hoping Dad doesn’t
notice and take it
the wrong way.
Which would be
the correct way.
But he’s too busy
sloppy kissing Zelda
to notice anyway.
Let’s blow this joint! orders
Syrah, and Monica reluctantly
lets go. Zelda, on the other hand,
seems happy enough to disconnect.
Trouble in paradise?
I hope not. Even though
she’s only been tethered
to Dad for a few short
months, she’s an anchor,
holding us in place here.
Just to be safe, I offer again,
“Dad, if you want to take
Zelda home and watch
the game, I’m good with
it. We can do a movie
and dinner in town later.”
He thinks it over, but finally
says, Nah. I’d have to come
back out and pick you up.
I’ve got a better idea. You girls
go ahead. We’ll talk about
dinner and give you a time.
Once the Others Leave
Dad tells me to get dressed,
we’re going for a drive, and as
I don a pair of loose-fitting jeans
and my favorite camouflage tee,
I can’t help but think about Zelda’s
comment. Could Dad be taking
us shopping for a used car?
Because that would make this
birthday just about perfect.
A car that belongs to me.
How awesome would that be?
Not because of some grand
desire to hit the road and explore
the country. I’ve already done
that, and so if I inherited Dad’s
wanderlust, it’s already been
satisfied. But just the ability
to drive myself to school, or
home after practice, without
asking for help or permission.
That, to me, defines freedom.
Not just the independence part,
but also the ability to decide
it’s time to go and find my own way
home.
I’ve Been Old Enough
To get my license
for a year now.
Everybody I know
already has one.
That includes Monica,
though she rarely
gets to use it because
she doesn’t own a car.
That’s been Dad’s
excuse, too.
No vehicle to drive,
why bother with
all that paperwork?
But I’m pretty sure
Dad wants to control
how I come and go
so he can inform
my every decision.
To be honest,
I used to think
that was okay.
I believed I needed
a decent keeper,
that independence
was too much
responsibility.
It was easy,
being told what to do.
But now that I’ve had
a taste of free will,
my appetite
for self-discovery
is growing.
I’ll never figure out
who I am and what
I want from life
if I keep relying
on Dad’s input.
Time to leap
from the nest,
experience flight,
even if it means
a crash landing or two.
I don’t say anything
like that to Dad, of course.
He enjoys his role
as overseer.
But maybe,
if I’ve played my cards
perfectly, he’ll loosen
the reins and let me try
to find my flight path.
But as It Turns Out
That’s not exactly what Dad’s got
in mind. In fact, it’s not even close.
He grabs a six-pack of Budweiser
from the fridge, tells me to get
behind the wheel of his LeSabre.
You drive. You can use the practice.
That has me going for a few, but
now he tells me to turn up country
rather than toward town. “Where’re we
going?” I ask, still hoping he’ll tell me
to look at a car. Instead, he says,
We haven’t taken a nice long ride
in a while, and I’ve been wanting
to check out this place called Indigeny
Reserve. It’s apple season, you know.
Plus I’ve got a hankering for cider.
Well, at least he’s letting me drive.
Once in a while when I was little,
he used to sit me on his lap and have
me steer while he worked the pedals.
Then later, when my legs grew long
enough to reach the gas and brake,
on way-out-of-the-way roads, usually
dirt, he’d let me handle it all. So I mostly
know what I’m doing. “When can I get
my license?” I nudge. “I can pass the test.”
Yes, I know. You just need my signature
on the application. You’ve been saying
the same thing for months. But since
you don’t happen to own a car—
“But Zelda said . . .” I realize suddenly
maybe I should’ve kept quiet about it.
Zelda said what? Open-container
laws be damned, he pops a beer.
Too late to turn back. “Oh, kind of in
passing she mentioned you’ve been
looking at used cars. Guess I assumed—
or hoped, really—it was for me.”
He splashes into a big pond of anger,
comes up stuttering. Bigmouthed bitch.
Damn, Damn, Damn
I’ve done it now. Last thing
I wanted to do was get him
angry at Zelda. “Don’t be mad,
Dad. She’s just excited for me.
If she was wrong about your
intentions, it’s no big deal.”
He slurps his beer, reels
himself in. Look, Air, I’d like to
get you a car, but I haven’t been
able to find an affordable vehicle
worthy of the investment. I can
do the labor if something goes
wrong, but parts are expensive,
plus there’s insurance and gas.
Way to explode my zeppelin,
Dad. But, hey, here’s an idea.
“What if I get a job?” I expect
him to embrace the concept,
but his immediate reaction is,
No frigging way. Not on my watch.
If I can’t pay for it, you don’t need it.
