The Coldest Day in Hell

It was 1967 and every Sunday afternoon in the Summer, my father would take me and my brother to the quarry. I didn't know it then, but my father was an alcoholic. All I did know is that he would be swigging out of a brown paper bag all afternoon, and a cigarette would never leave his fingers. He would lie on the banks as Tom and I would scramble up the rock face and dive into the turquoise water below. Smiling and laughing, splashing him with each cannonball, competing with each other to see who could get him the wettest.

In the mornings he was always quiet. Well, he wouldn't say much, but he certainly moved with a ferocious tenacity; always uncomfortable, always unkempt. He would moan and groan, huff and puff, and slam cupboards and cabinets until that cool feeling of that brown paper convenience store bag found it's way into his swollen, callused hands. His hair was dark brown with streaks of gray, his chin and upper lip always had stubble, and his belly stuck out over the waistband of his pants ever so slightly, showing his age. His belt never seemed to keep his pants up, because his ass would hang out all of the time. My mother would scold him, "Henry, pull up your pants, you're indecent," and he'd always grumble and wave her away with his large hands. She'd then press her forehead against his and tell him she loved him, and he'd always squeeze her waist and look her in the eye with an insatiable desire that I knew was love. They'd been together since they were 12 and, at 35, they had a tough, rough-and-tumble 15-year-old son, Tom, and a spicy and arduous 6-year-old daughter, me, Nancy. 

My father was a hard-working man. He owned a woodworking shop about 2 miles down the road. Every Sunday after lunch, it was a tradition that Tom and I would bike there and he would take us to the quarry. Our dad would throw our bikes into the back of his red 1950 Ford pickup truck and we'd bounce our way down the dirt and gravel road to the quarry that overflowed with other families enjoying the sweltering heat and the cool relaxation of the placid water of the man-made pit. The seats of my dad's truck were worn and peeling, the interior of the doors stained from the cigarette smoke, and it smelled of dust, burnt leather, and tobacco. Every week we'd stop off at the Texaco just before the turn to the quarry and my father would run in only to emerge moments later with two more brown paper bags, a carton of cigarettes, and a 20 oz Pepsi for me and Tom to share. 

During the week, we never got to drink soda. It was always water, orange juice, or milk. Skim milk. Yuck. One time, when I was five and Tom was 14, Tom and I snuck to the Texaco and he bought me full fat milk, and my life has never been the same. Skim milk is just water lying about being milk. I swear my mom got it just to torture us as kids. 

Anyways, on this one particular Sunday, Tom and I made our way down to my dad's shop around half past noon - as we always did - to go to the quarry. Jameson, Marty's mastiff, greeted us with a wagging tail and a hot tongue lapping up the salty sweat that coated our skin. Jameson was never allowed to run loose outside the shop when my dad was around, which made the whole slobbery greeting seem odd to me. 

"Mr. Charleston, is my dad here?" Tom called as he dismounted his bike. Marty Charleston emerged from the shop, wiping his hands and forehead in a towel that was covered in grease and wood stain. 

"He left about an hour ago. Wanted to get to the Texaco and back before yous two got here. Said he had a treat he wanted to get ya'll." Marty was tall with slicked back jet-black hair, the wrinkles by his icy blue eyes expressed wisdom, and his tanned skin glistened with sweat. His white tank had brown sweat stains down the front and back, and his work boots looked like they were 60 years old. The laces were frayed and different lengths, and they were loose around his feet making his gait labored and shuffled. He was only 23, but his hands showed the same age, calluses and wear and tear of a man who had been working for at least a decade. He smiled with glistening white teeth as he ran his fingers through his hair and wiped sweat from his brow once more.

"He shouldn't be long." and he turned to saunter back into the shop.

"Can I come?" I inquired eagerly, discarding my bike by the shop door, skipping after Marty. 

