Buried Biker (28 page)

Judging by the litter pan, they’d been here very recently.

If I were a cat, I’d have retreated as far as I could from all the human activity. Carrying the bowls, I went upstairs. All the bedroom doors were open. Kelly’s room and the bathroom were in disarray, but the kids’ rooms seemed to be more or less in order. I called gently and was answered with a soft “mew” from Brianna’s room. I stepped in and set the bowls on the floor.

Goddess, the mother cat, cautiously stuck her head out from under the bed. I pushed a bowl over toward her. She looked at me, then hesitantly crept out and sniffed the bowl. The two kittens followed her. I was surprised that they didn’t seem any bigger than the last time I’d seen them, which was a few weeks ago. Hungrily, they all attacked the food.

I tried to ruffle Goddess’s fur behind her ears, but she shied away from my hand. I left them alone to eat.

Scooping up food scraps, pizza boxes, and cigarette butts from all horizontal surfaces in the kitchen, including the floor, I filled several trash bags. I suppose I should have looked to see if there was recycling I should separate from the rest of it, but there was just so much
stuff.
And a lot of it was totally disgusting.

I carted a few bags of trash out to the garbage cans by the garage. A cold wet dusk was quickly turning into a freezing night. I figured I might as well sleep here, see what I could get done to get the place cleaned up and feed the cats again in the morning before I left. I’d stayed there often enough to know where Kelly kept things.

Then I tackled the cat litter pan. It was so disgustingly full I checked to make sure there was a supply of fresh litter, then emptied it completely into a sturdy trash bag. I scrubbed it out and dried it with a paper towel. Then I filled it again, using the entire contents of the carton. Did that mean I should pick some up so Kelly wouldn’t have to worry about it?

Staring at the living room, I decided that if I got the beer cans and bottles rinsed out and the trash picked up, I’d have a good part of it cleaned up.

An hour later it was back to looking something like a living room. Large bags of trash and recyclables lay next to the door. I wouldn’t be able to do much about the damp spots in the rug—they smelled like beer, not vomit, at least, but I cleaned it as best I could, all the while remembering tales of people being electrocuted while operating vacuum cleaners on damp rugs. This time, that didn’t happen.

I was just thinking about seeing if I could find anything to eat and maybe getting some sleep when the doorbell rang.

My first instinct was to ignore it and pretend that no one was in the house. But the lights were on and the front drapes were not tightly closed. Anybody on the front porch who peered through the cracks could see me.

I wiped my hands on my jeans and went to the door.

A man I didn’t know stood there, his hair and clothes in disarray. He smelled of alcohol.

“Kelly here?” he asked.

“No.” I wasn’t about to offer any more information. “What do you need her for?”

He rocked back on his heels. “So you’re the boyfriend, huh?”

I didn’t see where that called for an answer.

He shrugged. “You and Kelly’ll have to take the kids back,” he said. “Louise fell and she can’t take care of them right now. And my mother’s not well enough. Her mind’s gone. So they’ll have to come stay here for now.”

“Suppose she isn’t able to?”

“Don’t give me that. I called the hospital and she’s been discharged. If she’s been drinking, that’s just too bad. It’s her turn. I’ve been taking care of the kids for almost a week now.”

I raised my eyebrows. “
You’ve
been taking care of the kids?”

“Well, me and my aunt and my mother. Definitely not Kelly.”

That was true enough.

He turned toward the car parked at the curb and called, “Come on, kids, you’re gonna stay with your mom for a while.”

The door opened, and the two kids scrambled out, each clutching a backpack. They dashed up the sidewalk and onto the porch.

“Where’s Mom?” Chris asked.

The man chuckled and swayed on his feet. “Probably passed out drunk.”

The boy looked pained but didn’t say anything.

Brianna launched herself across the threshold and leapt into my arms. “Jesse!” she sobbed, burying her face in my chest.

