“I don’t care if my wife forgets to pack my lunch, but she’d better not forget the beer for the ride home,” Tim said, taking a drag on his cigarette and retrieving a Milwaukee’s Best from the small cooler stowed behind his seat. His skill at fishing things out from the back seat while driving rivaled that of the most seasoned mother of small children. “Want one?” he asked, being most hospitable on my first day.
“No thank you,” I said, portraying a perfect poker face. I surprised myself at my outward calm. Inside I was jumping up and down screaming, I can’t believe this guy! While looking him over, wondering if I’d done the right thing by pinching my transportation pennies, I noticed two cigarette burns in his jeans. I wished I could wear jeans on the job, but it wasn’t allowed. Office workers didn’t do that.
“Oh, sorry, mind if I smoke?” Tim tapped his cigarette near the ashtray. Most of the ash missed. He didn’t seem to care.
“Smoke kind of bothers me,” I said, when I’d have rather said, I sure as hell do mind. It was, after all, his car.
“Sure.” Tim poked his cigarette out the crack of his window and kept it out there between drags every time we carpooled.
When I came home and told Glenn what Tim said about his wife and the beer cooler, he gave a slight chuckle and marveled. “Huh.”
Nothing to discuss.
The next Thursday, the shift whistle sounded. Fredrick ran out to the car along with a thousand others—grown men rushing to be the first to their cars and out the gate. It was like a herd of schoolchildren being dismissed.
Fredrick handed Tim a beer for the road and took one himself.
“Thanks.” Tim popped the top. “Beer down,” Tim whispered as if the cop across the street could hear him. “Cop.”
A half block later, the coast was clear. “Usually it’s a two-beer ride home,” Fredrick informed me. “Tonight it might be three.”
“Take what you need, Fred.” Tim understood.
I hated Thursdays more than the other days.
* * *
A trained monkey could do my job. I wondered why they hired a college grad for the position. And I wondered why my boss wasn’t smarter than me. Christmas break brought welcome relief.
I won a scholarship for degree number three. It was a merit scholarship, not a need-based scholarship. And I didn’t need it, not for college anyway. TWA had a generous college reimbursement program, which I took advantage of, just in case.
Unexpected cash in hand, I decided to take a Christmas road trip to Karla’s in Savannah. Brad planned to be there too.
“You’ll get to meet my brother and sister,” I told Glenn, springing the surprise. “You don’t want to get on Karla’s bad side though.” I gave fair warning.
After eight hours of driving, three of which were at a slippery snail’s pace through slick and heavy Tennessee snow, we ate a quiet Christmas dinner of Waffle House grease-laden hamburgers.
“Reminds me of slammers,” Glenn said, referring to a concoction of chili- and egg-topped greaseburgers enjoyed only after imbibing mass quantities. He recalled fond memories of late night gut bombs with the boys. “The good old days.”
I let out a sarcastic, “Mmm hmm.”
Glenn casually let one rip, reverberating on the vinyl seat.
“That’s sick,” I said, waving the fumes away with my hand.
“That’s not sick, this is.” Just then, Glenn belched to rival Booger in Revenge of the Nerds.
I half sank back in my seat, rolling my eyes. At least he’s comfortable enough around me to be himself.
“How many cars did you see slide off the road?” Glenn asked, moving on and working out the joints in his fingers. “I was gripping the steering wheel so tight; I wasn’t looking at anything else.”
“At least twenty.”
“Your car’s handling well on its first long trip.”
“Of course! Ye of little faith.” I playfully scolded Glenn, confident that our vehicle conflict was long past.
“Only eight more hours to go.” Glenn rose from the table. He patted his stomach, looking sick from the Christmas feast.
* * *
“Karla’s house is right over there,” I said, pointing just past three trees on the left.
“Where?”
I wondered why Glenn asked; it was obvious. Hers was the only house on the block. As Glenn pulled into the drive, Karla, Brad, and to our unwelcome surprise, Mother, came out to greet us.
