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Odds Are...
It was just past midday on day three or four, post birthday... Ebbie Rose wasn't counting. She’d found herself a nice secluded spot on the beach not far from the hotel. Cocktail half, sunscreen applied and book in hand lay unread unopened and like the cocktail was an anchor. She just sat and stared at the water. The dogs were good the kids were fighting but good, her mom wanted answers but knew not to ask and so she was good. She felt better. Awake but every cell knew she was only holding on by a thread.
The buzzing had stopped, but she wasn't quite ready for people. Truth was..... only moments away looming, if she would let it. She wasn’t coping well. Her life was gone as she knew it and it wasn’t that she felt bad about, she just felt stupid. She felt bad about being stupid. She was even bad at letting it be. She had failed failing as a failure. It bubbled in her.
Questions roiled they were like B movie trailers in her head: When was it that you started giving away little pieces of yourself? When doing what needed to be done took top place. When your dreams got put on hold when joy took a backseat except for those rare moments, when it slipped in and under. When how much you accomplished in the day became the measure of your worth. No one asked me to give up myself and I thought I wasn’t, he didn’t ask but so much of it was expected. Not doing was not caring. And so the trap and the hole became deeper and it’s not enough and a hunger arises and the thirst is not quenched and so the rat race is on to do more to prove more and it will never be enough and you know it and you try to break free and you are punished for not complying with the dictates that is laid before you unyielding unforgivable unrelenting and you fail no matter what you do you fail "it was all your fault you never loved me" he says for the millionth time in your existence together. And you try but you fail.” You're always too busy" you try to explain. " Always the bitch” and you put aside your doubts and you try again and you fail again.
Truth comes in odd number called moments. Never in twos fours and sixes. Hers felt more like ones, threes and nines. Right now it was a nine or more like nine nines. Ebbie Rose felt like she was breathing because her body had no choice. she didn’t know what else to do. She had no idea what this trip was costing her. A pound of flesh not a drop more. This was triage, she’d been bleeding from wounds so deep they had to be cauterized or eventual amputation. She didn’t want to think of him but the nines had the deck and there was no way to control it. It hit like a wave.
She had gone to the Department of Motor Vehicles earlier that morning. Had begun the task of slaying dragons at the crack of dawn. It was a normal get it done day, and what was left would have to wait in line. He called her several times to see if she had fixed her problems that was inconveniencing his life, costing him money. Even though she knew the forthcoming crucifixion was not of merit she felt responsible any way and must fix it. Her doctors’ appointment would have to wait for another day in the next two months. Funny, now when she looked back, the moments were clear. She knew but didn’t know.
Another wave hit “Out loud, I let shit slide and I didn’t see what I see now”
She took a drink, she sighed, it was gone, she signaled to the waiter on the beach who had not left her side for another. He nodded. No words speak..how nice.
Jeff had met her in the parking lot outside his office. She rarely went in on her busy days and they were always busy. She answered questions about dinner, the kids, the bank account, her resolving her unforgivable transgression regarding her car and how much she had to pay again. Yet another time she was defending her life. her miserable life. She turns to him and says “I found a sweater in the car”, he chuckles and says “its my lover” she doesn’t smile because she thinks at that moment its not funny because she’s heard that tired joke for the umpteenth time and it still isn’t funny. She should have known. “I have an early flight” he says “I may sleep in the crew room, don’t wait up for me”. She should have known.
“Out loud, I let shit slide and I didn’t see what I see now”
Lost, she only notices the young waiter because he is standing in her light. She nods a thanks, signs the bill and drinks not letting it go till the bottom miming another one a double this time. She was buzzed. It was nice... the waves were coming but she couldn’t let them touch her.
He was always flying, he was never home and in the deep recesses she knew but didn’t know. She honestly never thought it would happen to her, she thought he was different, that they were different.
Then one day for sure she knew and everything tilted on an axis.
A little birdie came and whistled in her ear. "God!" she thought squirmed. They'd sat and had a drink. She heard it from the first time to the last. Oh that canary sang. It sang for their supper, their cocktails and dessert. It sang until the fat lady burped and left.
The future, you see had come to 44 Kansas street Valentine’s Day and a bloody massacre was about to happen.
By the time the waiter came back she was asleep.
Chapter 3.....The Hymns....coming soon.
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