What I remember most about that year is food. Not eating it, thinking about it. Meals at the McCobbs’ were never enough to tide me over. Dinner usually was burgers that Mr. McCobb picked up at a drive-through on his way home, two each for the adults and one for us kids. Maybe some fries to share. Or Mrs. McCobb would microwave some of the Lean Cuisines she had in the freezer, again one each for the kids and two for the grown-ups. She’d bought a slew of those little box-type meals on sale because of trying to lose her baby weight. After babies-times-four she was one of those ladies with the small, pretty face and everything else kind of pillowy.
She kept boxes of snacks on top of the fridge, and I mean the works: Pringles, Oreos, Dunkaroos, your basic snack festival going on up there. I kept waiting for somebody to give me my snack bowl like at Aunt June’s, but nobody ever said “Make yourself at home” in the McCobb house. Even though I didn’t have any other one. After school Mrs. McCobb would sometimes get down a box and dole out a snack to each of us, but not every day, and I knew not to ask.
Luckily Miss Barks kept up the forms for my free lunch at school, but I was off the list for Backpacks of Love, with the church ladies figuring out I was somebody else’s problem now. At school I cruised the lunchroom with some other guys, picking off extra fries or whatever we could score. Maggot wasn’t in on it anymore. He was getting fed at home on black eye pea soup, ham biscuits, apple cobblers, and all the other best things ever known, and not all that thankful for it honestly. He and I were still best friends and blood brothers of course, but in January we got reassigned to new homerooms after too many homeroom make-out sessions between certain girl and boy parties, so I didn’t see much of Maggot unless our lunch periods crossed. If we did talk, he’d bring up that Mrs. Peggot was asking about me. What was I supposed to say to that? I told him not to worry, I was in a new foster with my own room and it was awesome. I told him they had a dog, to make him jealous. I said, “We have a dog,” even though their bitch Missy actually wanted nothing to do with me. Possibly due to getting kicked out of her room.
Our lunchroom visits never lasted long. I always downed my lunch fast and then hung out by the kitchen shelf thing where we put our trays. Some people and especially girls would bring back their lunch basically untouched, drop the tray, and waltz away like food grew on trees. Apples without one bite out of them, milk cartons not even opened. It killed me to think how this was happening at other lunch periods without me there to grab it. I mean, first graders, probably throwing away the best stuff. You want to cry for the waste.
In the day-to-day, I got by. Weekends were rough. I had dreams about food that went to the extreme. Like I’m eating a large pizza with pepperoni, smelling that peppery meat smell, the cheese with that great rubber feeling in my teeth, and then, bang! Awake. Back in the dog room, hungry. I’d go through the dirty clothes pile looking for edibles. Haillie sometimes would leave a box of Junior Mints or something in the pocket of her little shorts. I’d sniff it out like a dog.
I wanted to tell Mrs. McCobb how hungry I was, trust me. Maybe mention that being over five feet tall and wearing the biggest shoes of anybody in that house, I might be considered more of a two-burger person than a one-burger like their first and second graders. I had this conversation with her in my head, six ways to Sunday. It always ended like my last talk with Mrs. Peggot. I’d given up all hope of rescue by that point in time. I’d already complained to Miss Barks, and she discussed it, but the McCobbs acted all shocked, saying they fed me night and day, how could a boy still be hungry after eating as much as I did? Miss Barks bought their story. She said if I didn’t get enough, for goodness’ sake, ask for seconds. If it even crossed her pretty head that these people were lying, stealing cheats, she was short on options. She had to let it go.
She stuck with a different theory: I needed to be more pushy with them. Did she give up on her dreams? No, she worked hard for what she wanted. Did I expect anybody to look out for Damon if he wouldn’t look out for himself? Life is what you make it! Here’s where Miss Barks didn’t grow up: foster care. She had no clue how people can be living right on the edge of what’s doable. If you push too hard, you can barrel yourself over a damn cliff.
Mrs. McCobb was not that bad a person, just going nuts with those kids on her every minute of the day. And I mean on her. The babies did all their sleeping or not sleeping, eating, screaming, diaper changing, etc. upstairs in her and her husband’s bedroom, and most days she wouldn’t make it downstairs till noon or after, in her pj’s and robe. Or if dressed, it was the type outfit where you can’t tell a hundred percent if it’s clothes or pj’s. Her hair she wore in a half-assed ponytail that got washed on rare occasions. She and I did our talking in the car, where she’d tell me her worries that I was to keep to myself, which I did. I did not follow the Miss Barks plan of Speaking Up for Demon at these moments. The idea of people wanting at all times to hear your problems, that’s a child thing. I had eyes. I saw Mrs. McCobb was in no mood.