Lucy's Pocket

have always had everything I need...not every thing I wanted, mind you. but certainly enough. enough food. decent housing. clean water to drink. good education opportunities. good work, even...lots of love. music. entertainment. decent amount of travel...enough to feel less than deprived...that's for sure... my parents were far from ideal. but they were not truly terrible. not at all...I have been a fairly healthy, well-taken-care-of house cat. not a wild animal in any way...not driven to feral ways. not given to great poverty...not even of the spirit...

Lucy was never as lucky as I have been. never. she was born really poor (as my mother would have said...for a white girl....) she had just, well...nothing. no housing that lasted more than a month or so. a very abusive father. a mother who let it happen. who was abusive herself. abused, herself....her brother raped her when she was eleven years old...it was a shame the whole town knew about. her brother lived in Juvi Hall more than even in the foster homes that threw him out. the foster families for Lucy were kind enough. but cold. the rape made her a less than lovable child, somehow. she was intelligent enough. but, not enough to catch the eye of anyone who would want to 'save' her...no unusual talent to make her appealing to a savior of any kind. she even caught diphtheria from infected water...was malnourished from poor and unappealing foods all of her days....she hadn't much going for her, when I first met her at our school Musical audition, in my Junior year of High School....

some people are strikingly beautiful, even though they've been through hell and back. Lucy had the eyes of a saint who had been flayed by life, but had walked through the fire and on water besides and lived to tell the stories. her skin was like glass...you could see all the veins and the blood pulsing through each little artery...she was that transparent... long hair like coal in flames,,, dark blue eyes like the deep parts of lake...tiny body. perfect body, she really was the only sort of girl I was ever jealous of...small. perfect. long black hair...I always assumed my big blond heavy-boned tall self wasn't the kind men really went for...I knew they loved the tiny feisty little women types. all of them did. even when I was young like that. it was fate. they would get the best mates. I would get god-knows-what....so, of course, I tried to be friends with her. I always did that. over-compensate, I mean....but Lucy never did.

Lucy behaved like a princess. correct that: Lucy was The Princess. In spite of what all the adults whispered and got raw mean about, Lucy literally held her head high... she didn't exactly not talk with anybody. she just never initiated any chit-chat. She behaved as if she was beautiful. and, that nothing more needed to be said... so boys found her sexy. girls were jealous of her. she didn't care. it wasn't like she acted like she cared about all that, either. she just accepted that she was an ordinary mind and a battered spirit inside of a striking body. there was no way she was going to feel sorry for herself for any of that. her pride was enormous. truly huge. and everybody resented her pride most of all....

No one ever asked Lucy to one event or dance or anything at school that I can remember...she was always there, tho. calmly helping at the food tables or the punch table or collecting tickets. being cordial. not friendly. just cordial. you wouldn't dare make fun of her. she didn't do one single thing that you could make fun of. not once. she'd get a ride home from some parent, who would drop her off at her latest foster home. she was always, always polite and thankful. and hidden. hidden from us all.

that's what made it such a shock when she tried out for the lead in the school Musical for our senior year. she had never even been in any of the music or drama classes or extra-curricular song groups, or anything like that. she just showed up at the audition. she got up and sang. and, as you probably can guess, every note that came out of that throat was beautiful. and perfect. and projected right into the heart of the last person in the last row of the auditorium. we didn't know whether we should clap, or laugh, or be embarrassed, or cry, or what. so we all just sat there with our mouths open. Our director didn't really have any choice. she got the part.

Lucy was so perfect in the lead that everyone was in complete awe of her. every line was wonderful. her every song was delivered like some important Star was in the part. She was present now. for sure. everybody wanted to know her now. but she still made no friends at all. she was kind, helpful to everyone in the show. polite. cordial. all that. she wasn't letting anybody get near, much less close. and we all fell in love with her as a result. only she never once looked at one of us in any kind of special way. we resented that as well. there's no pleasing the public. especially teen age kids. they can be cruel.

her male lead started it first. he started giving her the wrong cues. real subtly. it took us all a while to notice. you couldn't see it in her face tho... she ad-libbed like some pro. after a while he had to stop. he was the only one looking stupid. then people started doing other mean stuff. trying to trip her on her entrances and exits. hiding props or costumes she needed. it all back-fired. she stayed cool as ice, but still kind. like we were just kids who didn't get it. that was true. we didn't get it.

I decided to be her champion. I admonished - well, bullied - kids who were trying to trip her up. I helped her find stuff...I gave her rides to and from the rehearsals. I started to flatter myself that I was better than everybody else. though of course, I wasn't. I was treating her like she was different. just like everybody else. she knew that. so she was kind to me as well...but not close.... she was becoming a 'Pro'....really, a Professional. we just were too young to see that....

It was when the local press uncovered that there were Talent Scouts from the biggest baddest Theater Company in the City... coming to see 'the show'...that most of us figured out what was up. we all cleaned up our acts as fast as we could. they weren’t' coming to see any of us but Lucy. but there was no sense in making fools of ourselves in front of the Real Thing. we knocked ourselves out supporting every move Lucy made. every note. we were all determined to go down in a bit of history-making. this was our 'big chance' too. but for Lucy...it was just going to be her due.

'cuz you know, Lucy had earned every damn accolade she got in the papers the next day...and the beaming director's little speech at the last curtain call...and the smug, professional nods of the Talent Scouts, who even looked just like we all expected them to look. and we were all so proud and happy that 'one of ours' had made it! the School Board even let her do her finals real early, so she could get her diploma as soon as she wanted, and go off to the Big City and her Big Start. she passed with 'Bs', and they were all earned honestly. Lucy never sang a wrong note. never.

there's a saying in our part of this Country: "She has the whole thing in her pocket!"...that was Lucy for you. she changed her name to Danelle. and kept the name of our town as her last name. the irony was not lost on any of us. if it was meant in irony at all...someone soon explained about the Saint of Hopeless Cases and so on....Danell St. Jude....

sure, she still is a big star. you all know her. how she began. how mean everyone was to her. how she was always perfect and wonderful and everything. it's all true.
no one ever has written about how I helped her out during the Musical and all...but hey, I guess it wasn't that big a deal...and after all, I have a perfectly good life myself...still even do a little work in community theater when they do Musicals and all...my life still is fine....

I wish I could get the connection: that you can have a really bad, really bad childhood, and look all damaged and stuff, and still get it together and just sing in showers and so on...and then do one great show in high school in the middle of nowhere, USA, and come out a Star? I mean, what was different for her...what did she do differently...that made the whole world fall into her pocket? and not into mine?

I don't think I get these sort of fates, or destinies, or lucky strikes, or whims of chance...or of dedicated purpose, maybe deep inside...not at all...I must have thin pockets...or no pocket at all.....

Lucy's Pocket...that's what she called her own Autobiography. It was a best seller. she even gave me credit for reminding her about the Pocket Saying, when she came in for the Fourth of July parade to be honored for all the contributions she had made to the high school music and drama departments and to the county's Foster Care programs and so on....

Yes, that Lucy of ours...she has in all in her pocket...
.
all in her pocket....