I MARRIED AN ILLEGAL ALIEN!

9.95 Standing Tall

After I argued with Alien about allowing his friends to draw on Nos, I didn't hear from him again. His mother and sister, on the other hand, called me a couple times a week, since we were coming up on the INS interview at the end of December.

Up to the day before, they were calling me, pleading with me to just go and lie for Alien, so he would not get deported. They offered to pay me some of the back child support that he owed me. I told them it was not their debt to repay, and that if they and I were always there to pick up after Alien makes a mess, he wouldn't ever grow up. I thought our conversations ended on a positive note. That's because I am Suzy Sucker.

The other thing is that all of their immediate family was flying in from Mars for December, and wanted Nos to join them for Christmas. Honestly, I asked him when he wanted me to take him (since none of them offered to drive all the way here to get him), and Nos said, "Never." I said, "Don't you want to see your grandfather and aunts and everyone?" Nos said, "Mama, I don't *know* those people. I said I don't want to go." And I left it at that.

We heard no more from them until the next month, January 2005.

9.94 Break Down

The next morning, I asked Nos what was going on with him, that he let someone draw on him with a marker. He said, "What was I supposed to do? Alien [Nos does not call him "Dad"; he never has] was there, and he didn't stop the guy; he was laughing along with them." I said I understood, but that he needs to realize that he is not a messenger boy, either, and that it is wrong for adults to do that to kids.

Then Nos started to cry. I asked him what was wrong, and he asked me if he asked me a question, would I tell him the truth? I assured him that I would, because he knows I do not lie. Then, he asked me if it was true that I poisoned the twins, and that's why they died.

I felt the room spin, people. I have to say, I now understand what it means when someone says something "rocked their world".

I explained to Nos that he remembers how sad a time it was for everyone, and that I was going to the midwife and the doctor to try to figure out what was wrong, but it was just not meant to be. I said, "Whatever would make you think I poisoned those babies?!" He said, "Alien said you did."

My little boy then proceeded to tell me that, all this time that he has been visiting with Alien, Alien has been badmouthing me. Nos said it usually happens once they are on the highway, and starts with, "Let me tell you something about your mother..." He told Nos that I was keeping Alien away, and that I suddenly moved to Philadelphia and he didn't know where we were, that I dated people who tried to kill Nos, etc. I was like, are you blanking kidding me???!!! What the HELL????!!!!

I said, "Nos, you *know* Mama. Don't tell me you believed this crap?!" Nos said he didn't believe most of it, but sometimes he was mad at me for making him clean his room or something, and so he liked to hear Alien talk badly about me. He said after a while, he got tired of listening to it, but he felt it as too late to say anything. And when Alien started talking badly about my sister, Nos said he knew then that he was a liar, because he said Auntie was the best person that he knew. "Anyway", Nos said, "Anytime an adult tells a kid not to tell anyone something that they say or do to you, especially your mom, then something is wrong. So I'm telling, because he told me not to." Then Nos cried, and said he was sorry he didn't ever stick up for me. I told him it was okay, because words can't hurt me, and that I was sorry he got put into such a difficult position.

It's one thing to say crazy things to me, but my boy is a good kid, and he doesn't deserve to have his mind filled with a bunch of crap. I contacted the lawyer. I told her the story, and she said she was going to make it a part of her request for supervised visitation. Nos was upset, because he was afraid Alien would "kill" him for telling.

9.93 The Last Incident

That day, when Alien took Nos out, everything was fine. Alien had been very pleasant to me, and had agreed with me regarding my decision to seek court intervention in our situation. I started getting concerned when Nos was doing his regular calling me every couple hours to talk about how bored he was, and that Alien had left him at his sister's house again. My Man and I went to some real estate open houses, and we were eating at an Indian restaurant when I got the call around 4pm that they were on their way back. We cut our day short and drove home. Around 5pm, we got a call that he would be back at 7pm-ish. Nos was with Alien and his friends.

Next thing I knew, Nos was calling and saying he was going to see the Lion King. He did not get home until after 10:30pm. He was 7 years old, and this was a school night.

When Nos got home, he was acting very strange. Even My man, who is quite oblivious to these things, said that something seemed off. Nos was so happy to have seen the Lion King that I didn't want to spoil his excitement by asking what was up, so we just told him to go to bed. Before he went to bed, he showed me "something really special": he had numerous drawings on his arms and torso, which were made with what looked like a Sharpie felt-tip marker. The drawings were crude, pertaining to the martial art that My Man and Alien both practiced. It was silly and it was pathetic. Nos thought, because Alien's friend had drawn them, that they were special. Mainly, they were propaganda for their style of the martial art. It was sickening, and I believe it was meant to be so.

