Page 5 of Way Down Deep

12.32pm

I guess so, but I don’t know if I ever thought of myself as trapped until right now. It’s safe here. It’s comfortable. I don’t have to make any choices or decide anything in particular. The hardest part of my day is picking what to watch, what to eat, whether to get up off the couch.

I’ve rubbed myself a smooth, soft rut in the fabric of my life.

Though I honestly don’t know why. If I did, I swear I would tell you. Nothing sounds so sweet to me as provoking tender feelings from someone who thinks he isn’t capable of feeling them. But if I tried, I know I’d probably slip into lies.

Make up something juicy for you, like, “it was on the day my family died.” Paint you a picture of a happy girl who lived a sunshine life, until storm cloud clichés came and stole it all away. I could describe the smell of blood with words like raw and heavy; tell you that a corpse turns the colour of spoiled food within moments.

And you would believe me.

It’s just that I don’t want you to.

Instead, tell me something sweet. Tell me something you like.

Tell me all your favourite things.

1.02pm

That’s all I’m getting out of you, huh? You’re a girl. Well, I’ll settle for that if you’ll tell me just one other thing about yourself…

What did you study before you dropped out of university?

As for my favorite things… Man, I’ve felt so little desire for anything other than sleep and whiskey these past few months, it’s like I almost don’t know. But for you, stranger, I’ll try.

I like being barefoot. On smooth hardwood planks or warm sand or dry grass or against cool sheets. I wear socks a lot here. It’s chilly and damp, and it makes my feet ache even though I’m thirty-four not seventy.

But maybe tonight after my obligations are met I’ll move my chair over by the window and take off my socks and prop my feet up on the sill, just above the radiator. That might feel good.

Maybe I need to be making more of an effort to feel nice things. Instead of just trying not to feel anything at all.

What else? I like pumpkin pie. My mom made really amazing pumpkin pie from scratch, on Thanksgiving and Christmas. I’d give anything to taste that again.

I like when a bar of soap is brand new and the logo pressed into it’s still crisp and you can see the seams along the sides.

I like dogs.

I like buying flowers for women.

I like music. A lot. Maybe more than anything.

I like the way my son’s hair smells.

There, I said it. You’re giving me crumbs, but here’s the whole fucking mouse-ridden bakery for you.

I have a kid, a little boy, two and a half. I found out about him a year back, met him five months ago when I moved here because his mom’s out of the picture now.

When he’s not afraid of me, he’s just … blank. He doesn’t speak, doesn’t look me or anyone except his grandmother in the eyes. He went through shit I might never know the details of, saw shit that’s turned him into this frightened, silent little ghost-boy. When he’s in blank-mode, I’ll sit next to him while we watch TV and put my arm around him, just wait for the points where our bodies touch to grow warm, so I know he’s real.

When he wakes up moaning in the middle of the night, I go to his bed and prop him up and hold him. The whiskey lets me do that. Hug him. I tell him he’s safe and I’m here, and I hope my voice comforts him, the way his moans nearly comfort me, because apart from those, he never makes a sound.

I play my guitar for him, sometimes. I play Blackbird and Country Roads and Pink Moon, and I don’t know if he hears.

I never wanted kids. Kids aren’t cool, especially ones as damaged as this little boy, and cool used to matter so much.

The counselor I met with when I came over said to give him time, he’s been through a lot. Let him know you’re here, that you care, that you’re not going anywhere. That you love him.

I don’t know if I do, though. Love him. I want to, but how do you love someone you don’t know? I have no idea what his thoughts are, because he won’t talk. I have no idea if he likes my cooking, or my singing, or a toy I buy him, or if he even knows I’m his father or what that means, or trusts that I won’t hurt him. He’s like a wounded animal—no language, only reaction and fear.

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