Swallow.
I can’t. How can she know so many details?
Swallow!
I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.
Try.
I do.
I choke and cough.
“That’s enough,” shouts Raphael.
I hold up a hand. My voice raspy, I say, “No. I want it all.”
The woman, still lost in the world of my past, continues as if she hadn’t noticed the interruption.
“The rumor had made it around town that your father had lost yet another job. Sheriff Tom Williams had gone looking for your father and been told that, his last paycheck spent at the bar, your father had gone home. There had been domestic disturbance calls to your home before and Sheriff Williams thought he’d better stop in to see if things were alright. He walked into one of the worst scenes ever witnessed in his 10 years with the Portland Police Bureau and 25 years as Conlin County Sheriff. You were lying on the floor. Curled into a little ball, you were staring between your battered and bruised arms that had down little to protect you from your father’s blows. Your eyes wide, you had taken it all in. The pools of blood on the floor and spattered on the tables and chairs. You mother, lying on the floor leaning against the kitchen cabinet looking as if caught in a horrifying peace, her neck at an unnatural angle.”
“We don’t need to hear any more of this, Chase,” Raff says
“You’re wrong, Mr. Santiago.” The woman says, her eyes still locked on mine. “You all need to hear it because, when I come to the point of my being here, my credibility has to be unquestioned. Only by hearing me out now will you comprehend how committed certain people are to the destruction of the friend you feel is more than a brother.”
“Finish it,” I say, the sudden sureness of my voice surprising me.
After taking a deep, shaky breath, she continues. “Sheriff Williams tried covering your eyes when he picked you up. But it was too late. The images were already seared into your brain with the red-hot branding iron of your father’s anger. Images that prove your ineffectiveness, your . . . how did your father sum it up? Ah, yes, worthlessness. What was his favorite expression for you, Chase? He did he describe your worth to him and the world? Something about a whistling piss pot?
I squeeze my eyes shut. How can those damned stupid words still crush me all these years later?
Opening my eyes, I fix the woman with a steady gaze and answer her question with a clear voice that, while calm, fills the room with the dread that I feel every time I fear I might fail at something.
“He said I was as worthless as a whistle on a piss pot. He had other quaint little sayings too, if you’d care to hear them.”
The woman’s eyes narrow as if not believing my willingness to be open about such a painful subject in front of others. But, after a moment, she tries to brush it off with a shrug and says, “No matter the actual words, they always cut you to the bone, didn’t they? And that night you proved him right. You proved your weakness, your worthlessness when you didn’t stop the monster from killing your mother. It’s the reason you do so much to control yourself and everything around you now. And now you’ve created a world where you and those you love and who love you can live in safety from the cruel world that exists outside these walls. It’s something of an obsession, isn’t it, Chase?”
“I think that’s more than enough of this nonsense,” says Gordon to the Palmer woman. Turning to me, he says, “Most of us know some or all of the details of your past, Chase, and we don’t care. There is no need to waste any more time with anything she has to say.”
I slowly shake my head no. “All of it,” I say, my tone flat. “I want all of it. Get on with it Ms. Palmer.”
Her eyes again getting soft and fading into a distance, the woman says, “You were in foster care for years, but it was little better. Desperate for acceptance, some friendship, some shred of affection to counteract the sense of worthlessness your father had pounded into your psyche, you were vulnerable.
“There were other boys abandoned to the system. Angry boys full of hate for themselves and everyone around them. They were eager to find someone weaker than themselves to vent their pain and frustration upon. And there you were. Not weaker physically but weaker emotionally.
“You were bullied, cowed into a corner of fear that you would never be liked by anyone, until another boy stood up for you. The irony was that the boy was smaller and not as physically strong as you, but his upbringing had been far different from yours. His had been strong and loving parents whose love for him gave him something more than physical strength; a heart of boldness and courage that still beats on even decades after their death at the hands of a drunk driver. Since his youth, he has added to that moral strength and indomitable will a tremendous physical strength. A remarkable physique housing a remarkable heart and, thus, a truly remarkable man . . . is Raphael Santiago.”
Her eyes fixed firmly on Raphael, she says, “Now, Mister Santiago, you have a home surrounded by people like you with the same protective instincts. Whenever you get the chance, you search high and low through the city to find people who have the best of humanity within them. You give them what your parents gave you, the firm belief that, through discipline, careful nurturing and hard work, they too, can become their best selves. Now,” she pauses and, looking back at Diane and Ai-Ling before turning to Graham, says, “And many others here do the same.”
Raphael is as still as stone, his eyes black as obsidian. The very room seems to be holding its breath.
Turning to Gordon, she says, “And now the irascible Gordon King.
Comments (0)
See all