by James, Marie
“He’s not,” I sigh. “How do you always call when I need you the most?”
She chuckles. “If you needed me, why didn’t you call yourself?”
I remain silent, but she knows me.
“Your friendship isn’t a burden, Fallyn. If you need something, all you have to do is call.”
“You can’t fix this.” I open the door to the nursery and peek in on Phoenix. He’s still sleeping, perfect puckered lips slightly parted.
“You’re scaring me. Is it something serious or an emergency like the time you accidentally flushed the diaper? I’m not a plumber, but I’ve got a pretty level head on my shoulders these days. If anything, I can talk you through whatever it is you’ve got going on.”
“I ran into Blaze an hour ago.”
Silence.
“Fuck,” she eventually mutters. “Was Phoenix with you?”
“He knows,” I answer. “He was beyond livid. Threatening to get custody while begging me to take him back.”
“He’d never get custody. You know that as much as I do,” she says, her tone stern as the background noise silences.
“He looks awful. Dirty. He’s lost so much weight. If our souls weren’t connected, I don’t know that I would’ve recognized him.”
Her frustrated sigh comes through the phone in a whoosh of air. “Your souls aren’t connected. This isn’t some fairy tale where he cuts himself and you feel his pain. If that were the case, you wouldn’t have needed an epidural during labor. He was probably so high, you wouldn’t have felt the contractions.”
“Brittney,” I groan. “He was devastated. I can’t help but think if he knew…”
“Things wouldn’t have been different, Fallyn. If he knew you were pregnant that day, he would’ve promised you the world, stole a hundred dollars from your purse, and celebrated becoming a dad with his junkie friends.”
I sigh, knowing she’s right. Addicts use when they’re happy, sad, lonely, bored…
“What if he shows up here and tries to take him? Julian’s gone. He won’t take my calls or respond to texts. You’re all the way in California.” My back hits the wall and I slide down, clutching my knees to my chest with my free hand.
“Did you get the restraining order we talked about after he and Julian attacked each other at the café?”
Damn it.
“No,” I mutter. “We talked about it, but remember, I got the flu right after that. Between ending up in the hospital from dehydration and worrying about losing the baby, it never came to mind again, and I hadn’t seen him since that day.”
“You need to get one,” she urges.
I want to yell and scream, but it’s not her fault. I pinch the bridge of my nose, attempting to ease the headache as it creeps into my skull.
“I’m pretty sure a piece of paper isn’t going to keep him from showing up and trying to steal my son.”
“Do you honestly think he’ll do that?” Concern laces her tone now that she’s thinking on the same track I am.
“The man I fell in love with? No.” I shake my head even though she can’t see me. “But he’s not that man anymore. The man I saw on the street today looks like he’s capable of very bad things.”
“Maybe he’ll get high and forget he ever saw you.”
I huff an indignant laugh. “If he were any higher than he was today, he would’ve been unconscious.”
“He looked bad, huh?”
“Horrible. The circles under his eyes were so dark, he looked like he had mascara running down his cheeks. Sores on his arms and neck. I can’t believe how dull his eyes have gotten. I didn’t even know your eye color could change.”
“So, not the handsome devil you fell in love with?”
“Not even close,” I say with a shake of my head, my voice sounding as deflated as I feel.
“That should make it easier,” she replies with a softness I don’t want to hear right now.
“What’s that?”
“To get over him. No way can you see him like that and still love him, right?”
The tears begin anew. “I love the man he used to be, the man I know he could’ve been if things were different.”
“You’re making excuses. You’ve got to stop lying to yourself.”
“The baby just woke up,” I lie. “Talk to you later.”
I hang up before she starts on her spiel about moving on and giving Julian a chance. She’s been harping on it since we met him. Team Julian Stone was a tangible thing in our apartment until she moved out, and it’s continued even though she’s hundreds of miles away.
