Soul of Moons: Snowden Olos... (Part 2)

My mother was the typical stay at home mom. She was part of that house. The walls, the furniture, the ugly little chipped mug in the kitchen, all of it was my mom. She was fiercely proud of every inch too. Mostly, from my view, she cooked, cleaned and raised us while my dad preached in a pulpit.
Whereas my mother was the picture of motherly love, my father fades in and out. I wasn’t the son he wanted, therefore, unworthy of his attention. It’s not like I was a serial killer or anything. Truth is, how he behaved, one would think my dad would have preferred to find out I was the next Ed Gein. No, I’m not kidding. I think he would have preferred a son bringing him home a candy dish made from a human skull than a boyfriend.
I was born on October 31, 1977. According to my mother, I was a bright, happy, loving baby. Out of my siblings, I was the well behaved one. My first vivid memory of being alive was going to church with my family every Sunday. I come from a strict, southern Baptist background. Everything was Jesus this, church that. The bible was the shield in our home. Probably the sword and the shield. I remember my mom used to sit me in between my older sister and brother because they would pinch each other if she didn’t. I would sing along with the hymns and swing my legs back and forth, proud to be helping my mom in any way I could, even if it was sitting in between Malcolm and Piper.
Malcolm and Piper were always referred to as “busybodies”.
Piper was Dad’s little princess. Same as every other Daddy’s girl on the planet. His little golden babe. Piper could do no wrong. Tell him she burnt down the house and he’d swore it burst into flames on its own. God’s will be done. Not his Piper. Nu uh. No way. His Piper was a good girl. Malcolm, on the other hand, was a brown-nosing waste of air. I didn’t grow up with a strong sense of kinship when it came to my older brother. For some reason, a relationship between the two of us never seemed likely. I was only six when I realized my brother hated me. He liked fighting with Piper, but me? No. He didn’t even want to be in the same room with me if it could be avoided. Malcolm hated it when mom would shove me in between them. He would spend the rest of service with his eyes glued to the green fabric on Daddy’s robe with the sullenest expression he could muster. Piper, on the other hand, would sing hymns with me, beaming proudly at our dad.
Our father wasn’t just any preacher. He was the preacher. I didn’t realize until I was older that this was significant in any way. In a small town, the church, our church was the only one where we held court and by “we”, I mean African Americans. A highly sought-after position according to my mother’s hushed conversations with the neighbors. “Everyone wanted it but not everyone deserved it.” Is what she would tell anyone who came over. I forgot to mention my mom had a bit of a gossiping problem. She didn’t have friends. Not in the traditional sense. She had the “sisters” from the church who would shuffle over to our house where my mom would make “oh my, I had no idea you were coming” cookies and gossip for hours on end about everything from the members of our church to the neighbors on our block. They even gossiped about Ms. Dandelion, the woman who lived at the end of our street. I didn’t find out until I was older why they had it in for Ms. Dandelion. That wasn’t even her real name. That’s just what I called her because her yard would stay covered in them in the spring. Ms. Dandelion was, according to one of the “sisters”, a bit of a whore. At such a young, tender age, I had no idea what Ms. Dandelion did to earn such a name, but eh, it wasn’t my job to understand church talk. Why did I care if Ms. Dandelion’s skirts barely covered her ass? Or that a certain deacon had been seen more than once slithering through her back gate? As you can see, my mom and her “friends” had boring conversations. Nope, I was in it for the cookies. My mom only baked them for show. The “sisters” knew it, she knew it. It was an unspoken truth between them that I was perfectly okay with as long as I was allowed to partake. Which I was so I didn’t bother them too much about their gossip sessions.
Personally, I didn’t like the church “sisters”. They would come over and it felt like their asses would make permanent indents in our chairs. One day, the gossip turned to me. I was sitting on the floor playing with one of Pipers dolls when Miss Calvin, who was single by choice, (Not because she was a nosy know-it-all who treated people like crap. No, of course not.) glanced over and noticed me. She’d been there a clean two hours and this was her first time acknowledging my presence. Her dark, beady eyes narrowed and zeroed in on my scalp. Even though I wasn’t looking directly at the kitchen table, I was highly aware of the judgement levels in the house rising to a record high. It went from partly cloudy to partly cloudy with a chance of isolated bitchiness real quick.
“Lydia,” She somehow managed to give my mom’s name six syllables with her southern drawl. One of her short, stubby fingers pointed down at my feet. “What on Earth is your boy wearing?”
