Baby Please Don't Go: A Novel

by Frank Freudberg

  He was bigger than the craving, he told himself as he pulled into a parking spot at CPS.

  He had a day filled with appointments and interviews and administrative tasks. They would keep him busy, but he knew she’d be relentlessly in his thoughts. He hadn’t been to a meeting in a week and he needed one. He intended to go to an eight o’clock meeting that evening in Chadds Ford.

  Lock kept his mind immersed in his work, and as the day wore on, he was surprised at how well he did at keeping images of Natalie at bay. He looked forward to being with a group of recovering drunks that night, knowing the camaraderie would provide some relief. But when he arrived home after work, the first thing he did was plug what he thought of as his Natalie phone into the outlet to let it charge.

  While waiting to leave for the meeting, Lock killed time by alternating between flipping through the pages of American Forests magazine and watching headlines on CNN. He thought about making a sandwich just for something to do, but he wasn’t hungry. He had tried to make some more notes about the albino redwood in his tree book, but it reminded him too much of Natalie, and he suddenly worried if he’d ever be able to write in it again.

  When it was time to head out to Chadds Ford, Natalie still hadn’t called, and she probably wouldn’t. He always switched his cellphone to silent mode during meetings, and he couldn’t help hoping that maybe he’d have a pleasant surprise when he’d check for missed calls after the hour-long gathering.

  The meeting was crowded but uneventful, and the only thing he heard there that gave him at least some respite from his Natalie-related thoughts was when someone said, “Sobriety in AA is the first thing in my life that ever worked.”

  Lock could say the same thing, and knowing that made him feel better, perhaps because it gave him a sense that if all else failed, he would still have AA to fall back on. That certainly seemed logical. Practically his entire social life these days revolved around AA meetings and the friends and acquaintances he had made there. When he was alone in his carriage house, which was much of the time, he felt confident that substance abuse was solidly in his past.

  The AA fellowship cautioned members to avoid the influences of “people, places, and things” formerly associated with their drinking and drugging. Lock abided by that advice, which naturally and dramatically limited his circle of friends, especially the three guys he used to hang around with—the same ones who had been there with him the night he was out of his mind at a bar in Bryn Mawr and, upon leaving, sideswiped three parked cars and nearly punched a cop.

  That night, Lock had hidden a glassine envelope of cocaine in his underwear, but the police searched the car and found a half-consumed bottle of vodka and a piece of foil containing a joint. For some reason unknown, they didn’t make an issue of it.

  The next day, at noon, Abner escorted Lock to his first meeting. He didn’t argue when his boss insisted. He knew he needed to be there. It was a relief, like pulling into the driveway after an all-night trip. That first day, Lock stopped outside after the meeting and nodded to the big sugar maple tree that stood sentinel over the building. It was how he marked passages in his life, trees like road signs to places new and places familiar. This one pointed in what Lock was sure was a good direction.

  Lock slept late the next day and the rest of the week. It was his habit to wake early and listen to the news on public radio while he cooked breakfast, but now he had trouble getting out of bed. There had been no word from Natalie. She wasn’t fading from his mind as completely as he had hoped. Natalie’s absence only made his thinking about her more vivid and frequent.

  Deep down, Lock didn’t believe Natalie was really capable of giving up on them. He didn’t trust his own negative assessment of the situation, but he was beginning to accept that it must be true. If he was on her mind as much as she was on his, there was no way she’d be able to resist calling. He knew that made little sense. He hadn’t called her, after all. She was stronger than he was, he concluded, and of course she had a life—her kids, her house, her orchids and her Orchid Society friends.

  The fourth day since he had last seen her passed in a blur. Lock drove to the King of Prussia mall, walked around, watched people, and purchased nothing except lunch, which he ate half of. He drove back home, took a nap, watered his plants, and cleaned his bathroom.

  Around ten that night, the phone rang. Lock let it ring a few times. If he didn’t answer, then he wouldn’t find out it was not Natalie.

  But what if it was? He lunged for the phone and answered before the fourth ring began.

  “Is it okay that I called?” Natalie asked.

  “No,” he said, “it’s not okay.” He didn’t want her to hear the exhilaration in his tone. He paused to get his voice under control and sat on the sofa. “But don’t hang up, either.”

  “I never want to go so many days without speaking to you again,” she said. “I’ve been going crazy thinking about you, thinking about us, fantasizing about what it would be like if it was you, me, and the girls. I want it to be that way.”

  “I don’t let myself think about it,” he said. “But yes. I feel the same way.”

  “Come over. Now.”

  “Can’t do it, Natalie. Love to, but can’t.”

  “Yes, you can.”

  “Maybe I will,” he said. “Maybe I’ll ring the bell and Witt will open the door for me. Late on a Saturday night.”

  “Witt’s in Avalon with the girls,” Natalie said. “I’m sure his lawyer told him to do more with them so in family court he’d look like he’s actually involved in their lives. Four or five years of arm’s-length fathering and now he’s going to erase it with a couple of trips to the beach. What a joke.”

  “His lawyer gave him good advice. And I’d bet he’ll be presenting the receipts to the judge to prove how much he loves his children.”

