Vessel Of Light

Acknowledgments

My sweet husband, Daveed, you have been my rock, voice of reason, my center. This book could not have happened without your confidence in me, encouragement, accountability, unconditional love, and support. You never allowed me to give up. No matter how difficult the situation, you encouraged me to keep pressing toward the mark, gently nudging me into my calling. Your countless hours and devotion to this project have been such a testament to what true love and teamwork are all about. I love you!

My precious son, Profound, you have been a constant friend and confidant and have spoken words of healing into me over the years. Your love and friendship are unmatched by any other son (no, I haven’t been trying out other sons)! Only God knows how much your love and encouragement have brought light into many dark places I have walked through. You are, and have always been, mama’s greatest blessing! Like King David, keep chasing after God; He will let you catch Him because He wants you to win! RWYA & RWYR!

To my family (you know who you are), I am very blessed to have all of you in my life. You each have played a unique role in the fabric of my being to help me become who I am today. Your love and support strengthen me as I continue on destiny’s path. I’m grateful that God chose you to be my family, and I love you very much!

Tracie Raines, your gentle, nurturing nature and calming voice helped give me the strength to pursue my inner healing journey. The unconditional love and non-condemning spirit you showed toward me were priceless as you safely guided me from the darkness of my past into the light of my present and on to my destiny. You made such a positive impact on my life that it made it possible for me to write this incredible, empowering book. Thank you for sowing into my life, which will sow into countless lives worldwide!

Annie-girl, thank you for your great wisdom, encouragement, love, and proofreading skills. Our time spent together working on this book has been priceless. Your ability to meet my deadlines is second to none. I was going to give you a turtle as a thank you gift, but I think I will provide you with a frowg instead!

Dr. Jacqueline Bell-Jones, Christine Steurer, Beth Bruce, and Pastor Sharon Reese; the four cornerstones God placed in my life when my whole world came crashing down. Thank you for being God’s hand extended to one of His wounded ones! Your unconditional love, wise counsel, strength, and encouragement helped me through the most traumatic time of my life and brought me back to God. You have forever left an imprint on my heart!

Rene Kyl, you have inspired me as we helped one another through some difficult times. Everyone should adopt your concept of doing something kind every day for two people you don’t know. Never have I met such a pure, giving person. Kindness oozes from you and permeates the atmosphere around you. I value our sisterhood very much! Keep being the light!

Nikos Ligidakis, your countless hours of coaching me into a better writer by helping me reveal the hidden treasures of my stories have produced a means to inspire and change thousands of lives. Thank you for sowing seeds of greatness into my life.

Mark Madsen, your patience, inspiration, encouragement, proofreading, and editing have been invaluable to me. I appreciate you pushing me forward on this project as you displayed incredible confidence in me and this book. In addition, the seeds of love and dedication you have sown into my and Daveed’s life are priceless to us.

Pastors Brent and Patsy Endris, no words in the human language can express how much you are loved and appreciated. You are soldiers who ran to the aid of a struggling sister in Christ. You only had a few to send when I was at war with a corrupt city, and God used those few to get a job done that should have taken twenty men to do. I am forever grateful for the many ways you have sown into my life. The light of your unconditional love has penetrated the darkness of others!

Jason Michael Spurlock, your words of wisdom have been invaluable to me as they have enhanced my writing skills producing a more powerful book. Thank you for making time to speak into my life. I’m sure God is proud of the man you have become. I know He loves you very much and is always in your corner.

Chris Dalton of Huck&Dorothy, I am so blessed that God brought you into my path to edit and advise me on the final details of my book. You have inspired me to continue writing; now, two more books are almost complete. I appreciate your confidence in me and your giving spirit. Without you, this project would not have come to completion. I am forever grateful that you have chosen to sow into my life! As you continue to bless others, God will keep showing up and showing off in your life.

Chapter 1

Whack, Crunch, Bump!

