Second Chances (14 page)

“What if…?” Ben started to say, faltering, “what if I
hit
him?  Like my Dad hit me.  What if I—”

“That’s bullshit,” Richard interrupted. 

The kid stopped midsentence, floundering on his words. He
looked at Richard sharply with a vague expression of anger and confusion.

Silence enfolded the room, hanging heavy, while Richard
slowly shook his head back and forth.

“The only thing that would make you hit your kid is 
you
.”

“After everything I was exposed to by my father—”

“No,” Richard said, breathing heavy. “No.  You can’t
keep blaming
him
. I get it. You were abused as a kid. It sucks. It
really does. But guess what? It’s time to grow up.”

“Grow up? How the hell am I supposed to grow up?”

“I listened to your sob story,” Richard said, “And I get it.
I really do. Life is tough and you were dealt a crappy hand.  But you act
like you’ve got everything figured out. You keep pointing the finger of blame
at yourself, like you know all the answers and like you’re the problem.”

“I
am
the problem—”

“But you know what,” Richard said, ignoring the kid. His
voice went up a notch as he felt his anger flare a little bit, but he kept it
steady.  His years of practicing law had taught him how to keep control of
his emotions and argue in a clean, clear voice.  “You don’t know anything. 
It’s time to get passed it.  It’s time to grow up and move on. You have a
kid on the way and all you want to do is complain about how bad you’ve got it?”

“What the hell do you know?” Ben asked angrily, standing
up. 

Richard stood up as well, kicking his chair back and
stepping closer to the kid. It screeched on the floor.

“I know that you’re looking for an easy way out. An easy
solution. But guess what?
Life. Isn’t. Easy
.  Sometimes you have to
mature and stop looking for excuses.”

“Excuses? Man I was
beaten
by my father. My sister
overdosed
and died. What do you want from me?”

“I want you to step up and take ownership over your life.
Stop pretending like you have all the answers and admit that you don’t know everything.
Hell, you don’t know much of anything right now.”

“Man—”

“Admit that you need help,” Richard continued. “There’s a
cutoff point for every person where they have to stop blaming their parents for
their childhoods and take ownership over their own lives. Their own
mistakes.  And guess what: you crossed it. You crossed that line when you
got a girl pregnant.  Now it’s time to grow up and accept responsibility.”

“And what if I turn out—”

Richard took another step closer, his voice rising in
volume.  He felt his body trembling and reminded himself to stay in
control. To stay cool.

It didn’t work.  

“You just want someone to blame. You want people to feel
pity for you. You want me to say: ‘Oh life was so rough for you, I totally
understand why you’re a fuckup.’ You want to be able to say, after you screw up
and make mistakes: ‘see, I knew I would mess up, but it isn’t my fault. It’s
everyone else’s fault.’’”

“I don’t want to blame anyone,” Ben shot back.

“Yes. You. Do. You’ve been telling me this entire sob story,
and the entire time all I hear is ‘woe is me, woe is me, I had it so rough and
now you can understand why I’m this way.’ But do you know what I 
see? 
I
see a young man who is going to be a father who is looking for any reason
possible to abandon his child.” 

Richard took another step closer. The kid backed up,
mounting fear in his eyes.

“That’s why you stole the bottle from the liquor shop.”

“I brought it
here
, didn’t I?” the kid said
meekly. 

“Because deep down there is some part of you that is crying
out, begging for help, and all you keep doing is trying to push it back down
because you think you already have all the answers. You think you know the
whole story. You are afraid to admit that you need help and that you can’t do
this alone. You want to drink so that things will get easier. If you drink, it
isn’t your fault. It’s your Dad’s fault because he beat you. It’s your sister’s
fault because she died so tragically.”

“Dude, fuck you,” the kid replied, taking another step
back. 

Richard continued ignoring him, stepping closer again. “You
say it’s your fault, and you know you shouldn’t blame anyone else. But you are
still lying to yourself. You’re just saying what you think I
want
to
hear. Do you know whose fucking fault it 
isn’t? 
It’s not your
child’s fault. So either grow up and start taking responsibility for your
mistakes or get the fuck out.”

