Breaking Brooklyn (15 page)

It’s a co-residential rehabilitation program
that only segregates men and women by rooms. Common areas and group
therapy are shared space. On my first day in the center, the
doctors put me on Antabuse and methadone so I could start my
detoxification.

Sobriety is a scary thing. It’s forcing me to
see myself for who I am, which is the very thing I am running from.
I have to look at, and accept, the destruction I left behind.
Worse, I have to remember all of the people I have hurt: Sam, his
parents, my mother, and most of all, my son.

I am reliving my mistakes, lies, tricks, and
deceits, over and over again as I sit alone in my room at night.
I’m unable to sleep. I hate myself even more than I thought was
possible. My craving for alcohol and drugs gets worse and worse
every day I’m sober.

I am looking at life from the bottom up, with
no money, and no place to live. My mother has cut me off and I
cannot count on my father. So, I fell back on what I know best,
finding someone else to prop me up.

I met my meal ticket during a group counseling
session. Sy was older man with very little hair and a good-sized
beer gut. Fraternizing with the opposite sex is prohibited, but I
see Sy quite a bit in the common areas. I learned all that I could
about him. He has a good paying job as a master welder at Amtrak,
and he is single.

A costly mistake on the job while intoxicated
had landed him with the choice of going to rehab or being
fired.

Sy is a good ‘ol’ boy from the Appalachian
Mountains in Tennessee. His family migrated to a Southern part of
Indianapolis when he was a young boy. They were extremely poor and
uneducated. However, Sy is unusually smart. His intelligence
enabled him to get high marks on his welder’s test and get a good
paying job.

Sy came from a huge family, a tree with
branches growing every which way. Every single one of his siblings
and cousins had children with multiple partners. Sy is the only one
who hasn’t had any kids yet. I hear he is sterol from all the
drinking.

The more I get to know about him, the more I
like the idea of being with him. It’s not complicated. Sy will be
easy to manipulate. If I am going to get my life back on track
after rehab, the fastest way to do it will be to make something
happen with him.

In our group therapy sessions, I glance his
way a lot, trying to get him to notice me. I have to literally
convince myself to like him. He is a large man with intimidating
features that make me feel safe. He has a strong jaw, but he is
balding. What hair is left grows around his head like a horseshoe.
His face is pocked with burn marks from welding sparks, which make
his face red and rough like and old piece of leather. When I think
of making love to him, I cringe.

Chapter
fifteen

“Some, they didn't make it. The
temptation just too strong. How can darkness cloud the mind to what
I know as wrong?”
― Kimberly Nalen

Jack Napier - Day 29

I have been in the hospital for almost a month
now. My nightmares are getting worse. Last night I had a dream
about Sy.

DREAM:

I hear footsteps from underneath my door.
They are slow and deliberate. I feel my heart thump against my
ribcage as I anticipate of the evil that’s making its way to my
room. Suddenly, the door flings open and I can see the silhouette
of a large man with a belt in his hand. The white light behind him
is blinding. As the beast approaches me I lose my breath. I am so
scared! The angry man grabs a handful of my hair and pulls me off
the bed.

Just the memory of Sy paralyzes my thoughts. I
didn't want to but Harleen insisted that I journal about him. She
told me that I need to confront my past so I can be free in the
present. Actually, writing about my life has not been as bad as I
thought. It’s helping me relax.

After my mother’s fevered dance with the
“Devil” and The New Church of Christ, she went completely off the
rails. She popped pills and chased after sex in her need to forget
about her past. She had dug a hole so deep she gave up on the idea
that she would ever get out.

I was being neglected like never before. There
was never any food in the house and I was left all alone for days
at a time. In a two-week period, Grandpa Bob hadn’t seen one sober
day. At this point his drinking was no longer a party, it was a
sickness. He was now drinking to avoid the painful
crash.

He would wake up late in the morning and take
a couple of shots of whisky to get rid of his hangover. Every day
started the same: No breakfast, no hello, just booze. Eventually,
he lost track of the days and was missing work on a regular basis.
Morris at the used car lot couldn’t take it anymore.

Grandpa Bob didn’t bother telling my mother
that he got fired. Maybe he was embarrassed, or just so sick from
his need to drink that he couldn’t. He would dress for work then
sneak off to the Alley Cat in the morning. My mother, who was lost
in her own depraved party, didn’t suspect a thing.

At one point Grandpa Bob was nowhere to be
found. He was late again on rent. I knew this because I had found a
handwritten note on the front door that said “EVICTION WARNING
NOTICE.” I knew from experience that soon our keys would no longer
work. This also meant I would have to spend a few days in the same
clothes looking for a place to sleep while my grandfather got his
shit together. Hopefully, this wouldn’t be with one of my mom’s
loser boyfriends.

I decided I was going to find him and
straighten things out sooner rather than later. So, I rode my bike
down a few blocks then over several streets until I saw the Alley
Cat. It was tucked behind the Broad Ripple Auto Body Shop. I parked
my bike outside the entrance, then opened the heavy metal door. As
soon as I walked through the door, I could smell cigarette smoke
mixed with stale beer and bad breath. It was packed. All the voices
sounded like one giant screeching noise.

“
What if I can’t find him?” I
murmured to myself.

