Baby Huey: A Cautionary Tale of Addiction

by James Henderson

  “John--”

  “Bottom line, grinding makes my testicles hurt, tender and sore the next day when I’m at work. Everyone can tell I’ve been grinding the way I pick up stuff--legs spread like a damn giraffe, not bending down all the way so I don’t put pressure on--”

  Blue slapped my arm. “John!”

  “What?”

  “I’m bare under the sheet.”

  Chapter 29

  Johnny Cash’s Man In Black played loudly from the room upstairs, the ceiling vibrating. An aggravating combination: rednecks and high fidelity speakers.

  I was kissing Blue’s ankle, taking my time.

  Blue said, “John, promise me you won’t hate me tomorrow.”

  Her skin tasted like a Payday candy bar, sweet and salty. “I won’t.”

  “You promise?”

  I licked the inside of her thigh. “Trust me, Blue, I’ll never hate you.”

  He scent was fresh, the smell of coconut. Her silky pubic hair brushing my forehead, I considered the oral proposition. Uh-uh, it ain’t that serious! I skipped to her stomach.

  Blue said, “Things will be different tomorrow, John.”

  Johnny Cash was singing Folsom Prison Blues, the prison audience sounding as if they were in the room. I moved to a breast, sucked on it. The condom was in my hand and very much on my mind. When was the right time to put it on?

  “It’s important to me that when everything is over you don’t think of me as a weak person.”

  I grunted uh-uh. Putting the condom on before getting started seemed tacky.

  “I’m not weak, John.”

  Stopping the flow--“Holdup a minute, let me put this condom on!”--seemed uncool.

  “I’m not weak, John. I’m tired.”

  “Blue, you sure you want to do this?”

  “I’m sure,” she said, not sounding enthusiastic at all.

  If she’d said no, I would have been physically unable to work a month.

  I rolled to her left, opened the condom and put it on, in the dark, not sure if I’d done it right.

  The second I got on top of Blue she said, “Don’t hurt me, John. Please!” She sounded scared.

  I kissed her, and could tell she was grimacing…then tried to enter her. She was too tense.

  “Blue, baby, you act like this is your first time. I’m not going to hurt you.” I kissed her again. “Promise.”

  With my hand I found entrance, guided my way in a bit…Blue gasped, started moaning. I kissed her, this time finding her tongue, sucking on it. And pushed halfway in. Blue started shaking her head side to side, but I held on. She bit my tongue and I still held on, tasting blood in my mouth. Another push and I was all the way in, started rocking.

  Johnny started Ring of Fire and I rocked faster, focused on the electricity coursing through my body, faster and faster, tingling my toes, faster and faster, shocking my brain…Blue screamed and I kept rocking, faster and faster…Then we screamed together, drool dripping out of my mouth, and I collapsed down on her. Electrocuted. Shit!

  I caught my breath…whispered her name, but she didn’t respond.

  “Blue, baby, that was electrifying. I’m not lying. I’ve never experienced anything quite like it.”

  Blue started crying.

  * * * * *

  The hayseeds upstairs had finally given Johnny a much needed rest. A sex scent in the air, the room was dead quiet. I was utterly confused. If Blue had cried for a few minutes, no big deal: some women cry after sex. But Blue had cried a long time, fifteen minutes or more, not responding to my asking, “What’s the matter, baby?” again and again.

  I had to ask the question: “Blue, was it that bad?”

  She didn’t respond, got up and turned the CD player on, Donny Hathaway, who I was almost as sick of hearing as Johnny Cash.

  When she got back in bed I said, “The first time, Blue…I’ve been wanting you a long time. I was anxious, too anxious. It’ll get better, I promise you that.”

  Blue said, “January thirteenth, nineteen-seventy-nine, Donny jumped from the fifteenth floor of the Essex House hotel in New York. Did you know that?”

  “No, I didn’t.” Nor did I care.

  “Two years later I was born, same day and almost the same time Donny did his swan dive. The same year, in July, my father along with a hundred-something people fell to their death from a catwalk at the hotel.”