“What
 
do you know?”

“There’s the fucking door,” Richard yelled, gesturing toward
the exit.  “If you want to whine and moan and look for easy answers for
why you are this way then get the hell out.”

“Man, what the 
fuck 
do you know?” Ben
yelled back.

“I know because I was beaten too,” Richard shouted into the
kid’s face. 

The words hung in the air, suspended, and suddenly all the
anger slipped out of Richard. He felt tired, drained, and weak.  The kid
stood there, mouth hanging open but with nothing to say. 

Richard fell heavily into his chair, rubbing his forehead
and slouching.

“I was beaten too.”

Ben sat back down, bowing his head slightly. A minute
passed, then turned into two. Neither of them moved. 

Richard forced himself to sit up straight, rubbing his hand
across his eyes.  “I was seven the first time.  He only hit me once
in a while, and only for a few years until I was about eleven. But it was
enough.”

The kid seemed to chew over several responses before shaking
his head and just mumbling: “Man.”

“I hated him,” Richard continued.  “I turned seventeen
and I left. Went to college and didn’t look back. Didn’t speak to anyone in my
family for years. I didn’t even start talking to Jason again until I was almost
forty. I wanted to blame my Dad for everything, make it all his fault. He beat
me, so what else was I supposed to do? I was just a product of my environment
so it wouldn’t really be my fault if I screwed up.  And do you know what
happened?”

“What?”

“Nothing.  I thought I was punishing him by avoiding
him, but he could have cared less.  I was only hurting myself, hurting my
family.  And because of it, I almost turned into him.”

Richard paused here, not sure if he should continue. 

His mouth kept going, though, before he could even decide: 

“I fell in love at college to the sweetest woman in the
world.  Someone who could tolerate that I was an asshole; who would put up
with me through thick and thin. Someone who understood me. We got married, and
were happy.

“Then one day my wife and I got into a fight. It was over
something really stupid, we were both wrong, but that wasn’t the point. It was
a screaming match and we were both pissed off without good reason. I said
something cruel and she pushed me into the wall.  So I drew my hand back
to hit her.”

Richard hesitated, wiping his eyes again. The room was
deathly quiet.

“I remember it all perfectly, frozen in time. I remember
thinking how 
good 
it would feel to hit her.  To assert
myself, because she’d already hit me. And I remember thinking: ‘it won’t really
be my fault because it happened to me when I was a kid.’

“And that scared the shit out of me,” Richard said.  He
shook his head slowly, back and forth with his eyes closed, as if willing the
memory away.  “I only hesitated for a second, but long enough for me to
stop and ask: ‘is this the man I want to become?’ I hated my father, and here I
was about to turn into him.”

“What did you do?” Ben asked.

“I ran out of the house.  I ran down the road and left
my car behind.  I didn’t even have shoes on. I could hear her screaming behind
me, yelling for me to come back, but I didn’t care.  All I knew was that I
had to get away.

“I wandered down the road until about four in the morning
before she found me.  She was scared to death, and she apologized
profusely for the fight, for hitting me, for everything. We made up, put it
behind us, and moved on. 

“But I never really moved past it. Not inside. I vowed
something to myself at that moment: never again. Never again would I have to
stop myself like that only seconds before hitting someone I loved. I would
never
be like my father. 

“I hated him because of what he did to me, so how could I do
something like that to someone else?  I was my own man, and he wouldn’t
have that kind of power over me.

“I have two kids now,” Richard said.  “I love them to
death, and I hope…” he hesitated and shook his head again, “no, I 
know
 that
I am giving them a better life than I had.”

Ben bowed his head again, folding his hands between his
knees.  “How do you do it?”

“The anger is still there,” Richard said.  “At my
father. At life, because it wasn’t fair. I just don’t give it a voice.  I
decided upon the man I want to be and I worked at it.  I’m 
still
 working
at it, even now, because the anger will never go completely away. That voice
that wants me to just give in, to just give up, it’s still there. The journey
never stops, but I can make incremental steps along the way.”

