Disclaimers in Part 1... (3/6) susieqla@yahoo.com Cracked Before I get anything that resembles a reasonable answer, her phone, (one of those regular old touchtones) that's sitting on its own little shelf in the entertainment center sounds off. She's in no condition to snag it, so I rise to the daunting occasion. "Hello..." This is a perfect time to glower, and I snap, "No -- this isn't Anatullo's Pizzeria, man. You've got the wrong number." My frown threatens to scar me permanantly. "What part of 'you've got the wrong number' didn't you understand, asshole? NO! This ain't damn Domino's either!" I wonder what makes me think Cin would find this enlightening exchange remotely amusing. The fact I'm wondering that she might reveals how shirky I can be at times; unwilling to deal with emotional crap head on. Hey, so I don't know how to handle the situation; sue me. After I've slammed the receiver on its cradle, I broadcast, "Wrong number," like she's hard of hearing, or she'd left the room for a little while. Somebody's hearing's sure off, and it isn't hers. "H-Happens a lot," she says through several rapid sniffles, and then the waterworks resume again as she really gives into letting go. Her blithe facade fissuring. Its flimsy construction, abundantly clear. Tucking thoughts of several conspiracy theories I have which revolve around those so-called 'wrong numbers,' back into the recesses of my restless mind, I'm at her side, on the couch, clumsily fitting my arm around her shivering shoulders. "I'm sorry, baby, I only wanted to help." "I know, I know. It's not your fault," she says all strangly. "It's mine. It's everything." She garners a few moments to compose herself. "Now I know you haven't changed," she reiterates. "Still coming to my rescue, Richie. Even when I don't deserve to be rescued." My tangible disbelief working my face doesn't erase her worry lines. "You mean like that time in Mrs. Went's class when Tracy Haynes told the class you were makin' it with every guy in twelfth grade, and I jumped up and said she had with all the freshmen dudes; with the dudettes too." I wipe away the tears still clinging to her smooth cheek. I do the 'ski jump' thing I used to do with her nose, and that brings her around to a degree. "That chick was jealous 'cos you were so pretty. Now you're." I nearly choke on my next breath, but somehow I squash out, "N-Now you're. You're totally gorgeous." I press my lips together until I can't feel them. "Still true to form..." She drifts away in thought, getting real quiet, and I imagine she's re-living several such chivalrous incidents I'd notched. She'd always been so nebbish when we were in high school. Somebody had to stand up for her. Blinking as though she remembers I'm still here, slowly she says, "Maybe there's more than coincidence at work here, bumping into you like this. Like I said, I've been thinking about you a lot lately. Especially this week, very intensely." Her lower lip starts quivering. "Sorry about the mess." She dabs at her puddle of tears that have stained my shirt. "Why this week in particular?" Unsure of myself, I take her hand. "I don't know," she says after a moment of deliberation. "Maybe some premonition of your showing up in my life, somehow. You may not choose to believe this but, it was very hard leaving you behind. I want you to know that. In the beginning, I nearly drove myself crazy, missing you." I get a sense of her getting this off her chest. "Tell me about it. I did it to myself, trying to convince myself I was better off without you." When my mind was 'pickled' on a regular basis, alcoholism had its uses, or so I had myself buying it. "Did you succeed?" she asks sorrowfully. "Jury's still out on that one." I close my eyes, and when I open them again, I fess up, "It was hard, baby. We had something special, right? Like we were like married, almost." "Wish we'd never broken up," she confesses, grasping my hand holding hers, and then kissing its starkly pale topside. I never thought I'd ever hear what she says next. "We should have gotten married, the way you wanted. I've been a fool. You were the best. You still are." I can count on one hand the number of times I've been told that in my life. My nose grazes in her soft, warm scalp; the feel of her leaning heavily into me is balmic. God, I've missed her. Now it really does feel like old times. "Only when we were a thing, Cin. You had a way of bringing the best outta me." I look into her eyes, not saying anything for a long time until, outside, footsteps shamble past the door, and she tenses against me. Suddenly, it seems she's living on her last nerve. "You expecting company? Kinda late." It's so weird; it's like I can feel her heart in _my_ mouth. "No... Not if you view bill collectors as welcomed company. They intrude at all hours." "No way, not me. They're more like big pains in the asses. I'm no stranger to both." "What about..." Her body stiffens further. "Clients?" "Clients? What kind of clients?" She gives me a meaningful raise of a severely-plucked eyebrow, as though trying to convey, 'now would be the perfect time to get a clue.' "Take a guess," she antes. "You always caught on to things fast." She lowers her head. "I'm not proud," she leverages, and indicts, "it's not anything to be proud of." The dawning on me stinks, as