by Xavier Neal
My hand turns the knob slowly. Mom is usually ready by now. What if something’s wrong? What if she's hurt? And if that's the case why am I opening the door? As soon the door is opened I'm relieved to see her sitting on the edge of her bed, black dress on, doing something with one of the shoes on her feet.
Looking up sweetly, she coos, “Hi, Slugger...”
“Hi mom.” I stare at her for a moment. She looks perfect. I thought people weren't supposed to be perfect? But she looks perfect. In her fancy dress. In her fancy shoes. With her fancy earrings. And now her fancy shoes. “Ready?”
A smile creeps across her face. She bites her lipstick covered bottom lip, “Are you?”
Her voice is playful and forceful as it repeats in my ear. I'm ready mom. I'm ready to see you again. With a tough grab, I yank the lock off, and push the garage style door up, revealing a sight that reminds me of finding a sunken ship full of treasures.
“On the left are the few things she had before her and Whiskey. The ones in the center are from their life together before you. And the ones on the right are the ones with you.....” my eyes glance at the few boxes at her life without us, the several boxes from her life with dad, and the abundance overflowing from the section of us together.
My voice cracks as I look over my shoulder. “It's all here...”
Mindy merely nods and sips her coffee. Finally she sighs, “Take all the time you need, Slugger.”
Slowly I move around not touching anything. Just observing. The things from her life before me and dad seem too uncomfortable to even think about touching. What gives me the right to know that part of her? That part of her that dad doesn't probably even know? My eyes scan boxes in that section labeled photos, memories, journals, other. Knowing that she used to strip for money makes me really cringe when I think see the word other.
I head towards some stacked boxes with similar names, but from the section Mindy labeled from when they got married. One of the boxes is labeled The Wedding. Curiosity has me grinning. Smirking. Smiling. My parents married. Happy. In love. All things I want for myself that seem to be slipping away. My chest tightens. The simple action of breathing too damn difficult to continue.
In an attempt to shake off the feelings, I head to the section filled with things that are stained in my brain as a kid. Immediately, the memories flood back. The brown boxes overflowing. The black dress that Haven wore on top. Pieces from our family photos shattered around. Glass littered everywhere. Whiskey smells choking me. Gagging me. I can't breathe. I can't breathe. God help me! I can't fucking breathe!
My knees fall and hit the ground inside the storage unit. Mindy rushes to my aid, dropping beside me, wrapping her arms around me. With my eyes squeezed shut I repeat the words softly, “I can't breathe...I can't breathe.” The faint smell of whiskey clouds my nose. And so does the smell of a cigar. He used to smoke cigars when he drank his expensive whiskey. “I can't...”
“Shhh, Slugger.” Mindy cradles me close to her body. And I feel no more than 10 years old. No more than the kid who wanted to grow up and be a baseball player. No more than the kid whose mother died before his eyes. I'm broken. And now I know it shows.
Something about the sight of those boxes, the smell, and the overwhelming anxiety surrounding it all breaks down all that's left inside of me. Tears fill my eye lids. One by one. Gathering. Conspiring. Deciding which should be the first traitor. Which should be the first to fall. And when it hits my cheek, the others take a dive down. Following the traitor’s path. For the first time, I let it all go. The pain from missing my mother. The pain from fighting with my dad. The pain from feeling alienated from Haven. The stress of the job. All of it drains from me, from my eyes, washing away the glue of the chaos that's barely holding me together.
Weak. Helpless. Damaged. That's what I've become. That's what I am. All of that because I let myself buy into the bullshit poison of hope. Hope that I could face my past. Hope that I could face my future. Hope that anyone could ever actually love me. Hope that maybe for the first time in my life I wasn't as alone as thought yet now I feel I'm even more alone than before. Which leaves me feeling hopeless. This right here. This is the reason I hate the very notion of the thing. It has a tendency to do this to anyone who buys into it. Tempts them. Seduces them. Then leaves them worse than they ever. Fuck hope.