Karla hugged me, her deep smoky voice whispering in my ear, “Mother’s here. Ha ha ha.” Then she jabbed tickling pokes with her fingers into my ribs. “Love you too,” she yelled as she let me go, then laughed again, tickling herself with her sadistic humor.
Then she turned to Glenn. “So, this is the dork you brought with you?” Karla biffed him in the head, chuckling again.
“Nice to meet you too,” Glenn said, where did she come from? on his face.
“I told you she wasn’t like me.” I shrugged. Karla and I hugged each other around the shoulders, side by side, staring at him. At just over five feet, she was a big personality stuffed into a small package.
“Whatever do you mean?” she said in her most feigned, haughty and astonished voice. “Why, we’re twins. Can’t you tell?” She smiled a huge plastered-on smile, batting her eyelashes. “Want to see my new trick?” Karla demonstrated blowing smoke rings before anyone answered, finishing off with a thorough exhale.
Sometimes even I wondered where she came from. She kind of had the complexion of Mother’s psychiatrist. Mother said it was because her grandfather six generations back was half Eskimo.
Karla pulled Glenn and me aside, away from the commotion and deposited a load. “Mother says if you two sleep together, then she’ll get a hotel room.” She lit the remaining half inch of a partially smoked cigarette, then took a drag.
I shot a look Glenn’s way, rolling my eyes, incensed that Mother continued controlling my life. Glenn unconsciously clenched his fist, punching it into his palm. Before either of us could say anything, Karla said, “I really don’t care, but if she needs a ride, you’re driving her.” She threw her cigarette down, stomped it, then picked it up, tossing it into a rusted soup can half-full of butts.
“Your mother can’t tell us what to do,” Glenn yelled at me, as if I was the target.
“Glenndall can sleep on the couch,” Karla said, dubbing Glenn with a new name and saluting him with the loser symbol against her forehead while she stuck out her tongue.
I laughed inside at the way she crossed her eyes, so disarming and endearingly immature. She slapped Glenn’s head again. “Well, if you were married, you wouldn’t have these problems.”
“Like I’d want that for a mother-in-law,” Glenn said, still mad.
His searing words confirmed my undivulged fear that no one would marry me with Mother for a mother. I immediately wanted to cry, turning away so I wouldn’t. Glenn had no inkling he had just hurt me. Discombobulated pain was all I felt, unable to ascribe it to only him. I hated having a ‘that for a mother,’ but was also disturbed Glenn felt at liberty to throw barbs her direction.
“Glendall, there’s more beer in the fridge. Help yourself,” Karla said, masterfully sending him away. She turned to me.
“You okay?” she asked, softening like the mother I didn’t have.
I nodded yes as the first tear broke through, then hugged her, sobbing. “Glenn and I have come a long way, but I don’t know . . .” I trailed off, unable to verbalize my unease, not even knowing what it was. Instead of enjoying a fun Christmas break, I felt like my life was coming apart at the seams. Taking the opportunity to harness some sisterly advice I said, “Sometimes I still think of Reese, even dream about him.”
“Well that’s normal,” she said, brushing it off, trying to make me feel better. “Everyone remembers their first love. Do you ever talk to him?”
“No. I don’t even know where he lives.”
“Well, he left you. It’s his loss,” s
he said, pulling me up from the cinder blocks we had been sitting on.
“But Glenn . . . sometimes we fight.”
Before I could say anymore, Karla said, “Everyone fights,” as if it were a non-issue, nothing to be concerned about. I remembered before Karla and Phil moved away, spending the night at their place and listening to their door slams and screaming matches, while I buried my head under my pillow, bedded down on the floor, trying not to hear. They were still married ten years later.
Loud music escaped as we entered the house. Karla flopped down on the couch next to Phil, relieving him of his beer, taking the last long swig for herself. Glenn and the others were involved in a deep conversation about nothing. Mother holed up in her room.
* * *
I didn’t get a spring break the next year. Glenn did, his second-to-last one. Taking full advantage, he set off for South Padre Island with the frat boys, aka brats. I didn’t understand the juvenile camaraderie, the party mentality, or why Glenn could blow $1000 on a spring break adventure, yet have to borrow money from me for his rent.