mentally, the seamy answer mocks many dear memories. It hurts, and sucks conjointly, realizing she's giving it up for cash. Nonetheless, I strive to come across as objectively, and lifelike as possible. I don't wanna go any farther. "Hint me with your best shot; fire away." "The kind who pay for it..." Her ken falls again. "The kind who make my skin crawl each time I force myself to go through with it, or they'll be true hell to pay. I don't wanna, Richie, I don't, but I have no choice." Her look isn't wasted on me until no further sound of footfalls can be heard, and her breathing steadies. "You're being pressured?" I gasp, the ire within rising. "Who's makin' ya?" My tongue scrapes against my incisors. "Coerced, pressured... I have no one to blame but myself. Bimbos get the shitty treatment they deserve." "Can that crap, okay?" She looks away. "No bimbos here. The closest thing to is that kewpie doll over there on that shelf near the ferns." I draw her near again, and my lips massage the side of her head near the temple. "It's killing me hearing you talk like this." She snuggles into me even more. "Are you gonna tell me, or will I have to whine it out of ya? What's with this shit?" Her eyes float gracefully to mine, and searchingly we commune on a level that approaches the non-verbal, the way we used to. "It's not a pretty picture," she clinches in finality. "So's life, ninety-nine percent of the time," I interpose, managing to sound impassive, with my feelings in better check. "If you think I'm gonna lay heavy put-downs on you, no way. I'm fresh out." "Since when?" she arches. Real trust begins budding in her eyes despite her tentative delivery. I kiss her damp forehead, but don't pull away immediately. Her saltiness trips my tongue. "Keepin' it real. Who'm I to judge you, Cin?" I could tell her that I've done time; soft, that is. Getting busted, spending bumming-out overnighters in jail for different funky stuff. Misdemeanors, yeah, but it's still time. The closest I ever came to a full- fledged felony was four years ago, but I got off on a technicality, thanks to the alibi Byers dropped. The guy's got uses, no doubt. "I wouldn't blame you if you do. You'd have every right." "No guilt trip." I do judge, however, that the time is right, so gently I ask, "What bag are you in? It might help talking." She captures my other hand like hers is a butterfly net. Looking compliant, and about to spill, she opens her mouth. I squeeze that hand at the precise moment when a small, frightened voice plaintively fills the living room whose walls feel as though they're closing in. "Mommy, Mommy, Mommy." "It's Jeffy; my son," Cin says, quickly looking towards the room from where her kid's voice emanates. Her hands squirm out of mine. "That'd be my guess too." "Let me see what he needs." "You, would be my next guess." I watch her attentively as she rises and hurriedly moves off, intent to assuage rife in her agitated face. My heavy heart goes out to her, along with my breath hitching. "Want to meet him?" she lobs at me. "Yeah, sure," I say enthusiastically, "bring him on." I do another time check while she's gone, and start, discovering it's nearly quarter to one. Knowing Frohike, the gnome who lives vicariously, he probably thinks I'm getting lucky. Whet his pointy little horns. The narc's most likely soaking his head in that ice bucket again; Modeski heavily saturating his one-track mind, still. A sure bet. Mata Hari, man. I'll never understand what he sees in that hyper chick. Told us we weren't paranoid enough, then sleeps with the enemy. Get a load, huh? Now to get Byers to believe that. She needs to take notes from Leese who's laid back down to her spine, and the goddess has a very slinky spine. Then my mind bumps smack into the thought that maybe Cin's son has a 'client' for a father. Involuntarily, I shudder. Hell, what a legacy, and I should know. I've lived the life; live it everyday, not knowing who my real dad, and mommy not dearest, ditto. I've run so many conceivable electronic searchs, and I always come up with bupkes; I'm sick and tired of all the dead ends. I've, for all intents and purposes given up. Too depressive. Thirty, and still bugged-out about being ditched by mystery mom, and 'MIA' pops. I knew I was no farm boy, when my step-daddy, 'Farmer Brown' told me the day one of the cows kicked me when he was trying to show me how to perform a rectal palpation. I was only seven- and-a-half, for goodness sake. I still got the damn scar on the side of my outer thigh. In my genes, I'd always known I was no hayseed. Man, was I glad when we lost the ol' homestead in Nebraska, and moved to PA to be near relatives; 'city folk,' which is what my stepfamily gradually became too. Cin returns with her baby, and I close up the mental trunk of 'blues' so my funk's gone before she detects I was in one. "Who's this big man?" I toss at them, sounding chipper, grinning. Snowing them and myself. "No way you have a kid his size." "This is Jeffrey Allen Tanner." She kisses her sleepy child's wrinkled brow. The blond little guy's rubbing the vitreous humor out of his left eye. His 'bootied' left foot dangles idly against his mother's hip. He's gonna be tall. "How old?" "He'll be three next Tuesday." I whistle. "Happy, happy," I congratulate. All of a sudden