Phantom Strays
Page 17
The end of Meredith’s relationship with Paul came in the middle of the night a week later.
Meredith, who lived at home that year in order to save rent, arrived home from her date with another man. After she had kissed the new boyfriend goodnight and locked the door, Paul rang the doorbell and pled and argued with her to convince her to return to him. Meredith refused all his begging, received an apology for the rude doorbell ring and closed the door. I could hear quite a bit of the conversation because the doorbell awakened me.
When Meredith groped her way down the dark hallway toward our bedroom, she blundered into Father who stood in the way waiting for her.
“Meredith, did you lock the door?”
“Yes,” said Meredith impatiently. She opened our bedroom door and walked in. I began to wake more thoroughly.
Father’s hand bumped along the door, scraping the wood with his nails and pushing it open. “Meredith, I need to talk to you! I need to talk right now about this situation.”
“Oh, golly, sorry about the doorbell. Paul is just jealous of me being with anyone, but we’ve broken up—”
“That was terribly alarming for your mother and me.”
“I’m really sorry. I mean, I’m not the one who did it, but he’s my friend, so I’m sorry. Just forget about it. Go to bed,” I heard her say wearily. “He’s gone now. It didn’t mean anything and he apologized.”
“Meredith, what was that all about?”
“Paul was mad that I went out with someone else so he wanted to talk to me. I guess he followed me in a car, but when we came back here he was too late. I’d already come in, so, like an idiot, he rang our doorbell, because I went in before he came up to the door, that’s all. Sorry about it. Sorry he woke you up.”
“Meredith, I don’t think you realize—”
“Let’s talk about it tomorrow. I’m going to bed now.”
“Do you realize he could have murdered us in our beds?”
Meredith contemplated that for a second. “Dad, who would be stupid enough to ring a doorbell before they murdered people in their beds? It woke everybody up. The murderer would be trying to kill a bunch of awake people.”
“Meredith, I’m tired of your ridiculous attitude. Your mother and I are at our wit’s end. Oh, God, I beg of you. Listen, please listen. I am on my knees on the floor of your bedroom at one a.m. begging you to end everything with this man. He will kill us in our beds. He will kill us!”
“Dad, get off the floor.”
“Promise me you won’t go out with him again.”
“Dad, just get off the floor, please.”
“I’m on my knees. I’m begging you, Meredith, to think of the family. Protect us. For God’s sake, protect us. I pray that we aren’t murdered at night while you are out. I have to pray for the family. Now I need my gun. I’ll have to get it out and oil it. This situation is unsafe. You are making me think I need my gun when I hadn’t thought that way since the Cuban missile crisis and that night I listened to the radio from Sonora.”
Yes, I remembered that. He talked about getting his gun out and oiling it and he thought Stalin hadn’t murdered Trotsky and he was coming to Tucson, or living in Tucson, and we would be caught in the crossfire. That was a lost story. A great scene from the American Southwest. I tried very hard to remember all of that comical story.
“For God’s sake Dad. You are really overdramatizing this.”
There he knelt on the floor of our bedroom, on the octagonal orange shag rug with orange fringe, in his briefs, barely visible in the dark room with slight moonlight, pleading with her. I pretended to be asleep but was hearing the whole insane half hour conversation that went nowhere and everywhere, the paranoia, the fear and hysteria of our father in his briefs. His voice, constrained and strange, discussing our impending murders by this jealous boyfriend.
“He wasn’t even that mad, Dad.”
“I don’t want him to come here again.” He spoke with a husky shaky voice full of emotion and anger. “I know when a man is capable of murder and he is.”
“I don’t think so. He won’t ever do that again. Ringing the doorbell at one a.m. You can be sure of it. He even apologized. A bunch, actually. He was really sorry to have done that. He knows ringing the doorbell was a dumb idea. He just lost control of himself.”
“Your mother is very concerned.” When he said “your mother” his voice trembled with emotion again. He had a wobbly sound to everything he said as though he were speaking to us underwater.
“Well, go tell not to worry. It’s all over now. Nothing happened and he went away.” Meredith voice sounded matter-a-fact as though she were giving directions to the nearest gas station.
“Your mother and I have a right to peace in our own home.”
“I agree. Go back to bed and tell her everything is okay.”