They had told Nos to say things to My Man's martial art master, along the lines of his practice being inferior and such. To see my son all shiny eyed and impressionable was terrible. He was bought by some puppetry and attention from "the big kids". I didn't ask him any more questions. We just told him we were glad he had a good time at the Lion King, and he went to sleep.

9.9 Oops, I Did It Again

I did another stupid thing. I thought to myself, maybe Alien wasn't running a scam with this woman, and she was just preying on immigrants like him who were looking for help. I know-improbable. But still, the part of me that always has to be helping people opened up my big mouth and called his sister and mother. I said, "Did you guys know anything about this?" They said no, that this woman must've taken advantage of their little brother/baby boy (he was 28 and a half, mind you). I gave up all the information, telling them I found out she wasn't even a real lawyer, and that she offered me money and everything. They asserted that if Alien did know what she was doing, it was because she tricked him into it. It went on and on, ending with: Oh, and, by the way, are you going to sign that paper?

AARRRGGGGHHHH!!!!!!!!! How could I have been so STOOO-PID??????????!!!!!!!!!! I just basically found out some crucial intel, then called the enemies up to let them know the who, what, where, when, why and how of it. Sometimes I make myself sick.

To add on to it, when Alien came that Sunday, I told him that, on the advice of his lawyer, I was going to file papers in court for my back child support. He listened to my explaination, and said it was a good thing, because then everything would be aboveboard for INS. It wasn't a malicious decision; the last thing I wanted was for him to get angry, because he was a scary mo-fo when he was angry. I just wanted the courts to handle my business, since I didn't seem to have been doing a good job at it the last several years. He agreed, then took Nos out.

9.8 Shady

On November 15, 2004, at 9 am, I got a call from Alien's lawyer. She asked me why I hadn't signed the paper. I explained my reasons to her, particularly how I didn't want to get into trouble with INS for lying, and she said I shouldn't worry about INS because they never really follow through on anything. I said I was not convinced. She said that I was being difficult, and that I should just sign it. She said I was being selfish, because Alien was going to get deported without my help. I was on speakerphone, and I felt she was talking tough for an audience, probably him. I asked her if she saw how much he owed me. She told me I had no court order for child support, and she said, "so you really have no way of ever getting this money." I asked if he was there with her, and she said no.

She then said she was getting $2000.00 from him for this case, and, out of the goodness of her heart, she would give me half of her fee if I signed the paper, because she was thinking of Nos, even if I wasn't. Once she made that offer, I knew something was up. I mean, I grew up watching LA Law and Law and Order. I know there is no way what she said to me was kosher. Anyway, he told me he was paying the lawyer $4000.00, so someone was lying. So I hung up. She called me back, and left a voice message for me to call her. I called back, to hear what else she would say.

She started talking about signing the paper again, and I said, "You have no idea what kind of person you are working for, do you? He doesn't care about his son, he has to be forced to give any child support, and he is only coming around in the first place so I will help him get his citizenship." She said, "Let me go into another room." I waited, and she took me off speaker and was talking softly. Obviously, this leads me to believe he indeed was there in her office. She told me that she had been in the same situation, and I interrupted, because she had a thick accent and a Martian name, so I said, "What situation? You married an American to get a green card?" She stopped and said that she means that she knows it is hard to be a divorced mother. I interrupted again and said, "With a deadbeat for an ex-husband." And she said, "yes, with a deadbeat for an ex-husband." She said that frankly, I wasn't ever going to get the money Alien owed for back child support, so I should just take this $1000.00 they were offering me and forget about it. I said that wasn't legal. She said, "The law doesn't protect women, so we need to do what we can. Take the money, ______; don't be stupid. Then, go to court and have the court try to collect child support from this guy." I said I would think about it, though I had no intention of doing so.

I hung up, and called my sister and brother-in-law. After I told them the whole story, they agreed something was up, and that perhaps it was time that I sought legal advice as well. My sister lent me a couple thousand dollars for the retainer, and I talked with a lawyer in the office of my father's lawyer, whom I will call Mrs. Lady. I gave her an outline sketch of everything going on, and she agreed to take my case. When Alien's lawyer next contacted me, I told her that I now had a lawyer, and to please contact her, as it was their arena. She got all flustered, and said, "Well, I am no longer representing Alien." I said, "Why did you contact me to see if I had signed the paper yet, if you are no longer his attorney??" She hemmed and hawed, then she said she had to go and hung up abruptly.

When I met with Mrs. Lady, I told her all that I have told you readers here, and she said she was outraged at the entire saga. She said she would take care of everything, and not to worry. She called up the law office of Alien's lawyer, and was told that his lawyer was really a paralegal, and the principal lawyer had no knowledge of the case at all. He apologized, and said he would fire the paralegal, though my lawyer and I both doubted that he would.

