A Tapless Shoulder (12 page)

“
Sometimes it
seems like you’re avoiding me.”

“
Yeah, I’ve
been meaning to tell you…”

“
Huh?”

“
Please don’t
do that.”

“
Don’t do
what?”

“
Don’t say ‘huh,’ it’s like ‘what the fuck,’ but
dumber.
Okay? At least elevate yourself a notch and use ‘what
the fuck,’ As a friend of a friend do that for me,
okay?”

“
You should
be nicer to me, man.”

“
Yeah, well,
you should be quitting time; I’d ignore you all day until about
this time, when, hey, wait a second…”

“
Yeah, okay,
maybe sometimes I deserve it, but you shouldn’t be so critical or
something.”

“
Maybe you
should be a beautiful girl. Man, I’m not nice to anyone, why should
you be the exception? Just ask Nate.”

Another text
from Katie:
i’m not texting
while driving, i’m waiting for you to go!

6:59

“
I don’t know
who Nate is, but speaking of hot girls, I saw your dad with one
just yesterday.”

“
That was a
whole sentence ago; let it go!”

“
No,
seriously, they drove by and honked and your dad stuck his head out
and laughed or maybe he was just laughing while going by, I don’t
know. Either way, from what I saw the chick was hot.”

“
Yeah, he’s
been drinking a lot though, man, so he was probably just in a
taxi.”

“
No, I don’t
think so, pretty sure it looked like she was laughing too and
grabbing your dad’s ass.”

“
That’s
your
dad’s butt now, or, fuck, I mean,
your mom grabbed my dad’s butt, or maybe my butt, no, that’s no
good either, never mind, you’re ugly.” I stared hard at him. If I
could throw punches with just a look, I’d have cleared his mouth
one tooth at a time. He was looking at me as though I was inflating
a blow-up doll in the middle of our conversation “Yeah, that’s,
the, her, she’s, um,” I stuttered, before pausing to collect
myself, “she’s available and I will set you up. Her name is Candy.
Yup, Candy with a capital D.” I started to smile but gave up on it
and sighed instead. He looked confused, and I looked past his head.
Behind my eyes an ache gathered quickly.

“
Oh, ouch,
love, what did you do to your head?” Katie asked, wincing and
craning her head for a better look.

“
I was following my destiny closely, maybe too closely.” I
answered with a small shrug. “I cleaned packaging machines today.
The piece of metal was there, I was there: we lined up too well not
to meet.” She made a face I took to mean, ‘
eek, crap-balls
.’ I agreed and nodded my head, yes, ‘eek and balls of
crap’ indeed.

She studied
my face. Concern grew in her eyes and was made obvious by the sound
of her voice, “Love,” she said sternly, “If it hurts that much you
need to go see a doctor.”

“
It is not my
head that’s doing this to my face,” I said, “not the outside of it
anyway.”

“
What is it
then, what’s wrong?” She asked, wanting to help.

I lifted my
gaze from the floor to her eyes. I couldn’t understand how she just
didn’t know what I was thinking. There was a part of me that wanted
to get angry at her for that. I took a deep breath and then shut my
eyes. I opened them and smiled at her. It was far more sensible and
I felt it was a winning move in getting through the conversation
unscathed. I was proud I had just kept myself from being both
foolish and selfish. That alone should have had me smiling. And it
might have if I just stopped and thought about it for a moment but
I wasn’t able to ignore the emotional backlash.

“
No,” I confessed, “no, I’m not okay. I’m trying to invent
profanities. They’re on the tip of my tongue, almost ready to fly.
I know if I say them right they’ll be so bloody loud you’ll think
they’re in a different language and translated at the exact same
time and that’s because
they
will be
. And if they hurt
your ears it’ll be because your mind is trying its hardest not to
hear them.” I threw my hand into the air, “Maybe it’s because we’re
overdue for new ones! Is that why these things are happening to me?
It’s just my ever loving destiny to hit my head at work a lot and
have an out of control teenager for a father; all so I can be the
inventor of new profanities. Fifty seven new profanities,” I
concluded and raised my fist into the air.

