Transcript

#25 Becky and Jo · Heavyweight

0:03
Speaker 1: Do you remember Do you remember.
0:05
Speaker 2: When you do you remember?
0:07
Speaker 1: Do you remember when you once told me that we
0:10
Speaker 1: were talking about the blues, because you like, you were
0:12
Speaker 1: saying how you you love the blues? You know, you're
0:15
Speaker 1: just making you said that you really know. You said
0:19
Speaker 1: you love the blues, and then you told me that.
0:22
Speaker 1: I said, oh, who's your favorite blues musician and you
0:24
Speaker 1: said Jim Belushi. I said, really, there's so many great
0:33
Speaker 1: like blues.
0:35
Speaker 3: You're an idiot.
0:37
Speaker 4: Oh my god.
0:44
Speaker 1: From Gimblet Media, I'm Jonathan Goldstein and this is Heavyweight
0:50
Speaker 1: Today's episode, Becky and Joe LA All around me cinematic landmarks,
1:10
Speaker 1: the Chinese Theater, Hollywood Boulevard, Sunset Boulevard, Sunsets, the Pacific Ocean,
1:19
Speaker 1: Tony Shaloub, the Observatory from Rebel Without a Cause, and
1:23
Speaker 1: the Hollywood Sign from the Entourage movie. Fun Fact LA
1:31
Speaker 1: is what industry insiders call Los Angeles. Hey, Becky, I'm
1:38
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles to see Becky. She grew up here.
1:42
Speaker 1: Her parents work in the film biz. They're producers of
1:46
Speaker 1: movies that if I named you'd say, I know that movie.
1:51
Speaker 1: What a nice place. Becky gives me a tour of
1:54
Speaker 1: the nice place which happens to be your mom's place
1:58
Speaker 1: because it is a quiet place, a good place to talk.
2:01
Speaker 1: It's so great the way that all the rooms disconnect,
2:04
Speaker 1: one to the other, one to the other. I'm in hollyweird. Alright.
2:10
Speaker 1: There are windows too, overlooking a yard. Oh my god,
2:15
Speaker 1: are those oranges?
2:17
Speaker 2: Yes?
2:18
Speaker 1: The California dream you just like? Open up the window
2:21
Speaker 1: in the kitchen. On the wall hangs the painting of
2:24
Speaker 1: a boat on the coffee table sits a pipe? Does
2:27
Speaker 1: your mom smoke a pipe?
2:30
Speaker 5: No?
2:33
Speaker 1: Just a conversation piece, but worth every penny, because as
2:37
Speaker 1: the tour draws to an end, the conversation begins. The
2:43
Speaker 1: story all started, Becky says a few months ago, while
2:47
Speaker 1: dining at an Italian restaurant with her parents and older
2:50
Speaker 1: sister Joe.
2:51
Speaker 6: We were at my birthday dinner. My whole family was there.
2:54
Speaker 7: Mom and dad.
2:55
Speaker 1: Becky's mom and dad are divorced, so the whole family
2:58
Speaker 1: rarely gets together.
3:00
Speaker 6: Like my parents, they're cordial, but like it's really birthdays.
3:04
Speaker 1: Their chit chat proceeded along, and that way. Family restaurant
3:07
Speaker 1: discussions often do a lot of remember that person, remember
3:11
Speaker 1: this thing, remember that thing. This person was supposed to return,
3:15
Speaker 1: but never did, and now we don't have that thing
3:18
Speaker 1: or know that person. It was in this way that
3:21
Speaker 1: Becky came to mention someone the family hadn't talked about
3:24
Speaker 1: in years, Letitia. As soon as the name was uttered,
3:34
Speaker 1: Becky could see the power it still had over her
3:36
Speaker 1: older sister, Joe, even after so many years.
3:40
Speaker 4: Becky brought up Leticia.
3:42
Speaker 1: This is Becky's sister, Joe. For her, the very word
3:46
Speaker 1: was like a gut punch. But as she looked around
3:49
Speaker 1: the table, Joe saw their parents were struggling to even
3:52
Speaker 1: place the name.
3:53
Speaker 8: It felt like people were trying to remember Leticia, like
3:58
Speaker 8: it was this hazy thing.
4:00
Speaker 1: Everyone held little snippets. Letitia drove a red car. Letitia
4:05
Speaker 1: had small hands. Letitia was very beautiful. As the family
4:09
Speaker 1: batted around half memories, Joe remained quiet. Becky watched the
4:14
Speaker 1: emotions sweep over her sister's face.
4:17
Speaker 5: Across the table in this very loud restaurant, I just
4:21
Speaker 5: got this wave of sadness about Letitia.
4:29
Speaker 1: Leticia was Becky and Joe's babysitter until one day twenty
4:33
Speaker 1: years ago, when she suddenly vanished from their lives as
4:44
Speaker 1: movie producers. Becky and Joe's parents worked long hours and
4:47
Speaker 1: were rarely home, so from the time they were toddlers
4:51
Speaker 1: until they were young teens, the girls were looked after
4:54
Speaker 1: by a parade of babysitters, one after the other.
4:58
Speaker 7: We had a babysitter named Melissa.
5:00
Speaker 4: We had a babysitter named Robin.
5:01
Speaker 7: There was a babysitter named Mae.
5:03
Speaker 8: We had a babysitter named Candide.
