Child of My Soul

"I'm not your father, Tory," Joe said casually, between sips of coffee.

The words hit me like the impact of a hand grenade. "What the hell do you mean? Of course, you're my father."

Standing behind the ornately carved wooden bar, he smiled at me and shook his head. "I never slept with your mother. Never even kissed her."

I looked around at the blues bar Joe had bought ten years ago to hide the pain his words had brought. Three hours until the bar opened for supper, five empty wooden stools sat next to mine. Joe's two waitresses refilled the salt shakers and ketchup bottles on the dozen or so tables scattered around the bar. One of the musicians Joe had hired sat tuning his guitar among the lonely instruments on the stage. The other musicians would join him for sound check in an hour.

I turned back and studied the man I'd thought of as my f father since I was four years old. The salt-and-pepper color of his hair was the only indication that he was nearly fifty. His neatly-groomed beard was still the original black color I remembered from my childhood. The front of his cropped haircut stood at attention like a row of soldiers before the drill sergeant. A single silver hoop dangled in his left earlobe. His green eyes stared back at me as he took another sip of coffee.

"I don't understand," I said. "You've always said you were the father of my heart. I was the child of your soul. That nothing else mattered. If that's so, then why the hell are we having this conversation?"

"I've been in your place," he said. "I just wanted to remind you of that. Lucy is Greg's grandmother. Kyle was her son. She tell Greg stories about him all the time. But he needs to understand Kyle from your memories. If he knows you're willing to answer his questions, he won't pester you so much."

Greg was my f five-year-old son with an inquisitive mind like the National Inquirer. He always asked questions about almost anything we encountered from the time he first started talking. But lately, his favorite subject seemed to be his father.

Greg was watching the Chiefs play against the Broncos on the TV. "Mommy, he said, "didn't Daddy play football in high school?"

I looked at my son and saw pieces of his father's features and flashes of his personality. Greg had the same blond hair that hung to his shoulders like his father's had done. His face was the same shape, and the two men shared a slightly lopsided smile. He eyes, the color of mine watched me as he patiently waited for an answer. "Yes, he did."

"What position did he play?"

"He was the quarterback."

"Was he a good football player?"

"The football team won most of their games when we were in high school."

"But was Daddy a good football player?"

I sighed. "We'll talk about it later, Greg. Let's just watch the game for now."

During my sophomore year in high school, my least favorite class of the day was third period geometry. I hated hated solving the various proofs that always seemed to be our homework. I can still remember how funny I thought the teacher, Mr. Albertson, looked. He was a man of fifty years old in severe denial over his receding hairline; the little bit that was left on top was brushed over to try to disguise the fact that his forehead began in the middle of his head. Whenever he would write problems on the board, his large stomach would jiggle like he was Santa Claus.

Because the school was being renovated, twenty hard-backed desks had been crammed into a classroom designed for 12 seats. By the end of the week, sitting in the chairs and listening to the teacher lecture managed to turn my butt numb and my mind wasn't far behind.

About the time Mr. Albertson was beginning to sound like Charlie Brown's teacher, the class was interrupted with the addition of a new student introduced as Kyle. He looked like the fulfillment of every adolescent fantasy I had ever had at the time. He had three gold hoops in both ears. He was built like a professional wrestler with more muscles than I could dream up. He blond hair, several inches below his shoulders, was caught in a ponytail at the nape of his neck. I longed to pull out the rubber band and run my fingers through it to see if it was a soft as if looked.

We were studying for the upcoming Math Olympiad that the top five teams from our school would attend. Each team consisted of two people that would work together to solve geometric proofs. Since my partner had moved a few weeks before, I was hoping that Kyle would become my new partner. He did. Even better, Mr. Albertson suggested that we spend our study hall together in his room to make sure that Kyle wasn't missing any background information he would need for the contest.

Mr. Albertson gave me a pass for the next hour--when we both had study hall--to come to his classroom. Kyle and I were seated in a pair of desks that faced each other. Mr. Albertson stood at the blackboard, his favorite perch. The three of us spent 20 minutes reviewing why congruent triangles are congruent. Then the office called on the intercom it tell Mr. Albertson that his wife was labor; it was his first child.

His reaction to the news was hilarious. Repeating "oh, my God," he ran around the room shoving math partners at his briefcase. Half of them ended up in the wastebasket beside his desk. He said maybe we should go back to study hall, then changed his mind, and said we were good kids. Wearing his coat inside out, he left his briefcase on his desk and asked Kyle to check his math papers.

Kyle turned, a heart-stopping smile on his lips, and fixed his blue eyes on me.

Finally, I asked, "Do I have toast in my teeth?"

"What?"

"You're staring at me."

"Am I?"

"Yes, you are. I thought maybe something was wrong with me. Like food in my teeth or something."

