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By Thomas M. McDade
Copyright 2013 Thomas M. McDade
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
Special thanks to the following publication that previously published this story: Hulltown 360.
“Tom Sanford, are we losing you?” asked Owen Small’s mother.
“No, just resting my eyes.”
“Welcome back, Drifty,” said Owen.
I was really wishing I’d stayed on our ship docked in Newport, RI. I’d weakened when Owen told me his family lived near Lincoln Downs Racetrack. I do love the ponies. Hell, I could have just caught a bus, skipped the heavy drinking and flirting at the Paddock Bar with a beautiful, very pregnant woman named Faith that Owen said was nothing more a barfly. A barfly is okay with me but not in a shipmate’s back yard, better a dive in Norfolk or Barcelona. A lucky day at the track would right all I reasoned as I caught a blond-headed boy, ten or eleven out of the corner of my eye, crawling to the back of the couch. Popping up, he covered Owen’s eyes with his hands. “Bet it’s my loony brother Todd. And I hear he’s weirder than ever, wants to join the Marines when he grows up.”
“Least they don’t wear Donald Duck suits,” said Todd, rolling over the couch and landing feet first on the rug.
“Todd Small, you’ll ruin that couch and break your neck besides,” cautioned Mrs. Small.
Right off the bat, Todd tried to guess my home state. After five attempts, I told him Ohio. “Seventeenth state,” he said, offering to recite the admission dates of all fifty.
“Not now, Todd,” said Mrs. Small, “be a good boy and pour me some coffee.”
“So, you want to be a Marine?” I asked.
“Could happen…I think I’ll call you Ohio Tom...I gotta get tough anyway so I can be a Hollywood stunt man someday,” he said, returning the pot to the coffee table and standing on his hands.
“Couch stunts and handstands big in the movies?” teased Owen.
“Shut your face, swabby,” snapped Todd as the front door opened.
“Ain’t that nice talk,” said the rugged man entering, who I guessed was Mr. Small.
He appeared to be much older than his wife was. His face was dark and leathery; he wore a crew cut. When he took off his coat, I saw his name over the pocket of his work shirt: Carl. Over the other pocket, Lincoln Building Products” was stitched. Seconds later, a man about thirty, wearing an old Army raincoat, walked in with a slender teenage girl. She had sharp cheeks and long red hair, mighty pretty, from where I sat. I’d sobered up enough to know I was seeing true. The red stone in her class ring on her finger grabbed the light and my eye. I guessed she was Owen’s sister Francy though the pictures I’d seen hadn’t done her justice. The man I supposed was Keenan, the backward cousin Owen used to imitate when he got drunk. Keenan blinked nervously. They all made a fuss over Owen except Mr. Small who was brief.
When introduced to Francy, I offered her my hand. Pushing it aside, I got a quick hug. She came up to my chin, just about. I’m five eleven. Keenan lingered off in a corner, playing with his Red Sox cap.
“Get over here, Keenan,” shouted Todd. Keenan obeyed, held his hand out to me as if I he were sticking it into a fan. I shook his clammy offering.
“The pleasure’s all yours,” stuttered Keenan.
“Yippee, you did it,” shouted Todd, slapping Keenan’s back. Keenan beamed. I wanted to laugh but I waited for the others, soon in hysterics. Mr. Small managed a hint of a smile but looked about to explode. Then he released a salvo at Owen.
“Goddam, Boy, when you gonna learn the Paddock Bar ain’t the mud closet to this house? Eight months away and you gotta pay your respects to it first?”
Francy moved to the piano, ran her hand over the top and absentmindedly clapped away the dust. She put a finger through the padlock, glared at her father. She looked as though she might lash out at him. Keenan twiddled thumbs and Todd held a small transistor radio to his ear. I wished I were somewhere else, anywhere.
“Many the days you came home through that same mud closet, Carl,” said Mrs. Small.
“I hadn’t been gone eight months,” returned Mr. Small.
“When you’re away a minute, it seems eight months to a year,” said Mrs. Small, dramatically. Mr. Small smiled through a badly fitting bridge and kissed his wife. Keenan
clapped timidly. I thought the storm had passed, but Mr. Small raised his voice to Todd. What a temperamental bastard, I thought.
“Bring that radio over here and don’t move a finger,” he ordered. Todd boldly marched to him, dropped the radio in his father’s hand. Mr. Small increased the volume. The Beatles were singing “A Hard Day’s Night.” “We got two perfectly good Country stations now,” said Mr. Small, “fine, drug free music. Hell, I remember when there were no country stations around here, had to stay up all hours hunting for WWVA. American Music, Boy.”
“It’s not booze free,” injected Francy.
“Watch your mouth, girl,” said Mr. Small, finger pointing at her.
“This has gone far enough, Carl. What mud closet did you find your way into on the way home? We have company. Let’s act like it.” Owen laid back his head and closed his eyes.”
“Back to mud closets, huh?” responded Mr. Small, “a couple of fellows at the pharmacy told me our company took some interest in the future unwed mother.” He spit out the last two words. Mrs. Small and Francy rolled their eyes. Mrs. Small sighed. I felt myself reddening. “He was rubbing Faith’s damned belly,” he added, eyes bulging but never facing me.
“Wonderful,” whispered, Francy, walking over to pat my arm. “She’s my idol. We’re like sisters.”
