Past and Present

Bobby is six years old and his room is a prison. His father had a bolt installed on the other side of the door so that he could keep his little monster inside. The old man’s rage fills the house, hiding in the shadows that the dim illumination of Bobby’s feeble nightlight sheds on the room. He keeps himself company by pretending that the electric bulb is a campfire and imagining the constantly shifting shadows that flame produces. Monsters in the dark don’t frighten him, but isolation does. Downstairs he can hear his father’s raging voice taper off and his mother gives a nervous laugh as the two are out for a night on the town. From his prison window, Bobby has watched them pull away more times than his 1st-grade arithmetic has taught him to count. Every time he yells at them to never come back. This is the exact opposite of what he wants.

Cathy first met Bobby in the grocery store when he came through her checkout lane with a jar of spaghetti sauce. He could have gone through the express lane, but he waited patiently behind four other customers with full carts, cradling the glass container as though it would taste better after having aged for twenty minutes in line. He would find out later that she became instantly attracted to what she said were his sad, soulful eyes. They had a short conversation, and over time he became a regular. Months later she asked him to dinner after work and her words caught him off guard. It was all he could do to say yes instead of no, because she was the first person who actually wanted to come into the locked room of his life.

Now he’s maybe ten and hiding in the bushes out in the yard, having realized that his runaway attempt is doomed because he has no friends to hide with. The moonlight makes his skin look pale and blue, and he hears his father yell for him, alcohol tangling the man’s tongue. Bobby looks down at the scratches cut into his skin by the cold clinging branches and realizes that they are a welcome change from the welts and bruises that will come when he gets caught. Peering through trembling leaves he sees his father wandering the yard in his pajamas, upset at how late it is and furious at Bobby for once again disturbing his peaceful existence. With broad shoulders, unkempt hair, and day-old whiskers, Bobby’s father is a foreign creature to the youth’s world of glasses, books, and Fischer Price telescopes. He wants to understand what makes these things happen. If he knows the whys and hows, he can control them, prevent them, and make others safe.

Bobby was in medical school when they started dating, and Cathy had only just finished getting her GED. They spent exactly one hour every evening together, and on Fridays they would be intimate and he would stay the night. She wanted him to be around more often, but he couldn’t seem to focus on her for that long at one time. He had more important work to do. His studies would teach him how to heal and how to save, and everything else seemed small compared to those. Even he seemed insignificant when compared to the possibility of the aid he would one day give. So his life filled with books and test scores, and she waited for him at her dinner table with a lit candle, usually managing to keep her complaints unspoken.

He’s fourteen, and he changes from week to week. His face explodes in acne that reminds him of lava flowing through the streets of Pompeii. His bones stretch and grow too fast for the skin, leaving him feeling as though his skeleton might burst out and start walking on its own if he moves too quickly. His voice breaks into a squeal and then mends itself only to break again. His mother tries to comfort him and tell him he’s just growing up. She says that even his father went through this phase, but he can’t believe that the smug-faced man with dead eyes and a gray mustache was ever in a position that he couldn’t control. The old man has been especially abusive lately, belligerent because of some problems going on at work and furious that Bobby has suddenly gained an appetite. They explode into arguments on a nightly basis now that Bobby has stopped retreating into his room at the first sign of a fight. Their battle culminates when Bobby turns his back on the old man and gets a heavy hand clamped down onto his shoulder. Bobby spins around and hits the old man hard, knocking him backwards. He watches the surprise in his father’s face and looks at his own quivering limbs. When his father strikes back he doesn’t resist and lets his mother separate the two. He has discovered how to hurt someone and promises to never do it again lest he become like the aging and suddenly weakened old man.

They had a fight. Or rather, she had a fight. Cathy couldn’t stand how cold he was, and she finally said so. Bobby remained mute and seated while she shouted and cried, knocking over a chair on her way out. He discovered then that there are more ways than one to hurt someone and decided to learn how to cure this broken relationship. He went over to her apartment, bringing a handful of neatly cut flowers. He knew that flowers made people feel better because he had seen so many patients receive them. The worse the situation, the more flowers they got. He found his theory confirmed when she saw the bouquet and smiled, her eyes shining with tears. He smiled back with her and stayed a little longer that night, happy that he had helped her.

Three years later he’s sitting in the front row at the old man’s funeral. His father lies in his casket, his face peaceful and his lips quiet for the first time that Bobby can remember. Even now Bobby shakes, fearing that this is all some elaborate trick and that his father will leap up at him at any moment. This is the first time in his life that he has ever been afraid of ghosts or monsters. But the fear passes with the funeral, and one hour later Bobby’s father is put into the ground and buried safely away. Bobby rests his hand on his mother’s shoulder in a weak attempt to console the weeping widow. His aunt May sits in the passenger seat of the sedan during the ride home, leaving Bobby in back with his thoughts. When no one is looking, he smiles. The smile comes quickly and leaves just as soon as he worries whether or not his father, now an omniscient spirit, can see it. Bobby realizes that he is not as free as he thought and wonders where his future will go; whether his childhood is behind him or whether the years ahead of him will be tainted by these experiences, simply footnotes to what came before.

They got married after Bobby graduated and while Cathy was taking part-time college courses. They spent their honeymoon in Alaska because Cathy liked cold weather and sled races and because Bobby wanted to be as far away from home as possible. On their plane ride back she slept with her head resting on his shoulder and Bobby smiled because he thought that he had finally gotten rid of the old man in the back of his mind. Then a few days later she raised a hand to pat his shoulder. He flinched, and realized that he still hadn’t been healed.

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