When I finally drag myself to bed after checking the alarm and every window in the house a dozen more times, I let the pain swallow me up, allowing myself thirty minutes for the self-pity and recrimination, the what-ifs and should-have-beens. I let the tears fall, not caring that my pillow soaks in the sorrow, growing increasingly wet. I grant my heart permission to miss him, to imagine a better life where Blaze is home for dinner and teaches his son the perfect spiral in the backyard.
The light streams in from the gauzy curtains, highlighting the empty half of the bed. It wasn’t his spot. He’s never been in this bed, in this house, but I give myself a second to miss him as if he has. At first, I pretend he’s gone for the night, an important business deal pulling him away from his family. I imagine the regret I’d see in his eyes as he kissed us goodbye, kissing Phoenix on the head, insisting he take care of me while he’s gone.
My illusions, however, have a mind of their own. The simple images turn into years of absence, ending with his untimely death, leaving me as an unmarried widow—a single mother who has no idea how to tell her son the daddy he has questions about never survived the accident the day we were married. I’d comfort him, knowing a little part of me died that day too.
Chapter 36
Blaze
“That’s the last time, old man.” I toss the tiny bag of smack in his direction.
It’s a lie. I know it, he knows it, but he’s too interested in getting his cookie tin out to respond right away.
“What are you blabbering about?” he asks as Kate watches him sprinkle the chunky brown powder on the blackened spoon and add a few drops of water, almost salivating, a hungry look in her eyes.
“Bones is pretty fucking pissed about the little whore house you’ve got going on.” I lean back into the sofa, wishing it would swallow me up. “You’re undercutting his prices. I didn’t think I was going to walk out of there alive.”
“He’s just a punk ass kid. He can’t do nothin’.” Kate whimpers when the flame meets the bottom of the spoon. He sneers down at her, his hand so practiced, the spoon doesn’t waiver. “You’ll suck my cock if you want some.”
I groan, wanting to get up and leave before that shit happens, but the high from the shit I dropped as soon as I got safely away from Bones is creeping up my spine and spreading to my limbs. I opt to close my eyes. I’ll be damn near comatose in another five minutes, so it doesn’t matter.
Not soon enough, I think when Kate speaks.
“It won’t even get hard. What’s the point in sucking a soft cock?” A solid smack rings out through the space and she yelps, but I don’t open my eyes to see where he hit her this time.
For most addicts, the sexual dysfunction is beyond frustrating. For me, it’s a blessing. Searching for pussy when all I want is the wife who rejected me again two days ago is a huge pain in the ass. My dick worked well enough to get my wife pregnant, and I can’t decide whether that’s a blessing or a curse. I just want to be numb. All the time. Numb…
“This is different,” my dad mutters.
I crack an eye open to see him still hanging out of his unzipped jeans as he melts into his broken recliner. Too stoned to stop her, Kate grabs the baggie from the tin and begins the process of loading up her next fix.
“This shit is perfect.” His words come out throaty, filled with pleasure.
I fight my demons daily—I fought again two days
ago and lost that battle within six hours. Knowing I have a son I’ll never hold is too much to handle. The pills are there for me, waiting to give me the numb I need to survive. They always will be.
Watching Kate wrap the rubber tube around the top of her arm and search for a viable vein to shoot into, I wonder what made her this way, what made my dad this way. I’d love to contribute my drug abuse to being born to two asshole junkies and having an addictive personality, but at the end of the day, I know my choices are my own.
Kate pierces her vein, pulls the tubing from her arm, and sinks the plunger. A faint smile turns up the corners of her mouth.
“Perfect,” she whispers before falling back on the dingy carpet. Just like my mother, she doesn’t even bother to pull the needle from her arm before she sinks into her high.
***
A wave of nausea washes over me. Lolling in an uncontrollable circle, my head feels like it’s been pounded by the hammer of one of those High Striker games from the carnival, and my mouth is so dry and chalky, I can barely swallow. I sit up as best as I can, resting my elbows on my knees, head bowed as I squint at the floor, waiting for my eyes to adjust.