9.7 So, It's Like That, Huh?

Alien told me that, due to my stubbornness, he had to pay $4,000.00 to get a lawyer for his INS case. He said, "That could've been money for Marcos, but you messed that up." Like I believe that, from the man who was driving a BMW earlier that year, and missing child support payments because "you have no idea how high the insurance is on those things." Whatever.

He then took out his handy-dandy file folder, unzipped it, and took out a sheet of paper which he then handed to me. It was a letter from his lawyer for me to sign. While she had taken into account my preliminary estimations of child support owed, she still omitted a great deal of it. Also, as you will see, number 3 is a flat out lie, and number 4 was provided for in the divorce papers. I wrote this all out in a response for him to give the lawyer, and pointed out the illegality of her intention to notarize something without me signing it in front of her and showing proof that I am who I say I am.

He was annoyed, but tried to hide it.

9.6 Quality Time

The rest of the summer was uneventful. Anytime he called, I passed the phone to Nos. He continued to do his late show/no show routine, but I changed how we dealt with it. Instead of waiting around for him, I gave him until 11:30am (he was supposed to come at 9am). If he wasn't here by then, we would go do something ourselves. I was tired of seeing Nos glued to the window, waiting for nothing. Mind you, I had tried to have Alien come other days, since it seemed Sundays didn't work for him. He said his other day off was Monday, and he liked to sleep in because he goes out Sunday nights. As for Monday afternoons, he said he was busy. So, I felt no qualms in telling Nos we would only wait 2 and a half hours for Alien to show up on Sundays.

The sad part is that Alien rarely did anything with Nos. He usually dumped Nos off at his sister's house, and took off for most of the day. Nos would call me to complain, or to ask me to tell whomever was there to change the channel on the tv, since only one sister spoke English, and if she weren't home, Nos was on his own. If Alien brought Nos to his apartment, he usually slept, while Nos played Playstation. In all the time that they had been visiting up until then (a couple years?), Alien had taken Nos bowling once and to the movies twice. Nos said he went with Alien even though he was bored when he did, because he never knew if they might do something sometime again. That broke my heart.

I started homeschooling Nos in September. Alien continued bring Nos home very late (8pm and later), despite the fact that I specifically asked him not to, since Nos' bedtime was 8pm sharp, and every Monday he was overtired and cranky. I guess he felt that since Nos was no longer in "school", he had no rules or schedule to follow.

9.5 Over and Over Again

One day, while I was in the city bringing my baby in for his 6 week check-up, I got a call from Alien. He told me he was very concerned about Nos, and wanted to discuss something with me. I said, "What, is there a problem?? Just tell me now!" He said he couldn't, because he didn't want to run his minutes up on his cell phone. He said he'd call me back after 9pm. I was like, it's 3pm now; if it's so important, let's not wait 6+ hours. He said no, he didn't have time.

Now, intellectually, I knew this was another of his ways to mess with my head, but since it had to do with my boy, I fell for it. I asked him where he was. He was on the highway, coming into the city. I told him I had been at the hospital, and was now several blocks away looking in the shop windows. I asked him to meet me. He said he couldn't drive there, because it was out of his way. I told him I could meet him in the next town over, which was nearer to the highway, in the parking lot of a grocery store. He agreed, so I pushed the baby carriage over there (it's far, but it is not a bad walk on a nice day, and I didn't want to walk all the way back to the hospital to take my car out of the parking garage).

When we met up, he was all dirty. He said he had actually been working in construction not far from my house (!), but had told the boss to "go f*** himself", and so would no longer be working there. I was not surprised at this, since he kept himself so shrouded in mystery-I didn't know where he worked, where he lived, or what his schedule was. I asked him what he needed to tell me. He ignored me, and talked about how he was still thinking about moving to Florida to dance (he was a stripper on the weekends), and how I didn't look fat though I just had a baby, and how the baby didn't look like me, etc. I said I didn't have time to chitchat, and what was so damned important that he had me come all the way there. He turned serious, and said he was worried about Nos.

He said Nos tells him things. I said, what things? He said, "Don't worry about it." I said, "What the hell are you talking about?!" He said, "I know all about you." I said, "What??!" He said, "I'm not going to tell you, because I promised my son I wouldn't say anything. You think I would tell you??" I said, "What the hell did you mention it for, then?" He said, "You are not fooling anyone. I know what you do." I said, "If you don't tell me what is going on, I'm leaving." He said, in this really weird voice, like he was spitting out the words, "You treat him like a slave, making him clean out the tub, wash dishes, and clean the floor. What kind of mother are you??"

