Terry aka
Theresa aka
La Teresita, was retarded.
She was a curse from God.
Her joy was listening to Donny Osmond, Perry Como, Frank Sinatra, Jerry Vail — but biggest baddest bestest favoritest was “Elvis, Live from Hawaii”
She’d sit on the floor in her father’s bedroom at 1411 Mendavia, with her turntable and thirty-threes. She wasn’t a forty-fives girl.
Go-Go, the uniformly reviled white poodle would snuffle in, check on her, go back to the florida room for his next beating.
Maria mopped the kitchen floor. ‘Fina yelled at her, watched The-Price-is-Right, wrote letters to congressmen and continued to wage wordless war with the nice daughter, Lucci.
Terry double-fisted. In her right hand was a fully-leaded Canada Dry Ginger Ale.
In her left hand Terry’d make her hand-doll Charlie Brown dance. If Charlie had a prior engagement — or was in the freezer — Linus would stand in, usually with his main squeeze, Blondie. Sometimes Pig Pen would shuffle in. Terry and her peeps would yuk it up, not singing, but laughing like retarded hyenas.
Terry would ask Charlie rhetorical questions then answer them herself. There were any number of people inside La Teresita.