A fight broke out in the yard of Raiford prison. You know, it’s the one where Ted Bundy was an inmate and executed. Guards tore the two men apart. Roy, short and scrawny, a mere five feet-four inches tall in his early twenties, sported a crew cut with his light brown hair, his piercing green eyes, and stared down his opponent. Arville, in his mid-thirties, on the other hand, scaled at six feet tall with flowing black curls, missing a few front teeth, staring back at Roy with murder in his dark brown eyes. Both men stood panting, knowing where they were headed. Finally, the guards subdued both men, handcuffing them as they walked them out to the prison yard.

Roy and Arville are then stuffed into coffin-like boxes with only holes drilled into them for air: the prison’s version of solitary confinement. They were allowed out of the boxes daily for food and a bathroom break. Sun beaming down, hot and sweaty in the prison yard, lying next to each other in boxes for the next week, the two men talked.

Roy discovered his trapped neighbor used to work with the carnival. They pass the time with Arville teaching Roy how to speak Carney talk. Who knew that people working in carnivals had their own weird language?

After the men were released back into the general population, they became friends. Roy pondered how cool it would be to become a Carney once paroled. His parole was coming up soon.

He heard about a church hosting Bible studies, and he and Arville decided to attend weekly. At church, Roy met a beautiful young woman named Rose. Her long, jet-black curls and dark brown eyes caught Roy’s attention. Little did he know that she would one day be his wife and give him a daughter, Annabelle.

***

Sunlight peeked through the early morning clouds. His picture on the dashboard stared back at her. Annabelle’s white knuckles gripped the steering wheel tightly as her shoulders shook uncontrollably. Tears stream down her face as the city quickly fades into the distance. With only two hundred fifty dollars in her possession, and nearly 3,000 miles to go on her first cross-country journey alone, her mind raced, filled with questions:

Why is she so unlovable?

Where will her feet land?

How will she move on?

How will she survive?

She felt weak, inadequate—a failure! Twenty-seven years of marriage, and her life was all but a vapor. All seemed lost; nothing left to lose! Life as she knew it had ended. She reflected on her childhood and failed marriage; her image blurry in the rear-view mirror. Her red hair was beginning to display strands of gray, her flawless milky white skin pudgy in places she’d never dreamed, her youthful smile all gone. All worn away by events beyond her control.

She often thought of her beloved father, who was not in her growing-up years.

Born with kidney failure, Annabelle faced surgery at age two and suffered greatly over the next fifteen years. She could not urinate and screamed in pain, so her parents took her to the hospital. Her right ureter tube was closed and did not allow fluid to pass through the kidney. So Belle was hospitalized, and the tube was stretched open. The doctor warned Rose and Roy that the tube would not grow along with Annabelle. He said she would need surgery every few years to keep the tube open for her kidney to function correctly.

By the time Annabelle turned four, her parents had gotten divorced, her mother moved to Georgia near family, and married a man named Joe, to begin what she described as a new life. Being two years old, her youngest daughter Tara settled in and accepted this change without protest. Two years her senior, Belle struggled as a daddy’s girl. She severely missed her beloved father, Roy. Annabelle would cry, stop eating, and become reclusive in her bedroom. So her stepfather ordered Rose to take her to her father. Rose submissively complied and began driving to Cocoa Beach, Florida, with her daughter in tow.

Those were happy days for Belle. She enjoyed helping her daddy work on his car. Often, when Roy would ask Annabelle to hand him a wrench, she would get the size correct. She knew the difference between opened and closed-end wrenches. Her father told her how smart she was and showered his daughter with hugs and kisses.

Roy walked his daughter to school daily and watched her swim after lessons. Annabelle would sit on a bar stool at the restaurant where he worked after school. He would make her grilled cheese sandwiches. She’d sit on his lap at night and watch Walter Cronkite.

But her happy world came crashing down.

