Our First Love (6 page)

“If I knew I wasn't guilty of something, I wouldn't care how many false conclusions people came up with,” I stated my position.

“Well, everyone isn't you,” Nigel countered. “Some people worry about what others say and think about them. And there's nothing wrong with that. It simply means…” Nigel's voice trailed off as he began lecturing me.

I knew Nigel would go on forever about this. He hadn't talked this much in days, so I pretended I was listening. What I really wanted was for him to shut up, get off his ass, grab the car keys, and dip. He needed to go somewhere, anywhere, so we could get out of this house. Being locked up in this house for the past month and a half was driving me crazy, and it started to show on my face and in my conversations with him. I don't know why Nigel couldn't see how aggravated I was. Maybe he did, but pretended he didn't. But then, all of a sudden, Nigel's eyes tapered to razor slits and his eyebrows hovered like too taut bows. I figured he'd heard my thoughts. His voice palpitated as he said something I couldn't decipher. I nodded in congruence, but in my mind I screamed, “Get a life, Nigel!”

He must have heard me again because he stood and looked around the room. He turned off the ceiling fan, then continued looking around the living room for something. I hoped it was the car keys.

“What are you looking for?” I finally asked.

“The remote,” Nigel answered. “I want to see what the weather's going to be like tomorrow.”

I wanted to wring his neck.

I sat at the computer preparing to write a blog about Barney, when Nigel walked into the living room and saw me. He must have developed mind-reading skills because he looked right at me and said, “Do not write anything about Barney in your blog. Do you hear me, Caleb? Nothing.” I usually get mad when Nigel talks to me like he's chastising a child because I'm a grown-ass man. I let it pass that time because it was the first time Nigel had ever mentioned the blog. However, he did give me an idea for a memory to write about.

The (not so true) Way I Remember It – by Caleb Greene

“How Momma Raised Good Children”

I hear it all the time.

Children are “badder” than they used to be.

I've heard it from relatives and friends who claim not to know where the children they're raising come from. I hear it from uncles and aunts, from people whose jobs require them to work with children, and from neighbors who live behind high fences or with bad dogs. And, after listening to them all complain about how bad children have become, they're caught off guard when I beg to differ.

My initial response to these people who are deliberately trying to give children a bad rap is what they're saying is an unproven fact. After explaining that an unproven fact is something you know to be true but only because your gut tells you it's true, I usually lay out my journalism credentials. You see, the first and most important lesson they teach future journalists at Richmond University is a factual error is an automatic failure. So, I learned to take issue with unproven facts.

However, most parents don't seem to care what they taught me or what I learned in college. I've read your comments and I know nothing short of
divine intervention will convince most of you that children are not badder than they used to be.

I'm not sure who's to blame for starting this misconception about today's children, but I've come to the conclusion that the reason children appear to be badder than we used to be is because nowadays you can't tell children to “get lost.” Or as my mother and father would command, “Get out of my sight and don't let me see you until I call for you.”

On weekends, during the summer, or any time school was out, Nigel and I were literally thrown out the house. And some days, when they wanted us to be really good children, they didn't allow us to hang out in the yard.

By the time one of them walked out on the porch and yelled across three neighborhood blocks, the house would be cleaned, dinner would be cooked, and the only thing left to do was feed, bathe, and put their “good” children to bed.

The encroachment of society's seedy elements into neighborhoods has made it even more difficult for parents not to raise “bad” children. I'm sure no parent wants to put their children in harm's way and they shouldn't. But how can you raise “good” children if you can't tell them to get lost? Getting lost when told to do so is what made us good children.

Technology is also to blame.

When was the last time you told someone to get lost? And they did? Or could?

Technology won't allow people to get lost.

Back in the day, when you needed to talk to someone, your options were to call their house or yell across three neighborhood blocks. If they were home, good. If not, you yelled until you were hoarse or you called back every ten minutes until their mother took the phone off the hook and you got a busy signal for the next hour.

Today, if the person you need to speak with isn't home, you can probably reach them on their cell phone even if they're somewhere they shouldn't be
talking on the phone, like in church or class. Most of today's so-called bad children have cell phones, which presents yet another problem. Even if you could tell them to get lost, you wouldn't have a hard enough time finding them. Just call your bad children's cell phones and yell, “Get here!”

After I finished the column, I was glad Nigel had told me not to write about Barney Aman. It was for a spiteful reason though. I wrote about Mom and our childhood, which was going to make him squirm when he read the blog. And he's going to read it only to make sure I didn't write about Barney. That's what he gets for trying to dictate what I write about.

When I needed to escape from inside these walls, I imagined I was a whale and these walls contained all the world's oceans. Then every shore, near and far, was within my reach.

It was Nigel's idea to go grocery shopping at midnight because, usually, there were only a handful of shoppers in the store at that time of night. He was wrong. There wasn't even a handful. The store was empty except for the two of us, two cashiers, and an assistant manager.

The three shelves lined with coffee in jars, cans, and bags were also empty as far as I was concerned. I wanted a large bag of Folgers Classic Roast, but the store was completely out of Folgers. Nigel picked up a bag of the store brand and put it in the cart. I took the bag out the cart and put it back on the shelf. Nigel gave me that look he gives me when he thought I was being difficult. Coffee was coffee, he said, and put two bags in the cart.

When we got to the register, Nigel realized he'd left his wallet in
the car. He went to the car while the cashier rang up the groceries. The total came to $187.32, which Nigel paid with his debit card. We saved a few dollars because some of the main items on our list were on sale. Eggs were on sale. Two dozen for $1.29. A twelve-pack of Diet Coke was $2.59. And a big box of Little Debbie's oatmeal pies was $1.09.

