The Third Step

by William Lobb

  Frankie grabbed his drink and swallowed hard. He silently stared at the floor as she continued, “The house is gone, too; your family sold the house. They didn’t get much money, but what they got will go toward her care. It gets worse; they razed the house and sold the property. Your uncle and a couple of his friends bought it.”

  He finished his drink, poured another, drank that one fast. He stood up. “Come with me; I need to see the property. I need to see it with my eyes, then I need to go see her.”

  Alex grabbed her bag, yelled up the staircase to her sleeping daughter that she was leaving with Frankie. The daughter yelled “Don’t go!” She came running down the stairs to see Frankie. She jumped into his arms and hugged him deeply. “I missed you, big guy,” she smiled.

  He said, “I missed you too. I’m just taking your mom to see my grandma; we’ll be back and we’ll go get something to eat, okay?” She smiled, said yes, and walked back up to her room.

  “That child loves you, my friend. You should stay here, where you are loved. With love we can bring you back. But first, you need to accept love.”

  With that, they shut the door behind them and walked down the dangerous wooden stairs to Frankie’s rental car in the driveway. It was just after 10:00 a.m. and the liquor stores were finally open.

  He pulled into the one down the street from Alex’s house, jumped out of the car, walked in and emerged with another bottle of Clan MacGregor. He sat down behind the driver’s seat and cracked the seal on the bottle and took a long, long drag. He handed the bottle to Alex, lit a Marlboro, and pulled out into traffic. She took a sip and passed it back to him. They drove on, mostly in silence. Frankie had NYC AM radio playing. “I Don’t Care Anymore” by Phil Collins came on the radio and they looked at each other and laughed. Alexandrine said, “That, right there, that should be your theme song, my friend,” and they laughed a little more.

  Then, she asked Frankie, “How did it happen? How did you come to just not give a fuck anymore?”

  Frankie countered, “I care about a lot of things. I care about you, your family, Grandma, some of my friends at the bar; I might even care a little about Betty, the girl I stayed with last night. I am just shrinking down the circle of people I care about.”

  Alex said, “Betty Klemmer, the girl you and all your buddies from the bar have been fucking since high school, that girl? She’s a very nice girl and perfect for you. You can worry and stress and get out of your mind when she is fucking one of you friends. It’s perfect for you: a little love, a little lust, a little violence and anger and jealousy. I’d say, darling, she may be the perfect girl to place at the center of what has become your collapsing life.”

  Frankie looked at her and got a little pissed. “She’s a nice girl, Alex.”

  Alexandrine agreed. “I know her. She is a very nice girl, but you’ll fall for her now that you are trying to replace Pam, and this girl will become another problem, another obsession, another excuse that you constantly seek in your slide to the bottom. I wish you’d try to look at things a little and try to understand why you do the things you do and what you do to the people you claim to love. Everybody hurts, Frankie. For you it’s a condition you crave. You seek the pain; the more complex and tortured and potentially painful, even deadly the relationship, the more you want it, the harder you seek it.”

  With that, they turned into the driveway of what used to be the old house. Nothing remained—just a large empty field, and to the left the old and crumbling garage still stood. He could see over to the right, the burned-out spot from where the old tool shed of his grandfather’s had stood, where nothing had grown, except some pockets of toxic Jimson Weed, strangely appropriate, it was also a hallucinogen, some called the weed The Devil’s Snare. He stared out at the fresh dirt. Alex said they leveled the place soon after it was sold; the place should have been condemned long before. Frankie wondered if the old woman knew. He wasn’t going to be the one to tell her.

  The piano, Frankie wondered to himself. Aloud he asked, “Where the hell did her piano go?”

  Alex said his relatives had all come and taken what they could; his aunt has the piano and the kitchen table. “You can go there and drink your coffee, my friend.”

  Frankie took another long drink out of the bottle and walked out to the garage. The Rambler was still there, covered in mouse shit, inside and out. He looked at the gaping hole in the garage roof and kind of laughed to himself. Why did they keep the garage? He looked inside and saw the keys were still in the car, exactly where he’d left them. He opened the door, heard the loud, metal-on-metal creaking sound, listened to the mice and rats scatter and he sat down. Turning the key, he listened as the engine groaned and coughed. The old car shook as it started.