Just after Belle’s sixth birthday, Roy was laid off and struggled to find work due to his history of incarceration. He resorted to the only thing he knew that would provide for her and keep his daughter with him: he mugged a man. Hiding in the shadows of the grocery store parking lot, Roy waited for his victim to walk by. Having no weapon, Roy jumped out of his hiding place behind a man and shoved his face down to the ground. A struggle ensued, and Roy overpowered him and took his wallet. As he was running away, someone recognized him from the restaurant where he used to work. They gave their statements to the police.

The day after the mugging, Annabelle was at school, and Roy walked to the apartment office to pay rent with the stolen cash. Police officers pulled into the parking lot, recognized him from his mug shot, and arrested him. Already having a record, they threw the book at him. Belle had to go to the state orphanage until they could locate her mother. This was easier said than done: Roy refused to give authorities relevant information about her mother. He didn’t trust Joe and wanted to protect his daughter.

Belle spent her seventh birthday surrounded by other wards of the state.

On her seventh birthday, marking the only pleasant day at the orphanage, a giant birthday cake was presented to her, covered in clown heads. You know, like a Jack-In-The-Box. The clown heads were attached to little springs bobbing from side to side. Maybe this explained her love for clowns and court jesters. How she came to be in such a facility for a time would haunt Annabelle for years to come, even after being taken back by her birth mother, Rose.

Roy’s attorney petitioned the judge to allow him to say goodbye to his daughter before his sentence of twelve years began, and the judge agreed. Belle is pulled from his loving arms while she screams and cries, holding tightly to her father. Annabelle struggled to reach for him, something deep in her gut telling her she might never see him again. Clouds darken the sky as raindrops fall, blending with her tears; confusion and sadness close over her like a thickening fog. She stands on the courthouse steps with a CPS worker, and a green 1965 station wagon pulls up. Inside sat her mother—a stranger to Annabelle—and a woman she didn’t recognize but knew to be her grandmother.

They approached her grandmother’s station wagon, the one with the wide wood paneling strip horizontally across the center of the car, and Belle’s mother climbed out. She reached for the back door handle, opened it, and inside, the rear seat lay flat, creating a type of floor covered by a quilt. Rose sat Annabelle beside someone she’d never seen before—or she didn’t remember seeing her.

This odd person was a little older than Belle, with a disfigured face and scaly skin. The girl began uttering incomprehensible, guttural jibber-jabber. Immediately afraid, she couldn’t predict what the girl might do next. Annabelle sat in the farthest corner of the back of the car, her arms wrapped around her legs, her face buried in her knees. She wept as her world was turned upside down once again.

The rain pounded on the roof of the wagon, and Rose tossed in her daughter’s bag, flip-flops, and the doll her daddy had given her for her sixth birthday, just before she was orphaned. Finally, the door slams shut, closing Belle in with this strange being in the back.

The elderly lady driving the car yelled, Jenny Lynn! Jenny Lynn made wild, weird bone-rattling noises, and snatched Annabelle’s doll, her voice croaking louder. Annabelle clung tightly to the last memory of her father, and the car drove away. Annabelle pressed her face and hands against the back window, trying desperately to catch the last glimpse of her daddy, but the rainy glass distorted her view.

As police officers on each side of him waited for Roy to say goodbye to his daughter, the father wept and blew goodbye kisses to his baby, waving miserably. Then, the officers turned Roy away to walk him to his final destination.

The trip from Cocoa Beach, Florida, to Albany, Georgia, seemed like it would never end. Still huddled in the corner at the back of the car, Annabelle watched Jenny Lynn throw one of Belle’s flip-flops out the back window onto the interstate. Annabelle could do nothing about it. The girl continued to observe her like a troll in its cavern. Annabelle soon discovered that her maternal grandmother, Delilah Ross, who drove the car, was Jenny Lynn’s mother. She had contracted German measles while pregnant with Jenny Lynn and gave birth to her daughter. The latter suffered from Down’s Syndrome due to the measles infection.

Finally, they reached their destination after their long journey. As Belle exited the car, Jenny Lynn continued with her jibber-jabber.

I’m not sure where I am, but I’m happy not to be trapped with Jenny Lynn anymore, Annabelle thought.