5:06
Speaker 7: Don't remember too much about Audriana.
5:09
Speaker 1: Sixteen babysitters in total, sixteen young women lurking in the
5:13
Speaker 1: background of family photographs, dimly remembered each odd in their
5:17
Speaker 1: own way.
5:18
Speaker 7: Helena, she was kind of an asshole.
5:21
Speaker 8: She ended up falling in love with this exterminator that
5:24
Speaker 8: came to our apartment when we had fleas.
5:28
Speaker 1: There was the babysitter who joined a cult.
5:29
Speaker 7: She just said, now, my name is Mollie.
5:32
Speaker 1: The babysitter who performed Reichi treatment on Becky. The babysitter
5:36
Speaker 1: who lied about a death in the family to scam
5:38
Speaker 1: travel money. Aislyn Aislyn Aislin brought Becky and Joe onto
5:44
Speaker 1: the front lawn one day and taught them a ten
5:47
Speaker 1: year old and a six year old had to put
5:49
Speaker 1: a condom on a banana.
5:51
Speaker 4: And let us like pick a flavor of condom.
5:54
Speaker 8: I just remember looking over across the lawn and seeing
5:57
Speaker 8: my sister, who looked so small to me, tasting a
6:01
Speaker 8: like grape flavored condom.
6:03
Speaker 6: Also just going out on the lawn part like, I don't.
6:07
Speaker 1: Oh, well, did you have a banana tree outside?
6:09
Speaker 2: Nope? Huh.
6:24
Speaker 1: Becky and Joe's parents were always absent, so while the
6:27
Speaker 1: caretaking fell to the babysitters. They fed the girls when
6:31
Speaker 1: they were hungry, comforted them when they were upset, became
6:34
Speaker 1: integral to their lives, and then after a couple of
6:38
Speaker 1: months they usually left. It walloped Joe each.
6:41
Speaker 4: Time to have all these women come and go and
6:46
Speaker 4: choose to go.
6:48
Speaker 8: It kind of felt as though, you know, they were
6:51
Speaker 8: hired to be our friend, and then we were just
6:58
Speaker 8: too much, or there was something that was too much
7:02
Speaker 8: to even make money worth being our friend.
7:07
Speaker 4: I just really felt like I had no one.
7:12
Speaker 1: But then came someone, neither Becky nor Joke and a
7:15
Speaker 1: recall where Leticia came from. She just showed up one
7:18
Speaker 1: day as glamorous as a movie star. Joe, ten years
7:23
Speaker 1: old at the time, was dazzled.
7:25
Speaker 8: She was everything that I kind of wished I was
7:28
Speaker 8: in a teenage girl. Her hair was straight and I
7:32
Speaker 8: wanted to straighten my hair and long nails, and I
7:36
Speaker 8: bit my nails. She wore spaghetti straps, and she was
7:41
Speaker 8: like a grown up popular girl.
7:48
Speaker 1: And what set her apart was how she made the
7:50
Speaker 1: girls feel like they were friends. She brought them to
7:53
Speaker 1: her home to meet her mom. She took them to
7:55
Speaker 1: the beach and to the mall and taught them how
7:57
Speaker 1: to apply lip gloss. Letitia seemed impossibly cool. Becky and
8:02
Speaker 1: Joe remember her showing up late one time and explaining
8:05
Speaker 1: that she just crashed into a cop car. The girls
8:08
Speaker 1: were in awe. Even her music was cool. There was
8:11
Speaker 1: one song in particular that she loved to play, that.
8:14
Speaker 8: Aliyah song are you that somebody with the baby sample
8:17
Speaker 8: in it?
8:18
Speaker 4: You know that like dirty so here we go? You
8:20
Speaker 4: know that song?
8:23
Speaker 7: Yeah?
8:23
Speaker 1: I don't know it. I make a mental note to
8:26
Speaker 1: sign up for Spotify to listen to the song, just
8:30
Speaker 1: as soon as I figure out how to connect to
8:31
Speaker 1: the hotel Wi Fi.
8:34
Speaker 8: Letitia choreographed this dance for us.
8:37
Speaker 6: Just like this weird thing that we would like do
8:39
Speaker 6: with our hands.
8:40
Speaker 8: In the car we were seated. Me and Becky still
8:43
Speaker 8: remember it and we can do it like on.
8:46
Speaker 6: Cue, driving in the car listening to that song and
8:49
Speaker 6: doing that dance, feeling cool and close to both of them.
8:54
Speaker 6: Kind of felt like I was like riding along with
8:56
Speaker 6: like two older, cooler girls. I always idolized my sister, yeah,
9:02
Speaker 6: a lot.
9:03
Speaker 1: So she was like your older sister's older sister kind of.
9:06
Speaker 7: Yeah.
9:12
Speaker 6: Letitia would just like lie on Joe's bed with her
9:16
Speaker 6: like kind of like on her stomach like pillow, talking
9:19
Speaker 6: sharing secrets or something. I think that Letitia genuinely, like
9:23
Speaker 6: really loved my sister.
9:27
Speaker 1: Letitia made them feel like she'd be sticking around, but
9:30
Speaker 1: in the end, she only stayed a couple months, and
9:33
Speaker 1: of all the departures of all their babysitters, Letitia's was
9:37
Speaker 1: the most brutally abrupt. The last day Becky and Joe
9:41
Speaker 1: ever saw Letitia, they were all hanging out in the kitchen,
9:45
Speaker 1: and when thinking about what drove Letitia away, this is
9:48
Speaker 1: the moment Joe always returns to. It was after school
9:51
Speaker 1: and Letitia was making her a smoothie.