Pride? I don’t think so. But if
not that, what then? “Lots of kids
get jobs, Dad. In fact, lots of parents
require their offspring to prove
how responsible they actually are.”
Except for a Slurp
Of his beer, he’s quiet for a good
half mile. Okay, it’s more like three
or four slurps, before he finally says,
I’ve failed you in so many ways,
little girl. I simply can’t let you work
when I’m responsible for your needs.
“But, Dad, you said it’s important
for women to make their own way
in the world and not rely on a man.”
He thinks that over for a second.
I don’t believe I’ve e
ver said that, and
definitely not when it comes to you.
An uneasy silence bloats the space
between us. I heard him say those precise
words before, and now I search my memory
vault to dig up exactly when. I’ve got it.
We were staying with Cecilia, one
of several women Dad hooked up with
along the way during our nomadic days.
That was a pattern. Touch down
somewhere he felt like hanging
around, he’d pick up a woman hungry
for a man and willing to put up with
his kid. Dad was all charm, and the world
offered up plenty of lonely ladies.
Talking them into putting us up for a while
was something he accomplished easily.
When I was really young, I totally
thought he was seeking a replacement
mom for me, but as I got older, I came
to realize the relationships were never
meant to become permanent. Rather,
they allowed us periods of home-cooked
meals, regular showers, and a temporary
address that accommodated school.
Oh, not to mention fairly frequent sex
for Dad, who happily accepted all benefits
as long as they didn’t require monetary
compensation. Once in a while he took
part-time work, but that was rare, and as
far as I know, he contributed very little
of his paychecks to our upkeep.
Things were no different at Cecilia’s, where
we’d stayed for a couple of months. I guess
I was twelve because I got to ride the bus
to school for a whole sixth-grade semester.
Maybe if Cecilia had just accepted Dad
being a lazy ass, we would’ve stayed longer.
She’d recently lost her job, and while
unemployment might have been enough
to provide for a single woman, it stretched
awfully thin for two hard-drinking adults
and one kid—even one who ate like a bird.
I’m not sure about Dad’s criteria when it
came to working or not, but at Cecilia’s
he heaped one excuse on top of another
for not finding a job. Finally, she decided
enough was enough, and as was often
the case, everything came to a head
after a night out at a local tavern.
They’d left me alone and I was asleep
when they bungled in, already immersed
in a heated argument loud enough to yank
me out of an indigo ocean of dreams.
. . . do you think you are, you goddamn
leech? I’m sick of buying your beer.
Come on, pretty baby, Dad soothed.
You know you never had it so good.
Besides, you want to be independent.
It’s not good for a woman to rely
on a man. Independence! That’s what
you want. Celebrate your freedom.
She Celebrated
By kicking us out
a few weeks later.
When it became clear
that’s where things
were headed, I begged
her for enough time
to finish the school year.
Kindly, she agreed,
but tension hung like
a static curtain in that
little house. Summer
was heating up, and
along with it tempers,
and I was very glad
the day Dad and I piled
into his car and took off.
We spent June and July
mostly camping out,
and by the time school
started in the fall,
we’d shifted states again,
from Idaho to Oregon.
I celebrated my thirteenth
birthday in a Corvallis trailer
park, with a whole new woman
attached to Dad’s hip.
Maya
School blows, man. The first quarter is almost over and I shudder to think what my report card will look like, though Mom probably won’t even ask to see it. She’s so blinded by her “church” work she barely remembers I’m here. Bad for her. Good for me, except when she tries to draw me into that insanity. All I’ve got to say about that is hell no, at least behind her back.
Mom got lured into Scientology by one of the women she works with at the credit union. Bethany convinced Mom that L. Ron Hubbard’s brand of pseudoscience could fix her “ruin,” which at the time was marriage to an uncommunicative husband. Of course, Mom never mentioned that the reason Dad didn’t talk much was because she never shut up long enough to give him the chance. Just bitch, bitch, bitch. I learned to tune her out around kindergarten.
Dad chose gin as his way to cope, and as he relied more and more on that habit, Mom retreated further and further into the belly of her cult, and that is exactly what Scientology is. She paid for their books. Paid for their courses and seminars. Moved from member to counselor to auditor and hopes to climb even higher in the organization. Whatever turns her on.
Personally, the whole thing turns me off. I was ten when she first fell prey to the hype, but Dad managed to buffer me for two years, and I listened to his warnings about the bizarre nature of the “not-religion,” as he called it. “They say they want to clear you of negative thoughts and events,” he told me. “But all they do is baffle you with their bullshit and keep banking your money.”
