12.24.79

“We are all going to midnight mass and that’s all I want to hear about it!” she screamed loud enough for Santa, even Jesus, high in the heavens, to hear. That vein in her temple throbbed, seconds away from losing her feeble grip. Mom dragged us off to Mass because Babchi (Polish for Grandmother) insisted our problems stemmed from a lack of faith.

I passed my brother on the way to get dressed after spending a few minutes fussing over the tree. There was too much blue on the left, not enough green in the center. Babchi’s handmade ornaments glistened. Crystal beads sparkled without a hint of the pipe cleaners that strung them together. Santa’s helicopter flew, Frosty tobogganed, and Rudolph skated on a mirror. The star was store bought, God forbid. Mom hoped that Babchi would craft one like she had for her sisters, but Babchi played favorites. "Maybe if you spent less time in rehab, I could teach you to make your own," she'd remark.

The star stood out like E-Z Cheese slathered on filet mignon, but I didn’t care, too busy with my daily inventory of gifts. Should I pile them or was it taboo?

We staked out spaces under the tree. I took the left, Jess dead center. Kevin, too cool to care, flanked right by default, his gifts eventually flowed there as Jess and I delineated invisible borders.

Thirteen total. I preferred them spread out rather than piled up, tapered. I succeeded in staving off my burgeoning curiosity since that year I found my bounty hidden in the attic crawlspace. Christmas morning lacked the usual fanfare since I had ruined my own surprise. Not this year. I only peeked at one, the soft one, knowing full well it was a throw away, a pillow embroidered with a choo choo.

It was nine thirty. I’d just have to sit through Midnight Mass.

“You’re not wearing jeans to twelve o’clock mass!” she screamed into a cough, thick and robust, a cigarette dangling from her lip.

“Jesus Christ Ma, settle.” Kevin argued back.

“Don’t even. If Babchi sees you in those it’ll be my ass too.” she half joked, the fuck you half, the most endearing half. The other half feared Babchi as much as we did, as much as Dziadzia did. Grandpa was so afraid of her he had his own room in the attic of their two-family home. I'm convinced he’d live in the downstairs apartment, if Wujek didn’t already live there. We called him Uncle Wujek, uncle uncle, but I didn’t discover the redundancy until long after he passed.

The snow piled high on both sides of the road. My stepfather drove maddeningly slow, tired from chasing down shoplifters at the local Richdale he managed. He made the papers the day he chased one into oncoming traffic. The boy was hit, flew thirty feet, and was pronounced dead at the scene. I didn’t see it. I just saw my stepfather stand over the boy’s body, nudging Grim out to collect what was stolen. I hated him long before he proved what a retch he was, so I tried to forget the fact that his blood money probably paid for half the gifts under the tree, that and Dad’s alimony.

Tradition dictated we spend the evening at Cioci Franny’s, Mom’s sister. Babchi waited at the door to criticize each one of us before granting passage to the basement. Laughter reached us as we stood for inspection. Kevin’s hair was too long, shirt untucked, niechlujny (Slovenly). Sneakers over dress shoes would fall on Mom for letting him out of the house dressed like a Plucha (Slob). Being second afforded me the opportunity to tuck in my shirt. Still, I deserved a wallop for my year end report card that dubbed me unsatisfactory in all areas except gym.

Downstairs, I was greeted by Cioci Gladys whose husband, Henry, made a fortune unloading the family plumbing business. It cost him the love and loyalty of his two eldest sons who felt slighted after helping him build up its six figure price tag, only to be left out of the deal. As always, my eyes globed onto Gladys’s three carat ring, the subject of much contention among the females of the family, too showy for Mom, a built in pool with slide, to Cioci Franny.

Cioci Franny’s four boys milled about the room while Uncle Ray’s pickled finger waded through an icy glass of scotch, his hip stiffer than usual. Soon enough Santa would appear with the same stiff hip, slurring Ho Ho Ho’s, and passing out gifts.

After mass, while everyone slept, I crept down to the living room to lay on the sectional. Four more presents appeared, marked from Santa in Mom’s handwriting. The wind blew swaths of snow past the window. Being near the tree felt like standing inside Cioci Gladys’s diamond. Sleep seeds sprouted, weighing down my already heavy lids.

By dawn, the tree’s red hot bulbs threatened to snitch on me. A night away from bed was a major violation. I extinguished it before it could sing. I’d need piping hot coffee to appease the sleeping beast. She lay under a mound of blankets. I exchanged vices, a glass of melted ice and booze for the coffee and made sure her cigarettes were within reach. Jess woke. I left my offerings to join her in the living room, both of us held in limbo until Mom and Kev woke.

It was the one day a year that Kevin magnanimously let me wake him without flack or a beating. He even woke Mom. His imposing size and disposition lent him more and more freedom from her wrath.

I tried to saver opening them, but was weak. While Mom sipped hangover elixir and smoked, I sat amid torn paper and toys: Legos, Clash of the Titans action figures, Godzilla, and Stretch Armstrong, ging tinglers, flu floobers, tar tinkers, and who whobas.

In the end I raked in seventeen presents. Seventeen symbols that proved they loved me.

Only three hundred and sixty four shopping days left until they do it again…

Him

The cold nipped. I walked with determination, but the same apprehension persisted. I was different, older, yes, but fundamentally different. My fists clenched inside my jacket pockets, my pace quickened. I couldn’t see the door to Capt’s yet, hoping to at least gauge what kind of entrance I’d make.

At the door, I felt him close by, to my left. Still rail thin, a rogue curl swirled out of the tail end of a wave that escaped the liberal use of product. He was in need of a gel intervention, still. His clothes were dated, not fashionable, or particularly stylish, seeking neither to stand out nor blend in. His eyes darted around the room, scoping which shadow he’d spend the night cloaked by.

