The Secrets on Chicory Lane: A Novel(26)

After a pause, I asked, “What was she like?”

He shrugged. “Small. Friendly. Cute. I met her in a bar in Saigon. She couldn’t speak English at all; she knew just a few essential words in order to communicate with GIs. It never would have worked, though. Things were different between us once we were living with her family.”

“How so?”

“I don’t know. Let’s change the subject, okay?”

“Sure.”

Upon his return in the fall of ’73, Eddie had started working for his father’s drilling company. He hated it but there weren’t many opportunities for young GIs home from the war. He still had to get his GED.

There was definitely a harder edge to Eddie. When we had been close in the sixties, he boasted a rather sarcastic sense of humor and a cynical personality. Now I could feel that this aspect of his demeanor was even more pronounced. The thing was, I agreed with him. I empathized with him and completely understood why he was being so derisive. I hadn’t noticed at the time, but afterward I realized he downed his whiskey pretty quickly and ordered another one before I was half-done with my drink. He was definitely self-medicating. There was a lot of pain inside him, and, God help me, I felt for him. I wanted to help somehow.

He then rolled his eyes and added, “And then Dad went and fell off an oil well.”

“Gosh, tell me about that. What happened?”

“It was a couple of months after I had come home and started working for Dad. I was with him at a drilling site. There was something wrong on the crown block—that’s the very top of a derrick, a little platform where you can stand and work with the block and tackle. Anyway, we were up there, and he lost his footing somehow. Splat. Broke his neck. He was dead on the spot.”

“That’s terrible.”

“No, it isn’t. You remember my father, don’t you?” I nodded. “He was a bastard. He was a no-good son of a bitch, pardon my language. Even when I was in high school, the guy beat on me and my mom. That’s one reason why I worked on my body while I was in the army. After I came back, he didn’t mess with me. I wasn’t sorry at all about my dad falling off that oil well. Good riddance, if you ask me.”

I didn’t know how to respond to that.

“Since then, I’ve just been living with my mom in the same house across from yours. I quit my dad’s business and started drawing comics. I’m, uh, I’m a little better than I was back in elementary school.”

“I believe it.”

“I’d really like to show you some of my work.”

“Do you make any money from it?”

“A little. I sent some stuff to a handful of comic publishers but I haven’t heard anything back. On the other hand, I’ve sold some pieces at a flea market I go to. Right when I got back from Vietnam, I was in California for a couple of weeks. I went to a convention for people who buy and collect comics. It was on Harbor Island, near San Diego. I sold some stuff there and talked to a lot of publishers.” He laughed. “You’ll get a kick out of the comic book I created. It’s called Devil Man, and it’s about a demon with superpowers who comes to earth and causes all kinds of hell. He’s a bad guy that you love to hate. I’ve got three issues drawn already.”

The description made me laugh, too. “You always used to draw creepy things like monsters and bugs!”

I’m pretty sure there were refills on the drinks by then.

“How are you supporting yourself and your mother if you don’t have a job?” I asked.

“Oh, Dad had some pretty good insurance. We’re okay. The house is paid for.”

We continued to talk through the night. He asked about Chicago, since he’d never been there. I was dying to know more about Vietnam, but he seemed to want to avoid that subject, except for the few stories he told me about some of the friends he had made over there.

Then, after a few moments of silence, he said, “You know, Shelby, you had a pretty good high school experience. I could see that you did.”

“Thanks. I’m sorry you didn’t.”

“Didn’t junior high suck?”

I laughed. “It did.” Then I remembered. “Hey, where were you that one year you were gone? You went away that … that summer.”

“Oh. Yeah. I, uh, went to live with some relatives in Wichita Falls. My parents thought it would be good for me.”

I wondered, why? Then I recalled what had occurred prior to his leaving. Michael had been abducted, and Eddie had been extensively interrogated by the police. “Eddie. We never got to talk after what happened. I mean, really talk.”

“I know.”

“That was a painful time. For all of us.”

“It was. That goddamned Mr. Alpine.”

“I tried to tell them you had nothing to do with it. My mother … she wasn’t right in the head. She still isn’t.”

“I understand that now. It’s all right. I lived through it.”

“Were the police rough on you?”

Eddie shrugged. “I don’t remember too much about it. I was real scared, I know that. I was pretty traumatized by the ordeal. There was a good cop/bad cop thing going on. The bad cop was a real asshole. He scared the shit out of me. And my fucking dad made it even worse. He acted like I brought all that trouble onto the family even though I didn’t do anything. He blamed me, just because I was … me. That’s the reason I went away. I did sixth grade in Wichita Falls. It was pretty awful. But maybe it was better than being at home with my dad during that time period. Anyway, at least Mr. Alpine got what he deserved.”