My Kind of Crazy
A story about overcoming internal and external evils.
Nadene Seiters
Text copyright © 2013 Nadene N Seiters
Front Cover Photography Copyright © 2013 by Aleshyn_Andrei
All Rights Reserved
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
For My Cousin
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
EPILOGUE
Chapter One
Anastasia
The air is crisp. It’s like sniffing at a fresh salad that was picked from the garden just a few minutes before eating it. Dew has gathered on the grass and created a blanket that looks like frost in the middle of summer. My feet scrape across the top of the grass as I take a step. I almost call out to my father, and then I realize that he’s no longer around. I’m lost here, but I don’t think I’m as lost as the man who is lying passed out on my front lawn.
“Uh, hello?” He’s nothing but lean muscle and bedhead hair with a boyish face. His face is the only thing that reminds me of a boy. The rest of him, which is currently on display, screams man. Thankfully he’s lying on his front, so I only have a visible of his backside.
My father’s old farm is around two hundred acres, so it’s a little weird to find someone in my front yard. It’s especially weird to find someone completely nude in my front yard; however, that would be weird anywhere. I kneel down in the wet grass slowly. When I reach a hand out to touch the five o’clock shadow on his face, a gentle breeze rolls over me.
He’s breathing as if he’s sleeping peacefully, and for a moment I just want to leave him out here. I have never seen this man in my life, and I’m pretty sure that he has to be on something to end up like this. What if he’s dangerous? I should go inside and call the police, but something keeps me from doing that. Instead, I take a steadying breath and put my fingers on the flesh of his shoulder.
It takes three strong shakes to get him even to move. Instead of waking up, he just turns his face to the other side so that it’s out of the sun. He’s mumbling something, but I don’t catch it. I finally try talking to him, maybe that will jolt him out of his slumber.
“Listen, if you don’t get up and come inside to get decent I’m going to be forced to call the police.” I try to sound stern, but it comes out pretty weak.
Eventually, a few more of the townsfolk and neighbors will be over to pay their respects. If I don’t have this man off my lawn by then, rumors will fly at the speed of light. I cringe at the thought. It’s distressing enough most of them know about my sketchy past. I don’t want to fuel their gossip, so I grab the man’s opposite shoulder in a sudden surge of bravery.
I manage to get him rolled over onto his back, and keep my eyes studiously on his face. It’s not that I haven’t seen a naked man before, but I don’t know this one. Besides, if he wakes up and finds me staring at his junk, this might get even more awkward than it already is. I glance to my left at the large German Shepherd sniffing around the grass and grit my teeth.
“You’re really not helping the situation by trying to find deer shit May!” The dog glances at me, and then she proceeds to rub her back all over a particular spot on the grass. I ignore the fact that she’s rolling in a pile of feces, and grit my teeth as I attempt to drag the man across the lawn.
At the incessant jerking on his right arm, he finally grumbles a little louder. He pulls himself up onto his knees, and I continue to tug. I manage to lead him across the manicured front lawn of my father’s old farmhouse, and then we get to the steps.
“I can’t carry you up the steps, you’re either going to have to get up or crawl up them yourself.” His eyes are still closed, and his face looks pinched. He looks as if he might be in pain. I glance up from his face and see May rolling in the pile again. I’m going to have to bathe that dog before anyone comes over this morning. I still have about an hour before people start showing up if everything goes like yesterday.
He’s still on his hand and knees at the bottom of the stairs when May finally gets up. She starts trotting for the house, and I point at her with one finger and a stern look. The large dog stops in her tracks and puts her tail between her legs. I draw in a deep breath, and kneel down to help the man up the steps. If I had the energy, I would have drug him out back to the shed. But the house is closer.
As I’m trying to get his arm around my shoulders, he barks out a loud ‘no!’. Then he proceeds to vomit all over my front porch steps. I put a hand over my nose and mouth to keep the smell from permeating my nostrils, but it happens anyway. With renewed energy, I grab his arm and start making him crawl past the vomit.
“Look, you’re going to ruin everything for me here if someone sees a naked man outside of my home. Hurry it up!” What gets him moving is May sniffing his crotch. It still takes me another five minutes to get him into the guest room on the first floor. Technically it’s my room, but I don’t have time to get him up another flight of stairs.
With the stranger settled into bed, covered chin to toe with a blanket, I make my way out to the kitchen. Before I head out to clean up the mess on the steps and the dog, I grab a quick glass of water and down some aspirin for my now pounding head. It’s distressing enough I’ve had to deal with the death of my father. Now I have to deal with some lunatic who randomly showed up on what is now my lawn.
When I’m finally done with my glass of water, I grab a bottle of bleach from under the kitchen sink and head outside. Washing off the steps is pretty simple, but the dog is another beast to be tackled all in itself. She sees the hose in my hands before it’s too late and takes off into the sun’s morning rays. I don’t bother shouting after her. She’ll be back in about ten minutes.
