by J. A. Wright
“Sure, come on over and look all you want,” I replied.
After we finished the ice cream, and a fifth of Dad’s Southern Comfort, the taller twin suggested we take the Mustang out for a little ride. I thought it was a bad idea at first, but the more I thought about Dad and how much he hated me, the more I thought taking his precious car out for a drive was an okay thing to do, especially after the cute twin kissed me and asked me if I had a boyfriend.
It was two local fishermen who found the car. I don’t remember too much except a little bit about getting stuck in the sand and walking down the beach with the twins to find someone to help us get the car unstuck. It was awfully dark and we were really drunk. I guess we got lost because I woke up on the side of the highway under a bush. The twins were nowhere to be found. I walked to a gas station, about a half a mile down the road, to ask for help, but a couple of fishermen had already pulled the car out of the sand and towed it to the gas station. I guess the tide had come in overnight because the Mustang was saturated with sand and water. The guy at the gas station happened to recognize the car—and he knew my brother—so he called Robbie to tell him what was up and he gave me a ride home.
It was Robbie who told Dad about his Mustang when they got home from the convention, and it was Dad who broke my nose.
When we arrived at the emergency room, they stuffed my nose with cotton gauze and asked me what had happened. “My dad hit me,” I said.
When two policemen showed up a few minutes later and asked me where my dad was, I told them he was at home. Mom was standing behind them, facing me, and shaking her head. “I didn’t mean that my dad hit me,” I retracted. “It was actually my brother, but it was an accident. He was teaching me to hit left-handed and a ball went right into my face.”
“Thank you,” Mom mouthed.
I guess the police believed me because no one ever followed up with Dad or Robbie. It didn’t matter, though, because Dad stopped speaking to me after I ruined his Mustang.
CHAPTER 13
Dad died on Thursday April 25, 1991, at the end of my sophomore year. I got home at 5 p.m. after a day of hanging out with Wade, a new kid from St Louis who told me I was cute and asked me to ditch school with him. We’d spent most of the afternoon at the beach park, in his car, drinking beer and smoking pot. We also made out a few times, and I let him give me a couple hickeys on the front of my neck because he wanted to.
When I got home, I knew I smelled like pot smoke, so before I did anything else I took a shower and used lots of Mom’s apple-scented shampoo, hoping it would wash the smoke smell out of my hair. Then I tried to cover my hickeys with face powder and concealer, but neither of them did a very good job so I put on the orange turtleneck Olive had given me for Christmas.
It was almost 5.30 p.m., time for Mom to get home, when I went into the kitchen to start dinner. I usually didn’t make dinner but Mom had asked me that morning if I would.
“Hey, your dad’s stuck in Seattle for a few more days, so why don’t you make us fish sticks and fries for dinner?” she’d asked.
Dad hated fish sticks and fries. He said they’d make me fat, and that they made the house smell like a sewer. I didn’t care, and neither did Mom, so whenever he was out of town we ate nothing but fish sticks and fries.
I’d put an entire box of fish sticks on a cookie tray and turned the oven to 400 before I noticed the light flashing and the number three lit up on our phone message machine. I hit the button to hear Robbie yell, “Where the fuck are you? It’s 10 a.m. and your school said you didn’t show up today. Dad’s dead, Mom’s a mess, and I’m driving there right now. Call me on my car phone! I mean it!”
Robbie was the only person I knew who had a phone in his car. It came with his new Oldsmobile, the one Dad had helped him pick out and probably paid for. I listened to the next two messages, both from Robbie, the last one at 4 p.m.: “I’m at the hospital with mom. Call me back.”
I hit the replay button a few times and listened to the messages again. I wanted to make sure that I understood what Robbie had said before I dialed his number. When he didn’t answer I felt relieved. I wasn’t going to leave a message on his phone but I did. “Got your message. I’ve been home all day in bed with bad cramps. How can Dad be dead? I thought he was in Seattle?”
