My Mother's Son: Chapter 11
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As I turn the corner from the metro station, my childhood home comes
into
view. I say childhood because I will not likely spend any more time
here.
Certainly not in the home of my
mother, and I would definitely not live here by choice. The old memories would haunt me at every turn: the stairs I fell down, the crevasse where my mother used to leave the key, the sight of Gary leaving every morning as he trudges to work. They would haunt me like so many ghosts, ultimately driving me to madness and an inevitable psychotic rampage that would leave everything dead in my wake. Also childhood because I've become a different person since I fell down the stairs that night. I'm not longer the child who used to moan and groan about his mother's moral quandaries, but would never take action against them. That night I did take action, and Gary felt the brunt of my force. I turned a page that night, a page in my life that has forever changed me. There is no turning back. Walking closer to the apartment doors, I note that nothing has changed. I realize that it has been at most a week since I left, but one always wants to look through rose coloured glasses when they venture into their past. But the concrete walkway is still chipped and cracked, the adjacent alley is still littered with trash. The old lady is still sitting on her second floor balcony, watching over the neighbourhood. She used to wave to me everyday as I returned home from school, always with a friendly "bonjour." The tales she could tell, I think, the things she has seen. She probably knows of the childhood I have suffered through, thanks to the perpetually opened windows that release scant oxygen into the decrepit apartments. She must know everything, I sigh, aware that every tale she could spin is a secret forever kept. Entering the building, my attention immediately turns to the banister on the stairwell. Half way up the first flight of stairs, it is missing. Looking up, I come to the conclusion that this is where I landed that fateful night. The impact of my body astounds me. I managed to take out an entire banister, I think to myself, almost proud of the permanent mark I've left on the building. Now even when I'm not here, my mother will be constantly reminded of me every time she walks by this quasi-monument. If for nothing else, breaking the banister was worth the fall. As I walk up the stairs, my mind is aflutter with a million minute particles of thought. Will anybody be at the apartment as this time of the day? I'm not sure if I could face neither Gary nor my mother at this point. The last memory I have of my mother was as she watched the nurse sedate in the hospital. She just stood there and did nothing. How can a mother do that to her child, who at one point she held and promised the world? But I could face her if I had to, I think. I've done it a million times under the worst of circumstances. To be honest, seeing her could give me even more drive to make a life for myself despite her. Through the years, I've accustomed myself to feed off her pain, to derive life from her death. The one person I definitely could not face would be Gary. Seeing him, I fear, could send me over the edge and lead me to finish the job I started that night. As much as the thought of taking Gary's life excites me to no end, I know I just can't do it. What would the old lady on the balcony think? I slowly walk down the hallway, treating every step like it could potentially be my last. As I tread past numbers 12, 13, 14 and so on, I realize that I don't know anybody on this entire floor. The occupants of these apartments tend to be in and out so fast that a neighbourly relationship is impossible, and the cheap rent often draws the sort of people one doesn't want to have any relations with at all. Which, coincidently, is a dead-on description of my mother. Reaching number 18, and what was once my home, I pull up the floor mat outside the door. As always, my mother has placed a key here. Most likely, she simply forgot that it was under the mat, nobody's had reason to use it for years. I pick up the key and slip it into the lock. It fits just as I remember it, awkward and uneasy. Jingling the key until it hits the exact spot, the lock releases its grip. I slowly open the door and peer into the apartment. The living room and the kitchen are both empty. A pile of dishes sits by the sink, seemingly over a week old. Looking to the kitchen table, I notice that one of the legs is broken. "Could I have done that?" I wonder in a quiet voice. "Did I hit the table with Gary that hard?" Probably not, I think, realizing that Gary probably flew into a rage when