A Man Named Dave

on it. A moment later, although there was only an arm’s length between us, I knew Mother and I were worlds apart.
    With a slight nod of her head, she let go of my hand. Mother understood. And yet I couldn’t move. “If this means anything, the one thing I can give you is this: You,” I said, pointing, with tears seeping from my eyes, “you made me strong. Because of … you made me want it more.”
    Mother cocked her head to the side. By her expression, I knew I had hit a raw nerve. Mother sucked in a deep breath, and I could feel the pressure build inside me. But a second later she let it pass. With the slightest nod, she understood my compliment.
    As I walked down the stairs leading to the door, Mother burst out, “David!” With my hand on the doorknob I spun around. “Yes?”
    “Do you love your son?” she asked.
    Feeling choked up while a dam of pressure built up from behind my eyes, I stated, “Yes! With every fiber of my being!”
    “Just remember,” Mother cried, “at one time I did … I loved mine, too.”
    In the car I couldn’t stop myself from shaking. A bone-chilling sensation crept up my spine. Once away from Mother’s house, I pulled the car to the curb, opened the door, and threw up.

11 – A Personal Matter
    Not a single day passed since my visit with Mother that I did not think about her. Whenever I found myself alone, my thoughts always turned to her. Usually I ended up wondering whether if someone had stepped in early enough to actually dig at the root of the problem, then maybe things wouldn’t have ended as they did. As Stephen grew from a toddler to a young boy before my eyes, I became haunted by Mother’s condition. Part of me felt torn between the life I had with my son and the darkness of Mother’s jail, as if someday, without warning, I could join her world. As if no matter what I did, no matter how hard I tried, I was destined to become like her. I felt in order to protect Stephen, I had to be a better person. I had to do more.
    In a sense, Stephen was slowly becoming not only my outlet but my savior. When not at work, I’d squeeze in every minute I could to be with my son. Rushing home after a flight, I’d strip off my sticky flight suit, shower, then race outside to watch Stephen splash in his tiny play pool. When he wasn’t playing in the water, he’d play baseball. Dressed in his brightly colored shorts, tank top, and no shoes, Stephen would clutch his oversized plastic red Bam Bam bat and cry out that it was time for “brasebrall”. Since I had never played ball or any other games with my father, I was in complete awe of the smallest thing Stephen and I did together. Once, as the sun was setting, with Patsy across the street gabbing with her friends, I pitched a slow underhand ball to Stephen. He whacked the ball from the middle of our yard and across the street, zooming over Patsy’s head and landing a few feet behind her. As Stephen ran in quasi circles, with his hand smacking the tree, the bumper of our car, or anything that he believed resembled a base, I hollered to tell Patsy of Stephen’s accomplishment.
    Since Patsy had seemingly missed Stephen’s monster hit, I sprinted across the street to tell her and to pick up the ball. As I reached the sidewalk where Patsy stood, one of her friends, Debbie, grabbed her own toddler by the arm and yanked the girl toward her. “Put the ball down, it’s not yours! You stupid little shit! You’d better listen up or I’ll whack ya till ya do!”
    Bending down, I thanked the little girl, Katie, as she dropped the ball into my hand. I could see her holding back tears. I stroked her head, turned up to Debbie, and said, “Katie’s a real cutie!” Debbie gave me a hostile look before huffing at me, then at Patsy. Maintaining my stance, without pushing too far, all I could do was smile at Katie, stroll back to Stephen, and take him inside.
    Later that night in bed, the incident with Katie continued to gnaw at me. For months I had heard Debbie lash out at Katie and then the sound of Katie’s crying. At times when I played outside with Stephen, I’d catch glimpses of Debbie, between her chain-smoking puffs, screeching obscenities at Katie while the girl played. Reminding me of myself as a child, Katie always responded by slumping her shoulders. But whenever Stephen played with Katie, Debbie seemed overly kind. When I brought up the subject to Patsy, she agreed about Debbie’s behavior, but brushed it off by saying, “Debbie’s just a loud person.” Since my