They went inside the single-wide trailer and were met by Belle’s sister, Tara, and her stepfather, Joe. Annabelle tried to be strong and attempted to hug Joe, but he shoved her to the floor and told her to stay away from him.

She never tried again.

All while Rose ordered her to forget her father.

Joe is your new daddy, Rose would demand. You will refer to him as such! Never speak of Roy again!

In the following months, waves of abuse plagued Annabelle— at the hands of Joe.

***

As the oldest child, Annabelle is expected to do various chores at the age of eight. One day, Rose instructed Belle to wash the dishes, so she placed a chair at the kitchen sink standing on the chair to wash the dishes. She ran the water as hot as any tender eight-year-old hands could handle. Joe stormed into the kitchen, saw what Annabelle was doing, and decided to put the water to the test with his rugged block and brick-laying hands. He jammed his hands into the water, yelled, and slapped Belle.

Cursing at her, he shouted: This water is too cold!

He drained the water and then refilled the sink with scalding water, steam shooting up out of the soap suds. He forced her little hands into it, holding them down.

Is it hot enough now, huh?! he hostilely screamed.

Joe slapped her in the head again and berated her. Sadistically, he held her hands in the scalding water and monitored her washing the rest of the dishes.

Sent to her room after the horrific task was complete, she stumbled to her bed, her hands red and blistered, her forearms on fire, her head pounding with pain. Sitting on the bed, blowing on her skin, Rose quietly opened the door. Entered. Silently closed the door so as not to alert Joe. She tip-toed across the room, sat next to her, and consoled her daughter.

Stay in here out of his way. It’ll be better tomorrow, Rose promised as she gently wiped her daughter’s tears.

She knew Joe would abuse them both if they openly displayed affection. Both trembled, feeling hopeless and defeated. Rose thought sadly that only an emotionally wounded person would torture a child. He was both detached and desensitized; healing was needed.

***

Life was transient for Annabelle’s family. Joe is forced to follow construction work, going where the jobs are, and eventually moves the family to Wisconsin, near Rose’s brother, Grant, and his wife, Nina. Annabelle attended school just one block from them and walked daily to their house for lunch. It was always fun at her uncle’s house because Belle and her siblings enjoyed playing with their five cousins. Happiness and laughter filled the air as Annabelle felt a sense of peace and freedom there. Aunt Nina always had something cooking in the kitchen that made you hungry even if you were full!

Belle enjoyed visiting them because Uncle Grant and Aunt Nina were kind and loving. She especially enjoyed spending time with Uncle Grant as he became a father figure to her. It reminded her of being with her father, Roy. Her uncle held her in his lap, talked, and hugged her. All while being a respectful gentleman. He gave her the love and attention she desperately craved. She felt safe and content.

Aunt Nina loved Annabelle and poured it on her every time she saw her. In addition, Aunt Nina always had a nice hot lunch prepared for her.

Happy days were here again, Annabelle thought.

The happy days seemed restricted to her aunt and uncle’s home. Unfortunately, her home life was anything but happy. In an all too common moment, one night, as Rose served dinner to Joe on a dinner tray in the living room so he could watch TV while dining, she leaned forward to put the plate down. A hair from her head fell on the plate. Joe went ballistic, knocking the tray onto the floor. He pulled Rose by the hair and grabbed the steak knife. Joe shoves her into the bathroom and has the steak knife to her throat as she hovers over the bathtub. He cursed and threatened to slice her throat.

Annabelle and her siblings stood at the door screaming and crying, begging him not to kill their mother. Rose would have died at his hands that night if not for her children. Joe berated her and released Rose as he left the bathroom, ordering her to clean up the mess. The children hid in their rooms quietly, consoling each other. Her hands were shaking, tears streaming down her face; Rose began picking up the broken plate and cleaning the food scattered over the floor.

Indeed, things can’t get worse, Annabelle thought.

But things did get worse at home; the atmosphere became negative with tension and fear.