  “I didn’t think of that,” she said. “I need your help, Lock. How am I supposed to do this without you? Shit, that sounded needy. You know what I mean, though. I miss you, but I’m thinking about the girls right now. What’s it going to be like for them if he gets primary custody?”

  Lock could see himself hurriedly getting dressed and hopping into his car.

  “And Candice is off for the weekend,” Natalie said. “Come over, Lock. We’re not done with each other, and you know it.”

  “I wish I could.”

  “Let me ask you this,” Natalie said. “Did your heart pound every time the phone rang these last few days? When you saw it wasn’t me, didn’t you feel it in the pit of your stomach? That’s how I felt, and if you tell me you didn’t feel like that, I’ll quit bothering you. I know you won’t lie, not even a white lie.”

  “Natalie—”

  “But if you did feel that way, then we’re not done with each other. There’s a reason that’s happening.”

  “Of course I felt the same way. Whenever the phone would ring, I knew who I was hoping it would be. But that doesn’t change anything. You want what’s best for your kids, and getting caught spending time with me isn’t going to look good to a judge.”

  She snorted angrily. “And you don’t want to lose your job, either.”

  “I don’t,” Lock said, “and I’m not going to apologize for that. My work is important. It’s important to me, and it’s important to the kids I help.”

  “I know, I’m sorry. It’s just—”

  “I want to come over, but we’d be risking everything.”

  “No, Lock, you have it all backwards. If you don’t come over, we’ll be risking everything.”

  For a long moment, Lock said nothing. Was she right? Could he build a life and family with her? He felt sure of it, but he knew that was irrational. Even if they were together, anything might happen. It might last a month, or ten years. It had been easy to do the right thing because he knew he wasn’t thinking straight. But now, hearing Natalie say out
loud what he had been thinking, something inside him began to shift, slowly, like the beginning of an avalanche.

  Lock stood up. He looked around his apartment and could picture a Christmas tree and giggling kids running around. He checked the wood-burning stove. The fire was dying.

  “Okay,” he said. “I’ll be there in half an hour. To talk. Nothing else, Natalie. To talk.”

  “Just talk,” she said. “Hurry.”

  10

  En route to Natalie’s house, Lock’s thoughts wandered to when, a little less than a year earlier, he had given up gambling at the same time he swore off alcohol and drugs.

  In those first days of craps table abstinence, the hunger for escape was so intense that Lock was convinced that he wasn’t strong enough to resist three powerful vices simultaneously. He knew something had to give. It was a Sunday afternoon when he rationalized that driving into Philadelphia to the Sugar House Casino was a lesser evil than picking up a drink or getting high.

  After wrestling for hours with an array of cravings, Lock walked into his kitchen, opened the refrigerator, and took out a Tupperware container in which he always kept a thousand dollars in one hundred-dollar bills. The cash was “emergency funds,” he had always told himself, but it was really gambling money, and rather than take a drink or a drug, he’d get into a craps game. It was safer, he thought, and the effect would be the same—near-total obliteration of whichever thoughts haunted him at the moment.

  It came as no surprise when, two hours later, he returned home from the casino with practically no money left. He had sixty bucks left—he had begun his journey to Sugar House with one thousand and sixty-five. At first, he bet with 100-dollar chips and won his first two bets. Within ninety seconds, he was up $300. He took a quick trip to the men’s room to clear his head and get his heart to slow down a bit.

  After returning from the bathroom, he took it a little easier, betting only green, 25-dollar chips. As soon as he lost the $300 he had been up, he got more aggressive, betting $150 on each roll. He won a few rolls, but then the trend turned against him. He lost six bets of varying amounts in a row, and the thousand was gone.

  He tipped the valet five bucks and drove home. His decision never to gamble again had nothing to do with the money he lost. Though he was far from rich, the cash meant nothing to him. He simply and finally realized there was no difference between cocaine, alcohol, and the green felt of a craps table. In AA, he remembered, someone once said switching vices was like being on the Titanic and demanding a different deck chair.

  Now he was on his way to Natalie’s place. Even though Lock’s hands were wrapped around a cold steering wheel, they were sweating, and no matter how many times he swallowed, he could still feel a lump in his throat. It was the same feeling he’d had when he knew it wasn’t in his best interests to be driving to the casino.

  I should turn around and go back home, he told himself. Or maybe I should stomp on the gas pedal and get to Natalie’s faster. Maybe I should drive my car into a bridge abutment.

  He wanted to argue that this was love, or could be love, and that was different. But after years of addictive behaviors, he had at least learned enough so that lying to himself was almost impossible. He flashed on an image of himself and Natalie lounging in deck chairs on the Titanic, glasses of whiskey on the tables next to them. He laughed at the idea and shook his head. Aloud, he said, “Can I get another drink? Oh, and tell the captain there’s an iceberg just ahead, but it’s just the tip.”

  When drunk, high, or anchored to a craps table, the only things Lock’s mind entertained were if there was enough booze, where he would be able to get more drugs, or how he’d get even after having lost so much money. Those were benign dilemmas, easier to deal with than the emotions he now sought to obliterate—especially the sense of isolation and the fear that he’d be alone, without a family, forever. Just talk, he thought. That’s fair. That’s not too much to ask for. But he knew that “just talk” was no different than “just one drink.”