“
It’s not
that bad,” she said with a smile that obviously didn’t know
otherwise.

“
It’s not that bad?
” I
exclaimed like I knew the truth and that wasn’t it. “Could have
fooled me; I mean, I have the stupid weight of the whole world
inside my head and it can’t get comfortable. So I’m mentally
stumbling towards or away from everything. And, okay, what else?
Well, every weekend I get to go into work and empty the devil’s
outhouse. That’s nice. That is actually becoming my downtime; a
little rigorous break from it all. Okay, that’s not terrible, but I
haven’t gotten to the worst part yet. Listen to me: I don’t’ even
know how to get to the worst part! It boggles my mind. And every
stupid time the phone rings, I think ‘
oh shit – for fucking pants
, what has he done now?
’
It pains me to
answer and I wince like someone’s going to tell me the most messed
up thing yet. I haven’t even the imagination for what that might
be, and that really scares me. I don’t know what to do, Katie. I
take deep breaths and push on my eyes until I see red for it to
be
not that
bad
.”

Even Katie’s
face was saying, oh, maybe you
are
right. But then
she gave me a devilish smile, and asked softly; “Does this count as
foreplay?” She began to jog on the spot. “Is it better when you
know I’m not wearing underwear?” I saw now that she had smiled like
the devil because she was the devil. She was using
the bounce
against me. I wasn’t sure yet if I thought that was
awesome or evil. I shook my head at her. I could feel my confusion
dulling to something pointless. She stopped as she’d begun to
giggle too hard; her hand over her mouth, until she finally shook
with laughter. Yes, I was a sucker.

“
You should head-butt this,” I said and held up my fist. She
laughed. “I just want my old dad back, Katie, not even the
old man
old dad, just the dad I used to have or, you know
what,
he
can be different, completely different, but
can’t it just be in a
normal
way
?”

“
I don’t know, but you really need to let it go.” She looked
into my eyes, “your dad loves you and would never do anything to
purposely hurt you. You know that, I mean, you
really
have to know that. You need to either let it go or tell him
how you feel. Without giving him that chance; the majority of this
is all in your head. I really think you need to start writing
again. You know this, love. It’s something you love, something you
need.” A smile then crept across her face like I couldn’t see it,
“Ego’s greatest con has been to turn what we think not only into
something believable, but into something we believe is
right
.”

I smiled
warmly at her and nodded. I didn’t know what to do or what to say.
I only knew that she was probably right.

“
How long ago
did you write that?” she asked.

“
That… I
don’t – what the hell does that even mean?” I laughed. I could tell
she was proud of herself for having remembered it. I also knew her
memory wasn’t the point. Her face again became serious, “how far
away from that are you?” Her eyes softened and she touched my arm.
“I love you. I think you are brilliant. And, see, I listen to you
and I read what you let me read. You haven’t given me anything to
read in a long time. I miss that I think as much as you would if
you tried.” She then did that thing she sometimes does where she
smiles at me and it looks like her best smile yet.

“
I know,
Kate,” I said harshly, “but it’s not just my dad; it’s spilling
over into my life, my personal life, like… I know that he’s part of
my personal life of course, but I mean, like, me, here, now and
everywhere. I didn’t even tell you, did I: about Nate? Today on my
way home from work I saw him out front of his place so I pulled
over and shouted at him. At first I kind of thought he was by
himself, but then I noticed there was someone with him. A woman
that one would say, ‘Oh, Nate, I know from having met your mother
that this is not your mother and both your grandmothers are no
longer living, so, um, who might this be?’”

I stopped to
stare at Katie, to let her take in what I had said so far, not
realizing myself it hadn’t
really
been all that
much. She stared back, unsure what to say.

“
Okay, so
maybe it was someone he works with,” she suggested like my
conclusion was quite inclusive.