“This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” he said. “Seize the day. When will I ever get to do this again?”
When I raised my objection, he acted as if I had taken the last crumb in an already pitiful meal. His persuasiveness caused me to doubt myself, feel guilty, give in. Perhaps I was selfish, trying to deprive him of one of his last college hoorahs.
In actuality, the last crumb was the only remaining morsel of sensibility I had, which Glenn swept away.
* * *
Deidre called, bored and out of her mind, while the brats were in South Padre.
“Do you want to go to dinner?” she asked. “I’m going crazy.”
“Sure,” I said, surprised that she was talking to the likes of me. Normally she gave off superiority vibes. “Why not?” We didn’t hate each other or anything.
While dining on salad and breadsticks, Deidre said, “So how did you and Glenn get back together after he made out with Courtney homecoming weekend?”
“What?” I said, gagging on an olive.
“Well, Ronin and I are kind of going through a rough spot and I was wondering how you and Glenn patched things up.”
“No, I mean . . .” My head swirled and my stomach was finished. Meal over. “Last homecoming?” I said in disbelief. “Who’s Courtney?” A million questions entered my mind.
“No, not last homecoming,” Deidre said, becoming concerned. “Two homecomings ago. You didn’t know?” Her foundation-caked face went pale.
“No, I didn’t know!” My head hurt. The ‘stupid’ vice clamped down tight. It hurt so bad that it pinched away the tears before they emerged, letting only confused thoughts flow. He’s borrowed Padre party money. Who’s he kissing now? I run at his beck and call, always catering to him, and for what? No ring, no promises, no future? Deidre might be having a rough spot, but at least she had a ring.
On the other hand, it was no wonder that she and Ronin suffered hard times. He was drunk before their wedding ceremony, lamenting their imminent nuptials. “I don’t want to get married,” he had said.
“He told us you broke up, so I set him up with my friend,” she explained.
“When?” I asked, still in shock, straightening out the details.
“It was right after you left the homecoming dance that Friday night.”
The details crept back in, then hit hard. My birthday from hell. He had made out with some girl the night before my birthday from hell. No wonder he was so weird that day, so mean, the day we broke up.
“We weren’t broke up,” I said, whipped and drained.
“I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have told you. I thought you knew. I thought you’d survived it, been there.”
“I can’t help you,” I said, still shaken. I couldn’t help myself.
* * *
My house was extra cold that day. The birthday bombshell was a larger dose of betrayal than I could swallow. I didn’t know what to do with it. I shook under the quilt Mrs. Gavins had made me and remembered her saying “he’s a nice boy,” when she spoke of Reese. “You need a boy who treats you nice,” she had said. I wondered, pulling the quilt nice and snug, what Reese had done with his life, probably finished college, started to settle down.
I shivered while reaching for the phone. Karla would know what to do.
“What?” she screeched into the phone after I told her what happened. “Do you need me to catch a bus? Do you need me to come up there and kick his ass? I will. I’ll do it if you want me to.”
“No.” My voice broke. The stupid vice loosened, replaced by the gullible vice, which allowed tears to flow. My head merely pounded; my ulcerated heart ached.
“Well, you did say that was two years ago, right?” She must have picked up the sensibility crumb. Stuff on the floor was okay with her.
“Year and a half.”
“When he gets back, you need to talk to him. I mean, you’ve been okay since then, right?”
“Pretty much. I think so,” I said. “Everyone has problems sometimes, right?”
“No relationship is going to be perfect,” said Karla. Then she confided, “Phil did that to me once. I mean, it was before we were married, and he was drunk . . .” I heard her flick her cigarette lighter and inhale.
“And you’re fine now?”
“Yeah, we’re,” she paused to blow smoke, “fine.”
