Life Begins (5 page)

His autism doesn’t make him an ass
hole. It makes him a man that actually listens to everything I say
and to remember all of the small details of every aspect of my
life. He can say he isn’t obsessed with me, but he can also tell
you things about me that even I have forgotten.

Chapter Three

Paradise Lost

Although I have joked that my childhood ended
when Christine didn't respond in the way in which I had hoped when
I told her I loved her, my childhood really ended when I was
twelve-ish. The exact time is hard to actually keep track of. It
was about that time that Christine's parents were getting
divorced.

While her parents' marriage had never been
perfect, there came a point where I think we both knew that it was
coming to an end. At that time, Christine started to spend more
time at my house. She would come over right after school and stay
until it was time to go to bed. My mom usually had to tell her to
go home.

I remember it being a very odd time. On the
one hand, I was very happy to have her there with me all of the
time. But she also caused a certain amount of stress on my parents'
relationship. I don't think I cared about that at the time. All I
cared about was having Christine with me as much as I
could.

There was one time after dinner that Christine
and I were sent off into the other room. We knew that my parents
were going to have a discussion about Christine. I remember
Christine feeling like it was her fault. She felt like she only
caused problems and that nobody wanted her around. We ended up
talking about her parents.

I think it was one of the first serious
conversations I have ever had with her. For the first time in our
lives, we talked openly and freely. It was like how we used to be
before the milk incident in kindergarten. But there was something
different about it, too. We were actually mature enough this time
to have a meaningful conversation.

I think I ended up holding her as we talked. I
don't remember how long we stayed that way. I wished we could have
stayed there forever. My father eventually came up to my room. He
looked at us, sighed, and then said that it was time for Christine
to go home.

After Christine went home, my father told me
to stay in my room a little bit longer. He said he wanted to talk
to me, but he had to talk to my mom first. About an hour later, I
had a discussion with my dad about the birds and the bees. I don’t
know why they call it the birds and bees. It’s a scientific
impossibility for these two to get together. Birds are so much
bigger than bees. And how do you know which one is supposed to be
representing your gender. I mean, depending on how you look at it,
girls could be the birds if they dwarf the bee’s stinger. On the
other hand, the guys could be the bird because they are the ones
that usually get stung.

I don't remember half of what we discussed. I
know that he put it in terms of being in love. I remember him
telling me that it was a commitment. Once I made love to a woman, I
might as well have married her. My soul would join with hers, and
we would be forever linked.

I remember him asking me about how I felt
about Christine. We talked about her parents. I asked how he met
Mom. Nothing was inappropriate with that conversation. It was like
talking to Arthur or Leopold. It was odd. My dad treated me like
one of the guys. From that point on, our relationship changed. I
could always talk to my father if I had a problem or a question,
but this was different. It was more like he was my best friend or
older brother. I kind of liked it.

I would come to depend on this relationship
over the next few months. When the actual divorce proceedings
started, Christine was sent away to a Catholic school. Her parents
felt that this was for the best. They knew that this was going to
get ugly. I think it was the first time they had actually thought
about Christine.

I was not going to be one to just let
Christine go without a fight. I went to my father and asked him to
intervene. He became their divorce lawyer. I'm not sure on all of
the details, but Christine got custody of the house. Her parents
would take turns living with her.

Three months, two weeks, and four days after
Christine had been sent to the Catholic school, she came back home.
Not that I was keeping track of the time or anything. You can add
six hours and thirty-four minutes to that time if you want to be
entirely accurate. I didn’t really care about keeping track of the
seconds. They are kind of like pennies. Most people don’t think
about them because they are so small, but they add up to a lot
before you realize it.

~~~

The night Jack got his facts of
life talk, I also had a discussion with his father. I asked him if
my coming over was going to cause him to get a divorce, too. He
told me that Jack loved me. That made me his daughter-in-law. That
made me family. He said that if I ever needed anything or to talk
to anybody, their house would always be open to me. That was a
great comfort as I was eventually sent off.

The Catholic school was torture.
There weren't any cute boys. Kind of defeated school girl outfits
really. I mean, I made that thing look good.

My parents were both Catholic.
They never went to church, except for Easter and Christmas. They
held off on the divorce for so long because of the belief that
divorce was an abomination to God. Apparently it was better for
them to cheat on each other while pretending to be happily married.
That is better in God's eyes.

I have never had much use for the
Church. They pick and choose which laws they are going to follow.
They condemn some people for one sin and ignore another person's
sin. I figure that it is kind of like being able to flirt your way
out of a ticket with a cop. I don't think God is like
that.

If I were ever to have a religion,
I would belong to Jack's. The only problem is that he doesn't have
an identifiable religion. His father was Jewish. His mother was
raised Catholic. She rebelled as a teenager and left the Church.
Somehow they ended up going to a Protestant church. Jack's religion
is a combination of Jewishness and Protestantism. He says that it
puts him in conflict with both religions while bringing him closer
to God.

I keep trying to get Jack to
believe that I belong to the First Church of Jack Gynapsy. He
doesn't believe me that if he keeps sparing his rod, he's going to
spoil this child. Whatever. He will come my way someday. He will be
like he was that night that I got back from the Catholic
school.

As soon as I got home from the
Catholic school, Jack was very glad to see me. There was a passion
about his kisses.

I knew that he was the one who
secured my freedom from that dreaded Catholic school. He was like a
knight in shining armor who had just rescued the princess locked up
in the tower.

We found ourselves in the old tree
house where we used to play house as kids. There was a warmth to
his kisses. I don't think I have ever loved him more than I did at
that moment. There was something different about him. I got lost in
his kisses.

There was a newness to his
touches. I wasn't sure what was about to happen, but I knew that I
wanted it to happen. I felt like I was in the hands of a master. I
trusted him completely as he started to undress me and caress me.
There was nothing wrong with what we were about to do.

Everything was going to be
different now. I wouldn't have to worry about my parents fighting
anymore. Jack was going to always be living across the street from
me. It was okay for us to be in love. He had fought and had won a
new life for us. We were in charge now. The future was
ours.

Just as our future was about to be
realized, Jack's mom came out yelling for him. His father had died
in a car crash.