  “Are you serious? Same hotel?”

  “No, this was at the Hyatt hotel here in Kansas City. My father worked at the Ralston Purina plant, a forklift driver; he had no business being there. That’s what hurt my mother more than anything else. She thought he was cheating.”

  The room went silent again.

  I pulled her close and kissed her shoulder.

  Blue said, “The insurance money and the lawsuit made Mother a rich woman. We had it all, new house, new cars. The roof fell in when I was nine, when Mother met Cecil. He was younger than she. Tall, dark, baby-faced, long jet-black hair down his back. He acted the gentleman, but he was a smackhead. Everything changed. Mother started sniffing smack, stopped taking me places, started leaving me alone days at a time.

  “Two years later we were flat broke, living in the projects. Cecil left when the money ran out and moved in with another man in the same building.” She paused. “I wonder did Cecil know his status. I understand it’s a virus, anyone can catch it, and there shouldn’t be the stigma attached to it. But if you know and carry on business as usual, don’t inform those who should rightfully know…that makes you one degenerate piece a shit!”

  The first time I heard anger in her voice.

  Blue continued, “One day the news showed this little white girl who exposed her mother’s drug habit. Everything worked out. The mother entered rehab and the girl was hailed a hero. Next day I took a syringe to school and told the teacher my mother was mainlining smack. Automatic expulsion. Two days later the police kicked the door down and beat Mother and hauled her off to jail. A month after they told me my mother was dead.”

  A long pause.

  “They told me my mother was in heaven and if I behaved I would see her again. A long time I had a need to believe that. But it’s a lie, John. Eternal life after you die? My mother isn’t looking down at me from heaven. She’s dead. That’s all. At peace but dead.”

  I hugged her tight and she said, “John, have you ever been tested for HIV?” I told her no. “You should. Substance abuse puts you at a higher risk for HIV.”

  “What about you, have you been tested?”

  “I don’t need to be tested, John.”

  That didn’t make sense, but I didn’t speak on it.

  Blue said, “John, you stopped using a month all on your own. One day you’ll quit for good. The last thing you’ll want to hear that you contracted HIV.”

  “Blue, baby, we both can quit, like we did before. You want me to get tested, I’ll go get tested.” I kissed her chin, not sure of her lips in the dark. “I’ve hurt too many people, Blue, I got to quit. I was wrong bringing you down with me. I promise I’ll never do that again.”

  “John, you use drugs to avoid pain. I use drugs to stop the pain.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “You’re still in love with your wife, aren’t you?”

  “A little bit.”

  Blue laughed. “See? John, honesty is the key to recovery. Be truthful with me. You and your wife had a good relationship till you started smoking crack?”

  “Sorta. It wasn’t perfect, but it was okay.”

  “When she kicked you to the curb, you realized how much you loved her?”

  “Yeah. What’s up with this, Blue? You’re a psychiatrist now?”

  “Okay. One last question. Who the hell duped you into smoking crack?”

  No way could I answer that.

  “Somebody turned you on. A woman? She wired you up to keep her high on?”

&nbs
p; “What you talking about? That didn’t happen.”

  “John, it’s cocaine, not Coca Cola. Somebody give it to you has an ulterior motive for doing so.”

  “Go to sleep, Blue.”

  “Okay. Final question and I’ll let it go. You see you and your wife getting back together?”

  “Ex-wife. Nope.”

  “Why not?”

  “She’s pregnant by my best friend. Ex best friend.”

  “Ouch! That does make reconciliation difficult.”

  “Blue, all that’s over now. History.” I found a breast, squeezed it. “You’re all the woman I need.”

  “You don’t love me, John.”

  I said, “Let me work on that,” and took the breast in my mouth. A perfect fit. The package in a rush to be delivered, I pulled her on top of me, Blue moaning now. I poked around for the opening in the silk, wetter than before, found it, palmed Blue’s buttock and pressed down, the initial going in the sweetest thing I’ve ever felt, Blue getting into it now, taking it all in, rocking slow at first and then picking up speed, grunting, begging me not to stop.

