Hello there! Here's chapter 26. I'm not going to say anything about this one other than, I hope you enjoy it and I'd love some feedback on it. Thanks!!
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26
A Broken Watch
I was driving, but I wasn't, except that I was. It was me at the wheel, but there were two of me. There was the me driving and the me inside the me driving. The me inside the me driving had no control over the me driving. I could observe, but not influence. I was on Route 70 headed east into the pine barrens, an odd forest in southern New Jersey made of sand and pine trees. The houses had thinned out and the scenery was exclusively trees. Traffic on the two-lane rural road was usually sluggish, it certainly was that day. The windows were down, hot humid air beat through the cab and stirred cigarette ash from the full tray.
I saw the rustic wooden sign and slowed for the turn. It read, `Mount Misery Methodist Retreat and Campground.' "'Misery,' that's fucking appropriate." I grumbled to myself as I pulled into the dusty gravel parking lot. As the me in the moment circled the crowded lot, trying to find a spot large enough to suit the Vic, he...or me I guess, thought about the 'Methodist' designation on the sign at the road.
We were Roman Catholics and it wasn't like my mother to willingly mix with other faiths. I assumed I'd understand once I got in and dismissed the meaningless question from my mind. On my last loop around the lot before I found a spot, I noticed my father's eleven-year-old Taurus sedan, responsibly parked near the lot entrance. He didn't mind walking a little if it kept my mother from having to wait when she wanted to leave. My mother wasn't the type to wait for traffic. I found a spot and parked.
I lit a cigarette and checked my flip phone. The date was July 4th, 2009. It was a Saturday, 11:37 AM. The me inside screamed in horror, `NOT THIS DAY!'
I had no control. The me in the moment opened the phone to check for messages. My brother Joe still hadn't called, and I was getting mad. He was the one that begged me to come. What the hell do I want to be at a church picnic for?' The me in the moment thought. They probably won't even have beer.' It was possible he'd ridden with my folks, but unlikely, and his beater Buick wasn't in the lot. I would have seen it; green with one brown fender made it stand out.
The me inside knew where he was because the me inside already knew his dark secret, the secret he'd been keeping from my parents. My twenty-two-year-old brother, all set to attend his first semester of law school come the fall, had knocked up his nineteen-year-old girlfriend. She was eight months gone and had false labor that morning. He'd spent the day at Garden State Hospital with her. In his worry, he'd forgotten all about the picnic.
Stay, or go?' The me in the moment struggled to decide. Stay. Drove all the way the fuck out here. May as well get lunch for my trouble.'
NO, DON'T STAY! LEAVE!' I shouted in his head, but he was deaf to my pleas. I was helpless. Nothing can stop this,' the me inside realized, `because it's already happened. I'm reliving this nightmare.'
I texted Joe again, ran the windows up against the dust, and got out of the car. It was hot. Hot and still. I would have said `hot as an oven,' but it was too goddamned humid to be an oven. My grey t-shirt clung to my sweaty back as I trudged along the tree-lined gravel path, breathing cigarette smoke and dust.
The path opened into a noisy clearing about the size of a regulation baseball field and dumped me out into what would have been deep centerfield. A white banner, hand lettered in red and blue magic marker, was tied to the last two trees at the end of the path. It read, Multi-Faith Independence Day Festival.' The festival' part seemed overstated. The 'Multi-Faith' designation explained Roman Catholics at a Methodist retreat, but not my mother's presence among them. I took my cheap, plastic sunglasses from my shirt pocket and put them on against the blazing sunshine.
The scene was a like a dystopian caricature of a Rockwell painting. To my left, a wooden pavilion crammed with wooden picnic tables and chattering people filled what would have been right field. Between me and the pavilion, three permanently installed charcoal grills were going full blast. A deacon I recognized only because he wore the worst toupee I'd ever seen, and two men I didn't know, cooked frozen hamburgers from a box over charcoal that was still trying to burn off its lighter fluid.