I wasn’t sure what I should be doing, but I knew I wasn’t going to leave the kids with this drunken fool, who I’d never met but was apparently their father. “Come on in,” I said, putting my hand on Chris’s shoulder and guiding him through the doorway. “Have you had supper?”

“No,” he said in a small voice. “We’ve been riding around in Daddy’s car, waiting for Mom to be home so we could come in.”

The man nodded. “I saw the lights, and figured she’s
finally
got home.”

“Okay.” I moved the kids and their stuff out of the doorway. “I’ll see they’re okay.”

“You just do that.” The man turned and stumbled down the porch steps toward the car.

He wasn’t in any shape to drive, and I hoped he didn’t get a DWI tonight. I knew he’d had at least one before, and if he got locked up for it, he wouldn’t be working, and he wouldn’t be making child support payments. Which Kelly needed.

Although another DWI and Kelly would have an easier time keeping custody.

“Where’s Mom?” Chris asked again.

I looked at his drawn, worried face. The things kids have to go through. And they can’t do a damn thing about it. These kids were no exception.

“She’s out of the hospital,” I said, “so she’s getting better. But she had to go to someplace called a physical rehab ’cause she can’t use her shoulder right, and they’re gonna help her get better.”

“Does she have to
sleep
there?” he asked.

“Probably.”

He looked around the newly neatened living room. “Where’s PopPop and all his friends?”

I had to think a minute. PopPop must be Old Buckles. “He’s gone on a trip,” I said.

“Did his friends go, too?”

“I’m not sure. Probably some of them. But they’re not staying here anymore.” Not if I had anything to say about it.

He looked relieved. “Are you gonna stay with us?”

“I guess.” The only alternative I could see would be to call child protective services. That would mean an emergency foster home. I’d at least stay with them tonight and see what I could figure out in the morning. Since the plant was closed down, I could stay with them for a few more days, too, if I had to.

We went into the kitchen, which was still pretty much a mess. Chris looked around. “Mom’s not going to like this when she gets home,” he said.

“That’s why we’re gonna clean it up as best we can,” I said, setting Brianna in a chair by the table. “Let’s see what we can find for supper.”

The refrigerator held nothing but a tub of margarine, a half-empty bottle of catsup, and lots of beer. The freezer wasn’t much better, but it did have some frozen vegetables.

A few cans and boxes, mostly soup and pasta, were on the pantry shelf. There was a half-empty jar of instant coffee and a few unopened packages of instant lemonade. I took some cans of vegetable soup and found a box of biscuit mix. That’d have to do for tonight. Tomorrow we’d have to go to the grocery store. I could barely afford to feed myself—how was I going to keep two kids fed, too?

While the biscuits were baking, we went upstairs and I helped the kids put the stuff from the backpacks away. Their extra clothes were clean. I knew we could thank Aunt Louise for that. I found spare sheets in the linen closet and stripped the used ones off their beds. Their rooms were not in disarray, but I had a queasy feeling that some people with less than perfect hygiene may very well have used the beds. And not only for sleeping.

We made the beds, then went on to Kelly’s room. A funky odor told me her room had definitely been used for a variety of activities. I kicked the cans and greasy paper plates into the corner to tackle tomorrow. We changed those sheets, too, although I didn’t think I quite dared sleep in her bed. The sofa in the living room would do fine for me.

Bundling the dirty sheets, we went back downstairs. I started the washing machine and dished out bowls of soup. The biscuits came out light and flaky. While I’d been in foster care with the Colemans, I’d learned the trick to fixing biscuits—handle the dough as little as possible. Their wonderful aroma filled the air and countered some of the stale stench that lingered.

“Do we have to go to school tomorrow?” Brianna asked.

School. I hadn’t even thought about that. It’d be much easier to get to the store and finish cleaning up if the kids were in school. “Of course,” I said. “Haven’t you been going?”

“Not today,” Chris said. “Aunt Louise has been driving us, but she didn’t this morning.”

“What happened to Aunt Louise?” I asked.

