by Frank Zafiro
Cartoons eventually gave way to football games, so he turned off the T.V. and tried to read his Dr. Seuss book again. It was difficult to concentrate with his ears piqued for any movement from his parent’s room.
He was starting to get hungry for lunch when his mother stumbled out of the bedroom in her robe. She breezed past the living room and straight to the kitchen, where he heard her brewing coffee. Then, magically, he heard sounds of sizzling food. The aroma of bacon wafted out into the living room.
His mother was cooking breakfast. She never cooked breakfast.
He walked to the kitchen and poked his head around the corner of the doorway. He spotted his mother standing at the stove, turning strips of bacon, then cracking several eggs into a frying pan.
From behind him, the heavy thud of feet stomped out of the bedroom and into the bathroom. From behind the closed door, Jeffrey could hear his father making retching sounds. His own stomach clenched at the sound. He covered his ears. After a few moments, the sound ended. The toilet flushed, followed by running water. Then his daddy stumbled from the bathroom and toward the kitchen. He brushed by Jeffrey without a word, sliding up behind his mother. Amazingly, he swatted her on the bottom, causing her to jump. A slice of bacon flew through the air and landed on the counter.
“Goddamnit, Stan!” she snapped. “I’m cooking your break-fast.”
“The kid can have that piece,” he said, motioning to the errant slice of bacon. He stood directly behind her, pressing up against her back. His arms snaked around to the front of her. Jeffrey couldn’t see what he was doing, but his mother twisted and dodged in place while he groped at her. “And I’ll have this one.”
“I’m trying to cook,” she said in an irritated tone. “Jesus, I took care of you last night.”
His daddy’s hand flew up and grabbed his mother’s hair. He pulled hard with a backward jerk. “And what if I want it again right now?” he asked her in a low, mean voice. He jerked on her hair again. “What do you say to that, huh?”
“You’re hurting me,” she said.
“You even haven’t seen the beginning of hurt,” he told her. “You want to see hurt? I will lay the whammo on you, Cora. You won’t walk right for a week. And you definitely won’t be able to smart back to me with that pretty little mouth.”
“The eggs are going to burn,” she whimpered.
He laughed then and let her go with a slight shove. She immediately went back to stirring the scrambled eggs, then retrieved the wayward slice of bacon.
His daddy glanced over and spotted Jeffrey in the doorway. He lowered himself into the chair at the kitchen table. “I see we have a little sneaky spy in the house,” he said.
Jeffrey didn’t know what to say, so he replied, “Yes, sir.”
His daddy laughed again. “Oh, he’s learning.” He reached out and swatted Jeffrey’s mother on the bottom again. “You hear that, Cora? He’s learning. Better than you, he’s learning.”
His mother didn’t reply. She served them wordlessly, just as she had the night before. His daddy didn’t thank her, but he tore into the food, eating quickly. Jeffrey watched him, amazed. Then he picked up his fork and tried to do the same.
Once his daddy finished eating, he lifted the water glass from last night and peered at the brown liquid. “Hair o’ the dog that bit ya,” he said, almost more to himself than anyone else. Then he drained the glass in one swift swallow. He grimaced, let out a small belch and sighed afterward. “Good ol’ Jack,” he said.
Jeffrey tried to eat his breakfast as hurriedly as possible. His daddy didn’t notice. Instead, he stood with the bottle of special stuff and wandered into the living room.
When Jeffrey finished, he found his way into the living room, where his daddy sat watching a football game and sipping his drink. Jeffrey found a place to sit unobtrusively and watched the game with his daddy. Neither of them said a word, but for Jeffrey, that two hours would become quite likely his greatest childhood memory.
When the game ended, his daddy glanced over at him, seeming to just then notice he was there. He took a drink from his glass and sniffed in disgust. “Seems like it was a bad idea for Seattle to get a football team, huh?”