9:53
Speaker 8: I accidentally I knocked over the smoothie. I was just
9:58
Speaker 8: so excitable around her and she kind of dropped her
10:03
Speaker 8: knees and I tried to help her pick it up,
10:07
Speaker 8: and she seemed pissed, and she was like, it's okay,
10:10
Speaker 8: I got it.
10:11
Speaker 1: For the rest of the day, Letitia seemed distant. The
10:15
Speaker 1: next afternoon, as always, Becky and Joe waited for Letitia
10:19
Speaker 1: to pick them up outside their elementary school.
10:22
Speaker 4: We just didn't see her car and we were waiting.
10:26
Speaker 7: She was sometimes late.
10:28
Speaker 8: You were like, oh, it's okay, Like five minutes, she's
10:31
Speaker 8: just really late.
10:32
Speaker 1: Five minutes turned to ten, turned to half an hour.
10:36
Speaker 1: Joe took a seat on the grass, and then so
10:38
Speaker 1: did Becky. Other cars came and went an hour, an
10:44
Speaker 1: hour and a half. As the school emptied out, it
10:49
Speaker 1: took on a far away, ghostly quality.
10:52
Speaker 8: I remember the light changing, also Becky's face changing and
10:59
Speaker 8: looking more to me. Becky's face to me was a
11:03
Speaker 8: huge emotional compass because she was so much younger than me.
11:08
Speaker 1: Joe's first impulse in scary, uncharted situations was to reassure
11:12
Speaker 1: herself by reassuring her sister. She'd explain to Becky what
11:17
Speaker 1: was going on or tell her things would be okay.
11:20
Speaker 1: But sitting on the front lawn of their empty school.
11:22
Speaker 1: As night approached, Joe wasn't sure things would be okay.
11:26
Speaker 1: I imagine there was nothing more to do than hold
11:28
Speaker 1: her little sister's hand.
11:31
Speaker 6: Two or three hours went by, and we were like
11:34
Speaker 6: sitting on the grass, like both of us just crying.
11:38
Speaker 6: Then like it really setting in that like she's not coming.
11:45
Speaker 6: I remember thinking too, like maybe she died. I think
11:51
Speaker 6: I knew by her not coming to pick us up,
11:53
Speaker 6: that like she was gone, like she was not going
11:57
Speaker 6: to be in our life anymore.
12:01
Speaker 1: And she wasn't. After waiting several hours, the girls phoned
12:04
Speaker 1: their mom, who instructed them to walk to a nearby
12:07
Speaker 1: friend's house. Maybe in the end, Letitia hadn't loved them,
12:12
Speaker 1: maybe it was just a job. Letitia was gone without explanation,
12:23
Speaker 1: but Joe knew it had to be because of that smoothie.
12:26
Speaker 1: Whatever the case, By the very next day, Letitia had
12:29
Speaker 1: been replaced Becky and Joe's mom had worked to get
12:33
Speaker 1: back to.
12:34
Speaker 8: The problem was solved the way our parents looked at it,
12:37
Speaker 8: which was, you know, they're okay, they have supervision.
12:42
Speaker 4: But I was just so heartbroken.
12:49
Speaker 1: Even all these years later, when Joe talks about it,
12:52
Speaker 1: it's in the language of a first breakup. Letitia's disappearance
12:56
Speaker 1: even comes up in therapy with each new relationships, biggest
13:00
Speaker 1: fear is that the person she's with might suddenly disappear,
13:04
Speaker 1: just like Leticia did. Since that family dinner, Becky hasn't
13:09
Speaker 1: been able to forget the sadness on her sister's face,
13:12
Speaker 1: But whenever Becky prods her about it, Joe brushes it
13:15
Speaker 1: off or changes the subject. But Becky knows her sister,
13:19
Speaker 1: and she can tell she's hurting, and she wants to help.
13:25
Speaker 1: As the older sister, Joe took care of Becky. Becky's
13:29
Speaker 1: now twenty seven and Joe is thirty. She's still the
13:31
Speaker 1: older sister, but Becky feels the time has come for
13:34
Speaker 1: her to take care of Joe. If Leticia's out there,
13:38
Speaker 1: Becky wants to find her and ask what happened that day?
13:43
Speaker 4: I want to talk to her.
14:09
Speaker 1: Becky doesn't know where Leticia came from or where she
14:12
Speaker 1: might have gone. She's not even sure of Leticia's last name,
14:21
Speaker 1: which is why Becky has chosen to wade into that
14:24
Speaker 1: swamp of collective memory known as the family storage Unit.
14:29
Speaker 4: I feel like.
14:29
Speaker 5: There's only so much time I can spend in here,
14:32
Speaker 5: just like because I know how many rats.
14:34
Speaker 8: Are in here.
14:36
Speaker 1: The storage unit isn't lit, and Becky forgot her flashlight
14:39
Speaker 1: at home, so she uses the light on her phone
14:41
Speaker 1: to scope out the room. Inside her boxes piled atop
14:45
Speaker 1: each other, containing years and years worth of old school assignments,
14:49
Speaker 1: VHS tapes, and birthday cards from barely remembered family friends you.