he my mother confessed that she went to the hospital to see me. That has to be it, I believe, that's the only logical explanation. Inching my way down the hall, I notice there is no trace of what Gary did to me. At the least, I expected a bloody mark against the wall, a dent where his foot may have missed me and crashed into the wall. With the force at which he pummelled me, I'm surprised the wall still remains. I creep around the corner until my bedroom door comes into view. I am almost scared to enter, wondering what my mother did to my meagre possessions. Knowing her as I do, she probably threw them out that very night in a vain attempt to rid herself of every last reminder of my existence. Deep down, she knows that my memory won't go away that easily, but she always does things superficially. Superficially I am gone, but subliminally, I will always be there. Upon opening the door, everything is gone, as I had suspected. The walls are ruddy with white patches, probably where my posters once hang. The carpet is marred with indentations where my bed once rested, and the window is still cracked where my mother once threw a telephone out of spite. Despite the fact I knew my mother would try to rid the room of my life, I still feel like lying on the floor and crying. I never imagined that I could so easily be erased from the face of the earth. The only physical impact I've ever had has been here in this apartment, and she has done away with all of it. If I were to die tomorrow, there would be no evidence that I was even here, let alone lived. Of all the things my mother has done to me, maybe this hurts the most. Like an eraser wiping away fragile chalk markings, she has nulled my existence. I snap out of my daydream to realize that I do have a task at hand. I have to find clothes. I know I won't get far in a blue hospital smock, somebody would definitely report me to the police. Walking to the closet, I notice the door is ajar. Inside lay all of my belongings. Like everything else she has ever done, my mother was not very thorough in her erasing of my life. I pull a pair of pants and a black shirt out of the pile of rubble. As I put them on, I remember that I had stashed some money in my closet for a "rainy day." Checking the top shelf, I realize it's gone. It's now a class-5 hurricane and I have nothing. My mother probably found it, I suppose, taking it to feed her vodka and tobacco habit. It probably lasted all of five minutes once she scrambled to the depanneur. I know that I won't get far without any money, I couldn't even take the metro or the bus. I know that my mother has always kept some old coins hidden away. I could probably pawn them for a few bucks, enough to get me by for a couple of days at the most. But it's better than nothing. As I walk into her bedroom, I immediately cringe at the though of her and Gary making "love" in this room. The thought of her making love with anybody is laughable. With her it's either raw animal desire like a cat in heat, or fooling around with another alcoholic while in a drunken stupor. I would be surprised if she has actually made "love" to anybody. The real, raw emotion and thrill that comes not from the sex, but simply from laying next to the one you truly love. Making "love" doesn't have to encompass sex at all, something my mother never understood. I look around the room. The most logical place for my mother to store her old coins would be in the closet, so I search there first. I have never been in my mother's bedroom; it was always off limits as a child. I suppose she feared she'd be "entertaining" when her little boy walked in. How embarrassing that would be for her. The chances of developing a month-long relationship would be nil after they knew she had a child. Not to mention the reputation she'd get. And if she had a rep, dear god, her life would just be over. The top shelf is littered with all sorts of junk, everything from Gary's pile of pornographic magazines to my mother’s old high heels. In the corner, barely within reach, lays an old shoebox that is labelled "private." Now I just have to open it. I carefully manoeuvre it over the junk and lower it to the floor. Opening the cover, it overflows with pictures and countless receipts each one with a story to tell. I pick up on receipt dated May 12, 1990. It's from the IGA on Atwater Avenue. The only items on it are a 6 pack of beer and a frozen TV dinner. The dinner was for me, of course, and the beer for her. That was a typical meal in our house, though my part often varied. Macaroni and cheese, a baguette, anything under a dollar, or in the reduced bin. I dump out the contents of the box so I can find the coins and get out of here before somebody comes