A moment passed in silence.

“I was lucky,” Richard said.  “I honestly have no clue
what made me stop, what kept me from hitting her.  God maybe, or more
likely something more mundane.  I don’t really care, I’m just thankful
every day that I’m not that man.  I have my problems—God knows we all
do—but I’m working on them.”

On an impulse Richard reached into his jacket pocket and
pulled a little silver box out.  From inside he fished out a business
card.  He handed it to Ben. 

“I don’t really know how this whole process works, with
sponsorship and alcoholics and all of that, but if you don’t have someone you
can call and you’re thinking about doing something stupid, then call me.”

Ben glanced at the card.  “I thought you weren’t an
alcoholic.”

“I’m not,” Richard replied. “But I know part of what you’re
going through. It’s not easy. I do get it, Ben.  You had it rough. A lot
rougher than me. Your life has sucked so far, and it would be the easiest thing
in the world to just keep going how have been. 

“You don’t owe me anything. You might owe yourself
something, but that’s for you to decide.  But this kid? You owe him or her
a chance to maybe one day meet their father. Their sober father. You owe this
child your best shot, even if it’s just a shot in the dark.

“All that stuff you told me? It’s horrible. I wouldn’t wish your
life on my worst enemy. And believe me, in my profession I have some pretty bad
enemies.  But you need to put it behind you.  Turn it into your
past
,
something that used to be a part of you but isn’t any longer.  Make this your
past, and go find your future.”

“How do I do that?” 

“It is a daily struggle for me, and sometimes I wish I had
someone I could just reach out to. Someone who understood how hard it was to
get over something like that.  Something blessed me and helped me become a
better man…

“…and maybe, just maybe, I could do the same for you.”

Ben stared at the card for another second.  “Thanks,”
he said, sliding it into his pocket.  

“No problem,” Richard said, then stretched his back out,
feeling it pop and crack. 

The moment was over: “God these chairs suck.”

The kid laughed. The air seemed to get lighter, easier to
breathe.  “I know. They are terrible.”

“Won’t have to deal with them anymore,” Jason interrupted
sadly from the back hallway.

Richard turned and saw his little brother leaning against
the wall with his arms folded, partly hidden in shadows.  He wondered how
long Jason had been there and realized it had probably been most of the time
Ben had been speaking. He just hadn’t made his presence known. 

“What do you mean?” Ben asked.

“This was the last day the clinic is open,” Jason said,
stepping further into the light and walking toward them.  “Tomorrow I have
to turn the keys over.”

“You’re kidding,” Ben said, looking back and forth between
the two brothers.  “Where are we supposed to go now for help?”

“I don’t know,” Jason said, “I’ll figure something out. We
used to use a local church, before I rented out this space, so maybe they’ll
let us come back.”

“We need to have somewhere,” Ben said. “Yours is the only
clinic in the area.”

“I know.  There’s nothing I can do about it though. I
already tried every resource I have available. Do you have a place to stay?”

Ben shook his head.  “I’ve been sleeping in an alley up
the road on most nights. It’s out of sight.”

“I know a shelter you can stay at for a while,” Jason
said.  He turned to Richard. “You don’t mind going a few minutes out of
the way before getting home, do you?”

Richard shook his head. His entire body felt numb right
now from his recent outburst and he was still trying to get his raging emotions
under control. 

His father wasn’t something he liked talking about, and
especially not the events of his childhood; it wasn’t that his father was a
terrible person and Richard hated him: Richard didn’t even blame him for what
had happened all those years ago.

But, that didn’t mean he liked to think about it.

Jason gestured toward the door and they headed out into the
night. It was completely dark outside and cooling off from the heat of the day.
Traffic was nonexistent. They stood in silence for a minute outside the clinic,
and Richard closed his eyes, letting the air cool off his skin.  

“Are you ready?” Jason asked.

“Yeah,” Richard said.  “I’m ready.”

He let out a yawn as they climbed into the car, rubbing his
eyes and wondering how late it was.  He wasn’t sure how long Ben had been
talking.

