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Chapter 18
Smokey is dead.
My eyes jolted open as I awoke to the sounds of a wailing screech. At first I thought the crying was coming from my unborn baby, but no, it was coming from Curtis. There was a commotion in the living room of my mother’s house. The air felt dense and warm as I left my room and neared the living room. There was a circle of people gathered around, looking at the floor. I pushed in-between Francis and my mother. I focused my vision downwards. Curtis was hunched over the creature, sobbing and covering its body with his. The poor boy, he didn’t realize Smokey’s fate. Smokey didn’t stand a chance against that barbaric tumor on his back. Curtis never did have many friends; I guess that this dog was his only one. I hated Smokey, but a part of me ached for the canine. Everyone’s face was strained with sympathy. Except for Betsy, of course. Death excited her, much more than it should excite any 5 year old.
I planned for the rest of my day to be spent moping around the house, picking at a bag of stale sour cream and onion chips, and peeing frequently. My mind was relaxed and at ease for the first time in months, it was comforting to know that my mind was capable of this feeling. I laid atop my bed and hummed a completely made up tune. I looked down at my belly, not much different than a couple weeks before. Like Dr. Lechase said, when someone started showing would depend on every girl’s body type and the 16th week wasn’t the surefire point of enlargement. Hell, I was 17 weeks along and I didn’t look half as big as the women 15 weeks along on the websites. Yes, I admit I had done research, but nothing too immense. I didn’t want to scare myself with diseases or any other crap like that, that’s why I never returned Dr. Lechase’s calls.
I came out of my calm state of mind and realized that it was Sunday. Every Sunday night we were all hauled back to Pastor Randy’s house to spend the night, seeing as that his house was closer to school. I dreaded the thought of spending another minute with Fay and her repulsive children. Especially now that Fay and my father had deemed me ‘the on call babysitter’. I hated watching Jojo the most; he reeks of dirt and bad breath. Not to mention his childish artwork that is strung around the house, as if my father is proud of it. Fay has my father wrapped around her skinny finger and it sickens me. He doesn’t even realize it; he assumes she is this angelic woman who loves him for who he is, what a deceitful slut. She is the shame of the world, why can’t my father just see it. They practically live at my house, when we aren’t there. Jojo sleeps in Curtis’ bed and who knows where Fay sleeps. But who am I to talk? My father pulls the wool over everyone’s eyes too. What kind of Pastor is divorced and forming a physical relationship with a young tramp? Not a very good one, that’s for damn sure. I wanted to stand up for myself so badly; I wanted him to see what he was doing, but what scared me the most was that after he saw what he was doing, he wouldn’t care. He would tell us, “too bad,” and then proceed to run off with Fay.
Parents don’t care. They are full of shit, selfish hogs. They lie and bitch until they get their way. They say they want what’s best for their children, but all they want is what’s best for them. How blind can Pastor Randy be? He cannot honestly think that we enjoy the presence of his new family. He just ignores us, to avoid conflict. He doesn’t want to stop seeing Fay and nothing is going to get in the way of that for him. A part of me pities Randy, his wife cheated on him and his children hated his new girlfriend. He just wants to be happy. I want him to be happy too, but not at the expense of his five children’s happiness. The situation tears my insides to shreds. I will not let out my emotions though, that will only cause him to resent me. Life, right now, seemed like too much. How could I possibly deal with my parents and my fucking pregnancy?
“Are you coming?” Nadine yelled to me through my bedroom door.
“Yeah, hold on, I’m just getting my bags.” I wasn’t actually taking time to grab my bags, I was making sure that my sweatshirt covered my belly and didn’t show any sign of enlargement.
As Nadine led the way out of the house, I smiled at my mother. She looked sad, truly cheerless. It was heartbreaking, did she always look like that or was today especially sad for some reason? I tilted my head and starred at her for a moment; she gave me a quick nod and turned back into the house. As I got into the car, I felt resentment for not hugging her goodbye. As the house became farther and farther away in the distance, I realized how lonely it must be to be alone for days on end. That was the first feeling of sympathy I had felt for my mother in a long time.
After the ‘family’ dinner at my father’s house I went down to the basement and clicked out of the screensaver on the computer. I was just about to search for fetal movement when I saw my father mosey on down the stairs. I clicked out of the internet and jolted my body around to face him. He sat down in a chair and looked at me, my body was shaking. Did he know my ever-growing secret?
“Hey,” he smiled at me awkwardly, “what are you up to?”
“Nothing, why?” I picked at the skin on my knuckles.
Randy cleared his throat, “Um, I just um—”
I stared at his polo shirt; it was very rarely that I saw him out of pastoral uniform.
“Mom has been doing some things I don’t approve of and I don’t think it’s appropriate that you kids go over to her house anymore, at least until she can get her life back into order,” he blurted out.
My throat felt like it was closing up. My eyes stung, from neglecting to blink. I starred at him and waited.
“Her drinking, Lily, that’s what I’m talking about.”