It’s been seven days since my father’s death. May still doesn’t understand that he is gone, and sometimes I think that he might walk through the front door. He would be wearing his faded jeans with holes all over and a flannel shirt, nothing underneath. When I was younger, there would be a cigarette hanging from between his lips. He never lit them, at least, not in the house. My mother would have killed him.
She died when I was eleven. Some people suspected it was not an accident, but I know the truth. I should know because I witnessed it. My father’s death, on the other hand, unmistakably was not an accident. I glance up from my reverie on the steps and see May slinking home. I make sure that she’s right by the hose before I grab it and start spraying her off.
By the time I’m done cleaning up the dog, I only have about five minutes to change before the first car arrives. I make sure to put on my respectable jeans and a long sleeved shirt, even though it’s going to be sweltering in another hour. The first car to show up is Mrs. Evans.
I watch from the kitchen sink window as she gets out of her vehicle, and groan when I see the casserole dish in her hands. She brings me a different casserole each morning, and I graciously accept them. Then I feed part of them to the dog, and the rest gets dumped outside for whatever wants to come along and dine that evening. If I threw it in the trash, the raccoons would tear it apart anyway. I might as well not make it too difficult for them.
Her hair is in a tight, neat French braid as it is every day. Not a strand of her black, graying hair is out of place as
she walks up the freshly cleaned steps. She stops, and I see her nose rise into the air. Mrs. Evans will be asking me about the smell of bleach, and then she’ll ask me the same thing she does every morning.
Before she can knock on the door, I pull it open as I’m wiping my hands on a towel. I want her to think I was busy doing something. At least, busy doing something other than watching her out the window and hoping that the man in my room remains silent. May stays behind me like the watch dog she was bred to be.
“Ana, you’re always a breath of fresh air in the morning!” Mrs. Evans says the same thing to me each morning. I almost want to recite it as she begins her speech. “Why, when you were born with your locks of blonde hair and those beautiful blue eyes, the entire town thought you’d be married by the time you turned eighteen!” I smile at her politely, and motion for her to come in. If I didn’t, she would be suspicious.
“Not yet, Mrs. Evans. Would you like a cup of coffee?” She shoves the casserole dish into my hands and pats me on the arm. She’ll give the same answer she does every morning.
“Heavens no, Ana. I have so much to be doing this morning, and I just can’t bring myself to step into this house yet. I don’t understand how you can live here alone, at night, when just in the other room you’re Daddy-” she cuts off her sentence and on cue her eyes begin to fill. I juggle the casserole that smells like potatoes and manage to get a hand free. I put a hand on her forearm and pat once.
“It’s just a house, Mrs. Evans. I’ll be fine. I understand.” I tell her the same thing each morning. It’s the truth. A house is just a house no matter what happened in it. It doesn’t matter that both my parents died in this house. I tell myself that lie every evening just before the sun’s rays set.
“Well, you take care now. Oh, and be careful at night. May will tell you those mountain lions can get feisty at night!” I smile at her and thank her for the casserole. She makes her way down the steps reluctantly, and I’m thankful that she didn’t ask about the bleach. I still don’t have a viable excuse made up.
I almost step on May as I take a step back and gently close the door. Mrs. Evans raises her nose to the air again, and sniffs as she’s going down the steps. She hesitates, and then she moves on and finally gets into her vehicle. It takes her about two minutes to get the old station wagon started finally, and then she’s off.
Even though the casserole smells like potatoes, I’m not sure what the goop is in the dish. I wrinkle my nose in disgust as I put the tin foil back over the top. Then I glance down at May’s expectant face.
“I don’t think even you would want to eat this, May. In fact, I’m pretty sure it’s meant to kill dogs. Maybe it’s even meant to kill mountain lions.” I would feel guilty feeding this to the outside critters, so I double bag it in trash bags. Then I put it into the trash can outside and pray that none of the raccoons will smell it.
For the next four hours, I check in on my unwanted guest. Each time I check on him he’s in a different position, but he’s been snoring steadily for the past hour. I’m relieved that he’s actually sleeping now and not passed out instead. Perhaps when he wakes up he can tell me what happened.
The next vehicle pulls up at eleven in the morning. I haven’t seen Mr. Taylor in three days, so when he gets out of the vehicle I actually feel genuinely surprised. I thought I made it clear the last time he was here that I am not selling my father’s old farm, and even if I were I would not sell it to a man who would only tear down everything to build a development.
“Mr. Taylor,” I meet him cordially on the front porch with him standing at the bottom of the steps. I don’t want his shiny, black shoes touching those steps.
“Ana, I was hoping I could have a word with you this morning?” I can smell his cologne from here, and it’s giving me a headache. I pinch the bridge of my nose to get the pounding to subside enough to be able to shake my head in the negative.
“No, Mr. Taylor, I’m pretty busy this morning. Besides, I know what you’re here about. I’m not selling my father’s property, and this is the last time that I will tell you that.” I’m about to turn on my heel and go back into the house when the man is up the steps with two leaps. He grabs my forearm and turns me around so that I’m close to him, too close to be comfortable.
“Mr. Taylor!” I say rather loudly, giving the fact that he’s startled me away.
“Ana, your father was going to sell out to me before he died. I think that you should honor that agreement.” His breath is hot on my face as he leans down towards me. It’s not that he’s not a decent looking man, but his actions frighten me more than a person holding a knife to my throat. There is something oily about him, slippery.
“It doesn’t matter what my father was going to do. The papers were never signed, Mr. Taylor. Now, please get your hands off me!” I try to wrench out of his grip, but it’s too strong. My breath catches in my throat as he pulls me close to him, and my cheeks flush at his proximity. It’s not the first time a man has tried to intimidate me with mere size and attitude.
“I think you had better let the girl go.” The deep timbre of his voice has the hairs on my arm standing on end. I manage to twist my head enough to get a glimpse of the man who was lying in my front yard naked now wearing a bed sheet around his waist. He’s holding a large butcher knife in his right hand, and he’s idly picking at a fingernail on his left hand.
Mr. Taylor tightens his grip enough that it becomes painful before he snorts and lets me go. He backs down the steps with both his hands up, but I can see the warning in his eyes. The next time he sees me, it won’t be as cordial.
“You’ll sell to me, Ana, you’ll see!” The man slides back into his Lexus, starts it with one press of his finger to a button, and peels out of the dirt driveway of the farmhouse at a reckless speed. May is standing behind the man in my doorway with her tail tucked between her legs. So much for her being a guard dog, she’s more like a chicken.
I gently put a hand on the arm that Mr. Taylor grabbed, and rub at it to get the pins and needles to go away. I was hoping by the time I looked up, the man in my doorway would be gone, but he’s still standing there with a hard look on his face. It’s not until a breeze blows that I realize there’s moisture on my face. I’m crying.
“Could you please let me into my own home?” I angrily wipe away the tears and don’t wait for an answer. I push past him, and make my way into the kitchen to grab the bottle of brandy my father kept in the upper cabinet. He’s kept a bottle of brandy there since I can remember.
I have to use a chair to get up into the cabinet, and even then it’s hard for me to reach into the back corner where the liquor is. When I turn around, the stranger is standing in the kitchen doorway now. The knife is no longer in his hands, and May’s tail is no longer tucked between her legs.
“Who was that?” The man asks with his deep voice. Voices like that should not exist. They addle a woman’s brain and make her compliant. That makes me furious.
“None of your business! Who the hell are you? That’s a better question.” I sit down on the countertop, using the chair as a foot stool while I twist off the cap of the brandy. I down about three shots before I put the bottle on the linoleum countertop.
“Jonah Quinton, that’s all I can remember. I was hoping you could tell me more.” I raise both my eyebrows in shock at his words, and then I take another long drag of the brandy. I’m starting to feel pretty warm and fuzzy all over, and decide that trying to put the alcohol back would probably land me in the hospital. So I slide off the counter and leave it by the fridge instead.
“All I can tell you is that you were in my front yard, naked, this morning. Then you threw up all over my steps, and you’ve been snoring for hours. Oh, and you’re wearing my bed sheet around you waist! Now I have to do laundry.” I mumble the last sentence, but I can tell he’s still caught my words. A wicked little grin graces his lips, and I find myself staring at that grin for way too long.
May’s tail whacking
against my legs brings me back to reality.
“While I’m sorry about how I ended up here, I can’t say I’m sorry that I did.” I don’t know what to say that, and I’m pretty sure that if I did it still wouldn’t come out in a normal voice. So I do the next best thing. I shrug to convey indifference.
“That’s too bad because you’re not staying here. I have to clean this place up, and I don’t have time to babysit some drug addled man!” I was wrong. I did have something to say to that. Thankfully, it didn’t come out in a squeak, but my tone was a little raised.
“So you want to be alone next time when that grease ball comes back?” I narrow my eyes, and I puff up my chest a little.
“I can take care of myself. I don’t need you to do it for me! I’ll call you a cab.” He raises his hands in the air as if in surrender, and May whines at the bite in my words. I pat her on the head to let her know that I’m not angry with her, and then I fumble for the landline on the kitchen wall. I have no idea what the number is for the closest cab company.
“Look, I can help you fix this place up. I think I’m pretty handy with a hammer and nails.” I ignore him, and start flipping through an old phone book. It looks as though it might be ten or fifteen years old. “Please!” I didn’t realize he had stepped across the kitchen and closed the distance between the two of us. It’s difficult to force myself to keep my eyes on the phone book because I know if I glance up I will come face to face with his chest. He has his fingers wrapped around my wrist. It doesn’t hurt, but it still makes my skin crawl.
“Get your damn hands off me! What is it with men now a days? You just think you can order a woman around, and when she doesn’t listen you get all grabby!” He immediately lets go of my wrist, and when I finally glance up at his face, I see that he has the dignity to be blushing.
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