"A woodworking shop is no place for a child. Let alone a pretty young lady like you. Your daddy would have me hanged if he knew you were in here with this lot of dirty, old men. Take Jameson with you and go wait around back under the willow tree." He said this without looking at me, and the tone in his voice was like a slap to the face. I listened, grabbed Jameson by the collar, and made my way to the spot Marty directed me to. 

As I passed the shop door, I could see Tom sitting on a saw-horse watching two other young men as they sanded and stained several doors. I could tell the doors were going to be beautiful by the door handles sitting on the work bench just to their left. They were bronze, shiny and ornate with flowers wrapping around the shaft and the letter 'C' carved into the center of the knob. The 'C' stood for 'Camden', which was the family name of the town sheriff. They were in the process of building their new home because his wife was pregnant with their 5th child so of course they needed an upgrade. Tom was admiring them as they worked, and he and I made eye contact as I stood sheepishly in the corner of the shop doorway, straining to catch any glimpse of the work they were doing. He grimaced, and threw his head towards the back of the shop, a stern warning for me to keep my ass moving. There were several discarded paper bags and dark brown unlabeled bottles strewn about the shop floor, and on various work benches I could see crumpled aluminum cans and more unlabeled brown bottles, more paper bags. 

I put my head down and ran to the willow tree. Jameson bounded along next to me, high-stepping like a show-pony. Next to my small stature, he was about the size of one. I reached the willow tree just as a gust of wind blew. The branches parted and my hair swirled around my face as I strutted through my willow branch curtain like I was the prima ballerina walking on stage for the grand opening of a show. I threw my head back and let my hair flirt with the wind as the branches spun around me, kissing my skin with their frilly tendrils, only to be blown away again. The branches sung a chorus, announcing my monumental entrance. I threw my arms above my head and just as I was about to make my first leap across my make-shift stage, I heard the sound of a car barreling down the driveway of the shop, sending gravel flying and a whirling tornado of dust through the air. Before the vehicle came to a complete halt, the driver's side door thrust opened and my mother came screaming out like a horse out of the gate at the Kentucky Derby. My mother came to the shop every other week to help Marty's wife Martha with the book-keeping, and it was odd to see her here so late in the day, and on a Sunday.

"Tom! Nancy! Get over here! Now!" My mother's yells cut through the wind like a hot knife through butter and I immediately knew something was amiss. Tom and I sprinted to my mother's side and she was breathing heavily, her hands were trembling, and their was fear in her glossy eyes. 

My mother was typically beautiful. She got up hours before the sun rose to do her hair, her makeup, brew coffee and have breakfast on the table. She was a grand housewife and the perfect juxtaposition against my father's ruthless temper and alcoholism. But that day, something was off. Her floral dress was crumpled, her hair was disheveled, sweat and tears had left streaks down her cheeks through her makeup, and her lipstick had been sloppily rubbed off, smears still coating her chin and the back of her hand.

"It's your father. Get in the car. Now." She ordered sternly. Before we had time to even comprehend what was going on, my mother ushered us into the car, threw it in reverse and peeled out of the driveway onto the main dirt road.

"Momma, what's going on? Where's dad?" Tom asked, curiously. My mother didn’t respond. She just kept driving, staring blankly ahead, tears streaming down her face.

We screeched into the driveway of our country home in 6 minutes. The wind had completely halted by now but the sun shone bright as ever, glistening off the side mirrors of my father's truck, blinding us as we pulled in. It was parked alongside the house as if he had just arrived home from work at 8PM. Only this time it was the middle of the afternoon. Parked behind my father's truck was his brother's silver mustang, the driver's side door still left open. Sheriff Camden's vehicle was idling next to the stairs leading up to the front porch and he and the coroner were standing there filling out paperwork, the front door of our house wide open. My uncle sat on the front stairs, head down, his hat twisting and turning through clenched fists. 

