Liz's Sister, Part II

A wonderful woman, Angela Jackson, comes to YANA sometimes with her coworkers from People's Community Health Center to talk about AIDS and related health concerns. We had a moderate crowd of listeners, including a few women I'd never met before, and I sat in the back, enjoying another of Angela's smoothly-run lectures and discussions. Shortly into her presentation today, though, a tiny, strange looking woman entered the room. When I got my first, partial view of her, I thought I was looking at Liz, though when she turned to look in my direction, she looked quite different. I wondered why I thought of Liz at all.

The strange little woman sat up front near Angela, talking, interrupting, almost trembling with freakish, random, small waves of agitation. At one point, she got in some cross talk with another client and then said she apologized. Immediately, she said she apologized again. In about another half second she said again that she apologized, this time sticking her face forward and grimacing until it looked like the exoskeleton of an insect.

At one point Angela asked if anyone knew how Hepatitis A was spread. The strange woman said it was from using the bathroom and not washing your hands. She said that's how her dad got it since he had never used drugs. This particular revelation seemed to leave her momentarily relaxed and amused, but as Angela followed up on the spread of Hep. A through feces, the little woman's haggard face continued its rotating display of tics and sags.

At the end of the talk, the little woman made her way to me, said, "I'm Liz's sister! She's in the hospital, and I'm so worried." Then she fell into my arms, making crying noises without actual tears. Samantha was, indeed, a real person, and, at long last, I had met her.

There isn't too much to tell at this point. I took her back to talk to Sid and Angela, and Samantha immediately began interrupting again, explaining that she had brain damage. Soon Angela needed to talk to Samantha alone about some health questions. The good people from Community Health Center agreed to follow up with Liz's hospitalization, and I had to get back to the larger group. It seemed to me, though, that if you grew up loving Samantha, you would have to keep on loving her. She seemed so obviously brain damaged, so incapable of being anyone other than who she was, so far beyond any rational criticism or rebuke.

To my mind, one of the worst things you can say about anyone is that he or she can never be expected to do anything differently or better. It's condescending. It's saying the person is hopeless, saying she's doomed, and I have learned long ago that those poor, helpless people can prove you wrong every time. Probably, I tell myself, there's a lot more to Samantha than I've seen in this one little meeting. But, still, my God. It's actually disorientating to think that Liz must be the healthy one in the relationship.

Liz's Sister Part I

One of our relatively new clients, Kimberly, has a lot to say. Apparently, she also makes cakes in a cast iron skillet. I'm supposed to get a peach cake one of these days. I'll let you know if I ever do. Anyway, those of you who have been reading this blog for a while know about Liz, one of our sicker, more troubled, and, in many ways, more endearing clients. Liz lives with a sister named Samantha. None of us have ever seen Samantha, but we hear a great deal about her. Samantha steals from Liz. Samantha spends all her money on drugs, then takes to her bed, demanding care from beleaguered, overwhelmed Liz. Samantha takes Liz's money, then throws her out of the house, not even giving her time to get her heart medication. Samantha has been married to a bipolar man in the suburbs for decades, taking his money and living with a series of boyfriends in the city while pretending to be faithful.

These damaged, complex relationships aren't unusual for our clients, but the stories Liz tells about Samantha can't possibly all be true. Years ago, Samantha kidnapped somebody, and Liz rode in the car afterward with her sister and the victim. Liz was sentenced to more time than Samantha, the judge having explained that being an unknowing accessory after the fact was worse than committing the underlying crime. Samantha also gave Liz syphilis by taking a bath in the same tub that Liz later used. Apparently, the 13 years of stripping and the 17 arrests for prostitution had nothing at all to do with Liz's catching a venereal disease.

I believe that Liz is a reasonably honest person. I don't think she has either the inclination or the self discipline needed to concoct elaborate stories or to prevent herself from blurting out pretty much every single thing she has ever done or thought. Still, the Samantha stories got so over the top that I sometimes flirted with the notion that Samantha didn't even exist. She seemed to be taking on the mythical qualities of an evil twin in the ongoing Gothic horror movie that was pretty much Liz's life.

Then we learned that Kimberly lives right next door to Liz and Samantha. In a cheap Baltimore row house, right next door is really right next door. Kimberly seemed to know everything about the two sisters and to have no compunction at all about sharing. According to Kimberly, Samantha exists all right. She exists, and, if anything, she's even more horrible than Liz ever told us. In Liz's presence, Kimberly reported the continual bedlam Samantha and her array of strange men produced. She repeated language so vulgar that even in Jr. High I wouldn't have wanted to hear it (at least, not all that often in the middle of the night). She emphatically stated that Samantha regularly took Liz's money and then threw her out of the house. She even told us that Samantha had thrown Liz out naked once, and that Kimberly had brought her in and given her clothes. Liz didn't seem to like being reminded of that particular incident, but she nodded grimly when Kimberly looked to her for confirmation.

"And Liz is sweet as gold," Kimberly told us several times. "Nothing at all like her sister. Sweet as gold." At YANA Liz is, well, something of a pain in the ass. But then, YANA is the place for abused people to strut their stuff a bit, act entitled, burst into tears and then luxuriate a bit in all the hugs and kisses that follow. Liz outside of YANA, is just a dying 48 year old woman, still prostituting, still getting fall-down drunk nearly every day, still under the power of a sister she loves.