On the way home, we made it through seven consecutive stoplights without having to stop. It wasn't because Nigel was speeding, unless you call driving thirty in a forty-five mile-per-hour zone mashing the gas. I was about to get pissed off with Nigel's Miss-Daisy-driving-ass because I wanted to make it home before the bottom fell out the clouds. The clouds were so heavy they looked like they had pot bellies that were scuffing the ground. After all that showing off, it ended up not raining a drop.

That was three weeks ago, the last time we left this house. Three weeks. Twenty-something days. And, far too many hours for me to try to calculate.

The only thing I hated more than my fear was not knowing why I was afraid.

I felt like screaming, I was sick and tired of sitting here staring out this damn window! Instead, I held everything inside and continued staring out the window. I didn't want to turn around and look at Nigel because looking at him would piss me off. Without looking for him, it was easy to guess he was in front of the television glued to the Weather Channel with that shit-eating grin on his face. When Nigel knew he was wrong and tried to pretend everything was fine, his grin turned inward on him. He sat there, pretending our world was perfect when I was a few seconds away
from rearranging his front teeth. It was a good thing he didn't say anything to me—anything—or even look at me wrong because I was ready to bust him in the mouth.

Nigel signed seven of the eight cover letters I left on the desk for him. I had a feeling he wasn't going to sign the letter to Aman Realty. I included the resume and letter to Richard Aman to see if Nigel would prove me wrong for once. But as usual, he didn't.

The hard part was mailing them. We had a new carrier. Friday was the last day for Vernon, our last carrier, and he didn't know who was going to replace him on this route until Friday. That's when he told me that a young black guy name Billy would replace him. Billy worked this route for three days last summer while Vernon was out on medical leave. I didn't meet him then because we didn't have any mail those three days, so I had not had a chance to explain our mail delivery routine: I'd retreat to the bedroom, Vernon would open the door, bring the mail inside, and pick up any outgoing mail. After he closed the door and left, I would come out. Friday, Vernon said he would explain the delivery system to Billy. I was glad he did.

Nigel was still in bed; probably on purpose. So, I had to give the seven envelopes to the mail carrier when he came by. Vernon used to come by around ten-thirty. Since it was drizzling outside and Billy wasn't as used to the route as Vernon was, I figured he'd be a little late. I started to wake Nigel and let him give Billy the letters, but I didn't want to bother him. It took a Herculean effort for him to sign the cover letters.

Our mailbox was on the wall to the right of the front door. It's too small to put the envelopes inside, but even if it wasn't, I still would have to open the door which would be a problem. I sat by
the window and waited for Billy, who would stop at Professor Childers' curbside mailbox before stopping here.

What if there's no mail for us today?
my conscience reminded me.

I hadn't thought about that. If there was no mail, Billy wouldn't have to stop. I saw the mail truck pull up to Professor Childers' mailbox and stop. I thought about waking Nigel as I watched Billy put two envelopes in the mailbox. He pulled away slowly, moving closer to our house.

“Please stop here,” I pleaded, my face pressed against the window. “Please stop. Please.”

The mail truck turned in our driveway.

“Thank you.”

Billy saw me in the window and waved as he got out the truck. I held up the manila envelopes so he could see them. Billy acknowledged with a nod and walked toward the front door. I inhaled and held my breath as I walked over to the door. Unlocking the door wasn't that hard, but turning the doorknob was a colossal task. Billy knocked on the door. I tried to turn the knob, but I couldn't. I tried again and the knob turned. The seal broke and the world poured in through a crack too thin for light to pass through.

I was freezing, drowning, dying. I fell against the door, slamming it shut.

“Are you all right?” Billy asked from the other side of the door. He waited for an answer, but my lips were frozen stiff. “Tell you what,” he said. “Let's do this the way Vernon did it.”

I couldn't answer. I was thawing. Shivering. Breathing air again.

“Did you hear me?” Billy asked.

“The table by the door,” I responded and placed the envelopes on the table. I hurried to my bedroom and slammed the door behind me.

I heard Billy yell, “I'm coming in.” A few seconds later, he yelled
as he left, “I'm closing the door behind me. See you tomorrow.” I heard the front door close.

Professor Anthony Childers, a chain-smoking, nonconforming Brit, taught international relations at Florida State University. Sometimes, mostly when he's a little tipsy and longing to hear a voice other than his own, he stopped Nigel in the driveway to chat about news and politics. Nigel would stand there and listen, steadily nodding in agreement, and listen some more. After thirty minutes or so, I'd tap on the window and beckon for Nigel or pretend he had an important call by waving the phone in the air. Professor Childers and Nigel hadn't hung out in over a month. I guess that's why the professor spent the afternoon standing in his driveway waving at motorists speeding by on Circle Drive.

I'm surrounded by boundless and untouchable shores that arose outside the windows, doors, and walls of 207 Circle Drive.

I hated not being able to share the few memories that I did have with Nigel, especially the ones of Mom and Dad. He's already told me the reason he won't acknowledge reading my blog. Although the blogs were about conjectured memories, they were still mostly about Mom and Dad. What I recalled about Mom and Dad weren't real memories, but I felt deep down that they couldn't all be things I made up. Sometimes, what I remembered was a smile, laughter, or a touch. And sometimes, it's the feeling there was really a Mom and Dad and not hazy images of the faces in the portraits hanging on our walls. If I could really share my thoughts with Nigel, he could fill in the blanks. I didn't know why Nigel hid from his memories of Mom and Dad. The last time I heard him mention
Mom or Dad was eleven years ago when he told me I was alive and they were dead. He never said how they died, and I never asked. I still didn't know what happened to Mom and Dad or to me because I was too afraid to ask.

A long time ago, before this life, before I evolved, I left footprints in the sands of the world outside.