After a deep breath, Mindy strokes the side of my face. “How about I tell you about the first time I met your mother?”
Through the quiet sobs, I managed to get myself together for a minute. “Yeah.”
Easing me up until I can rest my body against the side of the storage unit, too close to the brown boxes, Mindy takes a minute to brush off the dust from my shirt, while I wipe away the tears with the back of my hand.
“I will never forget the first time I met Jamie. Doug and I had decided we needed to move away from that life we had been living. And Doug was friends with Striker, who knew Felix, so after the two of them got acquainted, Felix introduced Whiskey to Doug. Anyway, we were headed to Reckonberg to check on our house to see if it was done being built and Whiskey invited us to stop by for dinner. So we arrive, I ring the bell, and this woman opens the door. She's got on jeans that have holes, a white t-shirt, her hair in a messy bun and paint on her face. I remember thinking how can any woman look like such a wreck yet be so beautiful. I kept praying to God Doug wouldn't notice...”
A small chortle comes out of me. Seems to help put a cork in the tears.
“That was a stupid prayer because Jamie was hard not to notice. She just...glowed and had such a give 'em hell attitude, it was infectious. Anyway, she put on a bright smile and welcomed us in, immediately apologizing for her not looking her best. She had been painting a room. Turning it into a nursery...” my eyes widen. “Apparently she had just found out she was pregnant and very excited. Even though Whiskey had told her to take it easy, she painted your entire room telling Whiskey that was her taking it easy.”
I find myself mumbling, “Stubborn...”
“What? You thought Whiskey was the only person you got that from?”
I crack a smile. “We had dinner that night and I remember watching them, the fact they were head over heels written all over their faces. I remember saying to myself, we're going to be seeing a lot of them. I just know it. So...when we found out of they were moving to the neighborhood years later I was quite glad.”
Silence fills the air. It feels like a brick that landed on my shoulder has been removed. I wish for more bricks to be removed. I need this moment. I need to know more about her. About the woman whose death made me this way.
My hands scrub my face. The chaos inside is threatening to stir again, which is when Mindy says, “Do you remember the first time you met me? When you moved into the neighborhood?”
I shake my head. The memory isn't one that stands out. Not many childhood ones do any more.
“While we kept in touch with your parents, we didn't see them again until they moved into the neighborhood. The day you moved in your mom brought you right over to meet me. You looked like a splitting image of the two of them. She had warned me that you were having a hard time with the move and accepting new people, so I offered you a snack which you quickly rejected. But when you found that they were chocolate chip cookies, you could hardly resist...”
That's when it hits me like a sucker punch causing the words to fly out of my mouth, “Is that why when I'm upset you always make me chocolate chip cookies?”
“Precisely.”
“You've always been trying to take care of me, haven't you?”
She offers a faint smile and touches my cheek. After a moment, she picks her coffee cup back up and takes a drink, refusing to answer my question. There's no real reason too. I already know the answer.
Mindy looks around and then back at at me. “You know what, Slugger, why don't we get out of here? I don't think this was the good idea I had intended it to be.”
Quickly I reach up and grab her arm. “No
, Mindy. It was...” A very brief smile graces my face, “Thank you...”
Flustered once more from the recognition she tries to push through past it. “Is there anything in particular you wanna look at? Maybe I can find it and just bring it over to you.”
It's ridiculous that I'm too much of a pussy to just dig through the boxes myself. I look around at them again. Being here is like being inside a piece of my mom, so yeah. Call me a pussy. But this is more than I've ever had to deal with it. And considering the fact I'm still new to this whole emotions bullshit, it's not my fault I failed this test. This inability to deal with the weight the situation. At least I'm trying. At least I'm here.
“How 'bout some baby photos?”