14:54
Speaker 5: Just made up in here that's like twenty years old.
14:57
Speaker 1: She's here to find Joe's childhood address book. When Joe
15:01
Speaker 1: was a kid, the way that some people might collect autographs,
15:04
Speaker 1: she collected addresses, so every time she met someone new,
15:08
Speaker 1: Joe would scrawl their address into a little book with
15:10
Speaker 1: a hologram dog on the cover. Becky is hoping the
15:13
Speaker 1: book contains Letitia's full name and an address, any clues
15:17
Speaker 1: to help agin the search everyway. While digging around in
15:24
Speaker 1: the dim light, Becky finds one of Joe's old journals
15:27
Speaker 1: with entries dated from around the time of Letitia. She
15:30
Speaker 1: sits down in the child sized chair she used to
15:33
Speaker 1: use in her family's old living room and realizes a
15:36
Speaker 1: dream long held by little sisters everywhere. With Joe's permission,
15:41
Speaker 1: she opens her older sister's diary and explores the once
15:44
Speaker 1: carefully guarded pages.
15:46
Speaker 7: The summer twenty first, two thousand.
15:48
Speaker 1: Dear we Both, Joe named her diary Webo, after the
15:51
Speaker 1: robot in flubber.
15:53
Speaker 5: Bush is our new president they told us about a
15:55
Speaker 5: week ago. Anyways, I have a totally new crush. It's
15:59
Speaker 5: Justin Timberly. He is so hot.
16:01
Speaker 7: I love him.
16:07
Speaker 5: She declares on December twenty third, nineteen ninety nine, that
16:11
Speaker 5: her relationship with Leonardo DiCaprio is over.
16:14
Speaker 4: She says, ps.
16:16
Speaker 7: Leo is over too. He is a part in my
16:18
Speaker 7: French gay Lord.
16:20
Speaker 5: It is the new Jojo and I'm a single exclamation point.
16:24
Speaker 1: With Leo and Justin, Joe created a fantasy of the
16:27
Speaker 1: perfect boyfriend, and as Becky reads further, she wonders if
16:31
Speaker 1: with Letitia, Joe had created a fantasy of the perfect mom,
16:35
Speaker 1: a mother who would always be around for her.
16:37
Speaker 5: Dear Weebo, mom is going away tomorrow. I can't believe it.
16:41
Speaker 7: Again.
16:42
Speaker 5: For four days, which is usually extended to six days,
16:45
Speaker 5: she never thinks about time with her family. I love
16:48
Speaker 5: her so much, and she's mostly away from me. Work, work, work,
16:52
Speaker 5: And every Saturday night she goes out with my dad.
16:55
Speaker 5: I just spend the scraps of time with her that
16:57
Speaker 5: I have.
17:00
Speaker 4: Fuck so sad.
17:09
Speaker 1: Alone in the dim light of the storage unit, Becky
17:12
Speaker 1: puts the journal down and continues her search, but after
17:26
Speaker 1: digging around for a couple hours, she gives up. She
17:29
Speaker 1: can't find the address book. It seemed like the storage
17:39
Speaker 1: unit had been a dead end, but a few days later,
17:42
Speaker 1: Becky phones with some good news. She'd taken Joe's journal
17:45
Speaker 1: home to keep searching for clues, and she found some.
17:49
Speaker 7: There are a.
17:49
Speaker 5: Couple entries that mentioned Leticia, and the.
17:53
Speaker 1: First mention of Leticia is from the day she showed up,
17:56
Speaker 1: which was also the day the previous babysitter left.
18:00
Speaker 5: Dear wee Bo. Today I found out some bad news.
18:04
Speaker 5: Sylvia is leaving. I'm trying not to make a big
18:07
Speaker 5: deal about it because I don't want to make Sylvia
18:09
Speaker 5: feel guilty. The new babysitter is Letitia. She's really nice
18:14
Speaker 5: and she's nineteen years old. August third, nineteen ninety eight.
18:24
Speaker 5: Letitia and I have found one thing in common. We're
18:27
Speaker 5: planning a Leo Knight. We both love Leonardo DiCaprio, love Joe.
18:39
Speaker 1: And what else do you have?
18:41
Speaker 5: There there's September sixth, nineteen ninety eight. Dear wee bo,
18:47
Speaker 5: Today Letitia's coming to babysit. I love Letitia. She's the best.
18:53
Speaker 5: She's one of those babysitters that actually does stuff with you,
18:56
Speaker 5: like For one, she will take you to the pier.
18:59
Speaker 5: Two she goes on the rides. A lot of my
19:02
Speaker 5: old babysitters weaseled themselves off the rides, but not Letitia.
19:06
Speaker 5: She rocks. She's coming at one.
19:12
Speaker 1: But only a few weeks later, Letitia was gone, and
19:15
Speaker 1: for Joe her disappearance was so painful that it led
19:19
Speaker 1: into the departures of the babysitters that followed.
19:22
Speaker 5: Dear wee bo, a'sln and Hillary are leaving. I don't
19:26
Speaker 5: want them to go, while at least they told us,
19:30
Speaker 5: unlike Letitia, we need to find a babysitter that will
19:34
Speaker 5: actually stay. I gotta go to school. I love you, Joey.
