The Drunk Logs (20 page)

“Hey, it’s downtown Robby Brown,” I joked. “The man who likes his women, one at a time.”

“Yeah, that’s me.” Robby smiled.

“So how much longer do you have here?”

He began to rub the stubble on his cheeks and looked up into the sky. “Oh, couple days I guess. I talked to my buddy that works with me and he thinks I only have a couple more. But when I get out, they’re gonna piss test me to make sure I’m doing all right. Always trying to keep a man down.”

Sam yawned and looked around the grounds at all the families that had come to visit. Through all the people, Victoria walked toward us.

“So, what’s your deal, Sam, how much longer you going to be here?” I asked.

“I don’t know, I’ve already been here two months and I’m still waiting for a room to open at the halfway house. So, that might be another month or so. After that, I’ll probably stay there for about a year.”

“Hi guys,” Victoria said as she sat next to Robby.

Sam immediately looked away, tightened his lips, and tried not to laugh.

“Why are you staying here so long?” I asked as I held back my laughter.

“Because, I can’t go back to that neighborhood. And the only real family I have is my niece, who’s been looking for a place for me to stay while I’m in here.”

“Then how are you paying for all of this?”

“I’ve got my police union pension.”

“No shit, you used to be a cop?” Robby mumbled.

“Most of my life.”

“Hey, did you guys see the new guy they brought in?” Victoria asked.

“No,” we all answered.

“Well, it looks like it might be exciting with this one…Sam knows.” Robby and I looked at Sam.

“It’s nothing, just a few stories about some people who have been in here. You don’t know if they’re even true,” said Sam.

“Like what?” Robby asked, as he fixed the collar on his windbreaker.

“Like people bringing in drugs or patients hiding their girlfriends overnight in their rooms. Shit like that.”

“Yeah, but what about the one that happened with Bobby?” Victoria chuckled.

Sam started to laugh, “Oh yeah, somebody stole all of Bobby’s underwear not too long ago.”

“What are they going to do with it? Wear it as a jacket?” I said.

Laughing, Sam began to cough violently as Victoria walked around the table and slapped him on the back.

“I’m all right, I’m all right,” he said as he spat into the grass.

“That’s disgusting,” she said and stepped back.

“What do you want me to do, swallow it?”

Meanwhile, Robby turned to me with a sincere, serious face. “A jacket?”

Again, Sam started to laugh along with the rest of us, when the intercom cut through the warm air.

“To all non-visiting patients, lunch will start in 10 minutes. Lunch will start in 10 minutes.”

We caught our breath, walked through the grass, and onto the path. Our enjoyment spilled into the vanilla and green hallway, where we followed the thin crowd and turned the corner. Victoria noticed the individual she spoke of earlier, still down at the nurses’ station.

“You guys, he’s still there,” she said as she slapped my right arm.

We stopped abruptly and slid over to the left side of the hallway.

“Who?” Sam asked.

“The guy sitting on the floor all dressed in black, with the black duffle bag.”

“The guy by the fire extinguisher?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“He looks harmless. Besides, he’s probably still loaded,” Sam said as we turned back.

“I’m telling you, the guy is crazier than we are. You didn’t have the pleasure of looking into his eyes.”

We continued to walk toward the cafeteria, and eventually blended into the crowd of patients, when the smell of chicken cordon bleu escaped from the cafeteria, and tantalized anyone who passed by.

Surprisingly, the cafeteria was abuzz, not from the patients, but from the employees who tried to keep up with the volume of individuals. The clatter of plates and silverware competed with the conversations as I asked Victoria to find a table for all of us to sit at, while we stood in line.

We slowly moved forward, when we noticed Father Tom pass by; Victoria offered him a seat at the table, which he gladly accepted. As I stared at Father Tom, I was puzzled why such a man, as old as he, even bothered to be here.

“Hey, Sam, how old is Father Tom?”

Sam turned around and rationed his sight between me and his place in line. “He’s sixty-five years old, I think.”

