A Lethal Inheritance by Victoria Costello

Author:Victoria Costello
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Prometheus Books

In 1982, Ronald Reagan moved into the White House, and the tone of the capital, where Geoff, Alex, and I still lived, changed dramatically overnight. Fortunately, Geoff, working as an engineer at the television network that would broadcast the 1984 Olympics from Los Angeles, and I, with a staff position managing television/video production at the American Film Institute, both had an opportunity to transfer to the same new city and keep our jobs. So we happily fled DC for LA. But it wasn't just about our careers. I had a keen desire to escape my sister's cycles of dope, bust, and rehab, which, though they played out mostly in New York, still felt too close for comfort. Southern California represented all the Northeast was not, a warm, flat climate that took the edge off—well, everything.

Having Rita show up on our Hollywood Hills doorstep three years later pretty much defeated my purpose in moving west and soon took over our lives. On most days, my sister's drinking would start right before or after lunch, lasting until she fell into bed well past midnight. I was six months pregnant with Sammy and still working full time.

Desperate to get her out of our house before Sammy's arrival, I rented and furnished an apartment for her six blocks away. In typical fashion, Rita busied herself finding a new drug dealer and cultivating friends in the neighborhood who shared her “interests.”

One night, when Sammy was about eight weeks old, our shared bubble burst wide open. It was a weeknight. Geoff was working late. Alex, then six years old, was fast asleep in the room next to mine while Mom was sleeping in the guest room downstairs. At three in the morning, I was in my bedroom nursing Sammy, when I heard Mom's scream. I rushed downstairs carrying a wailing Sammy and found her standing in the hallway.

From the bathroom, I could hear Rita retching and coughing.

“There's blood!” Mom said in a ragged whisper.

Rita was holding onto the toilet and gagging up blood, spitting it into a circle of yellow vomit. Desperate to get my puking sister out of my house, I threw on some jeans and dragged Rita from the bathroom into the car.

It was a thirty-minute drive to the public hospital in South Central LA, the only place I could imagine that might take her in for a detox. Rita continued to throw up in the back seat all the way. By the time we got to the hospital, she had regained enough of her wits to resist the idea of going in.

“You're either coming in with me or I'm leaving you here in the parking lot,” I said.

People in wheelchairs and on stretchers lined the hallways, many seemingly unconscious or, if awake, contorted in pain. The few visible hospital staff sat behind glass sliding windows. Rita took her place on a hard plastic chair, nodding off while I forced myself to stay awake long enough until it was her turn for an intake interview.

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