19:41
Speaker 1: And then, in a diary entry written months after Letitia's disappearance,
19:45
Speaker 1: Becky discovers proof that her sister's heartbreak went beyond merely
19:48
Speaker 1: writing about Leticia. She was also writing to Letitia. The
19:53
Speaker 1: substance of Joe's letters was always the same, I miss
19:56
Speaker 1: you and I'm sorry.
19:59
Speaker 5: I wrote a letter to Letitia. It says I still
20:02
Speaker 5: love you, and today I got a letter in the mail,
20:05
Speaker 5: but it turned out to be an advertisement. I really
20:09
Speaker 5: want to track her down.
20:12
Speaker 1: All told, Joe wrote Letitia about a half a dozen letters.
20:15
Speaker 1: Letitia ever responded, and now twenty years later, it's Becky
20:20
Speaker 1: who wants to track her down. According to Joe's diary,
20:28
Speaker 1: Letitia was nineteen and attending a nearby college when she
20:31
Speaker 1: became their babysitter, so present day, Letitia would now be
20:34
Speaker 1: forty years old and possibly an alumna of the local college.
20:39
Speaker 1: Armed with this, I start dialing Letitia's by the dozens.
20:43
Speaker 1: An excellent dialer, I dial with confidence, leaving dozens of
20:47
Speaker 1: messages but receiving no responses.
20:52
Speaker 3: Until Yeah, I just received a call from this number.
20:56
Speaker 1: Oh hi, yeah, I was looking for Letitia.
21:00
Speaker 3: What what is this called? Pertaining too well?
21:04
Speaker 5: I uh.
21:05
Speaker 1: While strong at the dialing part, my weakness has always
21:08
Speaker 1: been the part that comes immediately after. There's a couple
21:12
Speaker 1: of people who wanted to reconnect. She was a part
21:17
Speaker 1: of their past. Is this the right phone number?
21:20
Speaker 5: Or sorry?
21:21
Speaker 3: Who would that be? Who would that be?
21:24
Speaker 1: She was their babysitter in the late nineties.
21:31
Speaker 3: Oh okay, that's interesting. Okay, I will pass the message along.
21:48
Speaker 1: That's great. So this this, this is Letitia's number.
21:56
Speaker 3: No, it's not, it's my number.
22:04
Speaker 1: At any rate, if you're in touch with her or
22:06
Speaker 1: what have you, you know, she.
22:07
Speaker 4: Could give me a call.
22:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, okay, thank you, bye bye. Was the hedgy
22:16
Speaker 1: owl man going to deliver my message to Letitia? Or
22:20
Speaker 1: was he merely some basement apartment bachelor taking a break
22:23
Speaker 1: from opening cans of chili to have a little fun
22:26
Speaker 1: at my expense Because I have no other leads. I wait,
22:32
Speaker 1: and then one afternoon a week later, I get a
22:35
Speaker 1: call back. So once again I unholster my trustee dialing
22:40
Speaker 1: finger and get ready to deliver some news. Hey, Joe, Hey, Becky. Hi,
22:48
Speaker 1: So I have some news to share. I found Leticia.
22:56
Speaker 5: Holy s what the fuck?
23:00
Speaker 4: Holy shit balls?
23:05
Speaker 1: After the break, the holiest shitball of all Letitia.
23:22
Speaker 2: Nice to see.
23:23
Speaker 1: We've arranged meat at a place near Letitia's house to
23:26
Speaker 1: talk about what happened that day long ago. It turns
23:29
Speaker 1: out that Letitia still lives in the same neighborhood where
23:32
Speaker 1: she used to babysit Becky and Joe. The sisters are
23:35
Speaker 1: the first to arrive, so it's just supposed to be
23:39
Speaker 1: coming soon. Do you want to sit there?
23:42
Speaker 5: Sure?
23:43
Speaker 2: And because I thought I.
23:44
Speaker 1: Would sit here, And after detailing my elaborate seating chart,
23:48
Speaker 1: I offer refreshments. I have some water and glasses for
23:55
Speaker 1: the water. We fall into a nervous quiet. Joe swimming
23:59
Speaker 1: in decades old emotions seems especially unsettled.
24:04
Speaker 8: When you said you found her, I was like, wait,
24:06
Speaker 8: I don't know this person at all. It's so like
24:11
Speaker 8: the last time I saw her was the last time
24:13
Speaker 8: I saw her, Like, it's so weird.
24:16
Speaker 1: Like And then we wait and wait and wait. Becky
24:32
Speaker 1: and Joe sit on the couch, side by side, listening
24:35
Speaker 1: to the cars pass by. Five minutes turns to ten minutes,
24:39
Speaker 1: ten to fifteen, until finally a knock at the door.
24:51
Speaker 3: Hello.
24:52
Speaker 1: Letitia has a warm smile and blonde highlights in her hair.
24:56
Speaker 3: Oh, it's nice to meet you.
24:57
Speaker 2: Come on in, Joe are here. Oh great.
25:03
Speaker 9: Before the last time I saw you, you were just kids.
25:06
Speaker 1: As per my seating arrangement, Becky and Joe are on
25:09
Speaker 1: the couch. Leticia sits down on the chair opposite them,
25:13
Speaker 1: So I maybe we can. I don't know how to
25:17
Speaker 1: to start exactly, but maybe maybe what with all my
25:20
Speaker 1: planning out the seating arrangement, which so far seems to
25:23
Speaker 1: be working like a charm, I hadn't come up with
25:26
Speaker 1: a plan for how to actually begin a babysitter baby sadded, reunion.