Then I heard the laugh that identified my
Grandpa Bob no matter where he was.

“MMAAAAH, MMAAAAH, MMAAAAH!” he belted,
throwing back a shot of Irish whisky.

He was sitting close to a young lady with a
fair complexion and dirty-blonde hair. The kind of blonde you get
when you bleach your hair with peroxide. She was wearing a really
tight V-neck tee shirt that showed off her boobs.

Pointing at me, Grandpa Bob shouted, “That’s
my boy! Come give me a hug knucklehead!” Then he looked over his
shoulder to big tits. “Tina, show my boy your tits.” He busted out
laughing “MMAAAAH, MMAAAAH!”

Without the slightest hesitation, Tina lifted
her tight T-shirt and gave me more than an eyeful. I had seen
women’s breasts in the magazines I found while dumpster diving with
my friends, but never in real life.

My heart was racing like I was being chased by
a pack of wild dogs. I started to sweat profusely and unwilling
blinked my eyes. Finally, she put her shirt down. I just stood
there frozen in place as everyone in the bar laughed.

“What do you need kid?” Grandpa Bob
asked.

“
What I have to say is private,
Grandpa Bob.”

“
Oh come on, kid! You can tell me
now. What is it?” he said, clearly an effort to impress his
friend.

“I don’t want to say,” I said with a “please
go outside with me” expression.

“Don’t you have friends to go play with?” he
asked, now irritated with our exchange.

“
Yes. This is important, Grandpa
Bob.”

“
Then say it, son!”

Feeling I had no choice, I shouted, “We’re
being evicted again!”

My grandfather glared at me, grinding his
teeth. He was angry with me for embarrassing him in front of
Tina.

“Go on, kid! That’s an adult matter. I’ll take
care of it!” He glanced over at Tina. “He has no idea what’s going
on. My landlord is a real asshole and never fixes anything, so I
withhold my rent until the work gets done. In return, he threatens
to evict us. It's just a game I have to play to get stuff
done.”

Looking back at me, he shouted, “Hey, kid,
don’t look at me like I stole your candy. It’ll be fine. Now go
play.”

It was an impossible situation. I had nowhere
to go and no one to look out for me.

As I suspected we were evicted and I was on
the streets of Broad Ripple. Eventually, Child Protective Services
was called and took me in while they looked for my mother. When
they found her she was arrested and charged with child neglect. By
court order she had to check into the Fairbanks and get clean. This
time grandma Daisy got involved and was able to get temporary
custody of me.

When my mother got out of Fairbanks, she
married Sy and they had two kids. I would visit them over summer
break and one weekend a month during the school year. My mother
wasn’t happy about the situation because she felt Grandma Daisy got
exactly what she wanted.

At first my mother and Sy were able to control
their drinking. But my mother, being her reckless self, got
restless. The stress of having two young kids started to get to
her. A casual glass of wine turned into several, which triggered
her need for the pleasures of something stronger. It was straight
downhill from there. Sy, trying to escape the humiliation of her
actions, also started drinking heavily. They had unconsciously
formed a bond that enabled each other’s addictions.

Sy was having violent mood swings on a daily
basis. His frustration would grow when we didn’t understand his
delusions. When this happened Sy and my mother would screaming at
each other for hours. My brother and sister would hide under the
covers. My mother would storm out of the house, leaving Sy alone
with my brother and sister, knowing he couldn’t leave. What Sy
didn’t realize was that she planned the whole thing so she could go
out and party with her new friends in Beech Grove.

Sy started hearing rumors that my mother was
cheating on him. People were even questioning whether little Mikey
was even Sy’s. The rumors undid him. He was infuriated and
embarrassed. The louder the gossip got, the more violent his mood
swings grew. He became so paranoid that my mother stayed away from
him out of fear that he would hurt her.

Sy would hang out in the detached garage in
the back of the house and develop conspiracy theories. He would
write down license plate numbers on small pieces of paper and taped
them all over the walls of the garage. Then he would pin lines of
string between the numbers in random patterns that only he
understood.

Sy was definitely very different than anyone
else in his family. Though he had only gone to grade school for two
years as a child, he was remarkably intelligent. This made him
stand out from the rest of his illiterate siblings. And when I say
they were illiterate, I mean they couldn’t even write their names
on a piece of paper.

When Sy’s family migrated to Indianapolis he
got a job at Muller Welding on the maintenance crew. His
curiosities led him to learn all about welding. He soon asked the
master welders to let him give it a try. When they saw how quickly
he picked up the techniques, they made him an apprentice. From
there he quickly became a master welder. When Amtrak got wind of
his abilities they offered him a good paying job with
benefits.

I remember walked in on Sy one morning while
he was in the garage. He started asking me lots of questions about
the project he was working on.

“
What does this look like to you,
Jack?” he asked.

I knew from past experiences if I didn’t
answer, he would become very suspicious, frustrated, and start
yelling. He would even whack me in the back of the head sometimes,
asking me the same question again. I quickly learned how to placate
him by answering his question with a question of my own.

For example, one day Sy asked me a question
once about a problem he was working on.

“
Jack, what do you see within
these two numbers?” he said as he pointed them out on the
wall.

I quickly responded, “Um, I actually think
there might be some kind of math connection. Why is there a string
between them?”