home. The pictures escape as if they've been freed for the first time in years, the settling placidly onto the carpet. A few pictures catch my eye. They are of me, probably school pictures from my elementary days. The look so innocent and naive, unaware of the strange twists and turns my life would take leading up to this moment. At that point in my life, I most likely believed I had the best mother that ever existed. To me, she was doing the best she could with what she had. Children can be so stupid. A few of the pictures are of her, but surprisingly the bulk are of me. Visiting grandma in Cote-St-Luc, skating in old-port, at an Expos baseball game. One picture in particular draws me. It's of my mother and myself at Mt-Royal, sitting at a picnic table. I was probably no more than 8 or 9 at the time, but I looked so happy. So did my mother. Eating a bologna sandwich and shading herself from the sun, she smiles, extending an arm out to wipe dirt from my face. People play in the background, a squirrel waits at the opposite end of the table. We actually look like a family. A happy family. For the first time in my life, I realize that everything may not have been all bad. But we as humans tend to accentuate the negative. And I've had plenty to accentuate, make no mistake. But this picture proves that we were actually happy at some point, however long ago it may have been. I remember loving her at one time, then becoming confused about my feelings, and now feeling the intense desire to ruin her life. Could I return to loving her at some point? I let my mind wonder for a minute, but then quickly snap back to reality when I glance towards the hallway. After that night, things will never be the same again, no matter what I say or do. Things are forever changed. Sifting further through the memories, yet another picture catches my attention. It is of a man, probably in his early 20s. He is handsome, dressed in a white shirt and pleated pants. He looks like somebody out of a Sears’ flyer, which makes me wonder why my mother has his picture. "Probably just another one of her fucks," I decide. But something continues to draw me to him. It's the only picture of him in the bunch, which leads me to believe that he actually meant something to my mother. Rare as that is, it's probably why she's kept the snap through all the alcohol-stained years of hard living. I flip the picture over to see if there's a sidebar. Sure enough there is. But it's not in my mothers eloquent handwriting, the only thing classy she can actually accomplish. Sloppy, like a child, the words "something to remember me by" are inscripted, followed by the name "Joseph Laroche" and the date, January 30, 1983. That date instantly strikes me. It would have been about that time I was conceived. Perhaps if I can get in contact with him, he will be able to enlighten me on the identity of my mother's rapist. As much as I want to ruin my mother's life, I do want to punish her rapist for getting the ball rolling. Since her rape, her life has been caught in a relentless spiral, delving deep into the darkness of the abyss. She's gone from the happy pictures of us at the park to the sad state she's in today, getting pregnant by a man as despicable as Gary. There is a noise. Almost like a door opening. Fuck, it is a door opening. I quickly gather up the pictures and stuff them back into the box. Carefully placing them back in the closet, a voice catches me off guard. "Honey, are you home?" It's Gary. My mind shifts into overdrive. If he sees me, he will definitely call the police and I’ll be dead in the water. But if he goes to the bathroom, I just may be able to sneak out the door. I peer through a crack in the door. Gary is walking down the hallway. He stops once he reaches the end, peering into the room which I used to inhabit. "Jeannie is always leaving this fucking door open," he growls. "I've told her to stay out." More than likely, he’ll be coming into their bedroom next. I quickly run to the bed, lie down and slid underneath it. Surely enough, he is right on my tail. He walks in and sits on the bed. His feet rest mere inches from my face. The temptation to reach out and twist one of them off is incredible, but I know I can't. As much as it's killing me not to, I just can't. As quickly as he entered the room, he exits, leaving the door open. He walks towards the bathroom and opens the door. Now is my chance. I slide out from under the bed and sneak out into the hallway. Tip-toeing up the hall, I slowly reach the top. Just as I put one hand on the doorknob, something interrupts me. It's a voice. It's Gary's voice. "What the fuck are you doing here?" I am silent. I don't even know what to say to him. I fear that if