~~~

Christine wants to paint that night as
something special. I left her alone in the tree house. She was
naked except for the Catholic school girl socks. I had no idea what
I was doing. I was just doing what I felt. I was willing to make a
commitment like my father had told me about.

I wasn't ready for that commitment. I was
carried away by my passions and lost all of my sense of reasoning.
I still can not get Christine to understand this. I think she has
been trying to get me to release that passion again ever
since.

That passion is dangerous. While it is good to
be passionate about things, we should never become slaves to our
passions. I am passionate about Christine, and would like nothing
more than to make love to her. What she is wanting is sex. She
wants it raw and animalistic.

Part of our current problem is that we have
different terms for going all the way. For her it is following our
passions to complete orgasm. Going all the way for me is being
there with her not just for sex, but in the bad times as well. I
want to be there to pull her hair back as she throwing up. She then
tells me that I can start practicing now by pulling her hair back
as she sucks me dry. If she happens to gag in the process, then we
could both be happy.

Would we have had sex that night? I think so,
if my father had not died. Should we have had sex? I don't know.
Life was so much different back then. I don't know what life would
be like now if my father had not died. I know that his death
stopped us from having sex that night.

Looking back as an adult and
considering everything else that happened between me and Christine,
this night no longer seems as important as it once did. It is still
part of our story, but age and distance have changed it for
me.

Right now I am happy with my life.
I am at peace with some of deepest regrets.

Chapter Four

Bar Mitzvahed by
Fire

There are facts concerning my father's death.
I have talked about these several times. I do not really talk about
my father's death. I will let Christine tell her side of the
story.

The facts are this. I was about to lose my
virginity, when I lost my father instead. He was killed by a drunk
driver. Well, he wasn't exactly killed by a drunk driver. Lee
Uhlrich, a twenty-four year old man, had been drinking. He hit my
father as he was on his way home after having Christine's father
sign the divorce papers. My father was actually killed by the
impact of Lee's car hitting his. His car then burst into flames.
The tragedy of this is that the one thing that my father did not
want in life was to be cremated.

After my mom got me from the tree house, I
went to the hospital and identified his remains. He was buried. I
was then left to manage the majority of his business dealings. And
that is basically everything that happened when he died.

~~~

There is much more to the story.
As he left the tree house, I just stayed there. He came back later
that night around one in the morning.

I cried as he held me and told me
everything. He didn't shed a tear that entire evening. He just held
me as I cried. I fell asleep in his arms that night.

I found out later that my response
caused a rift between us. He felt that I only cared about my own
grief and what would happen to me now that his father had died. He
felt that it was his hour of need, and I only thought of myself. He
said that I was his place of comfort. He had to find it that night
in just holding me. I have always regretted this. If I could change
anything, I would have acted differently.

I don't think I realized what Jack
was going through. He never exactly talked about it, either. His
mother was so distraught that he had to identify the remains. He
was also in charge of the funeral arrangement. All decisions were
made by him.

She was in counseling for about a
year after the event. I know that she had to take medication. Jack
was in charge of that household. He made sure that the bills were
paid and that everything was taken care of. He did all of this
while never missing a day of school. And he never complained.
That’s Jack.

I have always felt like Jack's
father didn't die that night. I think Jack died that night. He
became his father. Whatever his father would have done, Jack now
did.

I mean, at the trial where the
drunk driver was found guilty, Jack acted like his father would
have acted. The man was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter
and driving under the influence. He was sentenced to so many years
of jail. The local news was there as he exited the court. I was
there with him and his mother. They just shoved the microphone in
front of him and asked him, "Do you feel vindicated by the court's
decision?" He looked at them. He then saw the drunk driver's
family.

He went over to that guy's crying
mother and said, "I'm sorry for your loss." She was kind of
shocked. He explained to her that it was natural for a child to
lose his parent. It wasn't natural for a parent to lose their
child. Hers was the greatest tragedy because her son was now going
to be in prison. A life of promise would now not be fulfilled. No
parent wants that for their child.

The news didn't know what to do.
Jack was the victim, and here he was not playing the part. They had
the footage of the drunk's mother crying and hugging Jack. It never
aired.