“Sixty-five, he looks like he’s ninety,” I said, shocked.

“That’s what booze will do to ya. But he says he doesn’t have a problem, he only drank wine with his lunch and dinner.” He took a step forward. “He’s a smart guy too, been all around the world, can speak four languages and even gives mass in Latin. But he has trouble with his liver, so his congregation sent him here.”

Sam grabbed a tray and stepped up to the metal counter with Robby close behind him. As I followed in step behind the two, I turned back again and looked at Father Tom as he sat at the table with Victoria. I was astonished at how well people can hide their true nature and remembered a saying once told to me by my father. He said if you wanted to see a millionaire up close, go to the man who wore second-hand clothes. I laughed as I grabbed two trays and proceeded down the line.

As I sat down at the table, I slid one of my trays in front of Victoria.

“Well, I guess chivalry is not dead,” Father Tom said quietly as he let the gravy drip from his beard.

“Thank you, Matt, I didn’t expect this,” Victoria said, shocked.

“It’s no big deal. You were holding the table for us, so somebody had to get you your food.”

I sat down next to Victoria as Sam watched my every move suspiciously. The clatter behind us increased in volume and the conversations multiplied as we battled to be heard. We held our food steady on our forks until Father Tom finished his prayers and joined the rest of the herd quickly, not to miss the surprise slice of apple pie.

Meanwhile, a group of patients started to form in front of the window that overlooked the front of the building. Nothing could take their eyes away from whatever was happening outside. Sam, Victoria, Robby, and I headed over to the window to see what the commotion was all about, when we noticed that a patient was trying to climb over the railing of the draw bridge.

He was a white man that had the appearance of an individual stuck between the 1950s and 1970s; he wore black polyester bell-bottom pants that tensed at the seams, a light blue colored shirt, unbuttoned to show the hair and gold necklaces on his chest, and brown hair combed back full of lard. He was apparently lost and had tried to climb back into the building. Inch by inch, he struggled to find leverage on the sloped ground that led to the jagged rocks below, as he grabbed onto the wooden spindles for dear life. With every muscle in his arms, he hoisted himself up to the top rung and flung his leg over.

“Come on. You can do it, spider man!” a patient screamed from behind the glass.

He dangled with slightly more support, as he hung from the railing with hand and leg, and contemplated his next move. Anticipation started to spread as we waited with breath held and eyes wide. He took a deep breath and, with a scowl, hoisted his bloated stomach on top of the railing, then teetered as “oohs” and “ahs” shattered against the window. Suddenly, a gust of wind rolled down the rocky river and pushed him over into the waiting arms of the concrete platform. He lifted himself up, dusted himself off, and stumbled into the entrance door.

Cheers exploded from the audience as they congratulated one another, evidently feeling they’d had something to do with this rescue.

We walked back to the table as the excitement gradually subsided. We finished our afternoon meal, when a lone voice spoke a question from the distance.

“Why didn’t he just go back around?” Robby mumbled, as he shoved another piece of apple pie into his mouth.

We sat motionless, when the corners of our lips started to rise.

“How’d you get so smart, Robby?” I said in a southern accent, as I wrapped my arm around his shoulders.

He blushed, lowered his head, and continued to chew on his apple pie.

“So, now that we have given someone a new nickname, what is everybody doing before we have lecture?” Sam said.

“Hey, since you want to work out one of these days, why don’t you show me the weight room?” I said as I stood up from the table with tray in hand.

“That’s fine, because we only have fifteen minutes.”

Sam and I left. Down the hall, the crowds of people grew thicker and the overflow spilled out into the fields and the pavilion.

“Man, where did they suddenly come from?” I asked, excusing myself as I passed.

“They’re getting ready for the final showdown, when the family gets to go one on one with the addict and let their feelings fly,” Sam said as he pushed the door open to the weight room. “It gets nasty, but it’s better they do it in here than when the individual gets out.”

We walked through a small corridor and into a room as large as the auditorium. The enclosed, two-story glass room had all the latest physical fitness machinery, free weights, punching bags, an aerobics area, treadmills, stationary bikes, and sauna.