25:31
Speaker 1: So I figure we should begin at the beginning with
25:34
Speaker 1: how Letitia came to be hired in the first place.
25:37
Speaker 1: Do you remember, like there being an interview. Do you
25:39
Speaker 1: remember initial impressions of.
25:44
Speaker 7: So I think I.
25:44
Speaker 9: Found a posting maybe on Craigslist. I want to say
25:48
Speaker 9: I did. I interviewed with your mom.
25:51
Speaker 1: You know, but didn't come up in the interview, Letitia says,
25:54
Speaker 1: is how big the job would be. It wasn't just
25:56
Speaker 1: looking after Becky and Joe. She also had to do
25:59
Speaker 1: the cooking and house cleaning. Letitia was barely out of
26:03
Speaker 1: high school and clearly in over her head. It was
26:06
Speaker 1: the beginning of a tumultuous period in her life.
26:10
Speaker 9: When I started to work with you girls, it was
26:14
Speaker 9: like I was going through like a breakup and like
26:17
Speaker 9: just my whole world kind of felt like it was
26:20
Speaker 9: just you know, unraveling, you know, it was just like
26:24
Speaker 9: it was overwhelming. I remember it being so difficult for
26:34
Speaker 9: me to get out of my car and like walk
26:37
Speaker 9: across the street because I felt so uncomfortable under the
26:43
Speaker 9: glare of like the people just looking at me crossing
26:46
Speaker 9: the street. I don't know, I felt very like vulnerable
26:50
Speaker 9: in the world.
26:53
Speaker 1: Letitia began to overeat compulsively, and when she gained weight,
26:57
Speaker 1: it filled her with self hatred to Becky and Joe.
27:00
Speaker 1: So Letitia was the definition of cool, but in reality
27:03
Speaker 1: she was barely keeping it together. Even the inspiring story
27:07
Speaker 1: about crashing into a cop car was less a middle
27:10
Speaker 1: finger to the man and more symptom of being trapped
27:13
Speaker 1: in her own head.
27:14
Speaker 9: I remember like breaking down in tears because for some
27:16
Speaker 9: reason I thought I was going to like go to
27:18
Speaker 9: jail or something because I hit a police officer.
27:22
Speaker 1: When Letitia stopped getting her period, she knew something had
27:24
Speaker 1: to be really wrong. So finally she went to the doctor.
27:29
Speaker 9: And it was the doctor who told me, you know,
27:32
Speaker 9: I think you're depressed. And suddenly when he said that,
27:35
Speaker 9: it was like, oh my god, yes, of course, like
27:38
Speaker 9: that's what's happening.
27:40
Speaker 1: Eventually, Letitia would crawl out of that depression, but it
27:43
Speaker 1: would take her a decade to do it.
27:45
Speaker 9: I mean, I wish I would have had the courage
27:47
Speaker 9: to come back and speak to you both in person.
27:52
Speaker 9: So I was really excited and happy to hear that
27:55
Speaker 9: you know, you guys had reached it out.
27:59
Speaker 1: For Letitia, the day she didn't pick up the girls
28:01
Speaker 1: from school was just one more bad day and a
28:04
Speaker 1: long blur of bad days. But for Becky and Joe,
28:07
Speaker 1: it's the day they keep coming back to, one of
28:10
Speaker 1: the worst of their childhood. Even if Letitia was depressed,
28:14
Speaker 1: why did she have to abandon them without a word
28:16
Speaker 1: of warning? Didn't she care that they'd be left waiting
28:20
Speaker 1: all alone? Joe can't bring herself to raise the question,
28:24
Speaker 1: so Becky steps up and tries to explain the day
28:27
Speaker 1: for both of them.
28:28
Speaker 5: We sat together on the grass, and I just remember
28:32
Speaker 5: like the last car, like and then sort of this
28:36
Speaker 5: panic setting in of.
28:38
Speaker 7: Like we're alone, and like, yeah.
28:42
Speaker 5: We waited a really long time, and I remember being
28:45
Speaker 5: worried that, like you were okay.
28:49
Speaker 1: Becky looks over at Joe. Just like when they were kids,
28:52
Speaker 1: they study each other's faces, looking for direction, trying to
28:56
Speaker 1: figure out their next move.
28:58
Speaker 8: Tentatively, Joe, Yeah, I mean that that is what happened.
29:04
Speaker 1: But Letitia looks confused. She offers her version of the day.
29:09
Speaker 1: She'd been unable to get out of bed for most
29:11
Speaker 1: of the morning, telling herself that she had to go
29:13
Speaker 1: to work, and yet she couldn't possibly go to work.
29:17
Speaker 1: This was when she picked up the phone and dialed
29:20
Speaker 1: Becky and Joe's parents.
29:22
Speaker 9: I called them and told them that I was going
29:25
Speaker 9: to be and this was before your school ended, that
29:28
Speaker 9: I was sick.
29:29
Speaker 4: But I did call. Of course.
29:30
Speaker 9: I called and told them, and this was before your
29:33
Speaker 9: school was out, that I'm sick, and I'm you know,
29:36
Speaker 9: I wasn't going.
29:37
Speaker 4: To come in that day.
29:40
Speaker 7: And that wasn't the day.
29:42
Speaker 9: That was that day.
