|
Smacked
`Mike!
Mike, you OK?'
I trip over his patched
duffel bag, kick it away,
fall toward the bathroom.
`What was that noise?'
His voice shuffles
through the keyhole.
`Uh, no biggie, girl.'
He needs food, caring.
He moves in with no
plan, no job. My kids love him.
Uncle Mike with the fey Irish
wit who makes them blow milk
through their noses at dinner
but now the leprechaun laugh
is a syrupy sludge.
`Just dropped somethin'. Me.'
I lean on the door; the hinges
groan, the worn latch yields,
and he looks at me, Christ
as Pieta, angelic, quizzical.
`Screwed up,' he says. `Hand
me that. willya?'
`That. You mean the
needle, Mike?'
NEEDLE?
`You're diabetic?' I plead, and
now the laugh descends to hell.
`Yeah.
Can't eat sugar.
Just smack.'
`Smack?'
`Smack, darlin'. H. Horse.
Heroin. Don'tcha know anythin'?'
My mind finally absorbs his
nudity. It's not that way, with us;
he's never touched me, never
even tried. Now I get it.
He has a better, hotter lover . . .
a sweeter high.
I grab the works, the spoon and
burner and needle, fling them
out the bathroom window, scream.
`GET OUT OF HERE! My KIDS!
How could you DO this?'
`Been wonderin' that myself,' he
mumbles, loosening the tubing from
around his narrow bicep. He
struggles to his feet, heads for the door.
`Mike, you're naked!'
He turns, the fix is all. I can see it
in the empty cesspool of his flat blue eyes.
`Been that way all my life,' he answers,
twisting the doorknob. `Nobody cares.'
And he's out in the hallway, loping
towards the exit door, rushing toward his
rush.
A week later, Mickey Mouse Kevin appears.
`Mike says give the kids this,' he rambles
in a cocaine'd geyser of words.
Sly smirk. `Yeah, he's OK now.
`OD'd last night.
Funeral's on Thursday.
Be there or be square, babe.
His Mom's a minister, didja know that?
Handy . . . '
Trembling hands, stoppit, the kids!
Think of the kids! I open the bag,
the rustling like leaves in a gutter. Two
dolls, pristine, carefully dressed, one
blonde, one brunette, just like my
children.
And a note: `You couldn't save him.
You were kind to him, but there
just weren't enough like you. Kiss the
kids. Love, Kev.'
I watch Kevin's retreating skinny
back, my mind fastening on the
depth and correct spelling of his
note, and I think, `Are you next,
my friend?'
And I go back to baking
brownies. The girls will be home
any minute. I'll never know why
or when he bought those dolls.
It only matters that he did.
Sandi
Schmidt
|