I willed myself to stay in my “good boy” lane. It was not my job to point out that it would be easier to gossip about the deacons playing poker on Wednesday nights instead of the prayer service they were always going on about than it would be for her to care about the glitter I’d decorated a pair of Piper’s old shoes with. According to my mom, I could keep them, but they were not allowed to make an appearance outside her front door. Not that I understood. I thought Piper’s raggedy Mary Janes looked absolutely stunning in glittery blue and gold. I’d even crafted little swirls around the heels. Ever the good boy, I cradled Piper’s doll to my chest and got up to leave. Before I made my exit, since I had to pass them anyway, I paused to collect three cookies. I was barely out of the kitchen when I heard: “You keep on and the whole town will be talking.” Translation: I will be talking. Keeping my trap closed is too much of a chore.
“It’s just some shoes.” My mother muttered. I knew she knew I was standing at the door eavesdropping. I was the good one but I was also a gossip in the making and I wanted to know what was so wrong with my shoes that I’d spend hours perfecting.
“Just some shoes?” Miss Calvin’s voice had taken on a disgusted tone.
“Yes, shoes.” Something wasn’t right. My mom only used that voice with Malcolm and Piper when she wanted then to do as she said right then, no questions asked. No back talk. No lip.
“No need to get testy.” She said calmly as if my mom was overreacting. “I was only asking because how old is Snowden? Six?” She inhaled a gulp of air before spitting it out: “The minister’s son can’t be gay, honey. It’s a disgrace.”
“What makes you think my son is gay?” My mom’s first lady façade was starting to crack. One thing I knew about my mom at this point from snippets of conversation here and there was that she wasn’t always the prim and trim woman these women knew. My grandmother on my dad’s side was always calling my mom a “wild one.” From the smile beaming from her lips every time she said it, one could get the idea that she would have been perfectly fine if my mother had popped out of her belly.
“Oh Lydia, you don’t have to be so protective. I’m just making sure you’re keeping around your doorsteps swept. A gay son could tip the scales at the monthly vote. You know how this town is. Small town, strong, Christian values.” The way she said “Christian” sounded suspiciously like a threat. “Gay son, loose house.”
I jumped at the sound of a hand slapping against a counter top. “I think it’s time for you to go, Donna.” My mom said calmly, her tone calmer than Miss Calvin’s. The first lady mask had finally slipped off. Her voice was saturated in intent.
The chair slid back a few inches, probably leaving a black mark on the linoleum, which my mom hated. For some reason, I didn’t have the sense to run before she knew I was listening. When she hurried past, I was still standing against the wall, the back of my head pressed against my mom’s three day old paint job. (I don’t know why she bothered to paint. Every house within a hundred mile radius was splattered in egg shell. We were a parody of the modern family.) Miss Calvin hadn’t even touched the doorknob when she realized I was watching her. Again, her eyes zeroed in on my shoes. She shook her head. “Shame.” She hissed like a snake in a garden somewhere. “Shame” The door slammed behind her.
“Snowden…” My mom’s voice sounded so faraway.
I never told another soul until right this very second but for months on end, even when she was smiling at me and giving me peppermints from her bag, all I could picture was the look of revulsion in Miss Calvin’s eyes when she said “Shame.” At night, I would toss and turn with nightmares of her chasing me around the church with a bible screeching “SHAME!”
A few weeks after the Miss Calvin incident was my first day of school. I wish I could say I loved school and everything about going made me swell with joy, but I won’t just sit here and prattle off lies so allow me to talk about school. First of all, where I’m from, the parents were allowed to keep their kids home until there was nothing more they could teach them. I’m sure there was plenty more Lydia Mackery could teach me, but at the end of the day, having me home during the day was becoming a problem. She never said it was partially because of Miss Calvin’s comments and I’m glad because she didn’t have to. I already knew.
Because of the month my birthday fell in, they chose to put me in Kindergarten. My first vivid memory of ever getting in trouble was in Kindergarten. No, I am not kidding. All I remember is sitting in a cell with little more than bread and water in some lady’s classroom for a crime I didn’t commit. I do not remember my kindergarten teacher’s name, so as of this second, she's Ms. 5K. I know at the beginning of this I said something about being in a cell with only bread and water. I can’t confirm nor deny, but there’s a chance I might have embellished a tad. What really happened was she made me sit on a wooden stool with my face pointed at the wall. I had the esteemed privilege of dining with my other classmates when lunch time came around but when it was over, my face was repositioned in front of that wall and that’s where it stayed until my sentence was served. The whole class should have been wearing those “Justice For Snowden” T-Shirts I designed in my imagination but since I couldn’t seem to imagine a patent, let me back up and tell you exactly how I got in trouble. I was not popular in Ms.5K’s class. Why? Well, for kids in this day in age, walking into kindergarten already knowing how to read and write is not a big deal. As a matter of fact, they invented 3K and 4K to help today’s kids get on the road to greatness as early as possible. When I was in school though, it made me unpopular. Kids avoided me. They didn’t want to be associated with the know-it-all who sat in the back writing and mumbling to himself. Yes, I talked to myself. I was my only friend and for the most part, those kids were idiots so it didn’t bother me. What was Ms. 5K’s response to such a child? She tried to get me to learn to be like the other kids. She would say: “Aren’t you tired of being alone, Snowden? Wouldn’t you like to play with the other kids?” How did I respond? For one, I was working on an anthology series called "The Mouse From Mexico". The day she grabbed my arm, I went home and ended the series by having his neck get caught in a mouse trap. SNAP! It was a torrid, gruesome affair, but imagining her face while I was scrawling it out made it worth my time. In class, I protested her attempts at normalcy by correcting her spelling and or grammar every chance I got. Every chalkboard or sheet of paper was scrutinized down to the last letter. I wasn’t raised to be like everybody else and she wasn’t going to be the one who made me start.