He decided he didn’t really care. Probably after ten,
but he could handle going to work tired.

Jason kicked the car into motion and they sputtered down the
road. They traveled without speaking, listening to the rumble of the engine and
wind whistling past their windows.

Richard glanced in the mirror and saw the kid resting in the
back, staring out the window. Ben’s eyes were faraway, lost in thought and
memory. Richard didn’t envy his circumstances.

He would have a tough life, whether or not he decided to
better himself.  Pulling himself back up after falling so far would not be
easy.

But Richard had confidence in the kid. Maybe Ben could actually
make things work.  He was lost and scared, and if he really decided he wanted
to make things better, he still could. There was a spark in him, and Richard had
hope that things might work out.

Jason pulled into a rundown parking lot outside an old three
story building. They were still inside the city limits, but on the outskirts.
It looked to be a converted fire house, with two large loading doors in the
front.

A few lights were on in the upstairs windows, but there were
no street lamps or external light sources. Both of the bay doors were closed
and it looked quiet.

“Is that jazz?” Richard asked, hearing the faint music spilling
from inside.

“Probably,” Jason said.  “The woman who runs this place is a
huge Coltrane fan.”

Jason walked to a wooden door beside the bay doors and
knocked gently.  After several seconds it was opened.  A tall woman stood in
the doorway, thin and wearing a sundress.  She smiled when she noticed Jason
standing there.

“Jason!” she said, then wrapped him up in a hug, laughing. 
“Haven’t seen you in
forever.”

“Hey, Vickie,” Jason said, laughing.  “Good to see you, too.”

“Where have you been?”

“Dealing with some personal problems,” Jason replied. 

“The clinic?” Vickie asked. 

Jason nodded. “Officially losing it tomorrow.”

She waved her hand in dismissal.  “Good riddance, I say.  I
always liked St. Mary’s Church better anyway. They had better tables.”

Jason shrugged. “I suppose.”

“Come on in,” Vickie said, gesturing. 

They followed her into a large room. It was mostly empty
with rows of tables in the center and a makeshift kitchen along the left wall.
As Richard had expected, large fire poles stood near the back wall of the room,
connecting to the upper floors.

Dozens of forms lay scattered around the fire hall, some
sleeping on tables and others on the floor. A few even had makeshift cots made
out of old pallets.

Their clothes were dirty and cheap and layered thicker than
the weather dictated. Various stained and rugged backpacks littered the floor
and leaned against the walls.   The smell of old sweat and burnt
beans hung in the air, the latter remnants of a soup dinner.

Most were asleep but two were still awake, sitting at a
table and talking quietly to each other.  Vickie went on ahead, leaning in
and speaking to the group at the table.  Her voice was low, too soft to make
out any words.

“These are friends,” Jason explained to Ben as they walked. 
“Good people. They can help take care of you for a while. A few used to drink,
but they don’t anymore.”

Ben nodded.  The group stood up as they approached and
came over to greet them.  Jason walked up and shook hands with both of them. 

“Hey Mark. Alex. How are you guys doing?” Jason asked, nodding
to the two of them.  

“I’ve been good,” Alex replied, smiling warmly. He had a
thick and disheveled beard, but friendly eyes.  “What brings you here so late?”

“Just coming to visit and speak with Vickie,” Jason said. 
“You missed the meeting.”

“Couldn’t get a ride,” Alex replied, scratching his beard. 
“And I’m sorry I missed it. Vic said it was the last. Did you set off
fireworks?”

Jason laughed.  “No fireworks.”

“I would have just burned the place down when I was done. Screw
the government,” Mark said, shaking his head. 

Alex laughed.  “That might be a little much. So how’d it
go?”

“Really well,” Jason said.  “We had a great turnout and
a lot of people shared tonight.”

“That’s good.”

“Yeah,” Jason said. He gestured toward Richard. “And my
brother came too, so it was nice he got to see it before it closed down.”

Alex nodded. “What are you doing with all of the stuff? Need
help moving out?”