The soft light coming in from the broken window means it’s either dusk or dawn, though it doesn’t matter. Never does. My life is always the same—wake up, get stoned, pass out, repeat. I pat my pocket, relief washing over me when I feel the outline of the bag I scored from a pissed off Bones yesterday.
Finally able to handle the light with the headache bouncing around in my head, I lift my eyes, never getting used to the rancid decay of my father’s house. I’ve been here over six months, no effort to stop using, no desire to live a life where I’m not high.
Fallyn.
She invades my mind, sending the crushing pain right to my heart, just like she manages to do every time I’m coming down.
I drag my eyes to Kate’s leg. Even though it’s cold in the house, she’s always in a tank top and panties—easy access for the men who come around to fuck her. Heroin makes you feel hot. When she’s coming down, she’ll sometimes complain that her skin is on fire, so seeing her damn near naked is no surprise, but it’s the ashy gray color of her skin that makes my heart hammer in my chest.
My head shifts to my father, head back exactly where it landed last night after he injected his part of the baggie I brought home. Crusted vomit clings to the corners of his mouth and the front of his stained t-shirt.
Without moving from my spot on the sofa, I already know they’re both dead. I saw it for the first time when I was eleven, happening upon an overdose well after it took hold and killed the man, and there’s no denying the sight before me.
Emotionless, I stare at what’s left of a man who lived every single day of his life with only one end goal: wasted oblivion.
That’s my life. I’m my father. Getting high, choosing dope over a son who deserves better than the piece of shit dad he ended up with.
The tears fall, snaking hot trails over my cheeks, landing on my shirt. Looking down, I swallow the baseball in my throat through the dryness from the pills when I see my clothes are just as filthy as his. A flash of my perfect son strapped to the front of his amazing mother takes over without warning, and in this moment, there isn’t anything I want more than to get clean for them both, make sure they never have to wake up to something like this.
You can stay away and get high. It’s the same thing, my brain argues.
I shake my head, the tears falling harder as my sobbing gets louder. Stumbling off the couch, I stagger into the equally filthy bathroom and dry heave into the sink. My stomach is empty, just like my life. Cold water hits my face from my cupped hands. I’m drained, at the end of my rope. I look up, the mirror reflecting the blue of my eyes—my son’s eyes—except mine are dull, nearly lifeless, bloodshot, yellow, and grainy…
My father lies dead in the other room and I can’t find an ounce of pity or remorse in my being, which makes me a sick son of a bitch.
I take quick sips of the cold water running from the faucet, only for it to come right back up. I can’t even remember the last time I ate. Irrelevant at this point. I collapse, somehow managing to catch the edge of the toilet seat with my ass before landing on the grimy floor. Both parents dead. A wife who hates me. Son I’ll never know…
Life is supposed to be about getting through the tough shit, not living in an endless pile of it daily. I spit the acrid taste of despair out of my mouth, barely missing my boot.
I’ve been coasting by, only concerned where my next high was going to come from, but all of that changed two days ago when I discovered I was a father and cemented this morning with the sight of my dead father and his whore.
Standing from the toilet, I turn the water back on and toss back the last of my pills. Changes have to be made, but I sure as fuck can’t make them sober.
Without looking in the direction of my father, I walk out of the house with no intention of looking back. He has people over all the time, so I’m not concerned they’ll sit undiscovered for long. Hell, I’m surprised it was only the three of us last night.
Staggering down the road, the weight of the world heavy on my back, I make it two blocks from my dad’s house before the red and blue lights flash behind me, swirling and reflecting off the windows of the shitty neighborhood. Hands clasped behind my head, I hit my knees before the cop can even open his door.
Chapter 37
Fallyn
TWO YEARS LATER
“Mama, twuck!” A wide grin spreads across Phoenix’s face as he holds up his most prized possession.
I reach out as he shoves the black truck toward me. “For me?”