Mindy looks relieved that I'm not trying to bail out. She gets up and her signature sound follows her. Click. Click. She starts to move boxes until she finds the one she's looking for. With a heavy tug she drags it out and over to me. Plopping it in my lap she sits down beside, propping herself reluctantly against the same wall. She's getting her designer sweater dirty. This has to be killing her. I hold back the smile at the thought.
My eyes look down at my name stitched on the front cover of the navy blue scrapbook. Clint Thomas Walker. Slowly I open it and begin admiring photos of my mother pregnant with me, pages filled with fun facts about her, like craving spaghetti with bacon chunks while 7 months pregnant. About the struggle of dad putting together a rocking chair for them to sit in. Then as I leisurely continue the scan I see baby facts about me and to my surprise many photos of me and dad together. The story of his favorite memory of me haunts the back of my mind every time I stop at one of the photos to stare.
I'm not sure how long it takes for me to go through the album, but it feels like hours. Afterward, I put the album away and agree with Mindy that that's enough for one day. Once we're in the car, I lean my head against the window, feeling so drained that I shut my eyes in hopes of sucking back some life into myself. I've got to start dealing with this shit. I can control the chaos. I have to. I need to. There's only a few days before I'm back out training in the field. I miss the order my life used to thrive in. I can do this. I can put the pieces back together. Hell, I started by facing mom's memories. Next? Telling Haven how I feel about Michele and the simple fact that in less than a week, I'm walking out the door back to work. I need to tell her that I need her. That I need her to need me. That I need her to want me. That I need to feel that from her. Fuck. When did I get so needy? Is it even normal to be needy?
I take a long breath and feel my muscles finally loosen, as if I was sinking in a hot tub. The final relaxation starting to deal with my life head on seems to be just the right amount of comfort.
Before I know it, I'm yawning and stretching, unsure of when I fell asleep. Looking out the window beside me at the scenic view, I quickly shoot a look back at Mindy who glances my direction.
“You're up...”
Slightly ashamed I shrug. “I don't remember falling asleep.”
“You were exhausted, Slugger. My guess is you haven't been sleeping lately.” If she only knew. “We were in the car for like five minutes before you passed out.”
“So...where are we going?”
“Home now.”
“Where were we going?”
“Nowhere. I was just driving around to help you sleep.” Leaning down in my seat my eyebrows furrow. I never realized car rides made me sleepy. “See, right after your mom died, you would be up late at night, so I would tell you, I had an errand to run and to get into the car. Within the first five minutes of me driving, you usually were passed out. I'd drive around for about an hour to make sure you really out before bringing you back home and tucking you in.”
All these years, I claimed my mother was dead. That I was parent less. Yet all this time, there was never a minute that went by that that was true. So much fucking time I've wasted makes me nausea. I won't do it again. I won't make that same mistake any more. That's my word.
“Mindy...”
“Hm?”
“Thank you. For everything.” She glances over like she wants to say something but can't. “And I mean everything. And thank you for accepting me then, now, and in the days to come.”
Her jaw trembles and she reaches over to give my head a good ruffle. Doing her best to shake off her tears, she replies with, “You need a haircut...”
I smile widely and nod at her, the words she wants to say crystal clear to me, “I know.” Leaning into her touch I sigh, “I know.”
After we arrive home, I shag ass across the street knowing that Haven is supposed to be home from her interviews, soon, but not soon enough. On my way up the stairs, I dial her number tired of dating my girl through text messages. I need to hear voice her. I need her here.
“Hello,” she cheerfully answers.
The warmth in her voice seeps through to me. “Hey you.”
“Clint,” her voice coos.
I smile and plop down on the top stair too happy to continue to my room, “You headed home, Angel? I uh...can't wait to see you.”
“Oh,” her voice quickly changes tone. Not to a tone I like. “Actually, we're going out tonight to celebrate our graduation together. You know, since we were all so busy with our families that night. And interviews since.”
Now, it’s my turn to change tone. “Right...how about I come with?”