  By the time he pulled into Natalie’s driveway, the clamminess in his palms had evaporated.

  “Oh my God, Lock,” Natalie said, rushing to him as he entered the kitchen through the driveway door.

  She stepped forward and hugged him hard, closing her eyes and holding him tightly. He returned the embrace and then stepped back, holding his hands out to say “slow down.” She smiled and nodded, and he smiled back.

  She took him by the hand and led him to the living room, with its beige and black décor, modern furniture, and a freshly started blaze in the fireplace. He eased his hand out of hers and she nodded for him to take a seat on the sofa. He threw his jacket on an armchair and sat where she indicated. Immediately, she sat down next to him, her leg pressing against his. He slid away, only a few inches, but enough to show he intended to stick to the “just talk” arrangement.

  She closed her eyes and leaned into him.

  “Come on, Natalie,” Lock said.

  “Kiss me once,” she said, “and I’ll be satisfied. But I need that kiss. Nothing more, I promise.”

  “You promised already,” he said, smiling. “Just talk.”

  “So? That was then and this is now. Kiss me.”

  He took her hand and kissed it and then folded it into his own.

  “Okay, okay,” Natalie said, rolling her eyes and shrugging. “You’re no fun.”

  An easy smile came to his face. She smiled back and looked into his eyes.

  “I never met a man who said he just wanted to talk who actually just wanted to talk,” she said.

  “I told you, I don’t tell lies.”

  “Listen,” she said, leaning back and taking a deep breath, “you’re a good man. I knew that the minute I met you, and I want what’s best for my girls and me. If I have to be patient—and believe me, that’s not one of my talents—I’ll be patient.”

  A gulp of beer, a line of coke, a roll of the dice. A kiss. Lock’s mind spun.

  “You made me think, Natalie,” he said, “when you said that if I didn’t come over, I’d be risking it all. I don’t want to risk anything. I’m finished with gambling. I want to do the right thing.”

  “Coming here tonight is the right thing. We can take it slow, but we have to take it.”

  Lock looked around the room to distract himself, but he couldn’t help it. He had to look back at her. “Oh boy,” he said.

  “I know,” she said. “What are you going do? Things happen. That’s life.”

  “Things happen when we let them happen.”

  “Exactly. That’s how it’s supposed to be. Let things happen naturally. You’re trying to stifle something wonderful.” Natalie ran her fingers through her short hair. “Let me ask you this. Do you want to kiss me?”

  “What I want and what’s best are two different things.”

  “So that’s a yes,” Natalie said.

  “That’s a yes.”

  “But you’re going to resist.”

  “What else can I do? You’re reckless,” he said.

  Natalie started to say something, but he held up a hand. “It’s not a bad thing. It’s one of the things I like about you. I used to be reckless, too. So, yeah, I want to kiss you. But once we do that, we’re committed.” He smiled and cocked his head. “Let’s blow up that bridge when we come to it, okay?”

  She laughed. “Okay, we’ll do it your way.” She got up and moved a few feet away to a high-backed chair across from him. “Better?”

  “Yes,” Lock said. “No.”

  “Definitely no,” she said. “Let’s talk about the kids. The case is still open, and I know that’s part of your concern about us. I appreciate it, I really do. I know you want the best for my kids, so let’s talk about them.”

  Lock nodded. “That works.”

  “So…if they’re raised in a loveless home, that’s bad fo
r them, right? If they see their parents always fighting, that’s bad for them, too. Right?”

  “It’s not ideal, no.”

  “If they’re being carted around by a drunk driver, isn’t that dangerous?” she asked.

  “Yes, that’s pretty bad.”

  “Then help me, tutor me,” she said. “About things fathers do, things that matter to judges, so I can recognize it when he does it—because I can guarantee you, if it’s irresponsible, Witt will do it.”

  Lock straightened up ever so slightly at this. “What, give you a few ideas about signs of abuse, excessive clinginess, kids getting moody for no reason? That kind of thing?”

  “No, things for me to be on the lookout for, things that Witt is doing that he shouldn’t be.”

  “Evidence for your custody case.”

  “Exactly. I need to know how to build a good case. I’m not Witt. I’d never invent anything, but he will, so I have to be as prepared as I can. Don’t make me fight him with one hand tied behind my back.”

  “So I give you ideas based on my experience and help you wind up with a better custody order. A better settlement. You’d take better care of Edwina and Dahlia than Witt ever could. Right?”

  “That’s it. Nothing else. There’s nothing wrong with that. Just talk.” She smiled, and he laughed.

  “Maybe you’ll get better than a fifty-fifty split. And this house—”

  “—and the one in Avalon, and twenty-five grand a month instead of pocket change,” she said. “It’s okay, I know what you’re thinking.”

  He shrugged. “Sorry. You do this job long enough, you get a little cynical. You do deserve those things, though. It’s the law, and you’d be using the money to take care of the girls. It’s not like you’re flying to Acapulco every weekend and leaving them home. I get it, I really do. The girls deserve the best life you can give them.”