One night Rose was working the second shift at the local drive-in theater, leaving the kids with Joe. Already drunk and leaving his brother-in-law’s, he loaded the children into the car and headed to a drive-thru on the way home. Joe had his cheap whiskey tucked into the center console. It was a cold winter night.

Whack, crunch, bump...he hit every mailbox on his journey. Occasionally, he would open the console and take a big swig of whiskey. The children huddled together in the back seat, scared out of their minds. They finally reached his destination, but Joe passed out at the drive-thru order sign.

A woman’s voice came over the speaker. Welcome to Dog N Suds. May I take your order? she inquired.

Being the eldest, Annabelle leaned her head out the window. Um, our dad is sick and fell asleep. Can someone call our mama, she asked.

The lady asked how to reach her mother. Annabelle told her Rose worked at a drive-in movie theater, and the woman knew Rose. Rose arrived quickly and got Joe and the kids home safely. Joe was awake upon their arrival home. He could barely stumble into the house with the help of Rose. Tripping and falling on the bedroom floor, he vomited profusely before passing out again.

She undressed Joe after pulling him up off the floor face down in his vomit. She put him to bed, lying on his stomach. He was stone-cold passed out. Anger welled up inside Rose. She thought of the tragedy she could have faced in losing her family and her children in an accident. Before she knew what she was doing, Rose straddled him, pummeling him with her bony fists. Luckily, he was passed out and too drunk to realize he was being beaten.

Exhausted, her knuckles throbbing, her anger spent, she slid off the bed, knelt, and cleaned the vomit off the floor with a towel, her tears mixing with throw-up. The kids were standing by, watching it all happen.

It’ll be alright tomorrow, mama, they encouraged.

Joe awakened the following day and wondered after seeing and feeling his bruised body.

I must have gotten in a fight last night. I’m sore and bruised all over, he moaned.

All who knew the truth kept silent. This was poetic justice for Rose and the family.

Being in construction work, Rose would always pack Joe a lunch and thermos. Soon after that horrifying incident, Rose made a chocolate cake laced with X-Lax. While the children were denied any cake, she packed a big slice of cake in Joe’s lunchbox. Joe was happy to discover a piece of chocolate cake for his dessert, and he enjoyed every morsel. While laying block on the twenty-second floor, his stomach suddenly rumbled. Joe tried to make it to ground level to the port-a-potty, but he didn’t make it. He crapped himself on the way down.

Some of Joe’s coworkers noticed what had happened and asked if he had a flu bug; others were laughing at his incontinence. It was an embarrassing and inconvenient situation. Joe didn’t have a change of clothes and had to leave work. Once home, Rose and the children heard him in the restroom cursing because he couldn’t stay off the stool. He thought he had caught a bug. Don’t mess with Annabelle’s mother; she will get even and she won’t tell!

***

Annabelle would soon begin to face sexual abuse from Joe, driving her to be the only suicidal nine-year-old in school. Rose was at the grocery store while the children were left home alone with Joe. Everyone was in the living room watching TV except Belle. She was in the bedroom styling the hair of her Barbie Doll head she got for her birthday. Charlie Rich sang Behind Closed Doors in the background. Joe entered the room and sat beside her on the bunk bed. He reached over and pulled her up onto his lap.

He must be starting to like me because he’s never been nice to me before, she thought.

Joe began to ask her about what she was doing. As they were talking, he ran his hand up her dress. Annabelle knew something wasn’t right, she was uncomfortable, and her mind began to race. How can she get out of this situation and not be harmed?

I have to go to the bathroom, she said as she climbed off his lap.

She quickly walked to the bathroom, glad that she had escaped. As she shut the door, Joe’s hand stopped it from closing, and he entered the bathroom, locking them inside. Trapped. Her heart was racing. Afraid. The unthinkable happened. Then, she heard her mother drive up. Joe washed his hands and told Annabelle to pull up her underwear. He threatened her, so she was afraid to speak of his abuse. Rose walked in with groceries and saw Joe come out of the bathroom, and Annabelle followed, going into her room.