I say anything, it will drive me over the edge and I will finish the job I started. "How'd you get out of that god-dammed hospital? I knew we should have sent you right to jail." "We?" I mutter. "My mother did not do this to me. She wouldn't have done this to me." Even I know I’m lying. Of course I know she would have sent me to jail. But it's so much more productive to blame it all on Gary. "I'm going to call the police," he says as he reaches for the phone. "Not you're not," I retort as I rip the plug out of the wall. "I hoped you were gone for good." "And I hoped I had killed you," I growl. "But you didn't," he smirks. "And I finally got rid of you. Thank god Jeannie walked in when she did. And I thank you for falling down the stairs. Now there's no evidence that I beat you that night and it you're the one who'll get in shit." "You know Gary," I smile. "Do I really have anything left to lose?" He turns worried. "You've taken my home, gotten rid of my stuff. You have the police after me and I'll likely go to jail for a few years at the least. How much worse could it be if I killed you?" "You’re a crazy motherfucker." "No,” I smile. “You fuck my mother." "You wouldn't." "I would do just about anything right now," I threat as I move towards him. "I have nothing left to lose." He starts backing down the hall "When one has nothing left to lose," I continue, "they're the most dangerous." He runs into the bathroom and locks the door. "Come on Gary," I laugh, knowing full well I'm not going to do anything. "Just let me kill you." "I'm calling the cops!" he yells. While he's dialling, I make my escape. I run back down the hallway and out the door. The sound of the door will surely alert him that I'm gone, and he'll no doubt come after me. I have to hide. I frantically run down the hallway. Coming to apartment 20, I pray that the door will not be locked. I turn the knob. And for once in my life, I'm lucky. I quickly walk in and gently close the door. Peering through the peephole, I can see Gary walking down the hallway. He stops in front of the door I rest behind. Shaking his head, he looks up at the door. He steps forward and knocks. My stomach sinks. The door was unlocked so somebody is obviously home. I'm going to be caught. I hear a noise from around the corner. In haste, I slip around the corner and crouch against a wall in the living room. I hear the door opening. "Hello?" a sweet female voice answers. "Yeah, did somebody walk into your apartment?" he asks, probably having no idea how crazy he sounds. "What?" "Did a young man walk into your apartment? He's over 6 feet, average weight, brown hair..." "I think I would know if somebody walked into my apartment," she says, disgusted. "Is this some kind of joke?" "You see my head? He did this to me. If you see him wondering around, call the cops. He's fucking crazy and there's no telling what he might do." "I'll keep my eyes opened," she says cynically, then slams the door. She turns and looks towards the living room. Fortunately I am hidden from her view. I slowly stand to my feet. As she passes by me, I reach out and draw her near. Covering her mouth with my hand, she is left powerless. "Don't say a fucking word," I warn her. "Keep quiet." If she screams, I know that Gary will hear it and bust the door down like some vigilante taking the law into his own hands. I must keep her quiet. She is trembling. Her mind is probably flush with the sight of Gary's concussion, and the though that I could inflict worse on her. I have to reassure her. "I'm not going to hurt you," I try to lull her. "I won't hurt you." Her skin is lily white and smooth like silk. Her golden locks are ravishing, and they feel like warm water as they wash over my arms. But her fear is as pungent as one of Gary's work shirts, and I can hardly bear holding her back. "If I let you go, will you say anything?" I ask. She shakes her head no, and for a moment, I actually take the leap of trusting somebody. I let her go. She jumps ahead, out of my reach. "Who the fuck are you?" she demands, trying not to be loud. "It's not important," I try to quell her questions. "You're in my fucking apartment. I have the right to know." I look aside. "All you have to know is that he can't find me." "I'm calling the cops," she says, reaching for her telephone. I jump towards her, "You can't do that!" Like a madwoman, she halls off and kicks me in the ribs. The blow is incredible. I am instantly sent to the floor, though I try to silence the shooting rods of pain. I can feel myself teetering on the brink of unconsciousness, though I know I cannot let myself go or I will once again wake up the hospital. Or worse, jail. She drops to her knees, "Are you okay?" I can't muster