I shook my
head. “Nope, no, no, no, because there’s more; he was like, ‘Oh, I
RAN INTO YOUR DAD,’ which I think he yelled at me to,
a)
, throw off the blame, and ,
b)
, shadow everything
he was about to say. Yeah, according to Nate my dad asked him if he
could give Cathy there a ride home, and, well, they started
talking, and it turned out
she had been paid for, by my dad, for the rest of the
evening.
She told this to
Nate
.
” My eyes were wide, “Paid for – and they were about
to go up to Nate’s,” I repeated in case Katie hadn’t caught that
part. “So this lady was a big and old – and had been with my dad
–
hooker
.” Even my eyebrows tried to join me in
reiterating my sentiment of
what the fuck
.

Katie smiled
uncomfortably and said, slowly, “So Nate was…”

“
Yes,” I nodded, “yes, Nate was, Nate
very
was.”
I stopped nodding and began to shake my head, “Oh, if you saw her,”
I said, “blond helmet for hair and a jean skirt for a torso. You’d
have thought she was a hooker
for the blind
.”

“
You seriously don’t think a blind man would realize she
was
big and
butt
?” Katie said wanting to
laugh.

“
Well, no,” I
disagreed, “because she’d just be like, ‘Oh that’s not still me,
honey, I brought a friend.’”

I stared at
him. He looked at me expectantly, waiting for me to begin.
Just guess
, I thought,
save me the trouble or awkward spillage and I will be so
very grateful
. I just wanted
to leave. I wanted to be anywhere but there. I would have been too
had I not promised Katie I would finally go through with it. I just
had to tell the doctor what I’d told her, apparently too often;
that I believed I may have been suffering from depression…
stupid
fucking depression
. It initially had seemed as simple as handing him an
envelope with those very words scribbled inside. Now it felt like I
had to drive him to the facility where it was still being
processed.

“
Yeah, I
don’t know where to begin,” I said prompted finally by his lack of
guessing. “I just, I guess I feel… like I’m being dragged through
life and I want to feel like I have my feet beneath me.” I looked
at him for a sign of understanding, agreement or conclusion.
Instead he picked up a pen that had been lying on the open notebook
on the desk before him. I had noticed it while I was waiting. It
was obvious he expected more from me, and I knew I should have
taken that pen when I had the chance. “If I write, depression, in
that book, may I leave?” I asked followed by a nervous
laugh.

“
I feel like I just don’t get it, like I’m missing
something,” I said desperately. “If ignorance is bliss, we should
be dancing, but I’m not dancing. No, instead I’m doubled over, in
pain over how many of us are driving by hospitals, going,
‘
Will you look at this
traffic; this is bullshit
!’
With just a fraction of effort – just a turn of the head – we could
gain some perspective.” I nodded assuredly. I had driven by a
hospital on my way there. I shrugged. “There is so much in life
seems so needless. It is for far too many people that I
automatically hear, ‘Well, I’m an idiot so blah, blah, blah,’ but
it’s for their sake because if I didn’t hear that
I would have to tell them
they’re an idiot
and that never goes over well. And then there
are times where I don’t know what I know anymore right in the
middle of saying something… like I’m trailing off in my own head.
It’s as if my inner voice goes, ‘
Ah, screw this, you can fake it
,’ and goes off to reminisce about better thoughts.” I
laughed and shook my head. “I mean, I know that happiness lies in
less, it hides in simple. Reduce your complications and, voila,
there it is. I guess that’s the problem, here in my little room of
life; it’s the mouse the elephant is standing on. But I know I get
it! It’s the rise and fall of my wife’s chest while she’s sleeping.
It’s the look on my son’s face when he tries to flare his nostrils
at me and I try to do the same back, but can’t, and we burst out
laughing. It’s that. It’s love. It’s laughter. I know that all so
perfectly well, but, I don’t know... I get my life to the point of
being simple but then it becomes a mess every time I try to carry
it forward. It’s like my mind can’t pack happiness right and time
is a clumsy friend helping me move.” I sighed like I was completely
empty. “I really enjoy writing, but I haven’t been writing and I
don’t know if that’s to blame and is the cause of my depression or
if my depression is why I’m not writing. I used to write all the
time, constantly, but that thread got tangled with many other
things over a mess of time, and now it’s like a kite I’d rather not
deal with.”