Diary of a Victim

By Diane Saks

Diary of a victim was originally published in 2004 with Publish America. Now out of print, Diary of A victim, is going to be re-released by Author House, with a new cover, and a more polished text.
Diary of a Victim is the story of a teenage girl living in 1980s Pennsylvania. Melissa has disability that requires her to walk with a cane and a leg brace. She also has a learning disability that requires her to go to a school with other students who have learning difficulties.
While Melissa is at the school, she encounters ridicule because of her disability. Join Melissa as she turns the tables on her bullies and defends her self-esteem.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Jun 25, 2013
• ISBN: 9781481741484

Diane Saks

Diane Saks is an 8 year resident of Arizona. She recently received her English Literature Bachelor of Arts degree from Arizona State University. Diane, who is an author of novels pertaining to disabled people facing the challenges of everyday life, is a 2 year member of ACT( Ability Counts Tempe) that is an organization for the students of Arizona State University Tempe campus , for the disabled and the non-disabled to join. Our goal is to let people know that the disabled are capable of just about anything. She is reissuing Diary of a Victim that was originally published in 2004. It has a new cover and the book has been tweaked to read clearer.

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

Missy Melissa

ALTHOUGH IT WAS A sunny late April afternoon, a foggy mood tended to envelope the school.

Melissa Gottlieb, just turned fourteen almost a week ago, sat alone by the classroom window of the cardboard-like prefabricated building. The classroom was the very large one, located on the very far eastern section of the school. She looked out of the classroom window, through her stone-washed blue eyes, and gazed down at the fellow schoolmates, playing ball, swinging on swings, and jumping rope. Melissa had a large cackling smile on her porcelain white face. Just off to the right was another window, she hoisted herself up by her hands, reached for her metal cane, lying on the floor, and slowly walked as though she were moving through three feet of snow to the other window. She sat down on another chair and threw her cane down on the floor. Melissa could see the parking lot of the school. Melissa noticed Mrs. Miller, turn left off the road, pulling into the lot driving her red Honda Civic. The girl almost laughed witch-like as she watched as the mother made a sharp left into the parking lot. Even as far up as two floors, one couldn’t help but notice the red and white bumper sticker on the bumper of the Honda Civic, which read, Proud Parent of an Honor Student at Hilldale Central High. Melissa still smiled a wicked smile down in the direction of the lady she thought looked like a bull dog. Mrs. Miller drove away from Melissa’s view as she tried to find a parking space.

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Twelve-year-old Johnnie Miller sat beside his mother in the dimly lit counselor’s office. He spoke to his mother, but looked past her at the watercolor painting of a sailboat on a pond that was on the far right wall. For no reason at all Cripple Freak hit me over the head with its cane.

Who? Mrs. Miller, with droopy eye lids and sagging jowls asked.

It’s the freak in my classroom with the white face and stringy light red hair, Johnnie spoke almost as if he were jealous of her. Johnnie continued to look at the painting on the far right wall as he spoke about Melissa. It walks with a cane, clump, clump, clump.

Mrs. Miller responded, Cripple Freak isn’t a proper name.

Johnnie focused his attention on his mother’s forehead. Cripple Freak isn’t proper.

What I mean is that I am sure this person has a name.

The counselor, a plump matronly type, replied, I think he means Melissa Gottlieb. He calls her Cripple Freak because she is handicapped and has a very pale complexion.

Mom. Cripple Freak hit me over the head with its cane for no reason at all and I think you ought to sue the entire Freak family because of it.

What does this school do about children who pick on each other ? asked Mrs. Miller.

Usually, we just have counseling sessions to assist our students in how to defend themselves when someone annoys them. The counselor wanted to recite her answers rather than speak from knowledge.

Do you suggest that the students grab something like a cane and hit someone over the head with it?

No we don’t. The problem of children picking on each other is just a phase of life that everyone goes through. I went through it during my youth. It is usually harmless.

You call hitting my son over the head with a cane, harmless?

