Chapter 9

“I overslept the next day. Mom was in the kitchen mopping the floor around the table. Her eyes were all red, and her cheeks were wet from crying. For some reason, when I saw that, it just made me madder. I felt like she had no right to be upset at me. She was the one who was living a lie all my life, not me. Before she could say a word, I bolted past her, grabbed my coat, and ran out the door. She yelled at me to stop, but I just kept going.

 “That day I decided to call the only listing for a Gilbert O’Shea I found in the local phone book. I figured he must live close by since everyone kept thinking I was his son. The phonebook said he lived in Stirling Heights, the next town over from where I lived. I had no idea what I was going to say when he answered, but I dialed the number anyway.”

His wife answered the phone, and I asked to speak with Gilbert, like I knew already knew him.

“A few seconds later, he picked up the receiver. I remember every word of our conversation like it happened yesterday.”

Shelly began kneading my knotted shoulder muscles with her fingers.

“When he answered the phone, I asked if this was Gilbert O’Shea.”

 “Yes it is, may ah ask who’s callin’?”

“Did you go to Quaker Hills High, like fifteen or sixteen years ago?”

“Yes… who is this?”

“Did you happen to know a girl by the name of Ellen Joh…I mean Stinson?”

“Yeah, I remember Ellen. Why? Who am ah talkin’ with?”

“This is her… ah… well, actually I guess maybe I’m technically your son.”

“What?” He almost shouted. Then he began to whisper in a forceful low voice. “What the hell are you talkin’ about?”

“I think I’m your son beca… ”

“Let me tell you somethin’ you moron. I only have one son, and he lives here in my house. I’m a happily married man and if ya think you’re goin’ ta screw that up for me, you’re dead wrong. Or at least you will be if you ever call me again. Now get a life of your own and let me alone!” 

“He hung up and I swore at him like he was standing next to me. I knew it must be true, and that he knew he was my dad, too. I guess ‘cause mom never went after him, he figured he was off the hook.”

“At least I knew the truth. I also knew why my next brother was eight years younger than me. Mom and Ed weren’t even dating when I was born. I suppose that’s why my parents never mentioned how many years they were married when they celebrated their anniversaries. They didn’t want me to figure it out. I felt like a freakin’ baby. I thought everyone in the whole town must’ve known but me, and I hated them for it. I also hated me more than ever. I don’t know why, but I convinced myself right then and there that they never did want me – that they were just somehow stuck with me.

“From then on, I vented on my parents every chance I got. For some reason I just couldn’t accept that they had pretended I was Ed’s son for all those years when my real dad lived so close.

“Casey had a connection to buy booze, so I started giving him money and sneaking out of the house late at night to meet with him so we could get wasted. As time passed I spent less and less time at home, and more and more time with him.”

I turned to look at Michelle again.

“The reason I freaked at the restaurant is because before I committed my life to Christ, I… Oh God. Casey’s gay, Shelly. We didn’t just drink. We did stuff together. …stuff like you asked me about, Shelly.”

“You were just reacting,” Shelly reasoned.

“That’s the real hard part, Shelly. It wasn’t just reacting. For as long as I can remember, I always wanted to do the things we did together. The alcohol just gave me the courage to do it.

“At first I made myself believe it was just experimenting, but after a while, I think I knew that the real reason I wanted to get drunk every night was so I had an excuse to be with Casey. He made me feel wanted.

“Mom and Ed found out about me sneaking out of the house, but they couldn’t do anything to stop me.

“I started taking money out of my college savings account so we could buy pot too. We were getting high together almost every day, and by the time warm weather arrived for the summer, I didn’t even bother going home most nights. …I’d just find a place to crash outside, or in someone’s garage. I tried to be home for supper and breakfast to try and keep my parents from finding out what I was doing, but they knew I was sneaking out. They just didn’t know how to stop me.

“Shelly, I… Oh God,” I sobbed. “When I used up all my savings, and they started suspecting that I was stealing from them, I got so desperate I even did stuff with guys in the public restroom just so I could buy drugs.”

Shelly tensed noticeably.

