Both Sides Of The Fence 3: Loose Ends (16 page)

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Authors: M.T. Pope

BOOK: Both Sides Of The Fence 3: Loose Ends
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Chapter 24
 
Shawn
... Remember?
May 8th 8:23
P.M.
 
“Mona, do you think I spoiled Ashley?” I asked my wife as we sat in the living room. She was on the love seat and I was on the sofa which was diagonal to each other. The kids were outside playing in the yard. I had just got off the phone with Ashley about an hour ago and was wondering where I went wrong with her. Mona was reading a book, which she did most of the time, while I had the newspaper. We looked like an old married couple.
“Why you ask that?” she momentarily looked up from her book and asked.
“I think she is acting out and up over there in California.”
“What makes you think that?”
“Well, the conversation I had with her earlier wasn’t a friendly one. It seemed like I was talking to James on the phone.” Her eyebrows raised and then she looked at me really hard.
“Huh?” She put the bookmarker in her book to save her place and then put it on the coffee table in front of her. “She can’t be acting like James because—” She paused mid-sentence. Like she was going back down our history with James and then she finished her statement. “Okay ... What are we gonna do about it?
“We?” I asked bewildered.
“Yes ... she is
our
daughter.”
“I know Mona ... I just think that it is my fault she is like this.”
“How so?”
“Well, my mom did the same thing I did to Ashley when I was a child.”
“You losing me.” She cocked her head to the side. “What are you trying to say?”
“My mother knew that I was being molested and she tried her best to shield me from it by taking me on trips and simply putting it, spoiling me.”
“Okay?”
“Mona, my mother made my situation worse by not dealing with it, but covering it up. I went buck-wild.... remember?”
“Yeah ... you are right about that.” She smiled.
“I did the same thing to Ashley and now lord knows what she has gotten herself into out there.” I sat back in my chair and rubbed my now-throbbing temple.
“So what are you going to do about it?”
“I need to pray first. I am going to need some serious help with getting this situation rectified. I am going to need to be as up-front as possible about James and all the mess he put us through and I need to do it soon before it’s too late.”
Chapter 25
 
Wallace
Snooping
May 10th 2:23
P.M.
 