I get this strong urge, and before I take measures to stop myself, I'm reaching my arms up to them. "Can I hold him?" "Sure," Cin condones. "I don't think he's wet. He hasn't quite got the hang of toidy use yet." Jeffy's a load for his looking on the lean side -- well, not that he's exactly skin and bones, but he's no 'chunka-monka' either, from where I sit, and am holding. Cin said he'd been sick a lot lately. With thumb stuck in his mouth, he gives a wide yawn, and snuggles into me. Kids are such a trip, man. They're one of my serious puzzles, behind women, that is. Women are number one; probably always will be. Wonder if I'll ever father babies? At the virginal rate I'm going, nobody should hold their breath unless anyone's thinkin' in terms of immaculate conception. Do I want any? Cin's standing there looking all maternal. I wonder what she thinks I look like. A fish out of water? A guy who's feeling about as comfortable as a Hawaiian-shirted Tahitian in an air-conditioned igloo, I bet. "He likes you." "What makes you think that?" "He doesn't warm to strangers this readily," she says, watching her son cuddling. "Maybe he senses my good vibes," I tout. "My all-around laid backness." Cin tangles her fingers in my hair the identical way she'd done in the car where the water under the bridge's flow began waning, as though wanting to reverse. "He's cute; just like his Mom." I'm about to wonder out loud about his pater, but I gather from what Cin says next, she's been doing a bit of wondering too, where I'm concerned. On the strength of our revived connection, she asks, "Is there anyone?" I wink at her, noting the return of the patter of intuitive dialogue we once shared. Then, just when I'm thinking we're totally back in synch, she says all sure of herself, "You're about to tell me, 'What do you think? Duh!'" Before I acknowlege the latest VIP (vitally involved person) in my life, I weigh the words carefully. Yeah, I hate repeating myself, but I will. Cin and I were over and done way before that damn bus edged out of sight, but these feelings she's tweaked in me again can't be denied. There's no cause for being callous, and I know callous. Let Frohike give you a blow-by-blow. I can see Cin's more than just mildly curious about my entanglement status. "There's someone funky I'm checking out. She, me." Maybe that was kinda blunt, so I buffer. What manner of insensitive geek do you take me for? (If you know what's good for you, you'll let that last remark lie flatter than a steamrolled rug.) "Not as funky as you, though; never was or will be anyone who fits that description the way you do." "Who are you, and what have you done with the _real_ Richie?" she says, sounding comically suspicious. "I don't know what you're talking about," I feed her as equally suspicious-sounding. Her kid squirms a bit, just as she finishes testing out a little chuckle. Before I know what I'm supposed to do, he quiets down, sucking his thumb like it's his sole source of nourishment. I think she's got a good boy on her hands, who's currently getting way comfy in mine. "What's up with you and the other half who made this whole?" I inquire on a more serious note. "I don't get the feeling he's a constant in this equation." Her eyes do a repeat performance of looking real sad. Another look like that one, and my heart, in a desperate leap with my mind, are stone goners. She's getting teary all over again. Damn. Yeah, she dumped me, don't blame her anymore now, and I suffered. So much so that it's taken me this long to get brave with someone else. The bitter pill was swallowed and assimilated ages ago. I healed somehow. The good we once had, and the compassion I feel for her now are in the driver's seat. Empathy's doing a great job of backseat driving. Whatever else's along for the ride. "Hey --I didn't mean--" "No, it's all right," she prevails through the veil of tears threatening to be shed. "Jeffy's father's a snake. The snake I work for; one of the most powerful heels in this phony town." Doing a great imitation of being a sack filled with lead weights, she dumps herself down next to me. "He either owns, outright, or extends a controlling hand into the biggest, and not as big clubs. Like the dive I..." She huffs forlornly. "Like the tacky dive I currently shake my tail feathers in." She wags her head and casts her eyes to the floor as though they were dice. "I've run out of options." I stare at her, not liking the cold, brittle quality usurping control of her voice. "He owns me..." "Ain't no way," I growl, allowing some of that cold brittleness to gain a foothold in my voice. "Nobody gets to own anybody," I naively squeak. Cin gives me a patient, pitiable look, as though I was born yesterday. Her voice descends to new depths. "A man without a soul, like him does. He has me right where he wants me. I'll never be free." "To hell with that shit," I curse and get into it with a foaming at the mouth vehemence until she needles me with her eyes which implore, 'please, not in front of my baby.' "Sorry," I whisper, and squeeze the little guy. "I'm the one. Sorry for being so stupid. So easily manipulated." She eyes me sharply then. "Jeffy was _no_ mistake, if that's what you might be thinking. I love my son even if his father wishes he'd never been born." She gathers herself