Jeffrey had heard of the Seahawks. Some of the boys at school wore jerseys to school with the stylized blue and green logo of the fictional bird. He himself didn’t care much about football, but if his daddy liked it, maybe he would, too. In fact, maybe football would be his favorite sport from now on.
“You retarded or something, kid?” his daddy said. “I asked you a question.”
“Yes, sir,” Jeffrey blurted automatically.
His daddy scowled. “Yes, you are retarded?”
“I mean, no, sir,” Jeffrey sputtered.
“No? You mean you like the Seahawks? They’re almost as bad as Tampa Bay.” He waved his hand at Jeffrey. “Now go to your room. You’re bothering me.”
Jeffrey spent the rest of the day in his room, listening to every whisper of movement and voice out in the living room and the kitchen. He crept out once to use the bathroom, peeing carefully onto the inside edge of the toilet bowl in order to keep as quiet as possible. He didn’t flush.
There wasn’t much talking between his mother and his daddy during the day, but occasionally he heard an exchange, though he couldn’t make out the words most of the time. Once, the words were sharper and he heard some sort of tussling. This was followed a smacking sound, which made him jump. There was a pause, then more tussling, but it was quieter and more rhythmic.
Around dinnertime, his mother brought him in a peanut butter sandwich. She had changed into her robe. He noticed a deep redness below her left eye.
He thought about asking her what happened, but instinctively, he knew. She must have made a wrong look at his daddy and so he laid the whammo on her.
He stared up at her, torn. He felt a perverse thrill knowing that she wasn’t in charge. Maybe she could still be mean to him, but she wasn’t the boss anymore. At the same time, an overwhelming desire came over him to hug her and make her feel better.
Before he could act on either emotion, she thrust the plate toward him. “Eat your dinner,” she told him numbly, “and put yourself to bed.”
She left without another word.
He chewed the peanut butter slowly, his stomach growling while he ate. He didn’t know what to think or what to feel. He was glad his daddy was home. But it wasn’t working the way he’d hoped.
What could he do?
Jeffrey chewed on his sandwich, thinking.
The next morning, he went to school with purpose. At the morning recess, he waited in line to play tetherball. Most of line was made up of girls, which he thought was just fine. In fact, it was probably almost perfect. His daddy would want him to put one of them in her place.
Laura Kennedy was the one who tried to take cuts when it was his turn. She was a girl who always wore overalls to school because she said her daddy was a farmer. Once, she’d told Jeffrey that being a farmer was much better than being in the Navy, so he thought it was fitting that she be the one to step in front of him now.
“It’s my turn,” he told Laura resolutely.
“No, it’s not,” she said. “It’s mine.”
“I’m next,” Jeffrey insisted.
“Shut up, Jeffie,” Laura said. “Why don’t you go pee your pants?”
Jeffrey felt a warm satisfaction coil up inside his stomach. He balled up his fist and punched Laura in the cheek as hard as he could.
His knuckles grazed her cheekbone and scraped across her ear. Laura’s eyes flew open in surprise, then narrowed in anger. She punched Jeffrey in the stomach. The air whooshed out of his lungs. He sank to his knees, then curled into a ball on the ground.
Laura wasn’t finished, though. She dropped on top of him, rolling him onto his back. Her knees pinned his arms to the blacktop while she punched him in the face. The first punch landed on his mouth, driving his lip into a tooth, cutting it. The second pun
ch blasted into his eye, sending racing white dots shooting through his head. The third and final blow crunched his nose, sending comets chasing after those white dots. The warm flow of blood gushed from his nostrils, covering his upper lip.
The teacher on playground duty interceded at that point, hauling both of them to the principal’s office, where Jeffrey had to undergo the humiliation of admitting that he threw the first punch in the fight. This shame was coupled with having been beaten up by a girl, even if it was a girl who wore overalls and whose dad was a farmer.