After Dad left, Mom coerced me into a couple of auditing sessions, where strangers tried to erase a few of my personal negatives by asking questions designed to induce guilt in children. The first was, “Do you have a secret?”
What kid doesn’t? I already knew that saying no wouldn’t cut it, but I also realized whatever I said would probably get back to my mom. So I answered, “I said a bad word.” When pressed, I admitted that word was “damn.” At twelve, I’d been practicing cussing for a while, and “damn” was not the worst of it, but that was all I was copping to.
The guy made me tell him where I said it (school), when I said it (at lunch), to whom I said it (a girl who bullied me). He was older, and tufts of gray hair poked out of his ears, so when he insisted I repeat the story, I wondered if he had trouble hearing. But when he asked me to tell it yet again, he wanted me to add stuff—what did I have for lunch that day, who was with the girl, what were the two of them wearing? Each detail was supposed to lighten the burden of carrying the memory around. Maybe it did. Who knows?
But, as I suspected, Mom scrubbed my mouth with soap on a nail brush. I guess it could’ve been worse, which is why I chose that secret to share. The one about letting our next-door teenage neighbor touch my boobs for a dollar? Yeah, not so much. I quit going anywhere near Mom’s “church” after I was stupid enough to admit shoplifting a pack of gum. Details. Juicy Fruit. The guy in line ahead of me was a large man, easily big enough to hide me from the cashier while I stuffed the gum in the front of my pants. Jeans.
When Mom found out, I couldn’t wear jeans for days. They irritated the welts. So now, when she’s busy training or auditing or whatever she’s doing, I use the unsupervised time to enjoy things I’ll never confess to her or her minions. Especially not in Los Angeles. Uh-uh. I’m not going anywhere. I’ve done a little research. Lots of horror stories out there about freaking Sea Org. It swallows people whole, and those who somehow find their way out are stalked. Harassed. Billed beaucoup dollars for supposed training. No sir, not me. I’m still working on a solid getaway scheme.
Today Tati and I headed downtown to see if we could scare up a good time. One of the bars had put together an unofficial Oktoberfest. Beer and barbecued sausages. Now that’s my idea of fun, especially when someone else is buying.
&nb
sp; Technically we weren’t allowed to drink, of course. We have fake IDs, thanks to Tati’s big brother, who’s got connections, but we’re kind of scared to use them. But luck was with us, because we hooked up with a couple of soldiers from Fort Hood. They were sitting at a table outside, sucking suds and half listening to the National League Championship baseball game onscreen inside.
“Who’s winning?” I asked as we approached.
“Atlanta. Fuckers.”
“Hey, now,” said the other guy. “That’s no way to talk to a lady. Sorry, girls. Robin’s a little pissed at the Braves.”
Robin. Weird name for an overbuilt hulk with a dark buzz cut and an iron jaw.
“Houston was in over their heads,” I said, showing off just a little. “Atlanta was bound to beat ’em.”
Mr. Polite checked me out. “You like baseball?”
“Yeah. Football, too. Hockey, not so much.”
Sergeant Jason Baxter laughed and introduced himself. “Sit down, if you want.” He turned his full attention to me, while Robin homed in on Tati.
“Buy us a beer?” I asked boldly.
“How old are you, anyway?”
I flashed my bogus ID. “Old enough.”
He rolled his eyes, but laughed again and went inside, returning with two frosty mugs of foamy brew. “So tell me how come you like sports. Most sports,” he corrected.
We drank and talked for a couple of hours, exchanging information cautiously. I talked about Dad, and recently losing him, avoiding much mention of Mom. He talked about himself, mostly.
Jason’s twenty-seven, and a Texas boy through and through. Tati thought I was crazy for picking a guy so much older than me, but I liked his manners and the way he made me feel like the prettiest girl in the whole place.
“But he’s shorter than you,” Tati said.
“Who isn’t?” I replied.
“Plus, he’s got crazy eyes.”
I have to admit that’s true. They’re the color of gunmetal, and ghosts live inside them. Haunted, that’s what they are, and I guess he might be, too. Not like I knew him well enough to ask. Anyway, he was fun to spend time with. Good-looking, and charming, too. And, while Robin got aggressive after several beers, Jason remained polite.
In fact, at one point Tati was pushing Robin’s hands away and Jason stepped in. “Ain’t no fun if the lady’s not into it, you know?”
Robin thought about making trouble, reconsidered, and stomped off. Tati was upset and wanted to leave. I thanked Jason for a nice day, and for reeling in his friend. “Only what’s right,” he said. “A man’s gotta do what’s right. Any chance you’d want to see me again? I have most weekends off and the base is only an hour away.”