Oh, Lordy, I laughed. I said, "Number one, if he makes a mess, damn straight he is going to clean it up. Number two, he *likes* to clean up the tub, because I let him wear his clothes in and he pretends like he is a prisoner on a pirate ship. Number three, nobody washes dishes in my house, because I have a dishwasher. You are making no sense!"

He lost his temper. His mouth was all twisted up, and he said, "What, do you think he is a WOMAN? He is a MAN; he should not clean! I never heard of such a thing." I laughed in his face. I said, "Here in the U.S., children have chores. That is how Nos earns his allowance. He cleans up his messes, he cleans his room."

Alien was livid. "That's what I want to talk to you about. I don't like how children are raised here. Nos should live on Mars with my mother. I will send her money, instead of sending it to you, and it will go farther there. He will have a much better life." I said, "What the hell are you talking about?" He said his mother and his sister had told him about the problems Nos was having at school. I had told them how he had been bullied for many months, until finally he turned around and knocked the kid down. Somehow, by them or just in Alien's twisted reality, that turned into gang violence. He kept talking, saying how he needed to update Nos' passport, and how he'd be happier on Mars; basically talking a lot of crap for my benefit. He said we lived in a bad neighborhood (not true), and said he told Nos to watch out because there were a lot of bad people around us. [To this day, Nos has this obsession with making sure the doors are locked and other Alien-induced phobias.]

I told Alien that my Martian is very rusty, and perhaps his sister and mother misunderstood when I talked to them about Nos and school. I said I was planning to homeschool, mostly because he was bored at school and was starting to hate it. Alien yelled, "You think you are so smart, just because you went to [Ivy League School], but you aren't!! You don't know shit; you're such a stupid, stupid girl." I was trying to explain that I had filed a plan of study, which was approved by the superintendent and the school committee, and that I had the support of his teachers and the principal. He just yelled over me, saying how I wasn't doing a good job, and that he should take Nos from me.

That shut me up. I looked at Alien, and could feel his hatred of me rolling off of him and choking me. I was so upset, I was shaking, but I said, "I don't have to listen to this. Don't ever talk to me again. If you have a problem with how I'm raising Nos, then take me to court." And I walked away, as he shouted things after me.

When I turned the corner, I was crying so hard I puked on the sidewalk.

9.4 You Like Me, You Really Like Me!

Throughout the next several months, Alien would either show up extremely late, or not show up at all. Nos would be up at 7am on Sunday mornings, dressed and ready to go, sitting by the window and waiting for his father. My Man and I could not do anything, because we had to wait around in case Alien showed up. When Alien did show up, he would be sullen, because I would not "help" him, i.e., lie to INS on his behalf.

His mother and sister started calling me more often than usual, first making small talk but always leading up to asking me to please write a letter for Alien. Each time, I would patiently explain to them why I could not do so. It would be a bunch of lies and, seeing as how I already should not have let him intimidate me into signing the petition to remove his conditions of residency back in 2000, I did not want any more problems than I could have with INS (or whatever they call themselves now).

I actually considered his mother and sister to be my allies. They constantly apologized for Alien's behavior, and let me know how much they appreciated me bringing Nos round to see them so much despite Alien and his craziness. When my second child was born in mid-June 2004, I brought him over there to see them as well. I believed that they were sincere.

9.3 Doesn't No Mean No?

I knew I wanted nothing to do with this immigration mess Alien had created. I just looked at him and said, "It's not my problema." He started sweet talking me, saying how sorry he was that he upset me before, and that he just loses his temper blah blah blah. He gave me the puppydog eyes. He smiled and tried to take my hand. Maybe it was the heebie jeebies I got when he touched me, or maybe it was the fact that we were on my front porch and My Man was upstairs, but I felt confident and in control. I said, "No."

He said, "Do it for our son, so he can have his father in this country." I said, "Excuse me?! I thought you hated the U.S. and you were leaving?" He laughed, and said that he still wanted to leave, but he wanted to be able to return if things didn't work out back home. I said, "No."

He started yelling at me, and I yelled back. There I was, on my front porch, invloved in a spectacle. [My neighbor later told me she heard everything. "I didn't know you speak Martian," she said. I replied that I muddle along in what would be called Marglish. "You sounded like you knew what you were saying." I thanked her.]

I told Alien, "Look, you owe me so much in child support; I can't lie and say you have been paying it all along." He asked me to write out how much he owed me. I grabbed a piece of Nos' notebook paper upstairs, and scribbled out a rough estimation. You can click on it here; I gave him a copy.

Alien read it, and said that he couldn't give it to me now, but that he promised he'd give it later if I just wrote a letter as the INS officer requested. I said, "No." He said, "I know you are just emotional from your pregnancy, so I'll just give you some time to think about it." I said, "I said no already. Don't ask me again." Then Alien took Nos out for the day.