Usually ridicule is harmless. Ridicule helps a child learn how to handle himself in the world later on when he grows up. It is like a leopard trying to feed herself and her cubs in the wilds of Africa.

Mrs. Miller got up out of her chair. Johnnie got up and out of his chair, raking the top of his sandy colored hair with his fingertips. He pouted as though he were an innocent bystander.

I’m sorry, but I don’t consider my son like a leopard trying to find food in the wilds of Africa. She turned, clutching Johnnie’s free arm, and headed out the door.

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Melissa’s mother drove into the parking lot of the school that looked more like a three story wood-sided Army headquarters than a private school. It was one of three buildings. Before the three buildings were bought by the Board of Education back in the 1960s, they were owned by the United States Army as a business headquarters for World War I, II, and the Korean War. The Army decided they no longer wanted to use the buildings, and so they put the buildings up for sale. The Board of Education bought the buildings for a song.

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At her Hilldale, Pennsylvania home, Melissa’s twenty-two-year-old sister, Melinda, was sitting at the kitchen table going over a to-do list. The petite, slender brunette dropped by the parents’ house to help plan her father’s surprise party. Melinda was finally getting settled in her new apartment. Usually she made some time to visit her parents and Melissa, a couple times a week. "Let’s see, I need to put together, a guest list, a menu, invitations, and someone to receive the calls from the potential guests.

Melinda and Melissa’s dark stud, nineteen-year-old brother, Nells, walked into the kitchen.

Nells, I need someone to work on the guest list so that we can call up Dad’s favorite restaurant and tell them how many people are invited. Nells was home from his college dorm for a short visit. Melinda got up and left the kitchen. Melinda strolled into the living room and plopped herself down on the sofa.

Nells walked over to Melinda and sat down on the sofa, I’m looking for my floppy disk that was sitting on my desk in my room. Did you see it?

You have a whole box of them. You can get another one.

Did you see it?

No.

Will you help me look for it?

I’ll help you look, after we work on planning Dad’s surprise party. We have to hurry up and get today’s meeting over with or he will find out.

The party is two months away, Melinda. We have time.

We need to do it now. I want to ask Mom if she can work on the invitations. I will arrange things with the restaurant and you can go over the guest list. Where is Mom, anyway?

Nells responded, She went to pick up Missy at school.

Well I want to talk to Mom as soon as she gets back.

Mrs. Pauline Gottlieb spent the past twenty-five years of her life married to Gerald Gottlieb, an accountant. She promised to be with Gerald through sickness and health, through better and worse. This was about to be one of the worst parts of all.

A slightly older looking version of Melissa arrived home in a huff with Missy tagging along behind her. Melissa walked with slow uneven steps. She seemed to favor her right foot over her left. When she walked with friends, she found it hard to keep up. Melissa was not only the only disabled member of her family, she was the only one with strawberry blonde hair. Everyone in her family in the family was brunette.

Melinda rushed up to her mother, Mom, I want to talk to you about the party. Missy cocked her head to the side in question.

Melinda I’m not in a very good mood right now. You will have to talk to me later on.

Missy, you and I are going to have to have a talk about your behavior, upstairs in your bedroom. Go. Missy slowly marched up the staircase with her mother right behind her as if she were walking the last mile. If one looked carefully, one could see near Melissa’s sneaker, a kind of white plastic cuff was part of a modern brace that has been used in orthopedics since the late 1970s. Melissa had to practically consciously pull her left leg up each step.

Nells watched as his mother and younger sister, Missy, walked into Missy’s room and closed the door behind them. It was a vision like a prisoner being led into her cell by the prison guard. Missy had her head hung down. Pauline Gottlieb was expressionless and silent as she quietly walked into Missy’s bedroom. Nells walked into his parents’ bedroom and opened up the top drawer of the night table. Nells thought of Missy as a sweathoggess. Nells believed that when it came to schoolwork Missy was a dumb as a stump. Nells feared that Missy could grow up to be the first disabled criminal in the world. He took out the telephone directory and placed it on top of the night table. He took a small notebook out of his back pocket. Nells copied down names and addresses from the telephone directory into the small notebook. He returned the telephone directory to the top drawer of the night able. That was too easy.