29:45
Speaker 8: No one ever told us that at all. We really
29:56
Speaker 8: didn't know, we really and it's been I'm.
30:00
Speaker 7: Thirty years old.
30:02
Speaker 8: I mean like I've gone my whole life thinking.
30:04
Speaker 4: That that was not a part of it.
30:08
Speaker 7: The fact that you called that she.
30:11
Speaker 8: Knew that you weren't coming is so absolutely bonkers to me.
30:18
Speaker 8: I think I felt at the time like it was
30:21
Speaker 8: it was me and Becky, like we were just too much.
30:27
Speaker 1: Becky and Joe reach out for each other's hands.
30:30
Speaker 8: As Joe continues, according to the I mean my mom
30:34
Speaker 8: was like, I don't know what happened, Like truly, that's
30:36
Speaker 8: what we thought happened.
30:37
Speaker 7: We thought that you just disappeared.
30:40
Speaker 1: Letitia tells them that she'd only meant to call in
30:42
Speaker 1: sick for one day, but that their mom had grown
30:45
Speaker 1: so upset that Leticia, in her fragile state, felt like
30:49
Speaker 1: she couldn't ever return, and so began Joe's letter writing campaign.
30:54
Speaker 8: I after you left, wrote like countless letters to you,
31:01
Speaker 8: and I remember my mom had all the stamps.
31:05
Speaker 4: And she would mail my letters.
31:11
Speaker 1: Joe looks at Letitia again. She struggles to ask the
31:15
Speaker 1: thing she really wants to know, why didn't you ever
31:18
Speaker 1: respond to me? But before she has to come out
31:21
Speaker 1: and say it, Letitia jumps in, I.
31:23
Speaker 9: Didn't get any letters. I never received any letters.
31:31
Speaker 1: Joe takes in Letitia's words and speaks in a whisper.
31:36
Speaker 8: That makes me so mad, Like it's just genuinely confusing,
31:46
Speaker 8: I mean anger, But like I'm.
31:48
Speaker 4: Just like, why.
31:51
Speaker 1: Why hadn't Becky and Joe's mom mailed the letters? And
31:54
Speaker 1: why hadn't she told the girls that Letitia had actually
31:57
Speaker 1: phoned that.
31:58
Speaker 10: Day that that is not my memory of what happened.
32:07
Speaker 1: I reach out to Becky and Joe's mom, Julia to
32:10
Speaker 1: ask her memory of the day is foggy, but she
32:13
Speaker 1: does not remember getting a call from Letitia.
32:16
Speaker 10: As I remember it, I just got a call from
32:21
Speaker 10: someone at school saying nobody came to pick up your kids,
32:25
Speaker 10: and that felt like the worst thing I had ever done,
32:29
Speaker 10: in letting my kids down.
32:31
Speaker 1: Julia also doesn't remember being given any letters to mail, regardless,
32:35
Speaker 1: she wouldn't have been mailing them in the first place.
32:37
Speaker 1: She says, Joe knew where the stamp drawer was. Julia
32:42
Speaker 1: remembers the time of Letitia's employment as one of worry
32:45
Speaker 1: and stress. She was producing about a half a dozen
32:48
Speaker 1: film projects at the time and was always exhausted. She
32:51
Speaker 1: kept long hours during the week, and on weekends she
32:55
Speaker 1: read the scripts that arrived at her doorstep in a
32:57
Speaker 1: huge pile.
32:59
Speaker 10: I didn't feel I had to apologize to my girls
33:02
Speaker 10: for having a career, but I did see that they
33:05
Speaker 10: kind of resented it, and I could understand why because
33:11
Speaker 10: it did take me away from them.
33:17
Speaker 1: Julia herself understands what it means to grow up with
33:19
Speaker 1: an absent mom. Her own mother was a New York
33:22
Speaker 1: talent agent who was always distracted with work and handed
33:25
Speaker 1: her off to a series of housekeepers.
33:27
Speaker 10: And I had my own memories of what I resented,
33:33
Speaker 10: like my mother did not get up in the moment.
33:36
Speaker 10: She liked to sleep late, and so she didn't get
33:39
Speaker 10: up in the morning when my brother and I went
33:42
Speaker 10: to school, so our lunches were always made by the housekeeper.
33:49
Speaker 4: I just remember.
33:50
Speaker 10: Wishing that my mother had made my lunch herself. You know,
33:55
Speaker 10: when I became a mom, I think I hoped I
33:58
Speaker 10: would do better, But when I got there myself, I
34:02
Speaker 10: saw how hard it was.
34:05
Speaker 1: But she was always sure to make the girl's lunches herself,
34:09
Speaker 1: taking care to drop a note in saying she was
34:11
Speaker 1: thinking of them, that she loved them. As for the
34:15
Speaker 1: other household chores, it seems like a lot of that
34:18
Speaker 1: fell to the young women she hired for Julia, being
34:21
Speaker 1: responsible for the cooking and cleaning while working a more
34:24
Speaker 1: than full time job was too hard, and it was
34:27
Speaker 1: made even harder by an agreement struck with her husband
34:30
Speaker 1: early on in their marriage.
34:32
Speaker 10: My husband, I mean, it was clear he never wanted
34:36
Speaker 10: kids as much as I did, and I think he
34:39
Speaker 10: loved them once they got here, but it was my deal,
34:42
Speaker 10: and I was fully one hundred percent responsible for all
34:47
Speaker 10: child's care duties and everything, and that was something that
34:53
Speaker 10: was a bit of a problem in my marriage, you know,
34:57
Speaker 10: which ultimately ended in divorce.