There was no need to wonder if he was high. It was just a matter of figuring out what his poison was that night. Coke, no doubt.

He checked in, exchanged pleasantries with Lisa, and stared Erin down, waiting for her to flinch before saying hello. I felt the need to offer her an excuse. She meant the world to him back then, but I decided to ignore it and him for that matter. I was there to party, touch base with old friends, mingle. I couldn’t let his presence bother me.

I ate, watched with glee as Rachel worked the room. At first I slipped back into old habits, preferring the corners to the electricity emanating from the middle.

I flirted with the hors d’oeuvres waitress, shook hands with Jim LeDuke, the principal’s son and the first person to offer me a seat in the cafeteria the first day of freshman year.

I couldn’t locate any of the guys I hung out with. Ritchie and Tommy wouldn’t be caught dead at a reunion. Tommy told me as much on the phone a month prior. I haven’t seen or spoken to Ritchie in over a decade. Across the room I saw a gathering of my old crew, Duane, Lisa, and Chris. I moved over to them. Duane and I embraced. Chris, already shitfaced, seemed taken aback when I stepped toward him, like he was trying to remember whether or not I still owed him money for a bag of pot we split. We all roared at the retelling of the senior prom, where we spent only twenty minutes before deciding to travel into Boston, to Northeastern, where my brother had an apartment. There we drank and smoked till we all passed out, sticking out like sore thumbs in our rented tuxes and Duane’s father’s emerald green Jag. He ruined the night by stealing weed and two hundred dollars from my brother’s roommate.

I relaxed. No one seemed to blame me for the fact that he loomed on the fringe. No one blamed me for the deplorable things I had to do to protect him all those years. Besides, I made enough of a splash to drown him out altogether with where I’d been since: rehab, robberies, prison, now a personal trainer and hopeful author, with the hottest girl in the room. Just then Boomer, the class genius, pulled me aside.

“Dude, is that your girlfriend?”

“Yeah,” I answered. A compliment I couldn’t really accept credit for was coming, but I did it anyway.

“Man, you need to get a ring on her finger, she’s awesome.”

I smiled and noticed that he was watching, jealous. I got angry. No one else noticed him.

I ignored him, trying hard at first, then effortlessly. Erin approached but Pat intercepted and pulled me aside, “You were the one that dated Ellen, weren’t you?”

I nodded yes.

“Man, I took her to the senior prom. She only went so she could be close to you. I was pissed.” he said, half joking, the other half still reeling.

It wasn’t me, but him, Pat was talking about. I shrugged it off. He moved through the crowd, on the way to the bathroom.

Erin and I finally had a chance to talk. She was always a little standoffish, but one-on-one she softened and let her guard down. We talked as if a lifetime of choices hadn’t separated us. I’m thankful Erin never truly fell for him. He’d hurt her. I’m indebted to her for making him feel better, if even for a short time.

By the end of the evening I lost track of him. Just before I left I spotted him, standing alone near the window looking out at Salem Harbor. I knew what he was feeling, left out, alone, afraid. I walked over, put my arm around him like I had wanted to do a billion times before and told him it was going to alright, that the pain wouldn’t last forever, his life is better than he could ever imagine.

I pulled him close, enveloping him before he vanished, gone but not forgotten.

Ode To Blaine

Some leave a fingerprint that takes a dusting of nostalgia to jog the memory.

Others leave imprints that trail off to another time and place.

There are those that leave scars, gnarled patches of the damage left in their wake.

But occasionally someone makes a meteoric impact on your soul, that no amount of time can erase their memory.

Blaine stepped into my life under the pretense of easing his own pain, self medicating like we all did at that age. When he asked if I knew where to get any weed, I looked him up and down. Clad in a bright yellow raincoat and matching boots, an argyle sweater, and course green corduroys, I thought, “This son of a bitch is going to get beat down.”

I told him I had a fiver I could kick in. If he went down beyond the hole in the fence, he’d find Mark, the neighborhood dealer, standing around a barrel fire with his friends, Larkey and Freddy. “Watch out for Larkey, he might try to steal those boots,” I only half joked since Larkey thrived off conflict in any form. But Blaine was resolute, and trekked down the sandy hill to where they stood, huddled.

“Whoa, it’s the Gordon’s Fisherman.” Freddy remarked.

“No, dude, that’s friggin’ Gilligan.” Larkey added.

It took two seconds to brand him. From then on he’d be referred to as Gilligan.

Blaine laughed, “That’s a good one. I was hoping to procure some smoke. Could you gentlemen point me in the right direction?” The group fell silent. Larkey took a strategic position behind Blaine. There go the boots, I thought.

Mark snickered. He was holding, always. My Catholic school friends were born with silver spoons, educated, articulate, and my public schools friends were, well, not. But Blaine was different. While the rest of us struggled with our identities, Blaine only ever wanted to be Blaine. Take him or leave him. I think they knew that in the first five seconds of meeting him, just like I did. Blaine walked away, boots intact. Mark even gave him six for ten, something he only did for his best customers, like me.

Our twentieth reunion was on Friday. I was as reluctant to go now as I was during all four years of high school. I never really felt like I fit in. I favored obscurity and remained on the fringe.
Blaine met with a lot of adversity in high school. He’ll tell you he doesn’t remember it like that, but I do. People took issue with the one thing I admire most about Blaine, his integrity.
Blaine handled private school differently and summed up his perspective in a drunken stupor after the reunion where he hugged everyone he met, drank like a sailor on leave, and partied like it was 1999, “I’d give you the shirt off my back, but you’ll never get me to change my mind if it’s set.” And he means it.

We’re great friends and in a way, he’s a hero of mine. He stands for something but does so unassumingly, and he asks for nothing in return for his unconditional friendship.