We came to a slow, rolling stop facing the front door, only this time, my mother did not jump out of the car. She sat there with her hands on the steering wheel, looking straight into the house. When my uncle saw us pull in, he slowly stood up and walked toward the car, not making eye contact with any of us. He stood by the driver's door, looking past where the vehicle had stopped and I knew I caught a quiver in his lower lip. My mother gazed into the house that my father had built when she was pregnant at age 18 with my older brother. I could see the corner of the mustard yellow chair that my father would always sit in every evening as my mother prepared dinner. Sprawled out next to the chair on the floor was a bundle of something with a white sheet draped over it.

My mother said nothing. She did nothing. She continued to stare, tears rolling down her face. Silent. 

"Momma? Is daddy home? I thought he was taking us to the quarry, like he does every Sunday." I asked, leaning forward onto the center console from the backseat. She turned towards me and I could see the blue in her eyes had turned a deep gray, and the whites were splintered red. Her eyes were puffy from crying but she said nothing. She then looked at Tom in the passenger seat, placed a hand on his cheek and pulled his forehead against hers, just as she would with my father every morning, then reached down and placed her other hand on mine and squeezed it. Hard. So hard that I grimaced in pain, fearing that my fingers would be crushed within her grasp. Little did I know, it wasn’t my fingers that would be crushed, but my entire world. The only world that I had known. The world filled with laughter, warm hugs, memories of watching my parents dance in the kitchen, my mother giggling and flirtatiously pushing my father away as he would kiss her neck, hands wrapped around her waist.

I remember the smell of coffee, whiskey and tobacco on his lips as he would kiss me goodnight, the grease in his hair and the sweat on the back of his neck leaving residue on my arms as I would wrap them around him, holding him tightly. This happened last night, too, only last night he sat with me for several minutes. He brushed my hair behind my ear, which he never did, and he didn't even have a cigarette in his hand. He placed his rough hand on my cheek and pressed his forehead against mine, whispering, "Goodnight, little princess. I'll be seeing you." He never called me "princess," and I giggled because it sounded so weird to me. Sighing, he said, "I love you," which also seemed bizarre because in my entire life I had never heard him say the actual words. His actions conveyed love, but the words had never crossed his lips. Not even once.

***

"Your father was a great man. He always loved you." My mother breathed. The way my mother used past tense blasted a hole through the bottom of my heart like a shotgun shell, just like the one that had torn through my father's brain and skull inside of that house just an hour before our arrival. Her words eviscerated my insides, tearing gashes through every inch of my skin. For being only 6-years-old I now knew the magnitude of what was going on. I knew exactly what had happened inside that house, where my father truly was, and that it was his body that lay beneath the crumpled bundle of white on the floor by his favorite mustard yellow chair. As my mother held me, I clenched my eyes shut and held her just as I had held my father for the last time the night prior.

***

My father died 20 years ago. I was six years old. It was 104 degrees the day of my father's funeral. That day will forever be remembered as the coldest day in Hell. I remember seeing people that I knew, and people that I didn't. My mother was beautiful again. But a haunting kind of beautiful. Her curled hair and lace scarf draped over her head blew softly in the wind around her shoulders. She wore black gloves and gripped my hand with the same ferocity and intensity as the day we found my father, her other arm wrapped tightly around my brother's shoulders. It was 104 degrees outside and I could feel my mother shivering as she held onto us. She didn't make a sound. At one point I looked up at her, and her eyes were swollen and puffy. She had been sobbing so violently for days that tears wouldn't even fall from her eyes. 

***

Fast forward to now. It's 1987 and every Sunday afternoon in the Summer, I take my two boys to the quarry. My sons scramble up the rock face, laughing as they dive into the turquoise water below. The tradition lives on, the memories are still there. Only this time it's me who lies on the banks below swigging out of my own brown paper bag, a cigarette never leaving my fingers. I lie back on the sand as my boys' laughter fades into the heatwaves, and the splashes of water kiss my face, just as delicately as my father would each night. Goodnight, daddy. It's your little princess. I'll be seeing you. I breathe deeply and close my eyes. I love you.