We All Fall Down

Part 2 Summer of '75 Chapter 17

Rick

It was Thursday, May 15th, 1975, an important day. John's birthday. The last day of his senior year, and he was leaving. I stood on our back porch, beads of sweat dotted my brow as I inhaled the warm summer air. Our beautiful pecan trees towered over the expanse of our yard. I bought this house when they were much smaller. I recalled imagining Patrice and our future children collecting the nuts that would scatter the lawn every fall. Patrice never really liked to bake, but I would catch the boys storing them in buckets from time to time to sell them off to neighbors.

Patrice was inside, banging around the kitchen. She was intent on making breakfast, but we all knew that she would forego the mission very soon. I found John packing in his room the day before and felt the nervous energy that emanated from him. I didn't know what to say to my son. I hardly knew him. He said nothing about college to us, his future plans, but judging by the thick envelope that came in the mail weeks prior, he'd gotten into Columbia. How about that?

My coffee mug felt heavy in my hand as I took a tentative sip. There is never a good moment to discuss my own news, never a time where anyone else could matter more than Patrice's latest project or worry. I'd even had to make up a story as to why I wouldn't be at work exactly a week before. If I had told my wife that I had an appointment with an oncologist, she would have spiraled. Her mental state had become increasingly erratic over the last several years. I couldn't get her to stay on her medications. Delores grew tired of the outbursts and quit. My parents had both passed within a few months of one another and I'd almost missed the funeral services because Patrice was having a fit. Even Ted and Becky were keeping their distance, claiming that life had simply gotten busy.

Life. I wonder what that word truly means anymore.

"Rick! RIICCKKK!!!!" Patrice's voice reverberated of the sliding glass door behind me. A few birds fluttered from the tree. "I need help finding the damn bowls!"

I closed my eyes for a moment before I turned to go inside. Ticking off the many regrets in my life. I apparently had symptoms for prostate cancer. I didn't want to jump to conclusions, because I knew that these things can often turn out to be nothing, but as I sat in that cold office, listening to the doctor explain the results of my tests, my life began to flash before me. His words ran together, an irritating buzz in my ears as I traveled back in my mind to the day I met Patrice.

The memory of when I was supposed to go right, but juked left and ran into Tommy Ratcliff, injuring my knee and ending my potential basketball career. This meant I met Patrice instead of taking out Donna Clarkson because I was at the laundromat instead of basketball practice. I was bewitched. The softness in her voice, the depth of her eyes, the intoxicating scent of her perfume. I fell victim to her. For so many years I was infatuated with everything about her and nothing else mattered but making her happy and creating a beautiful life together. But until I found myself sitting across from a stranger who was basically reading me my last rights, I had no idea what a horrible and life-altering decision I had made. I didn't even feel sorry for myself, but guilty for my sons. So guilty that I didn't pick a better mother for them, guilty that I didn't snap out of her spell until it was too late. Guilty that I may have played a part in what truly ruined her but most importantly...I felt guilty that I didn't feel guilty that I get to die and they're left with her.

I didn't tell anyone about the news, the boys didn't need to feel like they had to baby me. Certainly, John would want to cancel his trip and I wasn't having that. He needed to get far away from this bottomless pit of destruction as soon as possible. Now that I finally had the wool torn from my eyes and could see our life for what it was. I despised this woman. I worked so hard to love her and no matter what I did, and how many times I bailed her out of the most embarrassing of situations, it didn't matter. She is still who she is, John is still leaving, Ben is still a lost boy, and I am a dead man.