The principal gave Jeffrey a look that was difficult to decipher as the boy sat on the chair in front of his desk with a tissue pressed against one nostril. Jeffrey wanted to believe that he felt bad for Jeffrey’s bloody nose or maybe that he was proud that he’d tried to put a girl in her place, but somehow he didn’t think so. Then he gave both children notes to take home for their parents to sign. “Bring those back tomorrow,” he told them. “And you two leave each other alone the rest of the day.”
Jeffrey endured the snickers and stares for the remainder of the school day. At the final bell, he scrambled to get away from the school as fast as he could. He managed to avoid all but a couple of catcalls from other kids. Once on the street headed home, however, he slowed to a crawl. He wondered if his mother would get angry again and march down to the school. Would she find a way to ‘own the school,’ like she told the principal last time? He remembered how good it felt for that short time while she was sticking up for him. He momentarily quickened his pace, until he remembered her admonition afterward.
And what would his daddy say? He’d been in a fight. Didn’t that make him tough? Deep inside, Jeffrey knew it didn’t. He’d been in a fight with a girl. And he lost. A real man laid the whammo on girls. Laura laid the whammo on him instead.
Jeffrey hung his head and shuffled home.
When he arrived, he found his mother sitting in her chair with her glass of special stuff, watching one of her programs. She turned her gaze toward him as soon as he walked in the door. The black eye, bloody lip and swollen nose registered slowly with her. She pressed her lips together and scowled.
“What happened?”
Wordlessly, he handed her the note from the principal. She snatched it from his hand and read it, her lips moving while her eyes scanned the slip of paper. When she’d finished, she balled up the note and set it on the rickety end table next to her.
“You’re supposed to sign it,” Jeffrey told her quietly.
His mother turned toward him again. Her right hand lashed out, slapping him hard across the face. The force of the blow was magnified by his earlier injuries and he yelped in painful surprise. His hand flew up to his cheek. Tears stung his eyes.
“He’s gone again,” his mother said quietly. A cruel smile curled up at the corners of her mouth. “It’s just you and me against the world again, Jeffie.”
A strange combination of relief, anger and fear washed over him at those words. The tears in his eyes bubbled over and coursed down his cheeks.
His daddy was gone.
An ache appeared in his chest, almost like a jagged blade was tearing through it. He let out a small sob.
His mother reached out to him. Gratefully, he fell into her embrace, resting his face between her breasts. The sobs rose up in his chest and came out in huge, racking moans. His mother ran her fingers through his hair. For a moment, even though he hurt, he also felt safe. He also felt good. Maybe the two of them could stand against the world. Maybe she could make everything-
Her fingers twisted and tightened in his hair. She jerked his head backward to stare up at her. Malice radiated from her red, watery eyes. Her foul breath washed down onto his face. The sour stench cut through his overworked sinuses, despite the earlier bleeding and his crying now.
“He’s gone,” she repeated, “but you’re just like him. You ruin everything, too.”
Jeffrey felt something deep inside him wilt. The intensity of his sobs waned. The color in the room faded.
“You ruin everything,” his mother said, and Jeffrey believed her.
October 1980
All he ever wanted anymore was snow. That was the only real wish he had left that he held out as a possibility. There had been a time when he wished for other things, but now that he was ten, he knew better. He knew better than to wish for the things that his mother or father (not his ‘daddy’ anymore. ‘Daddy’ was a baby word) would have to be responsible for making happen. Instead, he wished for things that came from outside his own house. The weather seemed to be the easiest thing to count on, and in Seattle, snow seemed like something special enough to hope for.
His father made it home once or twice a year. Jeffrey both dreaded the time and looked forward to it. He held out an insane hope that the next time would be better. His father and his mother would decide to make it so they were all a real family. His mother would stop being mean all the time. His father would want to stay. He’d tell Jeffrey how big he’d grown to be and how much he was proud of him.
But these foolish hopes didn’t come true. Every time his father visited, in fact, they seemed to slip farther away. His father usually arrived in a foul mood, sometimes already drunk. Sometimes Jeffrey noticed he had one less stripe on his uniform. Other times, he’d have it back. He noticed the lines on his father’s face and how he always looked tired. He seemed meaner, but not as strong.