A line of fat, hungry people clutching paper plates and white bread hamburger buns trailed off towards second base. Everyone was dressed a little nicer than they would have for a back-yard cook-out. The religious connotation seemed to demand better. Polo shirts and pleated shorts for the men, modest dresses for the women. Straw hats and fanny-packs were the main accessories.
A playground from the 1980s took up most of the infield; rubber strap swings hung from rusty metal chains, monkey bars, two see-saws, a shimmering metal slide, and one of those kid-powered merry-go-rounds. Shrieking children crowded the attractions. I was certain each was slathered with SPF 50 by parents who were protective enough to worry about skin cancer but too thoughtless to remind little Johnny that tin-slides on summer days usually leads to the need for skin grafts.
To my right, lanes had been painted in the burnt grass for relay races and other contests. An assistant priest, wearing his formal black suit and collar, broiled in the noon sunshine and managed the chaos that passed for games. In the shade at the edge of the tree line, disaffected teens in black metal-band t-shirts listened to digital music players or texted each other from several feet apart.
I waded into the clearing, headed for the buffet tables at the far end of the pavilion. `Maybe macaroni and cheese, or potato salad.' The me in the moment thought with guarded optimism.
"About time you showed up. Where in God's name is your brother?" A sharp voice shrilled behind me. I turned to see my mother and father standing awkwardly between the fixed benches of opposite picnic tables. The me inside recoiled and tried to block out the image but I had no power. I could only watch.
The me in the moment felt resignation. My father was a stocky man who would have been an inch taller than me except for the stoop in his posture. He wore a buttoned-down long sleeve shirt, white with narrow brown stripes, dark-brown pleated and cuffed slacks, and brown lace-up shoes. His complexion was grey despite the summer heat. He stood with his hands in his pockets, his jaw set, and his usually neat, salt-and-pepper combover spoiled by sweat. His brown eyes glared at me, disapproving always. I dropped my cigarette onto the hard-packed sand and ground it under my heel. His eyes followed the motion, then returned to my face.
My mother, shorter than him but still very tall for a woman, was clad in a solid green, high-necked dress with a skirt that almost reached her ankles. She was lean and spare with sharp features. Her prematurely grey hair was pulled up into a severe bun. She had a habit of clutching her handbag in front of her in both hands, like a squirrel with a nut. She was behind my father and trapped by the narrow aisle they stood in. Her head darted passed him on both sides, like a ferret trapped behind a column, as she asked me about my brother. She yipped at my father and stamped an orthopedic shoe on the concrete. "Simon, WILL YOU let me by?" Forever impatient, forever talking, forever judging and finding everything wanting.
My father moved into the sunshine with measured steps and checked the gold-tone watch he wore on his left wrist. I was certain he didn't have a pressing engagement, but he checked that watch a million times a day, like anywhere he was and anything he was doing, was a waste of his time. My mother stepped forward but stopped at the edge of the shade cast by the roof of the pavilion. "Well?" she demanded.
"I haven't been able to reach him." The me in the moment answered.
"Haven't been able to reach him," she mocked, "I like that. Don't know why anyone carries cellular telephones if they refuse to answer them. Just an expense. No sense, your brother. Joseph never had any. Then again, neither did you. Your sister, Mary, she has good sense. Just twenty-six and already married to a deacon. A fine, upstanding, God-fearing, professional boy he is. You're almost thirty-years-old. Not even a steady girl. If you weren't a son of mine, I'd think you were one of those filthy, godless queers."
The me inside screamed at her. "I AM! YOU HATEFUL BITCH, I AM ONE OF THOSE FILTHY, GODLESS QUEERS!" The me in the moment simply added the small wound to the gaping maw worn in his soul by the two people who should have loved him unconditionally, but never even loved him conditionally. "I'll come find you if he calls." I said and tried to escape to the food.
My mother objected. She refused to be left alone with my father. "Don't you walk away from me. I am your mother. Show some respect to the woman that gave you life." She scurried up next to me, threaded her arm through mine like we were on a date, and allowed me to escort her to the buffet of covered dishes. My father followed silently behind.
I used the buffet tables as a reason to shrug her arm from mine. I peeled off three of the cheap paper plates in a stack, and started heaping food onto the pile. My mother's constant, stream-of-consciousness narration continued without pause. "I see you're still not picky about what you shovel into that fat gut of yours. I wouldn't touch this garbage. Half of it right out of a can. I can't believe they opened this event to Lutherans. They're barely even Christians. I suppose we had to tolerate the Methodists, it's their retreat after all. At least they didn't invite the Episcopalians. I CAN NOT abide Episcopalians."
Her words did something to me that day. I don't know if it was the heat, or that I hadn't heard from Joe, or the screaming kids, or what, but something inside me couldn't endure her any longer. I wanted her gone, away from me, anywhere that wasn't where I was. I faced her squarely and said something I normally wouldn't have dreamt of saying, something I knew would trigger her. "I heard they wouldn't come because they can't abide you."
My mother's pasty, pale face colored pink, then red, then purple. It was fascinating to watch, like a mood ring of rage. "HOW DARE YOU!" She shrieked. "HOW DARE YOU TALK TO ME THAT WAY!" She pointed a bony finger at me. "SINNER! COMMANDMENT BREAKER!" She wheeled on my father. "I will NOT stay here to be insulted by my own flesh and blood. Simon, we ARE leaving." She shoved passed him and went on her affronted way.
My father glared like he always did. He checked his watch and used the heel of his left hand to rub the back of his bent neck. He cleared his throat. "This is your fault." His deep but rarely used voice said. His accusation made; he followed my mother out.
The me in the moment celebrated the small victory over my parents. I knew my mother would have her revenge at some point, she always did, but I was happy I'd won a battle, even though I'd spent my life losing the war. The me in my head didn't enjoy the hollow victory. I railed in vain against the satisfaction the me in the moment felt for driving them away. I cried out even though I knew nothing could change what was going to happen. `DON'T LET THEM GO! STOP THEM!'
The me in the moment sat at a corner table and ate, then I ate some more, then I smoked a cigarette, and went back for dessert. I was trying to decide which brownies looked better when my phone rang. "This better be you, Joe." I said aloud and answered the phone without checking the number.
"Church Philips," an unfamiliar voice said, "this is Maple Shade Police Sergeant Tim Mercer. There's been an accident. We need you to come to John F. Kennedy Medical Center right away. It's on Chapel Avenue in Cherry Hill."
The name the voice on the phone had given struck a distant chord. I remembered a Tim Mercer that was a year behind me in high school. My brain didn't process right away. The word `accident' finally registered. I thought of Joe who still hadn't called me. "What happened?"
"Church, we need you to come..."
"FUCK YOU, TIM!" I roared into the phone. "TELL ME WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED!"
The way he blew his breath out, I knew what was coming was serious. "Your father was crossing route 73 at Fellowship Road, he had the green light. A loaded tri-axel dump truck, southbound on route 73 failed to stop at the signal. I'm sorry, Church...your parents are dead. I know this doesn't help, but they didn't suffer."
Both of me went numb. "Church...Church..." Tim called, "Church, are you there?"
"Uh, yeah Tim." I answered, speaking my numbness into the phone. "Where did you say I had to go? Kennedy? Gimmie a half hour."
"Just ask for me when you get..." I closed the phone.
The me in the moment seemed to function on automatic pilot. I went to the parking lot, I got in my car, I drove to Kennedy, I asked for Tim. I went through the motions. I identified the shattered corpses of my parents that I'd seen alive less than two hours before. I signed for an envelope of personal effects. I called my sister from the lobby. She was the executor of their will. "Wait there." She said when I'd explained what happened but not my role in causing it.
"No."
"What do you mean, no?" She demanded like my mother would have...if she'd been alive. "You call me to tell me our parents..." I closed the phone.
I drove the Vic home to Philly. On the way, I stopped at the bar and got drunk. When I could no longer speak, Big Nick flagged me. I don't remember driving the two blocks to my house. When I woke the next morning, I was on the couch, the car was on the sidewalk, the envelope from the hospital was torn open on the coffee table, and my father's cheap, metal band, gold-tone, digital watch, was on my left wrist. I looked at the cracked, non-functional, liquid crystal display, presumably broken in the crash, and heard my father say, `this is your fault.'
"This is my fault." The me in the moment said aloud and wept. The me inside him agreed and wept. We covered our faces with our hands and wept.
Strong, soft hands gripped our wrists and pulled. "Church...Church..." the low-register tenor called us. "Church, I need you to wake up." The hands jerked our wrists, pulling our hands from our faces.
I looked into Shawn's worried face. The me inside was now the me in control. I was in bed with Shawn in our suite at The Capital Hotel. It was five in the morning. "What the fuck did you do to me?" I demanded. I felt just like I had that day, the crushing guilt I felt for killing my parents was fresh and raw.
"Tell me what happened." Shawn hugged himself like he was freezing. "You had a dream about that day, didn't you?"
"HOW THE FUCK DO YOU KNOW THAT?" I boomed at him.
He shrank from my shouting. "Your emotions are...you feel horrible. It's making me sick. I can't even describe it."
"I didn't fucking dream it, Shawn. I just lived it again. Like I was my own fucking ghost of Christmas past. Now you tell me why I had to relive the worst day of my life." I didn't wait for an answer. I threw the covers off and went to my room. He followed me.
I started putting clothes on. "What are you doing?" Shawn asked. "Where are you going?"
I didn't answer. I finished dressing and went to the sitting room. I grabbed the smokes and lighter that still sat on the desk, hurried outside and fired one up. Shawn followed me out, apparently more worried about me than the fact that he was only wearing briefs.
"Why are you smoking? You don't smoke anymore. Your new lungs..."
I pointed the smoldering cigarette at him and shouted. "SHUT UP! Just...shut...up. I need something familiar. It's either this or I go to the bar and drink my breakfast. WHICH WOULD YOU PREFER?" I drew on the cigarette and my new lungs burned in my chest. "Goddamnit!" I swore on an exhale. "You tell me what the fuck happened."
He did that thing where he makes a fist of his left hand and squeezes it with the right. He looked at the ground. "An ultra-rare side effect of the way I put you to sleep, is waking dreams. You must be in that group...the group that experiences them. I suppose you dreamed of that day because that's the day you're most afraid of."
I wanted to scream and hit things. Shawn knew it, felt it I guess, and he wouldn't look at me. He was afraid. I leaned against the railing and squeezed my head between the heels of my hands. "Thank you, Shawn, for that fresh trauma. Do me a favor, the next time you want to subject me to something with an ultra-rare side effect...don't."
I crushed what was left of my cigarette out on the rail and tossed it over. I went back to my room and started undressing for a shower. He followed me. "Church, what happened wasn't..."
"DON'T!" I shouted. I knew he was going to say that what happened wasn't my fault, but whether it was or wasn't, I blamed myself. Shawn shrank away from my yelling, and I felt like shit for scaring him. I squelched my temper and lowered my tone. "Just let it lay." I begged him. "I'll deal with it." I went to the bathroom to turn the shower on.
Shawn came to stand in the doorway. "Do you want to shower together?"
I knew what he was offering. He was offering me refuge in his body. I appreciated the gesture but didn't accept. "No, I don't. I just need to be alone for a while. No offense."
He felt like I'd slapped him. "I understand." He said with no sincerity and left me alone.
I stepped under the water and tried to calm down. I leaned my hands on the glass, arms straight, head down, and let the water run down my back. "What's wrong God?" I asked aloud. "I found some happiness and you want to punish me for it."
God didn't answer me, but I recognized the familiar feeling of karma planting its boot in my teeth. "FUCK!" I shouted to the shower.