  “Blue, baby, I can’t…I can’t hold it!” Shit!

  Her body went stiff, then she started shaking, and fell on me gasping for air. I laid an arm on her back and she jumped, her muscles twitching involuntarily.

  Breathing hard, Blue said, “Tomorrow, John, don’t hate me. Please don’t hate me!”

  * * * * *

  Sunlight illuminated the holey, slime-green curtains. The digital clock on the CD player said a quarter till five. I would have to hurry to catch David. Blue was still asleep, her mouth half opened.

  In the bathroom I used wire pliers to turn on the hot water faucet in the shower. Brushed my teeth. Stood over the commode…and froze, got real scared. There was dried blood where it shouldn’t have been.

  I hurried back to the bed, threw the sheet back. More dried blood, a lot more.

  I shook Blue awake. “Baby, you should’ve told me.”

  Blue pulled the sheet back over her. “Told you what?”

  “You should’ve told me, baby.”

  “I told you. You didn’t believe me.”

  A long time I held her, kissing her face, neck, telling her over and over that she should have told me.

  “John, aren’t you going to work?”

  “Baby, I do yard work. Leaves pile up, leaves blow away. Who cares?”

  “Go to work, John.”

  God, she was beautiful. Not a blemish on her face. Perfect teeth. What the hell she see in me? A sad look in her brown eyes.

  “Okay, baby, I’ll go to work.”

  “John, hug me before you go.” Tears brimming in her eyes.

  I hugged her and said, “Baby, soon as I get off I’ll be right back. Next week we’ll get a phone so I can call you from work.”

  “Good-bye, John.” A tear rolled down her face.

  * * * * *

  David was waiting in his truck when I walked up. I hopped up front and he said, “Next time I’m not waiting on you.”

  It was cold, but there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. A beautiful day, a very beautiful day. David drove to a Spanish-style mansion in Olathe, Kansas, where he and I raked leaves and cleaned out a large pool shaped like a piano.

  Around noon we went to a bar and grill across from a Target Superstore. David said lunch was on him and I ordered a barbecue sandwich, fries, and a coke. He ordered ribs and a Michelob.

  The dining area and the lunch crowd were small, pictures of the Chiefs on the walls, miniature NFL helmets lining the top shelf behind the bar. No music.

  David said, “What you on today?”

  “Huh?”

  “Man, you’re working so fast you making me tired looking at you. What you been smoking?”

  “I ain’t smoked nothing, man. I was out there dragging ass, you’d complain about that. I’m just working, man.”

  David stared at me. “A woman, ain’t it? It’s all over your face.”

  You could work for a black man a hundred years and not once would he ask of your personal life. A white man thought history and minimum wage went hand-in-hand.

  David took out his wallet and showed me a picture of his scrawny, cockeyed wife. “Married fifteen years. Your girl looks better than my Amy?”

  See, what I tell you?

  “No, David,” I lied. “Very few women can match your Amy.”

  David was still smiling when the waiter returned with the food. The barbecue was fatty, hard to chew.

  I spit a piece of gristle into a napkin. “I thought Kansas City was famous for its barbecue.”

  “You ain’t in Kansas City.”

  After the meal David ordered another beer. Not ten minutes later, another.

  “David, you think we should get back to work now?”

  He laughed, a beer glow in his eyes. “We’re done for today. You ran through the work so fast. I got another house lined up for tomorrow. Order a beer, I’m buying.”

  “Thanks, but no thanks. I’m ready to go home.”

  “You got it bad, don’t you?”

  Driving back, David talked about his wife, his three-year-old son, Junior, and his cat, Tabby, who had recently scratched Junior, prompting his wife to call Animal Control. The man came to relocate Tabby and David threw a fit.

  “I told him he touch my cat I’d kick his ass and call the police.”

  I wondered if David had ever kicked somebody’s ass without calling the police.

  He continued rambling and I tuned him out, thinking of Blue, a warm feeling spreading throughout my body, exciting the package. Twenty-two years old and no man had ever touched her. Except me. She’d had a hard life. Mama and daddy both dead. An asshole stepbrother. Whatever it took I wouldn’t let anyone hurt her again.

