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Haunted by the Past - Chapter 36 - The Simple Truth
By: RampageSports Date: April 25, 2016, 10:04 pm
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Author's Note: The Spenser, Hawk, Susan Silverman, Vinnie Morris
and Ives characters belong to mystery novelist Robert B. Parker.
Mr. Parker is one of my favorite authors, and his work is a
major influence on the the way I write. Whether I even come
close to mimicking his style is open to considerable debate, but
I have chosen to use his characters in this story as something
of an homage. My goal is to handle them as lightly as possible
and to maintain them as Mr. Parker created them. Any failure on
that front is completely my own.
[hr]
Haunted by the Past - Chapter 36 - The Simple Truth
Driving away seemed wrong, but I had no idea what I would say if
I knocked on the door. So, I just stood there for a very long
time, letting the snow accumulate on my head. Eventually,
nature forced my hand, and we got in the car and left.
I couldn't tell you anything about what the drive was like,
because I made the whole trip on autopilot. Thankfully, though
the snow was coming down hard, the roads remained mostly clear.
Instead of going home, I drove to the small waterfront area in
town. It was an area I still found strange to look at. Growing
up, the Raritan Bay had been a cesspool of chemical and medical
waste. Back then, the waterfront consisted of a makeshift
parking area where people could nose up to a ten foot high dune
that spared the residents from having to actually watch the muck
and used needles wash up on shore.
At some point, someone realized throwing all that stuff into the
water was a bad idea. Laws were passed to stop the practice,
and, slowly but surely, nature repaired itself. Over two
decades later, not only was the water visually clear, but it was
safe enough to swim in. Down came the dune and up went a beach
and a pleasant pedestrian walkway — offering joggers, pet owners
and anyone else who cared to visit a lovely and relaxing
bayfront view. Staten Island was visible on the left, and, on a
clear day, it was even possible to see across the water into
Brooklyn.
Suddenly, the cesspool was a postcard picture.
Of course, the view from here has not always been so pleasant.
It seemed like only yesterday we had all stood here on a bright,
clear September day and watched the thick, black column of smoke
rise into the sky from the site of the crumbled and still
burning World Trade Center. The main lot had been full that
day, so I'd parked down by the playground area and stood among
the Crayola colored equipment — crying for the innocent lives
that had been lost and for the heroes who had died trying to
save them. Even then, amidst our shock and horror and sorrow,
each of us knew full well that our lives had been changed
forever.
This was also the spot where the waters of the bay had first
spilled into town, pushed out by the storm surge that arrived
with Hurricane Sandy. Now, as I sat parked in the main beach
lot over three years later, reminders of that disaster were
everywhere. I could turn to my right and see an endless row of
homes being built on lots that have long been vacant — the
structures that were previously there either completely
destroyed or rendered uninhabitable by the flooding.
While the new construction represented the resiliency and heart
of the town's residents, it also served as a stark reminder of
the frailty of everything we take for granted. One day,
everything was fine... flowing along as it had on all the days
that had come before. The next, hundreds of families had their
lives literally washed away. Many were left with nothing. Not
a roof over their heads, or even, as my mother would say, a pot
to piss in.
For those who were wondering, the devastation you saw on your
televisions was not overblown. People who live here at the
waterfront say the water was eight to ten feet deep in some
places. That sounds like an exaggeration, until you consider
that I live nearly a mile inland from this spot, and the storm
turned my living room into a swimming pool nearly three feet
deep.
The damage forced me to live with family for over a year, and I
was one of the lucky ones. Many here are still waiting for
their homes to be rebuilt. Some are still trying to find the
money to even get started. Others are simply gone, having
picked up what little they had left and moved on to build a new
life elsewhere.
But, perhaps the most striking thing about the damage that storm
brought, is the image I see when I turn my head the other way.
On that side, the homes that had been there on that day still
stood, mostly unchanged. Though these homes had the same
waterfront view as the others, the storm had done relatively
little damage. Flooded garages. Damaged cars. Certainly, it
had been a traumatic experience, but, on this side, normalcy had
been restored in a matter of months.
The distance between the two areas is only a few thousand feet.
If you started among the missing and half-built houses and
walked up to where the original homes remained, it's highly
unlikely you wouldn't even notice the incline. And yet, that
slight incline had been the difference between mere aggravation
and total destruction.
Oh, how fickle fate can be.
Danni's kiss was not an event akin to the hurricane or the
September 11th terror attacks. Not even close. No lives had
been lost. No one's belongings had floated away. In fact, this
little storm involved only two people, and both of us were
likely to come through relatively intact.