Here I was again on another Saturday afternoon daddy-sitting at my parents’ house. My sister/brother was with his best friend. And my mom was at a church function again. I was dusting and cleaning around the house, but that was very little. My mother was an expert cleaner and she made sure everything was in place most of the time. I had to find something to do besides stare at my father, because he had little conversation for me and I didn’t have much to say to him either. There was still resentment there and I guess we both knew it. I just didn’t know why he had it for me. I really didn’t care that much either. What kept flowing through my mind was the fact that he basically turned Robert and David out. I still was stuck on stupid about that.
I was wondering if my mother knew. I had no idea how to tell her or evidence to show her if I indeed had to be the bearer of bad news. I left my father upstairs in his own shit literally and figuratively.
“I didn’t come back for all of this.” I frowned my face up in the bathroom mirror of the mini-bathroom next to the kitchen. I was overwhelmed with James’s past and now my family’s secrets were seeping out as well. I had to make myself busy so I decided to go down to the basement and see if I could find some of my old stuff that was packed away.
I opened the basement door and a cool air hit me and caused me to breathe in and out really strong. Like a smoker take a breath after a puff on a cigarette. I began the descend down the steps and I remembered that the basement was broken down into three rooms: laundry, my father’s home office, and storage. I walked past the first door and then the second one and got to the last one. I opened the door and felt on the side of the wall for a switch to turn the light on. I rummaged through Christmas boxes filled with ornaments, cards and various other ornaments. Then I came upon the boxes with the names of all of us children: David, Robert, and then me. I only had one box and I pulled up an old rusty metal chair out of the corner of the room and sat down with me and my box full of memories.
The first thing I saw when I opened the box was my chef’s hat that my mother had brought me with I was eleven years old. I pulled it out and tried it on for wear. It was too small. I didn’t have dreads at the time when I first got it. I smiled because I also saw the apron that my mother had brought me as well. There was a tear on the side where my father tried to snatch it off of me, when he saw that I had it on.
“Only sissies cook,” he barked at me. I held firm to the apron with all my strength. I was about to give in when my mother came to the rescue.
“Ronald,” she pleaded with her eyes as she spoke to my father. His gripped loosened as he stared at my mother and then at me. I had on a pitiful frown that I hope with get him off my case.
“Okay.” He let go and moved on toward wherever he was going to before he spotted me. I looked up at my mother with a sparkling smile that made her kiss me on the forehead. It was my thanks for her rescuing me once again. You see I didn’t hate my father then. I was actually confused by his constant prodding me to “man up.” In my mind I was like “It’s just food, dammit!” but he saw it a whole different way. I still didn’t understand. I sifted through the box some more and found a composition notebook that I used to write recipes in as a boy. I opened it up and found my favorite recipe of all: oatmeal cookies. It was my mom’s own secret recipe. I smiled as I remembered the time she gave this to me. She said it was a secret and to tell no one. Come to find out her recipe was the same as anyone else’s. She made me feel special no matter what went on in the house. Don’t get it twisted my mom was just as good to my brothers, just in their own way. My mother knew how to spread the love evenly. Thinking on the secrets and turmoil that is going on right now made me think that kept secrets were like time bombs threatening to take a family down and maybe a few bystanders as well. I didn’t know what to expect next or what else was going to be exposed. After a few more seconds of rummaging through the box I decided to take it with me when I left. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind me taking it. After all it was my things.
I gathered up the box, switched off the lights and made my way back down the hall toward the stairs. When I stopped and looked at the door that led to my father’s home office, I knew it was unusual for me to be nosy, but I had to see why my father was so secretive with his psychologist practice.
I sat my box down and peeked up the steps for a few seconds. My mom said she didn’t know how long she was going to be gone, but I didn’t want to be caught in a position of disrespect for my father’s privacy. And I didn’t want my mother to be disappointed in me, even as an adult. I heard nothing so I twisted the knob that opened the door. I grabbed my box in one hand and felt for a light with the other. Once I found the light I made my way in fully. I closed the door behind me, sat my box on the floor and looked around his makeshift office. Brown and white boxes were scattered about with names and dates marked on each one. A big brown desk with a lamp on it and an old television sat on a stand with a VCR attached to it.
“What are you looking for Wallace?” I asked myself. I had no clue. I just looked. All those years of my father coming home and spending hours and hours down here had made me curious as a child. Now that he was out of practice, I figured what could the harm be to just take a look at all of the crazies my father tried to help. I sat down in a chair and just looked at all of the boxes.
“He sure did help a lot of people,” I mumbled to myself. I pulled my hair back into a ponytail and started opening box after box.
Paranoid, delusional, out of touch with reality, schizophrenic. . . these were some of the terms I read on some of the files my father had in boxes. There were files so thick I know my father had to have been treating some of these people for years.
After about a half hour of looking I became bored with it all and decided to get back upstairs just in case my father needed to be fed or something. I bent down to get my book off of the floor and what I saw made me drop to my knees and inspect it a little further to see if I was seeing what I saw.
“John Parks?” I pulled out a box with the name I knew all too well on it. “My father treated him too?”
I sat the box on the desk and opened up the top to see what was in it. In the box were folders filled with papers and VHS tapes. I was confused because in the other box I looked through I saw only folders.
“What’s up with that?” I wondered out loud. There were at least twenty tapes in the box with dates on them. I didn’t know if I had time to look at the tapes or what was on them, but I knew it had to be important for it to have been taped. I didn’t want to risk my mother or Rebecca walking in on me so I packed the entire John Parks box into my box and placed the box in the trunk of my car for when it was time for me to leave. I didn’t have a VCR at home because they were so obsolete, so I had to find one or somebody with one that I could trust. I sat in my parents’ house for another hour before my mom came home. I kissed her good night and exited the house in hurry.
 
The next morning I called Alex to see if he knew of anyone who had a VCR or a device that could read VHS tapes. I hit the jackpot when he said he had one. I asked him if he could come over and bring it with him when he came. He reluctantly said yes, because I told him it was extremely important.
Chapter 26
 
Grace
Grievances
May 13th 2:13
P.M.
 