I hung the phone up, put the cookie tray in the oven, and sat on the kitchen floor thinking about how angry Dad had been with me for the past six months, ever since I ruined his Mustang. I felt pretty bad about it, and I’d tried to apologize at least one hundred times, but Dad had just ignored me and never once mentioned his Mustang or my broken nose. The one time I tried to explain what had happened, he put his hand around my neck like he was going to strangle me and said, “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll stay out of my way.” From then on, whenever I asked him a question he’d act like he didn’t hear me and say something to Mom like, “Tell the girl to stop talking at me, will ya?”
As I stared at the kitchen ceiling I prayed really hard that Dad had died from some type of accident and not anything to do with his high blood pressure. Robbie had told me at Christmas that I was the reason Dad had high blood pressure. “All you’ve ever done is cause trouble. Dad’s blood pressure is through the roof thanks to you,” he’d said.
After thinking about things for a while I began to wonder if Robbie was playing a trick on me just to be mean. Why would he drive all the way from Sacramento to Huntington Beach if Dad was in Seattle? I wondered. I phoned Olive and when she answered I told her about Robbie’s messages. “Is it true? Is dad dead?” I stuttered into the phone. “Oh honey, I don’t know if he’s passed away or not. Your mom is at the hospital. You could try to phone her there,” she replied.
I felt my legs melt into Jell-O and my stomach turn sour. I was more frightened than ever and could see my hands shaking as I picked up the phone book to look for the hospital’s number. When I finally found it and called, the switchboard operator transferred me to a nurse. When I asked her about Dad, she said, “He is here, but I can’t give you any information about his condition.”
I felt like something inside of me was fading away. My throat tightened and I could barely say, “Is my mom there?”
“She left a few minutes ago with your brother, I believe.”
I looked at the oven clock and saw that it was after 6 p.m. I wondered how long it would take Mom and Robbie to drive home. I took the fish sticks out of the oven and paced around the house. I tried to watch TV, folded laundry, and dusted Mom’s Hummel collection (which could only be done with Q-tips) before I realized how much trouble I was probably in. I couldn’t stand the way I felt. I wanted it to go away, but I knew if I helped myself to a beer my brother might smell it on me, so I decided to have a look in Mom’s room for something else. She always had pill bottles on her dresser, and I’d been helping myself to them for years. She never seemed to notice, probably because I was careful not to take any if there were only a few left in the bottle.
After reading the labels on three of her prescription bottles, I found the one I wanted. I was only going to take one, but then I remembered Mom saying, “Why do I only take one of these when I know I’m going to want another one in an hour?” So I swallowed two pills, lay down on the couch, and waited for the calm to arrive.
It was just after seven when Mom and Robbie walked in the door. I really wanted to get up and ask what had happened to Dad, but I could hardly open my eyes, and my head was too heavy to lift. When I tried to speak, I couldn’t make any words, only weird sounds.
Robbie yelled, “So you’ve really done it this time, haven’t ya loser?” as he slapped me on the side of my head so hard I thought he might have broken my skull.
I slept all night on the living room couch and didn’t get up until noon the next day. I was still groggy from the pills, and it took me a while to make it from the couch to Mom’s bedroom, only to find she wasn’t there. I called out to her and then to Robbie, but no one answered, so I heated u
p a can of soup, ate it with an entire box of Ritz crackers, and wondered when I was going to get the chance to ask Mom about Dad.
It didn’t take long: Robbie and Mom arrived home about 3 p.m. and Mom headed straight to her room, so I followed.
“How did he die? Where did he die? You told me he was in Seattle, so how did he get home?” I practically screamed.
“He lied to me. He was with Genie in a hotel room down the road. The doctor thinks he had a stroke,” she said as she took her coat off and let it drop to the floor.
I watched her look over her prescription bottles for a few seconds and then pick up the one I’d helped myself to the day before. I thought about telling her to only take one pill because I was still a bit stoned from the two I’d taken, but she’d popped two in her mouth before I had a chance to say anything. “God, I needed those,” she said as she reached out and grabbed me around the top of my shoulders.
I snuggled into her. “Do you think we’ll be okay?”