“You liked her fine when cousin, Ellis was alive and he and Faith were living together,” Mrs. Small reminded her husband.
“She was close to family then but then again, they never married,” Mr. Small said.
“She’s got a womb full of kin now,” stated Mrs. Small before adding, “For God’s sake, let’s have lunch and try to act civil.”
We went to the dining room. My chair faced a wall where a large painting of Jesus hung. The pink tablecloth was the same color as Faith’s T-shirt. A vase of silk purple flowers
was the centerpiece. After serving bowls of mushroom soup and homemade bread, Francy sat next to me. I imagined one of the fake flowers in her hair.
Keenan made short work of the soup while filtering out the mushrooms. Todd did the same and they both made sandwiches of them.
“Look at them,” said Francy, to her mother, “they’re embarrassing.”
“I don’t care how they eat as long as they eat, “said Mrs. Small. There was silence. I ate the delicious soup slowly, enjoying every spoonful. I remembered to tip the bowl away when I was finishing up. My mother always corrected me on that one. I watched Mr. Small butter a piece of bread as if the spread were frosting. Two sparrows chowed down at the birdfeeder outside the window. As I was trying to get a sidelong glimpse of Francy, she spoke to me.
“That baby’s going to be beautiful, Tom,” she said, “You saw how beautiful Faith is and Ellis was handsome as a movie star.”
Mr. Small shook his head. “That child is going to be just like Keenan, the way Faith smokes and drinks,” he said.
Mrs. Small was a bit more optimistic. “Let’s hope the child gets its fill and doesn’t bother with those vices again. Too bad gambling wasn’t included,” she added.
While Francy helped her mother clear the first course dishes, Todd and Keenan went into the living room. “Gimme fifty,” ordered Todd. Keenan dropped to the floor and started doing pushups. When Mrs. Small returned from the kitchen with a platter of sliced ham, cheese, lettuce and tomato, she quickly set down t
he food and rushed to them.
“Just what do you think you’re doing, young man?” she asked Todd.
“I’m playing drill sergeant,” he answered.
“Both of you get back to the table and you’d better learn to respect your elders, Todd Small. Suppose Keenan got sick on the rug?”
“Keenan never gets sick and he’s not an elder, he’s just Keenan,” said Todd to his mother. I was hoping Keenan would give shit-bird Todd a backhand, but I didn’t let it interfere with my appetite. After three ham sandwiches I still had room for two servings of chocolate ice cream. When I turned down a cup of coffee, Owen asked, “Can you imagine a sailor not drinking coffee?”
Mr. Small answered, “I can’t imagine anyone, sailor or not, skipping coffee.” No one else offered an opinion. I didn’t drink coffee because my grandmother on my mother’s side told me when I was a boy it would turn my stomach into tractor-trailer tire rubber. More than that, I believed it was like booze: just another unpleasant taste tunnel to pass through toward wired. Booze was enough for me.
“Tom,” said Mrs. Small, “Why not take a little nap? Francy will show you around town when you’re rested.”
“Ma, Tom came here to go to the races,” said Owen.
“Oh, I forgot about that,” said Mrs. Small.
“I can go to the track,” said Francy, “I’ve been before.”
“You will not and you have not,” said Mr. Small angrily. “Where do you think Faith got started?”
“Started at what?” asked Francy, staring blankly at her father. He grimaced.
“Tom can take Francy to the school dance tonight. What do you say to that, Tom?” asked Mrs. Small.
“Fine with me,” I said, thinking Francy didn’t really look ridiculously young.
“Isn’t anyone going to ask me who I want to take me to the dance?” questioned Francy. Running from the room, Todd mimicked her. He quickly returned with a guitar and stood in a corner.
I guess it must have been leftover buzz from the Neck & Noses behind it. Without a second thought, I was on one knee asking Francy to allow me to escort her to the dance.
“The pleasure is all yours,” she said, smiling at Keenan. He burst out laughing as we all did except Mr. Small.
“Are you and Maureen going?” Francy asked Owen.
“Don’t think so,” said Owen. Francy giggled.
“What’s so funny?” Owen asked, in a threatening tone.
“Oh, nothing, chocolate ice cream always makes me giddy,” she explained.
Todd played his guitar and Keenan sang “I Walk the Line” off key. “This is our punishment for not saying ‘Grace’,” said Francy.
“Grace is for dinner,” said Mr. Small. “The Lord isn’t interested in lunch, besides Keenan is in fine voice.” I didn’t think Mr. Small noticed Todd was playing the Beatles’ “P.S. I Love You” on his guitar but when Keenan stopped singing, he said, “Keenan, how about teaching this young heathen how to play American chords?”
“I thought I fooled you, damn it,” said Todd, snapping his fingers.
“I didn’t come in with the morning milk, Sonny,” Mr. Small said, winking and flashing a grin. “And in the future don’t damn me, you little snot!”
When Owen headed out to pick up Maureen, we talked a few minutes on the porch.
Todd’s piercing “Hi Yohio Tom, Away,” trailed us.
“Don’t forget Francy is my sister,” were Owen’s parting words. I said I wouldn’t and was hurt that he felt he had to remind me. The hurt was all I needed to grant myself license to imagine her whispering, “The pleasure is all ours.”