Sassafras, Part 31

Rick


I don't know how long we sat there, but I could have stayed there forever. It felt so nice to have her sitting next to me, with my arm around her and her head resting on my shoulder. Every time a car drove past she would perk up, but they always just drove by. After a while she settled down, and later I noticed she was sleeping. I picked up the remote and turned down the volume on the TV so it wouldn’t wake her up and just watched her sleep. The light from the TV played across her face, blue then green then white. I saw her eyelashes move, and knew she was dreaming. Was she dreaming about me? Or was she dreaming about that senator? Or was she still worrying about her sister? She mumbled something, then her head slid down on my chest and her arm wrapped around my waist.

I must have fallen asleep also. About 11:30 I heard something bump into the front door. I tried to get up without waking Joan, but she woke up anyway. Bill came in the door and I could tell from across the room that he was drunk. His shirt was dirty and ripped. He stood in the doorway, holding on to the doorknob with one hand and the frame with the other, glaring at me.

"Get the hell out of my house, mother fucker," he said, swaying a little.

Joan jumped up and walked over to him, starting to read him the riot act, but he went off on her, too. "You can't tell me what to do! You're not my mother. My mother's dead! Nobody can tell me what to do anymore! I don't have to listen to you or your boyfriend."

Joan looked furious, but I told her I would take care of him. "I'm going to kick your ass, mother fucker," he said and lurched into the room. I waited a second and then took a step forward and gave him a little push. He fell backwards onto a recliner, and then rolled over the arm and onto the floor.

"Whoa, Champ, looks like you need some help. I think you've got a date with your pillow," I said and started helping him to his feet.

"I've got a date?" he asked, completely forgetting about kicking my ass. "I never had a date. Is she pretty?"

"Oh, man, she's hot. I think she said she was a cheerleader."

"A cheerleader? Is it Debbie?”

“Yeah, I think she said her name is Debbie.”

Where is she?" He wobbled around trying to see where Debbie was. I put my arm around his waist and started steering him toward the hall.

"I think she's in your room waiting for you, Stud."

"Aw, man, that's great. You're great, man." He stumbled down the hall with me holding him up as best I could. I didn't know which room was his, but I recognized it when I saw the posters of Hooter's girls on the wall.

"See, there she is," I said, pointing at one of the posters. "She wants you to get undressed and get into bed and then she'll be right there."

He kept saying how great it was, and that I was awesome. I helped him get his shoes and jeans off, and then had to untangle his shirt from around his head. I finally got him in bed and covered him up. When I stood up I saw Joan standing in the doorway watching.

"You're slick," she said.

"I'm awesome," I corrected her.

You're awesome," she agreed, and reached up and kissed me. "How did you know what to do?"

"That wasn't the first time I had to work a drunk. You should have seen me before I got busted. Out drinking and partying all night. I was a real big spender."

"I bet your girlfriend loved that,” she said.

"Yeah, my wife didn't though." I said

"Your wife!" she hissed and backed away from me. "You're married!"

Why did I open my mouth? I shooed her down the hall and sat down on the couch. "No, I'm not married. I'm divorced." I thought about my ex-wife. She had been more of a maid for me than a wife. I never did anything for her, and thought all I had to do was come home once in a while and eat and change clothes and she would take care of everything else. "Dana learned to hate me with a capital H. I was a horrible husband. If I wasn't working all day I was out partying all night. She divorced me about a year before I got busted."

Don't say it, don't say it. I looked at Joan sitting about as far away as she could on the couch. Don't say it. You don't have to say it. "We had two kids, too, a boy and a girl.” I could see her out of the corner of my eye. She looked away and wrapped her arms around her like she was sick to her stomach. She probably was. “She had my parental rights severed while I was in prison and now I'm not allowed to see them anymore. I can't call them or write them, I can't even send them a birthday card. I haven't seen them in almost 8 years. The last time I saw them they were seven and five. Josh would be about Billy's age now, Crystal would be about 13."

Why was I saying this? Why couldn't I just shut up? I thought about the two little kids with that red-headed woman that had met Joan at Don’s. I remembered the boy pulling my hair, and tried to remember when Josh was that age. I had been so focused on myself I only remembered when he had been so sick he had to spend three days in the hospital, and now I couldn’t even remember why. "I keep thinking about going to California and seeing them, but I won't. I can't. If I do, they can put me back in prison. Is that fair? I can go to prison just for looking at my own kids. I don't even have a picture of them."

I couldn't look at her because I was afraid I would start crying. Why was I telling her all this? Why was I even thinking about this? I had been doing my best to not think about them ever since I found out Dana was severing my parental rights. There was nothing I could do while I was in prison, and nothing I could do now. It wasn't fair, but I had learned life was seldom fair.

Joan moved closer and put her hand on my shoulder, and said she was sorry. "Yeah, I'm sorry, too. I shouldn't have told you. I wasn’t going to. I wasn't going to tell you anything. Not about prison, not about Dana, definitely not about Josh and Crystal. When I saw you sitting in Tanner's, I wanted to get to know you better, but I didn't want you to get to know me."

"Why did you tell me?" she asked.

"I don't know. It just felt like I had to tell you. I didn't want to, but if you found out later you would have hated me. You probably hate me now, anyway. A little romance was all I wanted; maybe have an innocent weekend fling. Nothing serious,” I said. “Well, Bill's safe in bed now, I should probably leave." I kept staring at my hands, trying to make my eyes focus but everything kept getting blurry. Don't cry. Don't cry. Just stand up and leave. Stand up. Come on, stand up. The door is only six feet away. Just make it to the car and then you can cry like a baby but don't cry now.