a word. All I can do is clutch my stomach and pray there is no internal bleeding. Her expression turns to one of concern, "Now I remember who you are. I found you on the stairs last week. I called 911." I am shocked. I always knew that somebody had to have called 911, but that person was always an imaginary one who would never cross my path again. Yet here she is. It's people like her who give me some faith in what's left of this wretched world. Somebody who actually cares about other people. It seems like such a rarity now, but perhaps that's only what I've been conditioned to believe through my nightmare of a childhood. But it makes me wonder what I would have done if I would have found somebody lying half-dead at the bottom of a stairwell. Would I have acted out of kindness and compassion? Or would the rush of the modern world have driven me to just walk over the body and hope somebody else would notice. I like to think I would have stopped to help, but logically I am not certain of what I would have done. "How did you find me?” I ask as I manoeuvre myself onto my knees. “I was coming out of my apartment when I saw somebody... you at the stairwell at the end of the hall," she recalls. "I thought you were just standing there, but then you fell." "And you called 911?" "First I checked to see how you were. You were knocked out cold, and you were bleeding from a couple of places. Then I ran back to my apartment." I work myself up onto her coach, "I don't know what to say.... Thank you?" "That's a start," she chuckles. "I'm just glad you're okay now." "I wouldn't go that far," I confess. "When I escaped the hospital I cracked a few ribs, and now.. well..." "I'm very sorry about that," she apologizes. "But what would you have done? There was a stranger in my apartment holding me, telling me to shut the fuck up. I'm sorry, but I did what I had to." I understand her viewpoint. If I were in her position, I would have ripped that stranger limb from limb. Thankfully she didn't. There is a knock at the door. "Don't get that," I plead, knowing full well it’s Gary. "He knows I'm here," she says as she walks to the door. "You again?" she opens the door. "What the fuck do you want?" Being rude to Gary. A woman after my own heart. "Did you see him?" Gary asks, seemingly desperate. "Look, if I would have saw him I would have called the police," she reasons. "Now leave me alone!" And with that she slams the door. She walks back into the living room and sits in the corner. She looks towards me pensively; giving me forewarning that the barrage of questions is about to begin. "Tell me," she looks deep into my eyes. "Did you do that to his head?" "I want to be honest with you," I reason with myself. "I did do that to him." "Why?" "I had my reasons." "When?" "What is this, 20 questions?" I attempt to get her to back off. With the pain I'm in, the last thing on my mind is recollecting what happened that night, and even less so with a complete stranger. "Why won't you say?" she continues to prod. "It doesn't matter anyway," I explain. "The important thing is that I get out of here and out of this city." I attempt to lift myself off the coach, but somebody is holding me down. Looking up, I realize that it's her hand. "You're not going anywhere," she orders. "I do not appreciate being treated like a child," I push her hand off. "I'm an adult. I will go when I want to." But apparently she has other ideas. Grabbing me by the shoulders, she gently pushes me down onto the coach. I try to resist, but I'm completely drained. Even if Gary were to bust in right now, I probably wouldn't even be able to muster any resistance towards him. "Can you help me up?" I plead. "You're not going anywhere," she says. "You barely made it back up onto the coach. Lord only knows where you'd end up on the streets." A strange sensation overcomes me. Nobody has even done anything for me out of compassion. My mother always acted out of necessity. If I looked like I was getting a little thin, she would feed me a little more. Probably not for my own health, but to protect her image as a "good" mother. The only person who has ever cared for me as a preventative measure was my grandmother. But like a homeless person being offered a large sum of money, I am wary of this girl‘s "help." "Why do you care?" I test her. "I saved you once, didn't I?" she smiles. "I'm not going to let you die now." And with that, she walks into the kitchen and turns on the tap. But I am still wary. I have heard this talk before, many times from my mother. Sure, she saved my life by not having an abortion after her horrific rape, but she more than made up for that by mistreating me over the next 17 years. A saviour with conditions, I always