After Joe went to bed, Rose asked Belle, What were you doing in the bathroom when your daddy was in there?

She felt like she blamed her for what had happened. That automatically placed the burden of responsibility on Belle. It shut her down and caused her not to confide truthfully in her mother.

I was brushing my hair, and dad came in to wash his hands, Belle explained.

She would look out of her classroom window each day at school, daydreaming of her beloved father coming to her rescue. The A’s and B’s she received on her school work soon turned to D’s and F’s, and Belle plummeted into a deep depression, hopeless, angry, and afraid. She thought that if only she were pretty enough like Shirley Temple, people would be nicer to her, and her daddy would come to her rescue. In the movies, Shirley Temple was pretty, happy, and dancing; everyone liked and was nice to her. If only she could be like her superstar.

Annabelle began Saxophone lessons at the beginning of the school year. The sax case was almost as big as she was. She boarded the bus each morning, and the bus driver would make his best attempt to help her carry the saxophone case. But Belle would always wrestle with him because she felt independent, strong enough to take it herself. It seemed to be the only thing she could excel at and control. Belle was so good with that sax, she was two music books ahead of everyone else in the class. It helped her to cope with the unbearable things she suffered at home. Music was her only escape. Annabelle hummed a lot and wrote songs; music calmed her. It distracted her. In the years to come, she would write more than thirty songs. So many of them would speak of her pain. It was a great outlet to write, hum, and sing.

Receiving failing grades and warning notes from school, she hid them all in her top dresser drawer to eliminate confrontation. One day Rose was organizing the dresser and found the letters. She disciplined Annabelle and took her saxophone away. Rose thought failing grades were because Belle put too much focus on music. She didn’t realize it was her relief from this horrible man. Darkness enveloped her.

By age eleven, Annabelle suffered brutal beatings frequently until blood was drawn. Joe would pit Belle and Tara against each other, giving them separate chores to do. If one of the girls didn’t finish her tasks on time, he beat both girls. Every move was a guessing game.

What will I do wrong today? How often will I disappoint Joe and be punished and cursed today? Belle wondered.

She was cursed daily, told that she was nothing and would never amount to anything. She had constant reminders of how ugly and stupid she was. Belle was constantly shaking from the inside out and became a nail-biter from sheer nervousness. She would chew her nails below the quick without even realizing it.

At age twelve, boils covered the right side of her body, and she would pass out frequently.

Belle had developed into a young woman at age fourteen. Many times, Joe burst into the bathroom while Annabelle was bathing. Jerk her out of the tub, beating her with a belt just so he could look and touch her. This ongoing situation brought division between Belle and her mother. She felt utterly unprotected; Rose said it was Annabelle’s fault. Although Rose was in the house when these perverse acts occurred, she remained silent. Maybe she was paralyzed by fear.

The one thing that helped Rose overcome her fear and persevere was her faith in God. She and the children got a break from Joe’s abuse while attending church services and events.

One winter morning, Rose got all the kids up. It was Sunday morning, and time for church. The church was about a mile from the trailer park where they lived. They piled into the station wagon, ready to go. Joe frantically ran out the door, holding a baseball bat. Cursing and hollering, he ordered Rose and the kids out of the car. She tearfully begged him to allow them to attend church. Joe lifted the bat and threatened to bust the windshield if they did not exit. Rose instructed the children to get out of the car.

The weather was freezing, with icy wind as they walked in the snow, but they walked toward the church. Joe let them go because the neighbors came out asking questions. It was like a family of ducklings following their mama. Tears streaming down her face, whispering prayers, Rose and all five siblings walked single file along the snowy road. The three younger children had coats, but Annabelle and Tara didn’t own one. They were so thankful that a little old lady, Sister Wright, noticed their need for coats and cared enough to crochet a shawl for each of them a few weeks before. Although the shawls weren’t as warm as a coat, they did help against the battle of the elements.

Rose’s prayers were answered for safety to the church but not as you would think. Halfway there, Joe drove up, gathered everyone into the warm car,