The You I've Never Known(74)

All women are the same.

“Come on, Dad. You don’t believe that. Zelda’s special. I can tell.

Sonora’s special, too, and I don’t want to leave. I love it here.”

Too bad. We can’t stay.

“We can. Maya hasn’t called

the authorities, and I don’t think she will, unless we disappear again.

She won custody of me, did you know that? So I’m pretty sure

not only are you a deserter, but technically you’re a kidnapper, too.”

No, goddamn it! She was leaving us for that woman, that Tatiana.

The one who was with her today.

If she really cared about you, she wouldn’t have brought her.





Spin


He’s good at it, and I know

that, but what he just said

might contain an element

of fact. Still, I want to know some things, the main one

being, “Who are Ariel

and Mark, Dad? Please

tell me the truth. I think

I deserve that much.”

He sighs. Okay. But then we leave.

He plants his butt on the arm

of the sofa, waits for me to sit.

You probably don’t remember because you were so little, but a few weeks after we left North Carolina we were in an accident in Virginia. You were fine, but I got pretty busted up. The woman who stopped to help was named Leona.

We lived with her for several months, while my broken bones healed up.

“I remember her, but only bits and pieces. She took care of me while you were in the hospital.”

That’s right. Well, Leona was a widow. She lost her husband and little girl in a train wreck.

Oh my God. The lights snap

on. “Mark and Ariel Pearson.

I remember photos . . .”

It was Leona who started calling you Ariel. You reminded her so much of her little girl, and I think she was a tad tetched in the head, which was why she wasn’t working right then.

She named her baby after Ariel in that Disney movie, The Little Mermaid, and she used to watch it with you. You loved it because you were the spitting image of that mermaid. Well, except for the tail.

Not sure if that’s a weird

attempt at humor or if he’s

serious, but I do have a vague recollection of sitting in a woman’s comfy lap watching that movie

while she hummed along to the music.





Makes Sense


At two years old I absorbed the name

Ariel. Yeah, but what about Dad?

“So how did you become Mark?”

I can pretty much figure out the why.

I needed a way to protect you, and he had no use for his identity anymore. Leona had everything necessary in her filing cabinet— social security cards, birth certificates.

You and I became the Pearsons.

Calculating bastard. “I see, and

did Leona know you took them?”

I think she kind of liked the idea of her family living on in some way.

Like I said, she was messed up.

In fact, at one point she tried to off herself. That’s the main reason I decided it was time to leave.

There’s truth here somewhere,

but I sense doublespeak, too.





One Question Answered


Truthfully or not,

others appear like

rabbits pulled out

of a magician’s hat.

“What about Ma-maw

and Pops? They always

called me Ariel. Didn’t they know I was Casey?”

I can see the wheels

rotating in his head

and expect yet another circuitous response.

Instead he answers

reasonably. They knew, but went along with it.

There was a lot at stake.

They’re good Southern Baptists, for one thing, and weren’t about to let you go live with your mother and her female “friend.”

But they also knew sending me back to the army would’ve been the end of me.





The End


Why not just spice up

the narrative with a big

dose of melodrama? “Come

on. Not like they would’ve

put you in front of a firing

squad for going AWOL.”

Shit. Flipped his switch.

That is not what I mean, girl.

You don’t know the things

I saw, serving my country

in godforsaken third-world

armpits. You don’t know what

it’s like to duck when you hear a sonic boom, to avoid July

Fourth celebrations because

fireworks trigger panic attacks.

You can’t possibly imagine

what it’s like to get turned on by the scent of blood, to break down at the smell of burning

rubber or singed hair.

Don’t you dare lecture me as if your life has been so fucking miserable, when all I’ve done for the last fifteen years is sacrifice my needs in favor of yours.





Dressed-Down


In proper military fashion.

“Sorry, Dad. You’re right.

I wouldn’t understand

any of those things.”

Here I am, apologizing,

like I always seem to do.