“It kind of happened by accident the first time. Some married guy saw me in the bathroom and offered me fifty bucks to let him into my stall. I puked my guts out after he left the first time.

“I bought my first bag of meth that day. Someone told me it would give me more energy and make me happy. Before I blew my first line, I remember how afraid I was of what might eventually happen to me, but then I figured my life wasn’t worth crap anyway, so I did it.

“I’d go days at a time without sleep because of the crystals, and I was never hungry. I lost like twenty or thirty pounds in those six months, most of it after I started using. I started getting sick a lot too.”

Gazing at Shelly until she looked up at me, I tried to lighten the mood a bit by pulling an old photo out of my wallet.

“Is that him?”

“That’s me, silly. I wore my hair in dreads so I never had to wash or comb it.”

“You had dreadlocks? I can’t believe that’s you. You’re too…”

“Too what?”

“Too… too perfect,” she said, looking into my eyes. She looked so confused. “You’re like this perfect guy who’s all nice and polite. I just can’t believe that was ever you.”

“Perfect? Nice and polite?”

“Lisa refers to you as Winnie the Pooh because you’re like this lovable stuffed animal.”

“No way”

“I’m serious. …so this is really you?”

“BC”

“BC?”

“Before Christ”

“Anyway, one night in June of that year, Casey and I got busted for breaking and entering. They called my parents. It was like three o’clock in the morning. I was scared of what might happen, but I think I was actually kind of glad we got caught. I was so tired of running and being angry at everyone. The only time during the day I even felt halfway decent was when I was high or drunk. The rest of the days I was either angry at someone, or so sad I wanted to cry.

“Mom was crying when they got to the police station. They only charged me with a few misdemeanors, but it upset my mom enough to finally force some issues with me.

 “At suppertime, about a week after being busted, mom told me she had made an appointment for me to see a counselor the next day, and made it clear I had better show up.

“That’s when she told me she knew I was doing drugs. She had done some research at the library, and figured it had to be either cocaine, or speed, or meth.

“When I wouldn’t answer her, she screamed ‘Listen to me, Phillip.’ Then she reached across the table and slapped my cheek as hard as she could with her hand.

“Wake up! For God sake, Phillip… please wake up. Oh dear God, please wake up before it’s too late. ”

“Well, that got my attention. I was mad as a hornet. I think seeing how scared Sammy and Aaron were, is the only thing that kept me from lunging at her. Ed jumped out of his chair right away, but he would have been too late to stop me. For some reason, more than anything else, I hated what I was doing to my brothers, even if they were only my half-brothers.

“I knew deep inside, I wanted someone to help me. I was starting to feel like Casey was just using me to get free beer. I couldn’t get high enough, or stay high long enough, to avoid the pain self-pity had filled my life with. I just couldn’t bring myself to admit to anyone I needed help. I guess I really just wanted everyone to be as miserable as I was.

“Mom told me the counselor would help me. I just spat at her, and asked if he was gonna volunteer to be my dad too? Told her ‘Sweet – him and Ed can take turns’.”

“She slapped my mouth for the second time that night. …told me that Ed had always been a dad to me. …that he adopted me because he loved both of us.

“I knew inside that what she was telling me was true, but I couldn’t bring myself to back down and screamed at her. I wanted to punish her, and must have said something that had the desired effect, because she bolted from the table, ran to her bedroom, and slammed the door behind her. It’s not that it made me feel any better. But I think I was glad she felt as miserable as I did.

“After that, I was forced to take remedial summer classes at school on account of my flunking three subjects. The Guidance counselor personally got me out of my class and escorted me to my counseling sessions just to be sure I got there.

“After just three weeks, my counselor told my parents that maybe the only hope I had of recovering was for them to send me to a youth intervention boot camp. Two weeks later, I had all of my personal belongings packed into one small duffel bag and was on a bus bound for a wilderness program in the Mountains of New York state.

“I remember them stopping to have my dreads cut off on the way to the bus station, and wondering if that’s what they would try to do at the camp: cut off everything from my life that they didn’t like.

“That’s where I met Jesus, Shelly. He’s the one that turned my life around.”