I loosened my quilt, resolved to discuss this with Glenn. In the meantime I also decided to get a second opinion. What would Megan say? The last time I heard from her, she was still looking for Mr. Right. She had good judgment of character and had not found The One yet. She’d kept herself out of a mess, maybe she could keep me out too.
So I wrote, catching her up on the past few months. I dropped my desperate scrawl in the mail the day Glenn came home from spring break.
“I missed you so much!” he said, happy to see me, swinging me around when I met him at his car. I would have been happy too, overjoyed at the reception if it hadn’t been for the oppressive weight on my mind.
My lips quivered. “Did you have a good time?”
“Had a blast.” Glenn was chipper and raring to go. “How about you?”
“I had dinner with Deidre one night,” I said, heart pounding.
“You did!” He sounded excited that I was getting out and about.
“She told me something.” Hindered by a violent lip quiver, I nearly cried on the spot, unable to speak.
“What’s wrong?” He seemed concerned, clueless.
“She told me about Courtney.” I looked up to see his reaction.
“Courtney who?”
I instantly wondered if Deidre had made it all up, if I was making a fool of myself.
“Courtney, the girl you made out with two homecomings ago.”
He remembered. Rage set in his eyes. Killer eyes. I had seen flashes of anger before, but this was rage to excess, the difference between an angry house fire and the infernos of hell. He scared me. Thank God he wasn’t angry at me this time.
“She had NO right to tell you that!” he shouted. People across the parking lot looked our way.
“She thought I knew.”
“I don’t care who knew! No one goes around telling my girlfriend crap like that.”
Crap, he’d called it. So it wasn’t true, I thought, relieved.
“That was a long time ago. Before I knew what I wanted,” Glenn said. “I kissed her and it felt weird, like I was doing something wrong. I never called her again.” He sounded sorry.
“Deidre said you made out. Making out isn’t just one weird peck on the cheek,” I said, jerked from my momentary delusion that I’d been misinformed.
“It was more than one little kiss,” he admitted, broken inside, “but it wasn’t right. I didn’t go any farther. It wasn’t you.” My hurt began melting into forgiveness at the rate of a 116-pound frozen turkey defrosting in cold water.
I’d hang in there.
* * *
“Deidre told me you went to see her today,” I announced, plopping down on the couch next to Glenn.
“Yeah,” he said, paying more attention to the television than to me.
“She said you made her cry.”
“She deserved it. She had no right to bring up yesterday’s news. It just caused problems.”
“She said you walked in screaming and yelling . . . scared the crap out of her.”
“Look, what she did pissed me off.” Glenn turned toward me. “I don’t want to lose you. I love you. What she did scared me. What if you left because of it?”
I sat, speechless. He said the elusive ‘L’ word. Plus, he actually went to bat for me, feared losing me. That spoke volumes. It spoke louder than the fact he had been a tactless, rampaging bull plowing over Deidre’s feelings with no remorse or second thoughts. So loud, that I didn’t even hear the stampede.
“That was two years ago,” I said, resting my hand on his knee. “I wouldn’t leave for something that happened when we were going through rough times back then.”
I felt sorry for him that he’d been worried.
“You love me?” I asked, going back to what he had said, making sure I heard right.
“I’ve loved you for a long time, but I’ve been afraid to admit it. Once you lose trust, it’s hard to trust again,” he said. “Trust is the foundation of love in my book.”
“But I never did anything for you not to trust me.”
“I know, but it took me a while to know I could trust you.” He put his arm around me, drawing me close. “I’m sorry if I’ve hurt you, but for me, once bitten, quadruple shy.”
Emotional baggage was worse than an STD outbreak. Highly contagious, it didn’t require physical contact to spread and could be transmitted from just about anyone, even people who had dumped on Glenn before we met. Indirect contact was all that was necessary.
He went on, “I’m glad you hung in there. I know now that you’d never cheat on me and that’s why I love you. I trust you.” Glenn kissed me and pulled me closer.
“So if the tables were turned, you would have left me. That’s why you freaked out.”
“Yes. That’s exactly it,” he said, happy I understood.
Love, Carry My Bags Page 26