“I don’t think so. Some of it I’m going to hang on to, like
the tables and coffee maker, but the rest I’ll probably drop off here.  A lot
of it wasn’t mine, or isn’t worth taking.”

“Sounds good,” Alex said. “Just let us know if you need any
help.”

“Will do,” Jason said.

“This is your brother?” Vickie asked, nodding toward
Richard.  

“Yeah. This is Richard,” Jason said.  “He’s older than me by
a few years.”

“A pleasure to meet you,” she said, offering her hand to
Richard. “You guys kind of look alike.”

Richard took the offered hand and squeezed it gently,
smiling back.  “You’re one of the first people to ever say that.”

“It’s a compliment,” she said.  “Jason is one handsome
devil.”

“Ah shucks Vickie,” Jason said, feigning embarrassment. “Hearing
a gorgeous creature like you say that makes my toes tingle.”

She giggled.  “Now 
I’m 
blushing. 
Who is the kid?”

“This is Ben,” Jason said, stepping aside to let him
through. Ben shook their offered hands, still quiet and subdued.  “Do you
guys mind looking after him for a few days? Help him get settled in.”

“Of course,” Alex said.  

“He’s somewhat new to the area and was living near the
clinic, but with it shutting down I wanted to make sure he had somewhere safe
to spend a few nights.”

“It’s no problem,” Vickie said. “We’re well stocked for the
next few weeks and I can help him get situated.”

“Thanks,” Jason said.

He fished his wallet out and pulled a few bills from inside
the fold.   He handed the money to Vickie.  Richard noticed the
wallet was bare by the time he was done.  “Take care of yourselves.”

“You, too, Jason.”

“I mean it,” Jason said.  “Just because the clinic is closed
doesn’t mean I won’t be stopping by to check up on you. I’ll be here whenever I
get the chance so no relapses, got it?”

“We’ve got it,” Alex said.  “But let us know when you get a
new place to host meetings.”

“Going back to the church?” Vickie asked.

“I’m not sure if I’ll be able to, but I’ll talk to the
pastor tomorrow about it.  We’ll figure something out.”

“We know,” Alex said.  “You’ve always been there for us
before.  We know you’ll still be here tomorrow. This doesn’t change
anything, Jason.  Chin up.  The world keeps spinning.”

Jason smiled sadly.  “Thanks, Alex.  Vickie. You guys
take care of yourselves.” 

Vickie gave Jason a quick hug and then took Ben by the
shoulder.  She gently led him further into the room, talking to him about
the shelter and the people. 

Richard stood beside his brother with the other two men. He
felt entirely out of place in his Armani suit and polished shoes; it made him
stick out, different.

“Looks like a good kid,” Alex said, once the two were out of
earshot.

“He is,” Richard replied.  “And he’s way too young to be in
a situation like this.”

The words, Richard realized after he said them, could be seen
as an insult to the two men standing in front of him.  They didn’t take it as
such though.

“You’ve got that right,” Alex said.  “Ain’t an easy life.”

“I’ll see you around,” Jason said, shaking their hands on
more time before leaving.

“Wait,” Ben said suddenly, turning around and heading back
over toward Richard.  “Will you…will you really help me?”

“Sure,” Richard said.  “I meant what I said. Call me if
you need anything.”

“I want to do right by the child,” Ben said.  “By
my
child.”

Richard nodded.  “And you will. It won’t be easy, but
you will.”

Ben grinned and then lunged forward before Richard could
react.  He wrapped him in a bear hug, squeezing harder than Richard
thought necessary.

“Thank you.”

“Anytime,” Richard said, attempting feebly to extricate
himself.  The kid pushed away after a few moments, sniveling. He nodded
again to Richard and Jason and then hurried back to catch up with Vickie.

Richard glanced at his brother and the other two men.  All
of them were silent with bemused expressions on their faces. 

He followed Jason out into the night. They climbed into the
car and drove off in silence.  Richard stared out the window, thinking
about the moments in his life that led to this.

“What time is it?” he asked.

“Half past ten,” Jason replied.

“Do you think we have time for one last stop?”