I sat in my mother’s living room and looked around at my past. Putting together my mother’s obituary was hard work. My aunt Bella was making it a lot easier with the help she was giving. I didn’t want to put too much pressure on her because she was up in age too. I had just suggested she go home a little while after she came to help me sort through some pictures and stuff. She wanted to put certain pictures in the obituary that I didn’t want. I got frustrated with her, but she kept telling me that the truth will make me free and that I should come to grips with my past before it ruins the rest of my life. I wanted to tell her it was already too late, but I know she would have been convincing me otherwise. I still wasn’t trying to hear all of that. Truth is I just I want to be alone. I had some grievances with myself, my momma, and John.
My mother still had pictures of me as a child up around the living room. Looking at them made my head hurt. There is nothing like the truth staring you in the face at every turn. I wanted to throw all of the pictures of my youth in the trash, because they were painful reminders. I got off the chair and walked over to the mantle over the fireplace and picked up the picture of me, my mom, and my sister, Sherry. I was about eight in that picture. It was right around the time John came to stay with us for a little bit. It wasn’t long after his arrival that my life as a child took a drastic turn.
“No!” I yelled out and threw the picture across the room. I picked up the next picture and did the same. Before long I was just throwing stuff everywhere. I didn’t care as I took my grievances out on the inanimate objects in my mother’s living room.
“Why me God!?” I hollered out. “I just wanted to be normal!” Tears rolled down my face. My makeup was now a mess, so I sluggishly walked to the mini-bathroom next to the kitchen. I ran some water and grabbed a bar of Dove soap from the shower caddy and started to scrub my face. Minutes later I grabbed a washcloth and patted my face dry.
I was now looking at the real me, no makeup. After all these years I saw the old me for the first time in a long time. I have been putting on makeup for so long now that I forgot how I looked without it.
“There you are.” I looked at myself in the mirror. “You’ve been hiding all this time.” An image of me as a child popped up in the mirror. I quickly turned away again. I thought I was losing my mind. I gripped the sides of the sink and shook my head from side to side wildly as I held it down toward the bowl. I didn’t want to look up again. I didn’t want to go back. I didn’t want to remember. But that was all I could do lately… in the classroom, my office, on the drive to and from work, and even in the bed with my husband.
“You’re gone! You’re gone! ... you’re gone! ... get ... out ... of... my ... headddd!” I grabbed and pulled at my hair as I fell back against the wall and slid down like gravity was pulling me down. I then began to bang my head against the wall as if I was trying to beat the memories out.
The last bang on the wall sent one of my mother’s thick ceramic masks that were hanging on the wall careening down, knocking me out cold.
 
 
I awoke about an hour later to a splitting headache. I weakly pulled myself up off of the floor by grabbing onto the sink and pulling up. I looked in the mirror to see if I had any damage to my head. Thankfully there was no blood shed. But I did feel a lump though.
“I can’t believe I just acted like that.” I spoke softly to myself. “Girl, get yourself together.” I opened the medicine cabinet and pulled out a bottle of Aleve, so I could get rid of the splitting headache I now had. I walked into the kitchen and pulled out the pitcher of water. I grabbed a glass from the cabinet, sat down, threw two pills in my mouth and threw back the water like it was an alcoholic beverage. I rubbed my temple to try getting some relief right now, but it was to no avail. I heard my phone ringing in the living room, so I walked as fast as I could to get to it.
“Hello,” I answered. It was my husband.
“Hey, baby.” He sounded a little down. “Where are you?”
“I’m at my mom’s house,” I said solemnly as I could. I was going for as much sympathy as I could get.
“I ... I thought I was supposed to go with you?” he huffed into the phone. He sounded disappointed. “Why didn’t you wake me this morning so I could come?”
“I’m sorry, baby,” I spoke as sweetly as I could. “I just wanted to do this alone.” A couple of days before he asked if he could help me with the arrangements and be the support I needed in my time of grief. I told him yes, but the night before I sexed him so good that I knew that he would sleep well through the night and the morning. I snuck out of bed and quietly got myself together and snuck out of the house without his knowledge. I was wrong for it, but I just wasn’t ready for him to meet any of my family. What little I had anyway.
“But you’re my wife,” It sounded as if his feelings were hurt. “You shouldn’t be doing this stuff alone.”
“I know ... it’s just that ...”
“I’m your husband,” he sharply cut me off. “When are you going to start treating me like the man of the house?”
“Baby, you are the man of the house,” I said, a little shocked that he had given me such attitude. “And I wasn’t alone, my aunt was here for a little while and she helped me a great deal. I will be home shortly, so don’t worry. I will more than make it up too you, daddy,” I whispered the last part and added some seduction when I said
daddy
.
“Well,” he breathed out an exhausted breath. “I’m going to the funeral, if you like it or not. I want to at least see what your mother looked like in person, instead of the pictures you show me, even if I have to sleep in your car. ”
“Okay, baby ... whatever you want. I‘ll see you later.” I pressed the end button on the phone and sat it back down on the table in front of me. I looked at all the damage I had done to the living room earlier and shook my head.
“It still ain’t as messy as my life is right now.” I shook my head, got up and started to clean up the mess I made. I made mental plans to do the same for my life. No matter the cost. I left my mother’s house and made it back to my house in about an hour. I was exhausted, but I still did what I said I was going to do for my husband. I made it up to him and the smile that was now across his face, as he lay in the bed naked, let me know I had done a good job indeed.

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