following a windy sigh. "I'm lucky my baby's so young. Too young to know he has a joke for a mother. A cheap piece of tail, trapped here . . . in white slavery." She didn't say what I think I just heard. Could she? "White slavery?" Bitterness oozes from her pores, so much so that I feel its contagion. "I hate my life. I hate what I've become. I'm so screwed." She's molding the biceps in my right arm into a different shape, the way she's squeezing the muscle. "It it weren't for Jeffy, I'd...I'd--" "How'd this happen?" I bluster; whining, entreating. "You really want to know?" "Would I be asking if I didn't?" I badger, while I'm still staring at her in naked turmoil. I wanna know all of it, I quirk, but surround my supplication in silence. She looks stressed-out enough. "The lure of making fast bucks instead of finishing my education, back in New York. I got lazy and real dumb." Vividly, then, in that moment, her x-rated virtuals are recalled to mind. How could I have forgotten? It was three years ago, and it really was her, though I'd teetered between denial and 'no way in hell it is.' I keep silent, guarding how one night, I'd stumbled across the cache of her skin vids circulating hither and yon, no thanks to the wasted use of borderline 21st century technology, via the Net... I'd hit the bottle pretty hard after making that sordid discovery for several 'lost' weeks; nearly drove Frohike and Byers crazy, since I wouldn't tell them why I was acting like such a 'repeat offender,' even with their threatening to kick my ass out not serving as a deterrent. AA to the dubious rescue once again, after nearly a month's time. Cin's laugh's haunting, sardonic to the hilt. "Ironic, huh? For someone who was going to take the dramatic world by storm? Some sick detour, huh? I live in a state of constant brokeness, not even having the luxury of living from paycheck to paycheck. It's more like butt to mouth. The little I earn goes for so-called hidden expenses accrued to overhead of employment so he can claim I'm a salaried employee, which is such a lie. I'm worse than a slave. Marcus, Marcus Ballantyne, Jeffy's father...the snake I just told you about, he's punishing me for having Jeffy. He wanted me to get rid of 'it.'" "Screw that, dammit." Her son twitches in his dozy condition. "Just get the hell outta this town, then. Vamoose. I don't see the noose." "Get out? Just split?" More violent head shaking. "Yeah." "I _can't_." "Why can't you?" I retaliate emphatically. "I've got to do what he says, work where he says, sell myself to whomever when he says or..." It's as though she can't bring herself to say the rest. "Or what?" I gently coach, softening my tone, although I'm feeling far from docile. "He'll kidnap Jeffy, and I'll never see him again," she exhales, going very limp, as though her spark has been extinguished. "He can't have Jeffy -- I'll never let that happen, even if I have to sleep with every prick in Vegas!" she vows through clenched teeth. What am I missing here? "How's he gonna rip-off your flesh and blood if you're long gone?" "You...you don't understand," she bleats, "he, he could. He's, he's a very powerful man. He'd hire people to find us. He's done similar things like that in the past. I know he has." A lightning bolt would be hard put, doing a neater job of renting me in two. Like, duh... What am I using for brains right now? The guys and I do it all the time for 'M and S'. All of this must be really getting to me. But, it's true what they say, I see. Kids have the enviable ability of falling asleep through practically anything. I gaze down at her kid who is presently snoring softly away in my arms. Regardless of the pig he has for a father, I like this kid. If Cin and I were to have any, they'd probably come out looking a lot like this little guy. The coloring, anyhow. More or less. The little dude's pretty pale, like me, so, more, I guess. I start feeling way sorry for her boy, and the girl I once viewed as mine exclusively. "How do you feel about me now?" Cin challenges through veiled eyes. "Go ahead. Tell me to my face," she says moistly. "Tell me what a loser I am. How nowhere I ended up, when I had so much going for me. I'm nothing but a dirty tramp...a filthy slut." I'm hugging both of them, making sure I've got a firm grip on her son, and an even firmer grip on his mother. "Cut it out. This is _me_ you're talking to, and you'll always be a star as far as I'm concerned." Cin starts weeping, but more softly this time. "Nobody gets away with treating my girl like crap," I spoon-feed into her ear, "whether he's stone Syndicate, or the flesh-peddler skulkin' and scopin' in the streets, on the make for fine young things." I hug her harder. "That was the edited version," I hand her, with attitude dripping all over the place; I'm reeking it, and she manages a weak smile. Her plight has made me as scrappy as hell. Even more contemptuously then, I vow, "See if I let the asshole of a scumbag get away with this shit..." Her son is disturbed momentarily before he burrows his head into my chest to really get comfortable, as if he's taking the first steps to bond. Makes something burn within my heart. Looks like someone, who doesn't really know who he is yet, needs a little fatherly interaction. The kind I'm a stranger to, too. ||oo|| End Part 3