  Hell, we could get married. Why not? I was divorced. We could have kids. I’d work and she’d stay home and watch the kids. Two jobs if I had to.

  “Blue, honey, from now on I’m taking care of you.” I couldn’t wait to see her face when I told her that.

  David stopped the truck in front of the lobby and told me he’d see me in the morning.

  I said, “Yeah,” and hopped out, started running to the room. The door was unlocked. Blue was still in bed, in a fetal position, the sheet over her head to toe. I’d worn her out. Got behind her, kissed her head through the sheet.

  “Baby, I got off early today. David told me I was working too fast. I was thinking about you, working my ass off. You hear me?” She didn’t respond. I patted her butt. “Blue, baby, I’m going to take care of you. I promise I’ll never hurt you. Yes, I still love my wife. Might as well be honest about that. But it’s over. It was over when she caught me with the pipe and I hit her. I’ll never hit you, Blue, I swear before God I won’t. You hear me?”

  Nothing.

  “Baby, at some point we need to start thinking about marriage. Not right away, but, you know, it’s something we need to think about. I’m a one-woman man. Honest. You’re all the woman I need. All the woman I want. You’ll never have to worry about me cheating on you because I won’t. Promise. Baby, do you hear me?”

  No response, I reached under the sheet and found a breast. “Blue?” Her skin felt cool to the touch, clammy, breast like liquid putty in my hand. “Blue?” And just then I smelled the sickly sweet scent, close, coming from…“Blue!”

  I threw the sheet back and almost fainted.

  Her eyes were wide open, the pupils cloudy and fixed. Her skin was a dark purple, the same color of her tongue, split in two, sticking out of clenched teeth. Dried blood filled her nostrils. A pool of reddish-pink vomit emanated from her mouth, spilling onto the sheet to the side of the bed.

  I screamed, “Blue!” and started shaking her. “Blue, wake up! Get up!” An empty pill bottle rolled onto the floor. “Dammit, Blue, wake up!” I pulled her to me and she came up in the same position she was lying in, her hands in pr
ayer under her head. “No, Blue, no! Snap out of it!”

  Seconds later I was in the lobby, running to the pay phone, a man on it. “I need to use the phone, man!” He couldn’t have cared less. I pushed him off the stool and snatched the receiver in one motion. “Now, dammit!” He got up and came toward me as I was dialing 911. “You don’t want to fuck with me now, man!” He did the right thing.

  The paramedics came in as I was carrying Blue to the bathroom, to put her into the tub filled with warm water.

  “Dammit, just don’t stand there, help her! Please!”

  The short one said, “Put her on the bed, sir.”

  I laid Blue on the bed, but the paramedics didn’t attend to her, just kept looking at me as if I was crazy. “Man, what you doing? Help her! Do something! Dammit, do something!”

  “Sir, she’s in rigor mortis. There’s nothing we can do for her.”

  I fell to my knees. “Please! Help her! God, please help her!”

  Chapter 30

  The sign said Little Rock was ninety-three miles away. I’d been on the road seven weeks. Friday, March 13. It was five in the evening. Already dark. Light traffic. Deer grazing alongside the road.

  This stretch of Interstate 40, between Fort Smith and Clarksville, was under construction, bumpy, hard on the kidneys.

  I hoped Mama wouldn’t faint again when she saw me. That gave me an idea.

  “Yo, Danny?” A grunt came from the sleeper. I called him again.

  The curtain slid open and Danny Ross worked his way to the passenger seat. He grabbed a pack of Marlboros on the dash and said, “Where we at?”

  Each time he got up, day or night, he always asked the same thing, even when he was the last one driving. The Marlboro had a funky smell, like manure burning.

  The safety director asked me did I prefer a non-smoking trainer. I said no, it didn’t matter to me. Danny smoked three packs a day. When he wasn’t smoking, he was coughing, his face turning crimson red, doubled over, sounding awful.

  I said, “We’re almost to Little Rock. I haven’t--”