Courage To Live. Morgan Q O'Reilly

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СКАЧАТЬ had plenty of beer to keep you company.” Balancing Rob’s plate and mine on one arm, I grabbed a bowl of cucumber salad to carry to the table and pushed past Quint. Rob was at the table and cast a wary glance at his father as he reached for his plate.

      Quint pulled his chair up to the end of the table and sneered at the food. “What’s the matter, Bobby-boy? You not man enough to eat a real char-broiled burger? Have to eat the candyass pussy food your mama feeds you?”

      Rob kept his eyes on his plate and tucked his paper towel napkin into his lap without a reminder.

      I glared at Quint. Abusing me was one thing; turning on our son was another. “Your stomach is made of cast iron. We haven’t built up such a tolerance.” I sat down and placed my napkin in my lap.

      “Hell, woman, he’s my son. Take that back and slap a patty on it. That expensive deli meat is pussy food.” Quint grabbed Rob’s plate and slapped it, upturned, on my chest. “Now make him a man’s plate.”

      Rob, the boy who’d held his tongue his entire life, chose that moment to talk back. “Why can’t you leave her alone? That plate was just fine with me.” He pushed back his chair, preparing to stand. Probably to help me clean up the food now dropping to the carpet in large wet plops. Great. Ketchup, mustard, potato salad… I’d have to dig out the carpet cleaner I’d bought a few months earlier when Quint had peed on the bedroom carpet in a drunken stupor.

      I was just standing when Quint’s right hand drew back in preparation of backhanding Rob. For once, his drunkenness played to my advantage. He moved slowly enough I was able to grab his arm and keep it from swinging to make contact with my son. Drunk as he was, Quint still had the strength to drag me part-way across the table. Swearing a blue streak and calling him every vile name I could think of, I ended up wearing food from all three plates and the vinegary cucumbers I’d set down. Quint planted his fist in my face and used it to push me away and down to the floor at the same time a left backhand crushed into my stomach.

      Rob raced around his dad to get to the phone base sitting at the end of the kitchen counter, all the while screaming for Quint to back off and get the hell out. That’s probably what the neighbors had heard, those who’d also opened their windows for a rare chance at fresh air in winter. Rob’s voice hadn’t changed yet, and on the phone he’d been mistaken for me more than once, to his great disgust.

      Trying to catch my breath, I yelled at Rob to get away from his dad. Quint ripped the phone from Rob’s hand and threw the entire base unit across the dining area, where it hit a wall. Six inches to the left and he would have broken one of the windows over the stairwell. Rob already had his hand on my cellphone, which had been charging on the counter. Quint quickly demolished that and turned on Rob in fury, his voice never rising above a normal volume. He was good at that. Let me do the screaming, or in this case, Rob.

      I threw myself at Quint’s legs and knocked him off balance so Rob could escape from the confines of the kitchen. Rob was heading for the door when Quint kicked me. I screamed loud enough for the whole street to hear, hoping, for once, just one of them would come to the door to see what the hell was going on.

      My scream brought Rob back, but Quint pushed past him, down the stairs and out the door. As consciousness wavered in and out, I heard Quint rev his truck and the tires squealed as he tore out of the driveway. The snow just beginning to fall muffled the sounds of his truck as he drove away.

      Except for Rob’s cries, not a sound followed.

      No one knocked on the door. No one touched the doorbell.

      Hell, not even police sirens ripped through the air. I could have died, for all my neighbors noticed. Rob could be lying at the bottom of the stairs with a broken neck.

      But all I could think, as I clung to the shreds of consciousness, was thank God. Quint was gone. Now if only he’d stay that way.

      For all their silence on Quint’s departure, somehow word of my auto accident made it onto the neighborhood grapevine. Since the detective’s visit, a few of the neighbors quietly began to take care of me. Lieutenant Sunshine and Ben had mowed my yard and he informed me they had plans to scrub the driveway over the weekend and put down a new layer of asphalt sealant. Ben, the general and Jack had already planned to do their drives, they just added me to the schedule. I had a week’s worth of casseroles filling the fridge. I’d been able to call off the committee a couple nights earlier. It was more food than we could eat, and some of it didn’t look all that appetizing, although the Korean ladies down the street made some fabulous spring rolls.

      Our mailman’s wife, who lived three houses down, offered to drive Rob to Tae Kwon Do, but I was reluctant to accept too much help. After all, these people had thought the worst of me. However, I wasn’t above accepting a few tokens of their abject apologies for misjudging me. I made an effort to wave, and if they stopped me, I chatted for a few minutes, then gently excused myself. Rob had invites to play basketball with the mailman’s son, who was a year older, and street hockey with the young teen directly across the street. They were the two black families in the neighborhood and the only kids close to his age. The Koreans didn’t speak much English, but they smiled shyly and weeded the flowers along my walkway. My violas, herbs, daisies and hanging baskets had never looked better. Molly from next door, the one Rob called the crazy cat lady, kept them watered.

      Not everyone felt the need to apologize. Many kept their distance, treating me no better, no worse than before.

      As for who’d left a message that day, I didn’t want to think about it. The microwave beeped and Rob pulled a burrito from the oven. “You want one?” he asked.

      “No. Thanks. I’ll just grab a power bar.” That, some water and a book would keep me company while I camped out in the car during the class at the dojo.

      Rob grabbed a bar from the pantry shelf and handed it to me.

      I wanted to ruffle his hair, but couldn’t reach so high.

      “Don’t you want to know who called?” Rob asked.

      “No.” Rob and I both had new cellphones, just not data-phones, to his great disappointment. I also had two hard-wired phones to go with the cordless handsets and the new house number. “Unless you recognized the number from Caller ID?”

      “No. Blocked caller.”

      “Then I definitely don’t want to know. Probably some politician or a survey company.” We’d certainly had plenty of those calls. “Hurry up, you need to change.”

      He shoved the last bite of burrito into his mouth and took the stairs down to his room, making enough noise to compete with a herd of elephants. A loud thump announced his arrival at the bottom just as the doorbell pealed.

      My fear of Quint returning hadn’t entirely left, so my stomach clenched hard.

      “I got it!” Rob called out. The door opened and I held my breath, listening.

      The voice that carried up the stairs as a rumbly murmur came from a man.

      “Mom, the lieutenant is here.”

      Damn. “Come up.” My stomach relaxed, while my pulse zinged.

      The boy was getting persistent. Apparently he was the leader of the Take Care of Candace Committee. I saw him every day and he greeted both of us with a smile. Rob showed an eagerness for the man’s company that both soothed and frightened me. Maybe as much as СКАЧАТЬ