35:01
Speaker 1: Julia says that when she envisions Becky and Joe sitting
35:04
Speaker 1: on the school lawn embracing as the sky turned dark,
35:07
Speaker 1: she can't help but remember the day she sat her
35:09
Speaker 1: daughters down to tell them that she and their dad
35:12
Speaker 1: were divorcing. Becky was eighteen by then and Joe twenty two.
35:18
Speaker 1: Julia remembers them holding on to each other while she
35:20
Speaker 1: broke the news. Well, Julia thought, at least they've got
35:25
Speaker 1: each other, and I.
35:27
Speaker 10: Felt like they're together, They're gonna be okay.
35:48
Speaker 9: Yeah, you were ten.
35:49
Speaker 1: I remember, because after hearing what their mom remembers, Becky
35:53
Speaker 1: and Joe say that there's probably no way to ever
35:56
Speaker 1: know for sure what happened. Back then. Julia was just
35:59
Speaker 1: trying to survive, and so was Leticia. They each remember
36:04
Speaker 1: things differently, and some things they don't remember at all.
36:07
Speaker 8: I remember making a smoothie with you and spilling the
36:11
Speaker 8: blender and I thought that was the reason.
36:16
Speaker 1: When Joe brings up the spilled smoothie, this painful regret
36:19
Speaker 1: she's carried with her well into adulthood, Latitia tells her
36:23
Speaker 1: that she has no recollection of any smoothies at all,
36:26
Speaker 1: and so Joe pulls out another pivotal memory.
36:29
Speaker 8: I have a question, do you remember that Alia dance?
36:33
Speaker 4: We're doing it?
36:35
Speaker 1: Letitia shakes her head. She doesn't remember, but the sisters do.
36:40
Speaker 1: It's another moment that they still carry with them, that
36:43
Speaker 1: only they.
36:43
Speaker 4: Share, Like I remember that.
36:47
Speaker 2: That's so adorable.
36:48
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was like.
36:55
Speaker 1: The sisters mirror each other's hand movements, they fall into
36:58
Speaker 1: the dance automatically. They're enjoying themselves and each other.
37:02
Speaker 4: And I just went again, that so funny.
37:10
Speaker 1: In the Aliah song are you that somebody? Aliah poses
37:13
Speaker 1: a question, are you that somebody? Because of a hotel
37:18
Speaker 1: Wi Fi situation. I've yet to listen to the song,
37:22
Speaker 1: so I don't know whether Aliah ever gets her answer answer,
37:29
Speaker 1: But watching Becky and Joe, it's clear they've gotten their answer.
37:33
Speaker 1: Becky and Joe's somebody was neither babysitter nor parent. The
37:38
Speaker 1: one constant the sister's always had was each other.
37:42
Speaker 7: I care a lot about my sister.
37:45
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I mean we're closer now than I think ever.
37:51
Speaker 8: And Becky's one of the closest people to me in
37:54
Speaker 8: my life and my hero.
38:02
Speaker 9: Hello.
38:04
Speaker 2: Yes, issue Okay.
38:06
Speaker 1: Letitia gets a call from the hedgie man, who it
38:09
Speaker 1: turns out is also her husband. Their nineteen month old
38:13
Speaker 1: daughter is having a meltdown and their six year old
38:15
Speaker 1: daughter needs to be picked up from school, so Letitia
38:18
Speaker 1: has to rush off. They all make plans to get
38:21
Speaker 1: together soon, but for now, Letitia needs to take care
38:25
Speaker 1: of her daughters, and Becky and Joe for their part,
38:29
Speaker 1: head out together into a beautiful la afternoon, doing their
38:32
Speaker 1: best to keep taking care of each other. Now that
39:15
Speaker 1: the furnitures returning.
39:19
Speaker 7: To its goodwill home, now that the last month's rent
39:27
Speaker 7: is scheming.
39:28
Speaker 1: With the damage to pozzle, take this moment to dissolve.
39:35
Speaker 4: If we meant it, if we tried. We felt around
39:40
Speaker 4: for far too from things that accidentally.
39:51
Speaker 1: This episode of Heavyweight was produced by Khalila Holt and
39:54
Speaker 1: me Jonathan Goldstein, along with Stevie Lane Nba Parker. The
39:58
Speaker 1: show is edited by Jorha Special thanks to Emily Condon,
40:02
Speaker 1: Lulu Miller, Annah Sullivan Kate Parkinson, Morgan Matilde, Urfelino, and
40:06
Speaker 1: Jackie Cohen. Bobby Lord makes the episode with original music
40:10
Speaker 1: by Christine Fellows, John K. Sampson and Bobby Lord. Additional
40:14
Speaker 1: music credits can be found on our website, gimbletmedia dot
40:16
Speaker 1: com slash Heavyweight. Our theme song is by The Weaker
40:20
Speaker 1: Thans courtesy of Epitaph Records, and our ad music is
40:23
Speaker 1: by Hailey Shaw. Follow us on Twitter at Heavyweight or
40:26
Speaker 1: email us at Heavyweight at gimltmedia dot com. You can
40:29
Speaker 1: listen for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
40:34
Speaker 1: We'll have a brand new episode next week.