At first, that diminishing strength only fed Jeffrey’s hope. He reasoned that if his father wasn’t as strong, then he wouldn’t be so mean to his mother. Then things would get better. His mother, however, seemed to have other plans. In the face of his father’s weakening, she grew more bold. He heard them arguing more frequently, with her voice gaining resolve. His father had to lay the whammo on her more often. Sometimes she ran into the bedroom and locked the door. Then his father would either break down the door or he would sleep on the couch. If he slept on the couch, Jeffrey made sure to leave him alone because he was always in a worse mood than usual. He didn’t hesitate to give Jeffrey the back of his hand for any perceived mistake or irritation.
Once, he spilled his cereal bowl. Milk and corn flakes splashed across the kitchen table and onto the floor. His father was sitting at the table, drinking coffee and reading the newspaper. He leapt up in his chair, wiping milk off his shirt and pants.
That resulted in a spanking with his father’s belt. The folded strap lashed his backside, raising red welts on his buttocks and the backs of his legs. He tried not to cry because crying only resulted in being told he was a ‘sissy’ or even a ‘little queer,’ both of which burned in his chest just like when the kids at school said it.
His mother stood in the kitchen doorway and watched the spanking. He looked up at her and pleaded silently for her to intervene. He knew she could probably make him stop, even if it meant that he decided to lay the whammo on her instead. She could make him stop. He knew it. So he pleaded with his eyes, begging her.
But she only watched the beating, her expression flat and unreadable.
The strappings only came when his father was furious or when he had a little time to think about things. Like the time he brought home his report card on the same Friday his father showed up. The littering of ‘Unsatisfactory’ ratings led to another session with the belt, with his father counting the strokes. He received one for every ‘Unsatisfactory’ on his report card.
More often, though, his father’s hard palm lashed out and cuffed him in the back of the head. Sometimes he got the back of the hand across the mouth, if that were more convenient. He tried to learn what to say and do in order to avoid it, but he was unable to crack the code. He got in trouble for asking questions, but he got in trouble for being too quiet. He got in trouble for staying in his room and for ‘hanging all over’ his father. He was punished for not looking at his father when he was being spoken to, but other times he got the back of the hand for the expression on his face.
And yet, still he tried to impress
his father. He asked his mother to let him play fifth grade football. She refused. When his father came home a few months later, he ridiculed Jeffrey for not being on the football team.
“Maybe you could be a cheerleader,” he suggested, shaking his head. “Jesus, what a mess you are, boy.”
Whenever his father came home, he made a point to show him he wasn’t a sissy. He wasn’t a little queer. He was tough. If that meant finding a way to get into a fight (never a difficult thing to do when all the other kids seemed to pick on him more every year), so be it. He’d come home with a black eye or bloody lip and a note, wearing those injuries like a badge of honor. But his father always took them to mean that Jeffrey had lost the fight (which was true, but how did he always know?) and ridiculed him all the more.
When his father was away, his mother ruled with an iron fist. Her hand was quick to slap his cheek for any reason. Sometimes there didn’t seem to be a reason, but he learned not to ask her why, because that resulted in a follow-up smack.
Jeffrey stopped wishing that it would ever truly be she and him against the world. He knew that she wasn’t going to love him enough for that to happen. Every so often, though, she gave him a renewed false hope. This seemed to happen in the evening and only when she’d been drinking her vodka (he didn’t call it ‘special stuff’ anymore. That was a baby word, too) for the majority of the day. He always knew when it was coming. First, she stopped watching television. Then she brought out old pictures and thumbed through them. Next, she grew weepy. She’d mutter things he couldn’t hear clearly nor understand. Then she’d call him to her, draw him to her chest and stroke his hair.
“You and me against the world,” she’d whisper over and over again.