I said nothing, the skin on my knuckle stared to bleed, the blood pooled into the lines around the knuckle.
“Does she drink around you?” He was desperate for a response.
“I guess.” I made sure to not make eye contact.
“Well that isn’t right, and I’m not saying that I am a perfect parent but no kids should have to see their parents act that way, I mean Betsy is only five for god sakes.”
“Okay.” My heart was beating hard and fast, the cut on my knuckle stung from my sweat.
“I have already talked with her about this and she knows she has a problem, I’m not saying you can never see your mother again, but not for while. I think she needs to take some time and think about what she needs to do to help herself.” Randy stood up and pushed the chair away, he motioned to pat me on the head but I pulled away. He frowned and stuck his hand inside his pocket.
“Look, I’m not trying to be the bad guy here, but I hope you understand where I’m coming from.” Randy raised his eyebrows.
“Mhhm,” I mumbled, my face felt hot.
I watched my father walk up the stairs out of the corners of my eyes. When I heard the door shut, I let out the breath I had been holding in. Why did everything have to go wrong? My life was one big tangled web of horrible situations. I wanted to cry, but I couldn’t bring my eyes to water. For some reason I felt relieved in a strange, sick way. Now that someone else knew, I didn’t have to bear the burden of making her stop drinking. I felt like the threat of loosing her children would force her to change her ways, but I still didn’t like the feeling of my father knowing about the alcohol abuse my mother deals with. My stomach turned and I felt woozy, everything was so mixed. In a sense I was happy that my father knew, but I also was furious at him from taking us away from her. It always seemed like Pastor Randy played the hero and the enemy at the same time. Should I hug him or punch him in the face? I never knew what to do.
There was one thing I knew for sure though, the load I was carrying on my back was becoming too much to bear and soon I was just going to collapse.
After the wonderful burden was placed upon me by my father, I slinked into Nadine’s room to see if she was around. Her room smelled like old beer and sweat, but I wasn’t surprised. Nadine was deep within her closet rummaging around for something, I called her name.
“Nadine?”
She peaked around the corner, “Lily, what do you need?”
“Did Dad talk to you?”
“That depends, about what?”
“Mom.” I frowned.
“Oh yeah, how we can’t go over there anymore, what about it?”
I was disgusted by her lack of interest in the situation, “everything about it!”
She rolled her eyes, “ugh, hold on, let me get out of the here before we have a heart to heart.”
I took a seat on her bed, hesitantly; I didn’t know what bodily fluids existed between the sheets.
She stepped out of the closet; her hair looked like a nest for some dirty animal. She also had a new piercing; a stud on her nose. She rested her hands on her bony hips,
“So, what’s this all about?”
“Well, what Dad told us.”
“Oh, right, well I’m not surprised. It’s not like this behavior is new or anything.”
“Well it’s only been going on since they split up, Nadine, that’s pretty new,” I corrected her.
“Psh, are you kidding? Mom has been like this since before they got married!”
“What are you talking about?”
“Um, well the reason they got married in the first place was because Mom was prego with me.”
My eyes widened, “what?”
“Oh yeah, Mom and Dad were big drinkers and partiers. They met in college when they were, what, 20? Then mother dearest got knocked up and Grandma and Grandpa McBride forced them to get married. They told dad how he would disgrace the McBride family name if he didn’t make up for his sins. So dad quit college and got himself involved with that wonderful church and that’s how it all went down.”
I sat there, in awe of what Nadine had just brought to my attention.
“Wow, why didn’t I know about any of this?” I asked.
“Well, it’s not like Dad would just announce it at dinner,” Nadine laughed.
“But still.”
“Look, Lily, Dad never wanted to be a Pastor and Mom never wanted to be a housewife. Mom felt trapped all those years so she would act out randomly, like with Curtis for example. Of course Dad knew about her affair, he just didn’t want to broadcast it to the world. They just didn’t love each other; seriously how horrible would it be if you were married to someone you didn’t love for 18 years? Mom told me that they would go months, even years without having sex, I mean come on, that has to be illegal in the laws of marriage or something!”
I shook my head in disbelief, “that makes a lot of sense, when you think about it.”
“Yeah, I know, I feel bad for Mom sometimes. If Dad’s parents weren’t so crazy strict she would have finished college and done something with her life. She drove me to the clinic those times because she didn’t want to see me throw my life away like she did. I give her credit for sticking it out as long as she did.” Nadine turned and faced her mirror; she put on some deep red lipstick and smacked her lips together.
“Nadine?” I said aloud
“Yeah,” she responded without turning around.
“So why does Dad want to start over raising two more small children with Fay?”
“I don’t know, maybe he feels like he can raise them right this time around with someone he might actually grow to love.”
I left Nadine’s room feeling shocked and astonished. I felt like for 15 years I had been in the dark and then Nadine finally switched on a light. I had newfound pity for my mother and my father.
Jesus, please lighten their loads.
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Come Again? 13