  He let the old Rambler idle and warm up. He was taking the car; no one else was going to have it. He told Alexandrine he’d leave it at her house and she could drive it while he was away. She looked at him with a look on her face that just screamed, “You cannot possibly be serious,” but to Frankie, finding this car was like finding gold.

  He walked over to Alex and handed her the keys to the rental. “I’ll follow you to the nursing home,” and he grabbed the half-empty scotch bottle to take with him. This was going to require some serious alcohol. The trip seemed to go by in a flash, always the case when we are heading to something we dread.

  The building was modern and metal, scary as hell. Intimidating, impersonal, and generally ugly. They parked the cars and Frankie took a long, long drink from the bottle, got out of the car, walked over to Alex and hands in pockets, looked down at the ground. He walked slowly and deliberately; the entire scene was surreal. They walked in the door, signed the forms, got a badge that said “visitor,” for what reason he could not understand, and took the long walk down the hallway to the old woman’s room. They got to her room and Frankie froze at the door. Alex looked at him and said, “Don’t be a coward, Frankie; come on.”

  Frankie opened the door and Alex walked up and kissed the old woman on the cheek. Alex said in her best “happy and excited” voice, “Look who I found! I’m going to let you two talk,” and she turned and ran out of the door as fast as a rabbit. The old woman was in a wheelchair; she looked clean and healthy and well taken care of. Frankie sat down in the chair in the far corner of the room: institutional plastic, beige walls, some fake flowers in a vase, a single window with white lace curtains. Some crayon drawings from unknown children decorated the walls. He sat there, staring at the floor in silence.

  Cora, the old woman, spoke first. “What is your problem, boy? You are not happy to see me?”

  He replied, “Not here, not like this.”

  She smiled. “I’m happy here. The girls are nice, especially that one colored girl. She’s like a daughter to me; I just tell her I left her in the oven too long. Like Alex, your friend, another nice colored girl.”

  Frankie laughed and said, “I’ll tell her that; she likes being called a colored girl. I should have been here. If I’d been here you’d still be home, not here. Not in this fucking place.”

  Cora scowled at him, as only a ninety-nine-year-old woman can, and said, “Watch your language. I’d slap you, but someone would see.”

  Frankie smiled, “Yeah, we don’t want that, Grandma. All these nurses watching you kick my ass again.”

  She smiled that amazing Irish smile, brightened by those perfectly brown eyes, eyes that had seen so much in her ninety- nine years. True Irish eyes, gateways into a depth he doubted many people had bothered to look. All the goodness he’d ever known, all the love he ever felt, all the truth he’d ever been told and all the wisdom that had ever been imparted to him, passed through those eyes and that smile. They sat for a long time, just staring at each other and looking into each other’s eyes; the old woman called it soul talking. Frankie felt she was trying to tell him things, but he couldn’t make the connection. There was no communion th
at she had hoped for and looked for, the kind of moments they’d experienced soul-talking when he was a young boy. Finally, with a smile that masked a deep, hopeless sadness, she broke the gaze, realizing in that final moment that their connection was gone forever. She sat there in silence.

  Finally she said, “You are lost to me, boy. I cannot connect to you anymore. Your evil, your violence, has taken away my boy.”

  Frankie looked back at her and said “I’m still here, Grandma, still your boy.”

  She said “No, you are long gone from here, long gone from me. All I see here is your shell; you might as well leave now. There is nothing left for either of us. I’m old; I’m making my peace with my God and the universe. You can count my remaining days and not have to count too long. I can see the end, boy; it’s clear to me and close, but I’m in a better place than you, boy. You are lost. I can hardly see you. I can hardly feel you here. I wish you’d come back, but I fear it’s too late. When you die, boy, there will be no end for you.

  “I saw your dream. I know your dream. It’s not what I wanted for you. I fear you are destined for the same fate as your grandfather. I cannot tell you now if I wish you to die tonight and free your spirit to wander this world forever or linger here in this near-death you call living and suffer until that day. I don’t think you need to come see me anymore. You should go do what it is you need to do. I’ll not pray for you Frankie. I think to do so might only anger my God. Praying for you would make a mockery of my God.”

  Frankie stood up and looked at her one last time. She forced a smile, but they both could feel the pain of this moment. He bent down and kissed her cheek. He felt her warm bony hand touch his face. They both silently wept, neither one acknowledging the sadness of this moment. He turned, opened the door, and walked away.

  He was silent as he left the home. Alexandrine stood right outside the door and heard most of the final exchange. She gently touched his arm and said, “She still loves you, my friend. She is just concerned, like we all are.”

  Frankie walked quietly to the cars, reached into the Rambler and pulled out the scotch bottle. He offered the first shot to Alex who declined, so he brought the bottle to his mouth and drank deeply, trying to somehow undo what had just happened. It was late afternoon now. He wanted to stop by the store and get some groceries for Alex’s house, and then he’d leave the mighty Rambler with her and head down to the shore to meet Mr. Jones.

  He parked the Rambler in the small driveway next to Alex’s house and carried the groceries into her kitchen, sitting them on the counter. Her young daughter was there, upset that they didn’t get to go to lunch. Frankie told her some things came up that were unexpected and he promised he would take her next time he came back to town. It wouldn’t be long, but now he had to go meet a friend about some business.

  He handed Alex the keys to the car and hoped she would just take them and not say much more. He’d really had enough for one day. It was almost as if Alex could read his mind. She graciously took the keys to the Rambler and accepted them as a great gift, which is exactly how Frankie saw it. She knew she would never drive the rat and mouse shit-infested car ever in her life.

  Alex gave him a warm hug goodbye, kissed him gently on the cheek, and walked with him out to the rental car. They stood there and looked at each other for a long time, both of them wondering if they would ever see each other again.

  Frankie tried to say a few things to make himself feel better, but Alex jumped in and stopped him, saying, “Please, no more promises, no more stories, no more lies. You have a tough row to hoe Frankie. I know you’ve made up your mind and nothing anyone will say can change that. I would ask you to please take care of yourself, but I know that request is a little ridiculous, too. Please call me when you get to wherever it is that you’re going and please keep in touch. If I do not hear from you I will assume you’re dead, so please don’t make me assume that. I fear you’re riding with death now, Frankie. Death is your constant companion on this journey, just right there within arm’s reach. I pray that you will come back to all of us one day.”

  Frankie hugged her again, kissed her on the cheek, opened the door, sat down in the rental car and thought to himself that he got off way easier than he’d hoped. There was a little bit less than quarter of the bottle of scotch left, so he figured he’d better stop for supplies before he headed south.

  Chapter Twenty:

  The Jersey Shore And

  Fat Joe

  Frankie walked into the grocery store and bought some beer, cigarettes, a cheap Styrofoam cooler, and a bag of ice. He figured he was sufficiently armed and dangerous as he headed to the shore to meet Mr. Jones. He saw a pay phone and decided he’d better call Jones. He had no luck, so he left a message with the lady who worked the desk at the hotel, telling her to tell Jones he was on his way.

  Frankie loved a road trip. The rental wasn’t a convertible—that pissed him off a little, but it had A/C and a good radio. With his stock of cold booze and smokes, he set out down Route 17 to the Thruway to the Garden State “Parking Lot” and on to Seabright, New Jersey. Drinking and driving seemed to be one of Frankie’s greatest talents.

  On the way, he thought about what Alexandrine had said and what the old lady had said. Her words cut and the old woman’s words cut. He wasn’t exactly sure how he got here and it really didn’t matter. Stuff happens. Shit happens. All Frankie knew, all he’s ever known or believed in was simple; keep moving, keep moving forward. Constant, unending motion, insomnia, days and weeks without sleep; just motion until motion simply fed motion. Moving until he found his current situation different than the one he was running from: better, worse, safe, or deadly, it didn’t matter. All that mattered was motion.

  In a way, in a small, deeply hidden corner of his mind, he’d always felt himself moving closer and closer to this edge. He’d never imagined it would be so sharp, so thin and bright and perfect. Some people never approach the edge; some people can’t even see it; some don’t even know it exists. They don’t want to know about the edge. They hide safely in their little homes, never coming out, never wanting anything to do with the edge; happy to live safely miles from it. Some come close; some come very close, but as they approach it, they see what is on the other side and they scurry back to safety, like the rats in the Rambler.

  Frankie felt his entire life had been building to these moments about to unfold. The people he had talked to in the past few days spoke as if his fate was already sealed; it felt twisted and strange, unearthly, like he was just following a script. No one spoke of specifics, but they seemed to be already mourning him.

  Maybe a fat preacher would find kind lies to say about him, lofty and glorious words, carefully crafted to deflect from what an evil bastard he truly was.

  As he drove into Jersey, he felt he was moving closer to that edge. He felt its power to cut, to sever, the razor-sharp edge; he knew he would and could dance barefoot right up there on that edge and cross over into darkness on the other side. He had become more and more comfortable with that darkness until he suddenly and deeply craved it. It was all just about motion; that perfect fluid, forward motion until he became a part of a perpetual system of movement, unstoppable, unrelenting, unending. Motion causing motion, until he found himself right there on the glistening edge; right there where it could really become far too easy to jump off and dive into the deep pitch blackness of the other side. That was the darkness into which he had always wanted to swim. That was where he could hide in open sight, mingling with the good people, the ones like the fat, sweating, preacher spoke so eloquently of, while he robbed them blind, stole their horses, fucked their daughters, drank their whiskey, moved into their houses and became their best friends. Forever smiling at the rage and chaos he had created. Chaos was Frankie’s engine; it was what drove him.

  As the sun was beginning to set, he pulled the car into the parking lot of the hotel where Mr. Jones was staying. A sm
all, clean, two-story motel right across the street from the great seawall that kept the Atlantic Ocean out of Seabright, New Jersey. It was a cute place, painted in blues and greens, with seashells and fish, and dolphins and whales on the walls. He walked into the main office and asked what room his friend Jones was in. The woman recognized his voice, smiled and said, “It’s nice to finally put a face to the voice,” Frankie politely smiled and agreed.

  He climbed up the stairs to the room on the second floor and stopped for a moment to look out over his new surroundings. From that vantage point you could see the ocean, the sun was setting to the west. You could smell the salt air, you could hear the roar of the surf crashing on the shore, sending up plumes of mist; the beach itself was invisible behind the great seawall. He put his arms on the railing, lit a cigarette and tried to take all this in. It was a very beautiful scene. He loved the ocean. He wasn’t much for lying in the sun or swimming in it, but he liked to look at it. He also noticed one hundred feet down the street, to the left, was a bar. Seeing that, he realized he had everything he needed to survive right here.

  As he knocked on the door, Frankie heard a lot of scuffling inside and some muffled voices. The door opened and Jones stood there. Frankie caught a glimpse of what appeared to be a very pretty blonde, tan girl, totally nude, running to the bathroom. Frankie looked on the floor and saw what appeared to be the remnants of a red bikini that had been torn from the girl in haste. He smiled at Jones and said, “It looks like you’ve been busy. Good work, my friend.” Then he said, “I’ll meet you at that bar right up the street whenever you get done with whatever it is that you’re doing.”

  He smiled, pulled the door shut, and walked over to the bar. Jones entered the bar about an hour and a half later, along with the gorgeous, suntanned, blonde-haired girl. She said hello to Frankie and grinned. Then she said she was going to go sit over by some people she knew and let the two of them talk. Frankie ordered a round of drinks for him and Jones and sent a pitcher of beer over to the table where the girl sat talking and laughing with her friends. It was a nice bar, especially if patrons were into the seagoing theme. There were nets full of plastic fish and starfish and clams and lobsters, and pieces of boats all over the place, big wooden wheels, rudders, anchors, and other seagoing stuff.