“That's a sweet offer, but I would hate for them to feel like--”
“Right.” I cut her off knowing where she's heading with it. Grinding my teeth I nod and lean my head back. I need to talk to her now. Shit. It can wait a few more hours. “Can you just do me a favor, angel?”
“Sure.”
“Whatever you do, if I'm asleep when you get home, wake me up. We need to talk.”
“Everything OK?”
My lips form a thin line. No. It's so far from OK, OK looks like a pleasure cruise. Clearing my throat I brush it off, just like I have been. “Don't worry about anything, angel. Just enjoy your night out with you friends.”
“Alright, baby,” she hums softly; the sound of Mandy's voice fills the background. “I'll see you tonight.”
“I love you, Haven.”
“I love you too.” Are her final words before the line goes dead.
Gripping it tight, I gently tap it against my head in frustration. Her friends. It's always about them. Need to add that the list of shit to talk about. I unlock my phone and hit another contact less willingly.
“This is the hot line for love, Glove speaking. How many of your fantasies can I make become a reality today?” his response is said in a customer service rep voice.
Disgusting. Why did I call? “Don't make me hang up.”
He chuckles. Bastard. “And what can I do you, Grim?”
“Just wondering how many reasons are you going to give my father's colleagues to arrest you tonight?”
“Hm...” he pauses. Then he begins mumbling, “Carry the seven...” I roll my eyes. “Why you wanna know? This close to deployment you can't POSSIBLY be interested in hanging out. Shouldn't you be hanging out with your girl?” The remark digs. Like the knife pointed tip. Fuck. Hearing no response from me he follows up, “Make sure your ass is here by 9. We will leave without you.”
“I don't doubt it,” is my response before I hang up.
It'll do me some good to get the hell out of this house. Just take a breath and a moment away from it all. Show my brothers that I still care about them. That they still matter to me too. They might not need it, but you know what, I sure the fuck do.
Laughter fills the table as the blonde girl sitting in Glove's lap readjusts herself, her arms falling around his neck. “Well I think he's cute...”
“Of course you do. You're a school teacher, and he's a child,” my comment gets another laugh from the girls at the table as Glove wraps his arms around her waist, grazing the skin above her hips.
“While I don't think she can school me in some subjects, I wouldn't mind staying a
fter school and letting her punish me.” one of his hands gives her ass a squeeze and she giggles, taking another drink of her beer.
“Maybe she'll let you wear a dunce hat.” I point my beer his direction and the pair of brunettes sitting next to me and Lordy start to chuckle.
To my surprise sitting here with them has been one of the better moods I've had lately. They're just the same as ever, full of stupid comments and easy set ups. They remind me of when life was easier. When this is what we did between missions. When there was stability and order.
“I wanna go dancing,” the brunette who has shown little interest in Lordy but won't stop eye fucking me whimpers. “Let's go dancing.”
Her two friends giggle in agreement. Before I have the chance to answer Glove pipes up, “Absolutely.”
“Let's go refresh our makeup.” the blonde whose name I think is Brittany tugs on the other girls hands.
As soon as they’re out of sight, I redirect my attention directly to Glove, “Not happening.”
“Grim--”
“I'm not going to a club, Glove.”
“Grim--”
“I'm not going to put myself through an epileptic fit to crappy dub step bullshit to up the chances of you getting laid.”
“Look.” Glove leans both his arms on the table. “Ever since you started dating Haven, I have been to birthday parties, Thanksgiving, graduations, and 'grown up' dinners. I haven't complained once--”
“You complained every time--”
“Not the point,” Glove cuts me off. “The point is, I have done these for you, and you will do this for me. You will go next door and drink so that I get my lesson in sex ed tonight.”
Looking him dead in his eyes, I find myself torn between going home and waiting for Haven and doing something for him. He rarely asks me to play wing man. Or at least since I've been dating Haven. Actually the two of them rarely ask me for much these days and make sure to give us all the space we need. For the two of them it's quite impressive.