And yet, here I was again, trying to figure out why every truth
I had known yesterday didn't seem to be true, anymore.
The first hurdle I had to grapple with was completely personal
and idealogical in nature.
Danni's act would once have been a crisis for me, but that time
has passed. As a Catholic, I am supposed to believe that
homosexuality is immoral. Unfortunately, I have discovered the
Catholic Church to be wrong so many times in my life that I no
longer buy in completely. I still believe in God, and I still
believe that most things done in his name are good. But, I can
no longer view the rules and teachings of the Church as
absolute. Too many scandals. Too much internal dissension.
Too much nonsense.
Beyond religion, there is the way that I was raised. When I was
young, I remember how sure my father was about everything.
Among those certainties was the fact that gay people were
abnormal. No explanation was needed, because that was a fact.
One of the most amazing things I remember about my father, is
how much he learned as he raised his own children. Things that
were once black and white turned to shades of grey. The older
he got, the more he heard and understood the words of those that
disagreed with him. Those words didn't always change his mind,
but they made him appreciate that there was always another side
to things.
Were he alive today, I still don't think he'd accept being gay
as normal. But he wouldn't be so sure of himself, anymore.
I know now how that change happened to him, because it's
happening to me. There was a time when the vision of youth made
everything perfectly clear to me. Everything I knew and felt
and believed was true. Anyone who didn't agree was wrong.
That unshakeable certainty is how I let myself get so far into
the underground fight world. The more I fought and lived to
fight again, the more convinced I was that I had everything
under control. Then, Boston happened, and I realized how
foolish I had been.
Now, all these years later, there is only one thing I know with
absolute certainty: that I don't know anything.
With that certainty comes the understanding that I don't get to
judge how others live their lives. Though I never understood
being gay, I'm long past the point where I'm sure it's a bad
thing.
That, however, leaves me with the more practical issue.
I am not gay.
I have never felt anything romantic for another woman. I have
never been physically attracted to another woman. Therefore, I
have never even considered the idea that I even could be gay.
Never, that is, until now.
It was not hard for me to accept that I loved Danni. In fact,
it's something I've known for a long time. But I had always
felt that love was something closer to sisterhood.
Now, I had to wonder if it could be something more. I also had
to figure out how I would know the difference.
Most importantly, I had to ask myself what hope I had of
figuring out what it meant to love somebody at this particular
moment, when I'd already had forty years to work on it and
still, apparently, had no clue.
I pondered that as I sat and watched the snow fall into the dark
water in front of me, and quickly accepted that I was doomed to
fail.
I tried turning the problem the other way, and wondered why it
couldn't be something more.
The answer was that there was no reason. Which was a nice
thought, but it only led me back to the first question.
I looked to my right at the lonely wooden skeleton of a home
being restored. Then, I looked left at the nearest home, where
the lights were on and the heat was running and life was being
lived. Once again, I marvelled at the radical difference the
scant distance between them had made.
And what, exactly, was the distance between loving a friend and
the kind of love Danni had me thinking about?
Easy does it, Plato, I scolded myself. You're getting a little
too deep for your own good.
I sighed as I realized that was true. This was not the time for
waxing philosophical. I needed to stay somewhere in the
vicinity of reality.
Reality, in this case, led to a simple truth: things between
Danni and I were never going to be what they were before. She
had taken a bold step, and altered our course forever. As for
my options, they were few. I could say the hell with it, and
see where life took us. Or, I could try to let Danni down easy,
which would likely be the first step in the end of our
relationship.
"That doesn't sound like much of a choice," I said to Tramp.
He reacted by getting up off the back seat and licking the side
of my face. It was a response that, while oddly comforting, was
hard to translate.
"It's not a choice at all," I said more firmly.
I flipped the wipers on to clear the snow that had gathered and
put the car back on the road, suddenly sure of where I had to go
and what I was going to do.
Because one of those two options was absolutely unacceptable.
[hr]
Character Reference
HTML http://s19.postimg.org/x7gm9w22n/Richelle_100x120.jpg
Name: Richelle Winterfeld
Nickname(s):
Background: Owner of the RSI stable, former underground fighter
HTML http://s19.postimg.org/9av3z511b/Danni_100x120.jpg
Name: Danneel Harris
Nickname(s): Danni
Background: RSI stable leader, reigning DEF welterweight
champion
HTML http://s19.postimg.org/5ul2pzr7j/Tramp_100x120.jpg
Name: Tramp
Nickname(s):
Background: Richelle's dog
HTML http://s19.postimg.org/6rw3cls3j/Winzig_100x120.jpg
Name: Winzig
Nickname(s):
Background: Danni's dog
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