He might have been 9 or 10. He could have been younger. They moved into that house when he was five or six. He's not sure.
There were three or four houses built on the lot behind the house where he lived with his mother. Funny, as he wrote this his fingers typed "monther," as though he meant to type "monster."
He's not sure when those houses got built. He doesn't remember their construction even though they were next to his backyard where he played and had birthday parties. At least one birthday party, anyway.
The lot might have had trees on it. He can't remember.
All he remembers about that lot before the houses got built was the one afternoon he was held captive.
He lived on the first floor. It was a three-story free-standing house with a front porch that was built across the front, a small back porch which led from the kitchen, with five steps to a cement path to the sidewalk. A tree stood in the backyard, even now it looks wild and scrawny.
He is looking at it on Google, somewhere around sixty years later. It's all still there. And so are the three or four houses that were built on the lot.
On the day he was captured, there were no trees, but rather mounds of dirt and trees that had been cut down.
He wishes he could remember how he was captured. He thinks the boy was older than he was. A teenager perhaps. He doesn't know what the boy did to keep him a prisoner within shouting distance of his own home.
He's not really sure how old his captor was. Could it have been a man? What is a man to an 11 year-old in the mid 1950's?
He has one sharp, clear recurring memory. He has never dreamed about it, but he can hear it like it were a recurring dream. A frightening voice that David Lynch might have given to the dwarf in "Twin Peaks" instead of the high, distorted voice.
His captor's voice was not deep. It was a buzzy voice with a slight lisp, not a swishy lisp, but a sinister lisp. Liquid speech.
He can hear it as he types.
He might have known his captor. It's hard to say.
"Savvy?"
He's not sure what his captor was asking him to understand. It might have been not to tell anyone what had happened. But to make sure he understood, his captor would say one word.
"Savvy?"
Like they said in cowboy movies. Used as a verb.
"Do you understand?"
"Savvy?"
Other than being held captive, it is the central and clearest memory of that day.
He thinks he may have pretended not to know what "Savvy?" meant. Why would he do that? He knew what it meant. Was it to deny his captor power over him? How could he have known to do that at such a young age? Had it happened before?
He doesn't know what reason his captor had for keeping him behind the hill of dirt and trees in the lot behind his house. Was he physically threatened? Was he molested? Why didn't he just run away and bang on his kitchen door?
Did his captor think they were just playing cowboys and indians? If that were true, why does it still haunt him today? Why does it cause his throat to close and fear to rise?
Why did his captor let him go? Did he ask to be released? Did he cry? Why wouldn't he? He was never taught not to. He was never taught anything about how to behave.
All he knows is that his captor talked to him and after every (what? order? request?) he always asked the same question.
"Savvy?" "SAVVY??" And in that voice.
He doesn't think he has ever spoken that word aloud.
He isn't sure if he ever said anything to his mother about it. He thinks he might have but she did nothing. He knows she did nothing to protect him from his captor. He doesn't know if he ever went back out to that lot again.
He thinks it made him feel profoundly unsafe. He doesn't think he's ever felt safe again. He never feels safe.
Ever.