"Nothing's wrong. In fact, you look perfect. It makes me want to . . ." He blushed.

I touched him on the forearm. He looked at my hand. "It makes you want to what?"

Still looking at my hand, he whispered, "It makes me want to kiss you, Tory."  He raised his head to stare at my lips.

It was as if he'd read my mind because I'd been thinking the same thing since I first saw him. "Then why don't you?"

For a moment, he looked stunned. Just when I was sure that he wasn't going to, he leaned across the desk and kissed me. It was a soft, gentle kiss like petting a kitten or holding a china tea cup. The kiss lasted for only a few seconds, but I still managed to grab a handful of his ponytail. It felt like silk in my trembling hands. Long minutes of silence passed as we stared at each other in shock.

"Wow," he finally managed to say.

"Yeah, wow," I stammered.

"What are you doing Friday night?"

"Going to the football game with you."

"I'm on the team."

"Then I'll be watching you play."

"I was hoping you'd say that." It was the beginning of a two-year relationship.

"It's been five years since Kyle died," I said, staring past Joe into the mirror behind the bar. "It still hurts. I see so much of him in Greg."

"Like I still see my brother in you even after nearly 20 years, Tory." Joe reached for the coffeepot behind the bar to refill his cup.

I looked at Joe as if seeing him for the first time. "My God," I said, I never thought about it before. Kyle and your brother--my parents--were both killed in car accidents. You really have been here before."

"At least you got to say good-bye to Kyle." He drained the coffee cup in one gulp and refilled his cup once more.

"How do you ever get over the pain?"

"You don't," Joe whispered. He spooned sugar into his coffee. "You remember the day he died and decide the pain won't eat you alive. It can, given half a chance."

Two months before we graduated from high school, I found I was seven weeks pregnant. I planned a romantic dinner with candle light and Kyle's favorite food to tell him about the baby. I was sure he would be happy even though we hadn't planned on having a baby until after we were both through college.

We were supposed to eat dinner at seven o'clock. At nine-thirty, Kyle still hadn't arrived or called. I sat at the table fuming over what an inconsiderate jerk my boyfriend was. An hour later, Joe answered the telephone on the fifth ring. I'm still not sure when Joe came home that night. My anger quickly turned to disbelief and shock as Joe told me Kyle's car had been hit by a drunk driver. No one was sure if he was going to live; he was still in surgery.

Time seemed to slip into slow motion as we waited in the hospital's waiting room. It felt like I was watching the Bionic Woman reruns where things are supposed to be moving faster, but they look like it's slow motion. Three hours after our arrival, the doctor came to tell us of Kyle's progress. They had done everything they could, but his injuries were just too severe. They thought he would be lucky to survive the night.

Kyle's mother, Lucy, asked if I could see him f or a few minutes. The doctor said no, I wasn't a family member. Lucy changed his mind with a stubborn look that would have done a mule proud.

The beep of the various monitors keeping track of his heartbeat, breathing and everything else was the only sound in the room as I entered. The nurse draped a sheet over his legs and lap as she left the room. Vivid bruises and angry gashes provided the only covering for his naked chest. Two IVs dripped into his arm. A white bandage concealing his left eye, ear, and the top of his head contrasted with the bruises marring the right side of his face.

I sat beside Kyle's bed on an orange, plastic chair holding his hand until my feet and legs fell asleep. Finally, he woke up and whispered my name. "Don't talk," I said. "Just listen. We're going to have a baby in November. So you have to get better."

He tried to smile at me, but it looked more like a grimace because of the bandages and bruises. "I love you. Don't ever forget that," he said. He closed his eyes.

The nurse told me I had to leave. Kyle died sometime during the night; no one was exactly sure when it happened.

I blinked against the abrupt pain I felt at remembering that day. I realized I had missed hearing everything Joe had said for several minutes. "What?"

Joe smiled. "I said sometimes talking about the person helps."

"Sounds more like a cheesy cliché to me."

"Maybe it is at that," Joe agreed, once again sipping his coffee. "I only know that telling you about my brother kept me sane. And, if you don't, it's likely that Greg's questions will only get worse."

"Maybe. What time is Lucy dropping off Greg?"

Joe looked at his wristwatch. "Actually, they should have been here about ten minutes ago."

The door to the bar slammed eon followed by my son yelling for mommy. Greg's long hair was held in a ponytail by a Celtic circle hairtie I had bought for Kyle on our first anniversary of dating. He scrambled into the bar stool next to mine. I pulled the hairtie from his ponytail and asked if he'd like to hear about the day I bought it for his father. His answering smile was the size of the Grand Canyon. As the bar began to fill with patrons looking for good blues and a beer, I sat in Joe's office telling Greg a story about his father.