“This is amazing,” I said.

“That’s why they give us a lot of food with carbohydrates. We need to build mass and get our bodies in shape. When you hear the nutritionist speak, she’ll tell you strong mind, strong body, it’s all part of the program.”

I absorbed everything at my disposal, when the intercom ripped through the air.

“All patients with visitors please report to the second floor at your designated rooms and all non-visiting patients, please report to the auditorium for group lecture.”

As we exited the fitness room, we noticed spider man pass by. He was disheveled, incoherent, and grumbled as he walked, while he slid against the wall for support.

“Shouldn’t we help him?” I said.

“No, I’m sure the nurses already found out about him, so they’ll be along shortly.”

Just then, Carl and Karen rounded the corner, grabbed him by both arms, and escorted him back.

“Told you, there’s not much they don’t already know,” Sam said as he held the auditorium door open.

I wondered if they knew about Victoria and me.

Chapter 11

The hall was relatively empty, only a few souls were scattered throughout the seats. While Maureen stood behind the lectern and read, every now and again she lifted her eyes to see who walked in.

Sam and I sat close to the front and tried to save space for the remainder of our group. But our only worry was Big Toledo, the leader of the pack, who entered on cue and sat behind us. In the last five minutes before the start of lecture, patients strolled in and took positions randomly throughout the auditorium, but still kept separate, women in the middle, men to the right and left. Even Victoria sat by her group of women, presumably to avoid any suspicions that might have arisen about her and me.

Maureen took off her glasses, set them on the lectern, and walked over to the center of the lecture hall. She gazed at her watch and waited for a few seconds before she spoke.

“Okay, class, I would assume that all groups are in the general vicinity to one another and that we are all prepared to participate today in lecture?” A mixed grumble of understanding came from the patients.

“Then, I would like to have all group leaders, which would be two from the men and three from the women, come on down, grab a marker, and write all your answers on the marker board from the two questions. When you are done, please go back to your seats and we will discuss what answers you have written.”

The group leaders stood and marched down to the marker board as Maureen strolled back to the lectern and watched as the answers appeared.

“My God, is Big Toledo massive. I never thought he was that big until he stood next to someone,” I gasped. “He looks like he could fit the girl next to him in his belly.”

“No kidding,” Sam agreed, as he stared at him. “Who would guess he’s just a big cream puff.”

As they wrote, they giggled like school children. When the last one finished, they walked back to their seats as Maureen analyzed each answer. She walked over to the marker board, popped the cap off a black marker, looked over the groups, and prepared to speak.

“I am glad to see that everyone took time and carefully thought out their answers. But can one person tell me the answer, which is the most important, that everyone forgot?”

We sat and whispered to one another.

“It’s ‘you,’” she said.

“What?” Many of us looked at each other in disbelief.

“Don’t be surprised, the answer is each and every one of you,” she said as she walked up to the marker board, and wrote
YOU
in capital letters.

She turned around, and paced back and forth in front of the patients, while she absorbed every expression.

“Granted, every answer has its validity in one form or another, but you are the primary reason that brought you here. Because,” she pointed to the other answers, “of the alcohol or drugs which you had no control over, or the court’s or wife’s concern for you…made
you
bring yourself here. You are here, because of you.” She put the cap back on the marker and waited.

But we did nothing, only sat quietly.

“I know it is not easy to understand at first, but when you mull it over for a while and let it sink in, you will come to a complete understanding and acceptance. Now, for our second set of question and answers.” She turned to the answers and immediately turned back. “The only answer to what you will do to keep your sobriety that bothers me is, “I don’t have a problem.” Now, I don’t want to know who said that, because you already know, and I would like to follow that up with one other question. If you don’t believe that you have a problem, what are you doing here? You can leave at any time—the exits are never locked. Somehow, whether you believe it or not, your addiction has been affecting your life or the lives of the people around you, and if you do not come to realize that, your addiction will only become worse.”