She hugged me for the longest time. “Sure I do. We’ll be fine,” she whispered in my ear before she released me and fell back onto her bed, the same way I used to when I was little and happy about something. I tried not to stare at her as she flung her arms over her head and grinned from ear to ear. I was confused about her smile and more confused about the emerging smile on my face. “I’m not worried about us, Mom. I’m worried that Dad died because of me, because of the high blood pressure I caused him to have.”
“That’s ridiculous. You didn’t cause his high blood pressure. He didn’t take care of himself and he drank too much.” She got to her feet and told me she needed a long bath and some time to think.
I went to my room and threw myself on my bed the same way Mom had thrown herself on hers. I put my arms over my head and thought about Uncle Hank. I wondered if Dad had gone to the same place as Uncle Hank and if they were together, talking about me. It was hard for me not to replay the scene from the day Uncle Hank died. I knew it so well. I also knew he’d still be alive if I’d just cleaned up the suntan oil I’d spilled. Now it seemed that I might have killed Dad, too, even though Mom said I didn’t. Everyone, including my mom, knew how red Dad’s face and neck would get when he was around me. One time, a few months before I ruined his car, he yelled at me for leaving the back door open all night and got so dizzy he had to sit down.
I guess if I’d just been a better person, or maybe a boy, he might not have hated me so much, or had high blood pressure.
I couldn’t take thinking about Dad and Uncle Hank any longer, so I got up and went to the kitchen to sneak a wine cooler. Robbie was sitting at the kitchen table drinking Dad’s Crown Royal from his favorite whiskey glass. When he saw me, he got a dirty coffee cup from the sink, poured some whiskey in it and handed it to me. Then he raised his glass over his head and said, “Here’s a toast to the best old man a guy could ever ask for.” Robbie downed the contents in a couple of swallows and threw the glass in the sink, smashing it to bits.
I sipped my whiskey for a few seconds before I finished it off, all the while wondering how my brother could think Dad was the best father ever.
“Hey, if you’ve got anything stored in my room get it out now or I’ll throw it out, ’cause I’m moving back in for a couple of weeks and I don’t want to look at your shit.”
“I’m not moving my craft table and stuff just so you don’t have to look at my shit. Move it yourself! Why do you have to stay here, anyway? We don’t need your help!”
“Someone’s gotta help Mom make the funeral arrangements, and it certainly ain’t gonna be you, so move your shit!”
I flipped him the bird, took a wine cooler from the fridge, and went back to my room. Later, I overheard Robbie talking on the phone telling someone he was staying around because he wanted to make sure no one, including Dad’s brother Bill, took any of Dad’s things, because it was all his.
Robbie left with his bowling alley friend around 8 p.m., just as Olive and Ken arrived with two bottles of wine and a bag of M&M’s. I had to knock on Mom’s bedroom door four times before she called for me to come in. When she finally got dressed and joined us in the kitchen, Olive handed her a glass of wine and said, “I don’t know if I should cry or laugh, but I’m sorry this is happening, honey.”
“Me neither. I feel like crying and laughing at the same time,” Mom replied.
I sat at the kitchen table eating M&M’s while they talked about funeral arrangements and Ken wrote an obituary for the newspaper. Dad’s funeral was set for the next Tuesday (five days after he died) because the funeral home was booked up until then.
Before I went to bed, Mom gave me a hug and said, “You look tired, honey. I’m worried that you’re worried. So stop worrying.” She smiled and then told me that Robbie had called my school and told them that I wouldn’t be back until after the funeral. “So please make an effort to get along with Robbie. He’s being very helpful,” she said.
“I will if he will,” I replied as I walked away.
Robbie spent all day Saturday sorting through Dad’s belongings in the house and in the garage, editing the obituary Ken had started, and reading over Dad’s will and life insurance policy. When I asked him if we were going to have to sell the house, he said, “Hell no. This house is officially paid off, and Mom’s going to get some serious cash too. Don’t get your hopes up about getting anything, though. You’re not mentioned in Dad’s will.”