Mr. K was just a casualty of one of the many injustices I suffered through in elementary school. Who was Mr. K? Mr. K was one of the twenty-six letters Ms. 5K had lined against the wall in the classroom. We were to address them as Mr. or Mrs. and each letter had an accompanying backstory to better help us remember. There was this kid who I only feel comfortable referring to as Little Snot Nose whom really had something against me. I never said or did anything to Little Snot Nose, I swear. For some reason though, it did not matter. Little Snot Nose had it in for me all the same. He had plucked Mr. K from his coveted location between Mrs. J and Mrs. L (I spent most of my Kindergarten years wondering why Mr. K didn’t marry one of them. They were such fine, upstanding cardboard cutouts. Mr. K, you set your standards way too high) and was pretending he was a cowboy. Mind you, these were not huge letters. These letters should not have had anyone galloping around a room shouting, “Giddy up!” just because the teacher had stepped out of the class for five seconds. Especially a hateful, butterball of a brat. He wasn’t halfway across the floor when Mr. K split beneath him, sending him spiraling to the floor.
Everyone, including me, laughed.
For some reason, when questioned, every finger in the class pointed directly at me. Not one tried to defend me. They all said I did it.
Ms. 5K didn’t even attempt to listen to me. Didn’t read me my rights. Didn’t offer me one phone call. I didn’t even get to see my lawyer. Just three quick swats with a ruler to my ass and then a wall for the rest of the day. Just in case you missed it, I came up at a time when you were allowed to get spanked in class. Ms. 5K didn’t hit hard so it didn’t faze me. Or, it could be that I was so mad I didn’t feel shit. I openly shunned Little Snot Nose and my entire class for the rest of that year. Did I try to get to know any of them? Hell no! They didn’t deserve me. Not that they were lined up to get to know me better.
I was Snowden, the pariah and not just any pariah. Oh no, I just had to go that extra mile and be the gay pariah.
No, the term “gay” wasn’t openly tossed around, but ever since Miss Calvin had released the term into the air, I had claimed it as my own. Before I had a clear understanding of what the word meant or why Miss Calvin practically had to shove it off her tongue, I embraced it. I was Snowden, The Gay Boy. Somehow, I had made up my mind if I were a superhero, that would be my name. I would wear all spandex with a gigantic glitter G on the front.
After the Mr. K incident, I doubled down on begging my mom to let my stay home. Each morning I would start off with my list of reasons as to why I should be able to stay home. Whether I was brushing my teeth or slinging my bookbag on my back, in between, I made time to beg for permission to quit school. She would shake her head and say school was in my best interest. One day, while Malcolm was walking us to school, I asked Piper why school was in my best interest.
“Because Mom is terrified she’s raising a fag!” Malcolm blurted, stopping in the middle of the long, dirt road. He placed a hand on each of my shoulders and shook, hard. “She wants you to be a man and you’re more of a lily in a valley of faggots.”
“Stop it, Malcolm!” Piper shouted, shoving him.
He didn’t release his grip on me though. “You think I don’t see the drawings? You’re no superhero. Just wait ‘til dad finds out.”
“Let him go!”
“Why?” Malcolm sneered. “He’s not going to do anything! He’s always sucking up to mom.” He leaned in closer. “She’s all you’ve got, isn’t she? No one else wants you around. No one wants you.”
I didn’t say anything. I just stood there. What was I supposed to say? My older brother barely uttered a single syllable in my direction, let alone touch me. I didn’t understand what was going on but I kind of got the feeling that being my brother was becoming a bit of an embarrassment to him. More than anything, that hurt.
“You’re the faggot!” I screamed, swinging my leg upwards. My shoe connected with Malcolm’s crotch. He howled and finally released me. I backed up as my brother crumpled into a pile in the dirt. I kicked some in his face. “I am a superhero.” I stepped over him and with my head held high, continued to school with Piper.