the news didn’t know where to go and cover, there was news happening everywhere. So much loss of life was happening in 4 different places. I remember the ladies and the directors were talking and wondering with the rest of the world if the Towers would fall over because of the impact they had taken from the planes. And then sure enough, we sat along with the rest of the world and watch the first tower crumble to the ground like a bunch of children’s blocks. We could not believe it. The Towers weren’t supposed to be able to do that, they were strong and able to withstand it but they weren’t made to withstand the heat that was so incredibly hot. As we sat there, some of the ladies had tears in their eyes, we watched as the second tower fell too. We just could not believe what we were seeing and hearing. Everyone what was a huge reporter that day were on TV, trying to make sense of it all. I remember Tom Brokehaw, Peter Jennings, Brian Williams and others, all on TV trying to cover what was going on. They couldn’t keep up. There was so much devastation and death everywhere.

As the day went on, and as some of us were able to peel our eyes away from the TV, some of the ladies were worried about their money being in the bank. Because we lived in N.C. we were close to Charlotte and Charlotte was a big bank city and I remember the banks there were closing in fear of what was going on that day.

It was just a crazy day, full of sadness and helplessness. I remember feeling helpless and feeling an urge to go to New York to do something to help but I couldn’t.

At the end of the day while the TV was still on in the living room, and the news just kept going, Jonsey called and we talked about what had happened. I don’t remember much about what else we talked about except that he proposed and asked me over the phone if I would marry him. I guess he and anybody else that had lived through that awful and sad day, thought the world was coming to an end. So, I said yes. I said yes to marrying a guy who I thought really loved me and I thought I loved him too. But, I really didn’t know exactly what love was, I thought I did and I thought I had learned what love wasn’t so knowing that somebody loved me was a comforting idea.

Soon, we made plans, Jonsey was going to come to North Carolina, he had already decided that he wanted us to get married December 14^th of 2001. Why that date, I’ll never know but I agreed to it. My friend Karen who lived in a small, independent trailer park, had found out that a small 2 bedroom trailer in the park had opened up and so we looked into getting it for Jonsey. He would need some where to live, as he couldn’t stay at the women’s shelter. Jonsey finally came up in October, moved into the trailer and started looking for a job. He ended up working at a truck stop that had a TCBY store and a restaurant in it. He would be one of the cooks. I would keep working at Burger King, by then I was starting to train to be shift manager. Becky and the two shift managers there saw potential and they knew I could do it even though they hadn’t had anybody learn the restaurant that quickly. Within a matter of weeks, I had left my station making hamburgers and was proficient at the register and or the drive-thru.

Eventually near November, Jonsey and I decided that instead of me paying to live at the Shelter and him paying for the trailer, we would move in together and save some money for the wedding. The directors at the Shelter tried to convince me to go to the local health department to get on birth control. They were concerned that I was going to be pregnant before we got married and they wanted me to wait even until after the wedding to have a baby. But, the whole birth control idea scared me. I had heard and learned about it at the Roloff Homes but for some reason it wasn’t a good idea to me. Besides, I was still a virgin and planned on being one when I got married. Jonsey and I had agreed that even though we were living together, we weren’t going to have sex until our wedding night. He was on board for it and I was too. But then I didn’t know much about sex, it was a taboo thing at home and even at the Roloff Homes, I hadn’t been exposed too much to the subject. I even trust Jonsey to not do anything to me either, I thought since he loved me he would respect me and my body but I would be wrong.

After leaving the Shelter and saying good bye to the ladies and the kids, I moved into the trailer. I still kept my job at Burger King and Jonsey was working at the truck stop. Karen was still at Burger King too and she was becoming a really good friend, even though she had a boyfriend who wasn’t much of a man. He was always doing drugs, cocaine and drinking. Karen drank too but she stayed away from the drugs, hoping that her boyfriend would clean up his act too and get away from it. That was the first time I had been that close to drugs and what they did to people and it was kind of scary. Karen would hold her own though and her boyfriend Mike was a cool guy when he was sober and not high as a horse. 

Life was going to pretty good I thought but the day came when it was time to let my adopted parents know I was getting married and Jonsey was supposed to tell his Dad and stepmom and mom and step dad. Well, my adopted parents didn’t want to have a thing to do with it or me and that was the end of that. I wasn’t surprised at all.

Jonsey called his Dad and stepmom who lived in Florida and they didn’t even know he was in North Carolina, he hadn’t bothered to tell them. His mom and stepdad in Atlanta were all excited and planned to give him the money they had set aside for his college fund so that we could have the wedding. I was soon learning what kind of family he had and it was kind of weird. His mom and stepdad fell in love with me and were happy for us, his Dad on the other hand wasn’t too sure. In fact I would learn later that they thought I had made their son leave Texas and I was the problem. His Dad and stepmom wouldn’t be a part off the wedding, they wanted nothing to do with it really.

As the weeks went by and time got closer to the wedding date, I was getting really comfortable with how things were. There was a sense of a routine and I had friends that cared about me. I was still involved with the church teaching children’s church and everyone was learning to accept Jonsey, even there were a few people who weren’t so sure that we should be getting married, at least not so soon. Looking back, I realize that people were looking out for me and warning me but I was convinced that this was what I wanted, I was loved and I couldn’t face the idea of being unloved again but I would soon question Jonsey and his motives.

One night when were in bed, he thought I was asleep and lack of being specific, he pretty much molested me in order to molest himself. I didn’t know what he was doing to me, I just lay there and didn’t know what to do. I wasn’t sure what to think, and I never said a word about it until years later. I soon wondered if he wanted to marry me for the right reasons, apparently he couldn’t keep his hands off me until our wedding night and if that’s all he wanted me for than maybe I was making a mistake? But, I would convince myself that it was just something that happened and in a matter of a couple of weeks we would be married.

We were married in a couple of weeks. We had the wedding at Shining Light with Bro. Danny officiating the wedding. We had invited the church to come but just a few people showed up. Two of the teenage girls that I had befriended and worked with sang ‘A Whole New World’. Karen would be my maid of honor, Scott a friend of Karen’s and I from Burger King would be there, my assistant manager Nancy came and took my pictures. Jonsey’s Mom and stepdad came; his step dad would be his best man. My good friend Mike would give me away, since my family wanted nothing to do with the whole idea. That was pretty much it. It was small and looking back, maybe awkward? But, we got married. I was 19 years old, he in his early 20s and we were married. We spent our honeymoon night in a hotel that his mom had gotten for us there in town. We had a small used car but we didn’t have the money to spend on a nice honeymoon, so the hotel was it. We spent one night there and then it was back to our little trailer, and within a couple of days it was back to our jobs and starting a life officially married as a couple. I didn’t know what was going to happen from there on out. Christmas was coming and we had enough money left over from the wedding to have a nice Christmas together. We bought tickets to go see the Gaithers in Charlotte New Year’s eve and we took Karen and Scotty with us. It was a nice night out and we had a ton of fun, but, a new year was starting and so much lay ahead of us, much certainty and yet uncertainty. So much had happened that year in 2001, I had left a life I had known in Corpus Christi, to start a life in North Carolina in the mountains, to start a life being married and it all happened so quickly that looking back, that year was more like a blur than anything else. I didn’t know what the year 2002 would hold in store but it would start out pretty dramatic. Dramatic is so many ways, ways I could only have dreamed about.

Until next time, be blessed and inspired to make a difference!

~The Adopted Child