“Big surprise there,” I replied as I headed outside to water Mom’s hanging flower baskets like she’d asked me to.
Robbie insisted on buying a stainless steel casket and contacting someone at the Marines about getting a flag for the coffin and a uniform for Dad to wear. I heard Mom tell him a couple of times that Dad wouldn’t want a military service. “He hated that war, Robbie,” she said.
But Robbie wouldn’t take no for an answer and even polished Dad’s military medals so he could put them on display at the funeral parlor. He also arranged for several of Dad’s friends to follow the hearse to the cemetery in their classic cars and hired a catering company to bring sandwiches and salads to the house for an after-funeral lunch in Dad’s garage.
I wanted to help, to contribute in some way, but I couldn’t think of anything I could do until after I went out to the garage to sit in Dad’s lounge chair on Sunday afternoon and think. I helped myself to one of Dad’s Pall Malls, and halfway through it decided to turn on some music, which was when the idea hit me. I remembered that Dad’s best friend, Mike, a really good guitar player and sound technician, had convinced Dad a few years earlier to record two of his favorite Glen Campbell songs. Mike had made copies of the recordings and had given one of the cassettes to Dad and another to me.
Dad thought his version of “Hey Little One” sounded almost perfect, but he didn’t like his rendition of “Less of Me.” He said he sounded too dramatic and that his pitch was off. I liked both and had almost worn out my copy of the cassette. I looked all over for Dad’s copy but couldn’t find it. I did find Mike’s phone number on the wall behind Dad’s workbench, though, so I called him. After Mike told me how sorry he was about Dad I explained my idea to finish off the funeral service by playing Dad’s version of “Less of Me.” Mike thought it would be a nice tribute and said he had a spare copy of the recording.
“Mine’s probably in better shape than yours,” he said. “I haven’t played it once. I’ll call the funeral home and make arrangements to bring in a small sound system, okay?”
I know Mike could hear me crying because he said, “Hey kid, it was just his time to go. He was a tough guy, but I’m sure he loved you.”
Even though I knew I was supposed to feel really sad about Dad dying, I didn’t. I was actually kind of happy that he was dead, and that confused me. I lay on my bed with Rascal for the next couple of hours biting my nails and wondering how life was going to be without Dad around.
That same night, while I made dinner, I listened as Robbie told Mom that Dad’s company ha
d a small pension fund that she was entitled to, about forty thousand dollars. He wanted her to help him pay off his student loan with it, but I don’t think Mom wanted to because she didn’t answer him when he said, “He’d want me to have it, Mom, right?”
I finished making all of us grilled cheese sandwiches before I interrupted their conversation to tell them about Mike bringing a recording of Dad singing to the funeral.
“What a great idea. It’ll be perfect. Your dad was such a good singer,” Mom said.
“We’re not having any honky-tonk country-bumpkin music at Dad’s funeral. He was a Marine, for god’s sake!” Robbie shouted.
“I’ve already arranged it,” I replied, and ran off before Robbie could say anything else.
Mom came into my room while I was getting ready for bed and asked me if I would clean up Dad’s garage the next day. “Can you please take those awful centerfolds off the wall and move a couple of cars out to the yard so that people have a place to sit and eat their lunch?” she asked.
“Should I keep the centerfolds or put them in the garbage?” I asked.
“I vote garbage,” she replied.
“So do I.”
She also asked me if I wanted to say something at the funeral. I knew Robbie had been writing a eulogy, and that he planned to talk for ten minutes before introducing some guy Dad really didn’t like to say a few words about the local classic car club and how Dad had been a founding member. I also knew Aunt Flo planned to say a few words because I’d heard Mom talking to her on the phone, but I hadn’t thought of saying anything.
“It might be nice, but only if you want to,” she said.
“I’ll sleep on it and let you know tomorrow.”
The next morning I dug through my poem box looking for something I could read. I didn’t find anything so I spent the afternoon taking Dad’s playboy girls off the garage walls, cleaning oil off the floor, setting out chairs, and thinking up a new poem I could read: