Yard Sale Chapter 5

Yard Sale

Chapter 5

 

I looked over to the picture of my boy, the picture no loving, caring, giving father should ever have to see.

I went into another trance, seeing my healthy happy boy hit a home run for the first time. He was the reason his team won the championship that first year he played proper baseball. He was always a good hitter at t-ball, but the sound of that bat almost obliterating that ball with such ferocity as it was thrown at him was glorious. Everyone in the bleachers were on their feet, cheering, excited for my little boy, my James. I was such a proud father that day, as I was everyday towards my babies.

Trish loved sitting on the bleachers, egging her brother on for victory. Equally, James always had an heir of pride when he saw his sister ace the beam in gymnastics. He was always the first up, clapping and cheering, upon her dismount.

My mind went back a few years to when it was time for pre-k to start. The kids were four years old. It was evident Patricia was book smart. She loved when I read to her. She was always quite happy playing quietly by herself with her doll house, the one I made her for Christmas the previous year. James, on the other hand, always came to me to play sports. He found it hard to stay still for more than ten minutes at a time. That was the reason we requested for them to be put in different classes when we enrolled them.

It was obvious that Patricia was a head above the rest in her class. She knew her letters, numbers, and colors alarmingly early. In her last evaluation to see if she was ready for kindergarten, she scored so high that we were advised to put her straight into the 1^st grade.

Daunted about the idea of having twins in different grades, Ellen and I, after much deliberation, decided we needed to do what was best for them both. So, the next September, Patricia started first grade, whilst James started kindergarten.

Patricia took to school like a duck to water, coming home with straight A’s. James, on the other hand, found it a bit more challenging. As the years went by, he found things increasingly overwhelming and asked Patricia to tutor him off his own bat.

They always sat at the same table to do their homework anyway, but whenever James had a question he didn’t understand, or some of the course work he couldn’t comprehend, he went to Trish who explained it in a way he could grasp. It wasn’t rainbows and unicorns for her, but she loved to be able to help. He went from getting straight D’s to C’s and B’s. That was gratitude enough for her.

In middle school, James fell out of love with baseball. His new passion was football. He was small for his age and dare I say, puny. The summer before he was due to start high school, my own mother got sick. She lived in the country, with a massive plot of land. There were little shacks dotted over the hundred acres she owned. Our family, along with my sisters, stayed in the big house with mother as she vanished in front of our eyes. The cousins didn't really get on, my sister’s kids were quite a bit older than mine. That didn’t deter James from following Kurt, who was three years his senior, around.

With puberty on his side, and the willingness to help Kurt train for his college football team, by the time James started high school, he looked like a different child, he had turned into a man! He had filled out nicely, and had grown at least a foot. The kids from his previous school didn’t recognize him. He was officially a jock! When he turned up to join the football team, I was on the bleachers watching. Ellen was working and Trish had STEM class, but I was there, sneaking a peek without James ever knowing. He ran faster than anyone else, seemed stronger than anyone else, and was able to run farther than anyone else. He had a good arm to boot. He went from being a wannabe to a doer. I was so proud! He was, of course, welcomed onto the team a few days later. I don’t think he ever found out that I was there watching him!

Trish, who was in all advanced placement classes, began applying to colleges early. She ended up with early acceptance to MIT, her dream school. She wanted to be an engineer of all things. We were so proud of her too! However, she ended up going to Penn State. It was an ok college, but we were disappointed for her to choose closeness over her dream. I for one, had a word with her as to why she changed her mind. Her answer was that she wanted the option to come home on the weekends.

When she did come home, as we insisted, she live on campus, she always tutored James for a few hours over the course of those two days. He was under pressure to get, and keep, a C average to stay on the football team. It was something he was struggling with, but she put in the hours with him, as did he, going over her notes every night. In his final exams he needed an average of over 60% in order to be accepted into Penn State on a football scholarship. That day he came home with his final grade; I hugged and squeezed him with joy. He got 67%. We were over the moon! In fact, I still think I have the test sheet somewhere in the basement. I was such a proud papa.

As Patricia was enjoying her second year studying physics, James wanted to try sports medicine. Because he didn’t have the grades for it, he made the decision to become a teacher instead. He envisioned himself teaching physical education. He loved every sport that he turned his hand to, but his heart was always with football.

We wanted James to focus on his studies, so there was no way we were letting him have a job as well. I told him I would give him $100 a week for everyday expenses, like gas and maintaining his car, a present for getting into college. We had done the same for Trish.

I’ll always remember the day he came home one Tuesday afternoon, a sullen and worried look on his face. Ellen was gone away with her girlfriends, so he talked to me.

James explained how he was asked to go to a party the first Thursday after he moved into the dorms. It was a fraternity party, one where most of his older team mates resided. He wasn’t the type of kid who went to parties, he believed his body was a temple. He just wanted to fit in. I guess I would have done the same in his position. He said he wanted to prove he could be one of the boys and that he couldn’t remember how he got back to his dorm that night.

When he woke, in his own bed, he had a girl laying on his chest. He confided in me that it wasn’t his style to just have a one-night stand, so they exchanged numbers. Ever the gentlemen, he walked her back to her home away from home, and kept in touch with her. He explained that they became good friends.

‘Dad,’ he said, tears forming in his eyes. I took his hand and managed to make him feel comfortable. ‘She came to see me this morning,’ he said and broke down. ‘She’s pregnant!’

I couldn’t help but gasp initially, but watching my eighteen-year-old son, with his head in his hands, what else could a good father do but hold him and tell him, ‘everything is going to be ok!’   

It would have been all ok had he heeded my sincerity, but instead, when he went back to college the next day, he immediately dropped out. We didn’t know this for a couple of weeks, but he had been living in his car, working as a male stripper in a night club. When we found out, we begged him to come home, but you can only lead a horse to water, you can’t make it drink. He was a grown adult, in the state’s eyes anyway, and there was just no talking to him. Determined to get as much money for Rose, the girl he got pregnant, and the baby, a fast buck was his goal. I guess he figured taking off his clothes was as easy as it came.

We had asked to meet the infamous Rose on numerous occasions, but he always had an excuse as to why not. I was eager to meet my future grand-babies mother, but I knew it would come…eventually! In the meantime, myself and Ellen just prayed he would come home!

A week went by with no contact. Both myself and Ellen, Patricia as well for that matter, rang and rang, only getting voicemail. When his voicemail was littered with good intensions, we had no way of contacting him.

Patricia found out off his ex-roommate, the name of the club he went to work in, and she found Rose too. She skipped her first class ever to try and get a chance to talk to the young lady. She waited outside her psychology class and scanned all of the female students entering the room. Trish knew what she looked like from social media. When she approached her, Rose was very taken aback. Apparently, they went for a coffee and got to know each other. According to Patricia, Rose revealed that James spent a lot of time with her. He usually gave her an envelope of cash every Monday morning, after a busy, and lucrative, weekend in the club. He was only being paid minimum wage, but made a fortune in tips as he grinded and gyrated against a pole.

We all were ashamed of the way he had chosen to live his life. There was no need, we would have been more than happy to help with money, especially if it meant he stayed in school. Patricia promised Rose that all anyone wanted was for the three of them to be okay! They exchanged numbers, then both went about their day.

Not wanting to bombard the poor girl, we kept her number but didn’t use it. We figured she would ring us if she knew anything more, something she had promised Patricia she’d do.

A week went by, myself and Ellen climbing the walls. When the phone rang on an autumnal Monday afternoon, we ran to it. It was Rose. We put it on loudspeaker so we could both hear what she was saying.

‘Hi. Um I’m Rose. I’m like, well I guess, James girlfriend. You haven’t, like, seen James all weekend, have you?’ she asked. ‘I’m only asking like, because his boss rang me an hour ago, saying he was like fired and could forget about getting paid for Friday because he let him down so much over the weekend.’

‘You mean you haven’t seen him since Friday?’ Ellen asked, perplexed.

That’s when I took over. ‘Hi Rose, its Patrick, James’ dad, thank you for making contact. I know it must have been hard for you!’

‘Hi’ she said before explaining the situation. ‘James usually drops in before class like, before he goes to work. I can’t even, like, ring him because his phone has been disconnected or something. He would, like, drop money off on a Monday morning, you know, from the weekend, but like, there’s been no sign of him today. It’s strange like, you know? Then I get this phone call, and I’m like, I’m his baby mamma, not his keeper!’ Rose took a breath.

‘Would you normally hear from James, except for a Monday morning I mean?’

‘Hi. Yeah, he would usually come over every day at like, around three or something. We’re trying hard to like, get to know each other and all. Especially because of the baby.’ Rose explained.

I wanted to ask her about my boy, but instead, decided to ask about her. ‘Are you ok? Do you need money?’

‘Well, umm…I’m supposed to go to the baby doctor and James promised that like he’d take me. Its across town and like, if he doesn’t show up soon, I’ll miss my appointment, you know?’

‘We can take you!’ Ellen blurted out. I nodded. ‘Yea, if you want, we can be there in forty minutes.’

‘Umm,’ I could hear her thinking, ‘would that be, ok? Like I mean, you wouldn’t mind?’

‘We’re grabbing the car keys right now!’ I said as I watched Ellen put on her jacket and look for her purse.

‘Thank you so much Mr. and Mrs. Malone! You’d be like, really helping!’

‘Please,’ I began, ‘it’s Ellen and Patrick!’

         

‘Are you ok Mr. Malone?’ detective Spencer repeated.

I felt my beloveds hand wipe the tears that were flowing from my eyes down my cheeks. I jumped as my trance willowed away like the leaves of the oak tree outside our neighbor’s front yard, the ones that always creeped into our yard that drove me crazy every single year.

As I thought of the leaves in the yard, I realized that Patricia and Mike were out there on their own with the boys. I started to rise off the seat of my chair, but, just as I got onto my honkers, Ellen pulled me back down.

‘But the yard sale?’ I asked her.

‘Patricia and Mike have it!’ Ellen reassured me and my butt hit the seat once again.

‘We tried so hard to bring our kids up right!’ I began to explain. ‘We attempted to bring them up feeling loved and with good morals. We wanted them to pass that love onto their own relationships and their own kids. Patricia, who is now pregnant with her fifth child, has passed on all that I could ever imagine to her family. She is such a great mom and wife. I’m so proud or her!’

‘We still have all of James stuff in boxes in the basement, ready to give them to him if he ever walks through that door again! There isn’t a chance in hell that we will get rid of any of his things…especially since he’s definitely dead now!’

‘I’m so, so very sorry for your loss, mist…hold on, when you say definitely dead now, what do you mean Patrick?’

‘Patrick?’ I felt Ellen touch my face. I looked at her with a blank stare. ‘Detective Spencer was asked you why did you say ‘now that we know he’s definitely dead?’