His eyes dart from mine to the toy, then back several times. “Mine!”
I grin when he clutches it to his chest as if I’d even contemplate taking it. Brittney chuckles at his possessiveness.
“He’s adorable,” she whispers, watching him create a road up the leg of the coffee table.
“He’s a handful,” I sigh, exhausted from the day filled with a quick trip to the aquarium and shopping, which resulted in one of his worst tantrums. “But I wouldn’t change a thing.”
“Is it hard?” I look over at her, raising an eyebrow. “Being a mom?”
I shrug. “Some days are better than others. The good always outweighs the bad, but I’m sure it would be easier with two parents.”
“Mama, twuck!” Phoenix exclaims, the same two words he says a million times day.
“Ten more minutes, little guy, then it’s bath and bed time.”
“Bubos!” Like the wonderful little guy he is, he begins gathering the mess of building blocks and less favored toy cars, and sweeps them into a pile. Bubbles in the bath are every parent’s lifesaver. I don’t know that I could coax him into getting clean without them. Less than a minute into his cleanup, he’s distracted by a toy guitar—the same one I’ve vowed to take the batteries out of every day since Christmas.
“I see he likes the toy Dean and I got him.” Brittney strums an air guitar, mimicking his actions, making him laugh.
“Yeah, loves it,” I deadpan. “I’ll make sure your first kid gets one too, if you guys ever decide on kids.”
Silence fills the room. “Yeah, about that.”
Distracted by Phoenix trying to twist one of the knobs off the well-loved guitar, it takes a second for her words to sink in. Once they do, my head whips around to hers.
“Seriously?” I glance down at her stomach.
She grins, placing a soft hand against her t-shirt. “Two months.”
“Why are you just now telling me?” I ask, though I’m not hurt by her reluctance. They weren’t trying and I know how surprise pregnancies have a tendency to knock the air out of your lungs and make you question everything you’ve ever done.
“We just found out.” She feigns a look at the nonexistent watch on her wrist. “Like two weeks ago. We weren’t sure, so we waited for confirmation from the doctor. We got that yesterday, and here
I am.”
“Are you excited?” My eyes widen as my pulse quickens, but I keep my emotions under control. I know they weren’t trying to get pregnant, it’s something she would’ve mentioned, and I also know the gamut of emotions a woman goes through when they find out.
“I’m scared shitless,” she answers, looking at me with honest fear in her eyes.
“I think every mother feels like that at first, even if they won’t admit it.” Her eyes dart toward the wall as she wrings her hands in her lap. I cover her fidgeting with my palm, trying to offer comfort. “How is Dean taking the news?” I ask, concerned maybe her hesitance has something to do with his reaction.
She huffs an indignant laugh. “He’s already talking about names, and yesterday, before I left to come here, I caught him on a baby furniture website. I wouldn’t put it past him to have poked holes in the damn condoms. He’s always wanted kids. Before we went to the doctor, he said he hoped we were having twins. He’s only thirty-three, but feels like he’s behind in the baby making game.” She shakes her head in exasperation, but her grin betrays her.
“You’ll be a great mother,” I assure her as Phoenix pushes his favorite truck into a stacked pile of blocks. “He’s so messy.”
“Boys,” she grumbles, shaking her head. “Maybe I’m having a girl and can avoid the disaster zone.”
I shake my head. “Oh, young one, you have so much to learn. I’ve heard girls are just as messy. Either gender, you’re in for a ton of cleaning and picking up.”
“When I let myself imagine being a mother…” she confides, “I never pictured them growing up, only the tiny baby stage. Being responsible for a helpless being freaked me out. Now that I picture this stage, trying to keep a living, breathing human who’s able to make their own choices safe? That terrifies me.”
“All normal, I assure you.” I pat her leg and stand from the couch. “Come on, Little Destructo, bath time.”
I scoop up my wiggling two-and-a-half-year-old and point to the mess on the floor. “Looks like you can get some early practice.”