called it. But after a while, the title "saviour" becomes dusty and rusted, and no longer applies before long. One cannot rest on their laurels forever. She returns to the living room and kneels besides me on the floor. With a metal bowl and a warm face cloth, she wets the cloth and attempts to wash my face. I pull away. But she continues. I realize I am too weak to fight it, so I let her continue. As she gently wipes the dirt from my forehead and trails her fingers down over my nose, then to my lips, I am taken back to my hatred of being touched. Even despite her angelic touch and good intentions, I cannot get past my phobia. As she leads the cloth around my neck, I and taken back to when my mother used to hug me before she tucked me into bed. I always remember a man waiting in the background, eagerly hoping she'd soon finish with me so that her attention could be on them. I remember her wrapping her arms around me before she's send me off the grandma's for weeks at at time. She would always whisper in my ear, "I'll miss you." Those three words put together in any way, shape or form still make me cringe. They take me to a time when I still had faith in her, and it disgusts me that I could ever be so naive. "You have a lot of cuts," she interrupts. "Are these part of your reasons'?" I say nothing. And as it usually is, the silence is an affirmation. These are my reasons, but only a few of them. That night with Gary was building for a long time. Like a pot boiling with its cover intact, the pressure kept building. As the steam collected, the pot sometimes opened slightly and some of the steam was released, but nothing substantial. But that night, the pot cover was blown off and broken into bits and pieces. The cuts and bruises I have are not the sole reason why I beat Gary that night; they are only what pushed me to the point of no return. She slips her hand lower on my body until she reached my waistline. She gently pulls my shirt up, only to gasp at what she discovers. I look downwards for the first time since I that night. My body is alien, something I no longer recognize. The skin is a deep purple- almost black, with a few white patches where collections of blood vessels were not broken. Many cuts, both gnashing and minor, adorn my chest and stomach. A few stitches are evident, mostly likely from where my ribs were reset. She removes her hand from her mouth, but is at a loss for words. The only thing she can mutter is "hospital." "You can’t do that," I plead with her. "They'll put me in jail. They can't find me." She looks into my eyes and sighs. Like my body were a fragile crystal glass, she slowly rubs the cloth into the cuts to wash out the dirt. Though it does hurt, I know if the cuts become infected, going to jail will be the least of my concerns. "Am I going too rough?" she asks, concerned. "No," I breathe. "You're doing a fine job." I can feel my eyelids start to droop. The setting of the apartment is lulling, like a warm blanket on a cold day. Paintings adorn the walls and plants hang from the ceiling. Noticeably, there is no television. I have heard of people not watching television, but I never believed it. Now I have the proof. She interrupts my train of thought, "I think I'll leave you to get some sleep. I'm sure you're very tired. I have some classes to go to." "You're leaving me in the apartment alone?" I am sceptical. She raises herself off the floor and sits the metal bowl aside. "What's the worst you could do?" she smiles. "Fall off the coach and pass out?" I smile for seemingly the first time in weeks. "I suppose you're right." She bends down once more and gently kisses my forehead. With that, she leaves the living room and walks out the front door. Instead of sending me into a case of the dry heaves, her kiss actually made me feel better. Whenever my mother kissed me within the last few years, I pushed her away and scrubbed my skin until I bled. But with her, it was different. I've never believed in guardian angels, mostly because I've never had a reason to believe. Nobody was there to save me from the nightmares of my childhood. I suffered alone; a victim of my mother's every want and whim. As she went from man to man, I cried, unable to help myself nor salvage her sole. As I grew, I became more vocal in my disgust of her, but I was still her victim. No matter what she wanted to do, I had to follow, like a lamb to slaughter. What other choice does a 13-year-old have? Nobody was there to watch out over me, to save me when I couldn't save myself. But now, at a time when I need her the most, she's appeared. My guardian angel. The only difference is this time I don't need her to save me from my mother; I need her to save me from myself. |