When he left his parents’ bedroom, Nells noticed that Missy’s bedroom door was still closed. Missy lay face down on her double bed. Pauline sat down beside Missy. Missy, you are to stay in this room and not leave it except for dinner.

Missy’s pale white face was now redder than her hair. Tears fell down her cheeks, and her right hand had wiped the tears off her cheeks. You don’t understand. You never understand. Nobody understands.

It seems as though we are always having this conversation, but now instead of getting better, things are getting worse. If you don’t learn to let ridicule in one ear and out the other, then you are going to grow up to be a very miserable woman.

I wish you could be me for just one day and see what it is like for me.

Pauline turned, expressionless, and walked away.

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Melissa’s problems seemed to begin when she was about ten-years-old and started having aches and pains in the calf of her left leg as she was walking home from school one day. Melissa used to go to regular school and was seen as a regular kid until she found she had worsened problems with her leg during gym class. The lady gym teacher had the entire class doing jumping jacks. Melissa sat down and crossed her legs.

Come on Melissa, I didn’t say stop and rest. Get Up! The gym teacher said.

Melissa got into a squat position and then pulled herself onto her feet. Her left leg collapsed and she fell down on the shiny hardwood floor of the gym. The other students stared at her and a couple of them even laughed.

Stop it! You wouldn’t like it if someone laughed at you, the gum teacher said.

The school nurse was informed of Melissa’s accident at school and called Melissa’s mother to come and pick her up. This was the first time and the start of a continuation of Melissa being picked up at school.

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Nells headed downstairs to see Melinda. Melinda was sitting in the living room on the sofa behind the coffee table. She had a spiral notebook opened in front of her. She noticed a large smile on Nell’s face. How many names did you get?" she asked.

I found twenty names. Is that enough?

Twenty-one if we include one for Missy. In second thought, maybe we could go for about a hundred.

Missy is in trouble again. Nells said.

I dread the future, responded Melinda.

Why?

Can you imagine what is going to happen when Mom and Dad are too old to handle Missy or when they die? Melinda asked

What about? Nells responded.

Missy is never going to be able to get a job that will pay her enough to live on her own. She will either have to live with us or in a group home. Nells, she is a cripple and besides that she has a learning disability. I really fear for our future. Suppose we want to get married and have a family of our own? It is going to be rough enough with a spouse and children, but when you add the responsibility of Missy, I just can’t think of it.

Mom and Dad are still young enough and we really don’t know what will happen with Missy in the future. Why worry about it now, Melinda?

Mrs. Pauline Gottlieb, reeking from that leave me alone aura, walked through the living room and entered the kitchen. We have been through this for four years and it doesn’t sink in. I don’t know what to do about this. Pauline started to sniffle as she peeled a potato over the aluminum sink.

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Melissa wasn’t the only one feeling bad about Melissa’s disability. Pauline remembered when she and her husband sat in the hospital examination room with Melissa lying down on her back on the table, crying, and her legs straight out in front of her.

Doctor, you don’t think it is cancer do you? Pauline sadly asked.

The young doctor replied, No, I don’t. I’m not sure what we have until I order an X-ray.

What could I have done to make my child hurt like this?

Nothing, probably. I see many patients, and I can’t tell you how many parents ask me the same question. It is just nature, I guess. That’s what doctors are for. We are supposed to find out what nature has done to our patients and try to correct the situation if we can.

Does this mean that Missy is going to be cured and back to the way she was?

I don’t know that either. This is why I need to order an X-ray from our radiology department and see what is going on. Unless I know, I can’t do anything.

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Melinda looked on Why did Missy have to upset Mom? Dad will be home from work soon and we won’t be able to talk about this party at all.

Nells responded, Why don’t the two of us work this out together and then show it to Mom tomorrow?

"O.K. I decided that for the main course it would be safe to stick with fish or chicken. I can always change the