“She fell this morning, right down the stairs. She said she was okay, but she couldn’t stand right. And she couldn’t walk—she fell again. So she told me to call 9-1-1, then she went to sleep. Right there on the floor. An ambulance came, and they took her away.”

“That’s pretty grown up of you, to call 9-1-1 and get help like that,” I said. “They didn’t call anybody to take care of you? Or was your dad there?”

“They asked if anybody was home with us, and I told them Grandma.”

Grandma was bedridden and suffering from dementia.

“Then what?”

“We just watched TV and waited until Daddy got home. Grandma never got out of bed. She doesn’t, some days. We’re not supposed to take food without asking, so we didn’t have lunch. Or supper, until you fixed the soup.”

“Well, we’ll fix something for breakfast tomorrow. And I’ll give you money for school lunches.” That would put a dent in my available cash, but there wasn’t much in the house I could give them, and they couldn’t go to school with no lunch or lunch money.

While the kids finished up their meager supper, I emptied the dishwasher and put in a new load, including the supper dishes. The kitchen was beginning to look livable, too. It was a bit early for bedtime, so we went into the living room. The kids seemed happy to turn on the TV, and I was pretty tired, so I just sat with them on the couch as inane cartoon characters muddled their way through ludicrous situations. I never had a TV of my own, and I’d never watched the one in the dayroom on the cellblock much, so I wasn’t too familiar with programming. This seemed terminally stupid.

Chris sat close to me, his tense muscles eventually relaxing. Brianna leaned her head on my arm and started to drift off to sleep.

“About time for bed,” I said, pushing Brianna into a sitting position.

“We didn’t do our homework,” Chris said, avoiding my eyes. “We’ve had it for a week now.”

“Why didn’t you
tell
me you had homework?” I asked, exasperated. Stupid of me. I should have asked.

“My teacher’s gonna be mad,” Brianna said, rubbing her eyes.

“Why’s she gonna be mad?” I asked.

“’Cause all my school stuff is over at Daddy’s house.”

Chris nodded. “And my books. So I
couldn’t
do my homework.”

“Maybe I can write a note and explain,” I said. I didn’t know if that would do any good. And would sending a note that I signed trigger some kind of investigation by the school system into the kids’ living situation? It might.

I wasn’t a parent. Or guardian. Was I opening myself to some kind of charges of interfering with lawful custody? Maybe kidnapping or unlawful restraint? Or even child abuse? I stirred uneasily. I wasn’t sure how much the school knew about me, but whatever it was, it wasn’t likely to be good.

The kids looked up at me trustingly. I knew I was going to take that chance.

“Will you read us bedtime stories?” Brianna asked.

“Yep. Get ready for bed. Teeth brushed and all. Then chose a book and I’ll read it.”

“Can we
each
choose a book?”

“I guess.”

They scrambled upstairs.

I had to send Brianna back up to brush her hair. When she came down again, she was carrying Goddess the cat. The kittens tumbled down the stairs after her.

Finally we sat together on the sofa and opened the books. Brianna had
The Very Hungry Caterpillar
and Chris had
Are You My Mother
?

That seemed a bit babyish for him. I’m no psychologist, but I would have bet one could have made done a detailed report on that choice.

It was getting late, but I was in no hurry to finish reading. One kid cuddled close on each side of me, the cat lay on my lap purring, and the kittens batted playfully at the pages as I turned them.

A moment of joy and peace in a painful and uncertain world.

I was acutely aware of the huge empty feeling in my gut. This was probably the closest I was ever going to get to the life I’d missed out on by being locked up for all those years. Sometimes I could trick myself into thinking maybe Kelly and I had a future, but it was hard to think that now.
And what kind of a life could we have if she was always willing to believe the worst of me?
Besides, I reminded myself, I didn’t have a hell of a lot to offer her and the kids. She’d be a fool to hook up her future with a paroled convict who could be whisked back to prison at a moment’s notice. Especially one who was showing a real tendency to do stupid things and get in a lot of trouble.