New York Is Bigger Than You Think

When you were seventeen you and your mama planned a trip to New York City. Neither of you had ever been. You were thrilled at the notion of angry horns emanating from yellow cabs, steam rising from sewer grates, people rushing by in a blur leaving behind a trail of importance. And your mama. Sometimes you and your daddy tease her for not getting jokes or for her awful voice as she sang along to the fuzzy country station on the radio. But in reality, she was the smartest woman you’d ever know and she taught you to never be ashamed to sing along. But every child’s fantasy about their parent’s godliness must, at some point, come to a screeching halt and this was your time. She explains to you that a friend of hers would be meeting you both there, in New York. A friend she’s known for a long, long time. Tears rolled down her face and her shaky voice tried to explain the ‘situation’ as she begs you to be understanding. And you tried, you really did. But that first night when you woke up alone in the hotel room with her side of the bed cold and empty, you imagine your daddy’s face when he would pick the both of you up from the airport. And you wonder how she could possibly look him in the eye, ever again. Six months go by before even you can look her in the face and when you do the event becomes catastrophic. You give your creator an ultimatum, she tells him, or you do, because every task that you watch them do together makes you ill. In no sooner than a week, with your mother at work and your siblings with a sitter, you ride next to your daddy in his pick up truck. The bed of the truck is loaded with his things and the loose gravel road mixed with the bad alignment of the tires causes the boxes to shift and bounce. These are the sounds that you listen to in the silent cab along with a crackling, twangy radio station playing so low that your daddy’s sadness can almost drown it out. You know she didn’t tell him the real reason. You know that she made up some story about growing apart, needing space, finding herself. Just as you open your mouth to baptize the dusty console and the light brown upholstered bench seat in truth, that’s when it happened. It wasn’t his fault, just a damn pot hole and the instability of those uneven tires. You still limp, and you still hold the truth within you. It’s been there so long that its oily blackness has seeped through your pours and stained your soul. But today, today you are four years older and the slow spilling secrets will gush from your slit open mouth when you knock on the door of the man whom you’ve been avoiding for fear of this very day.
You know that he still cries. Mostly you know this because at least once or twice a week your phone will ring at some ungodly hour, and despite your gentle attempts to get the faceless voice to identify itself, you hear nothing but sobs. You know it is him. What you don’t know, however, is why exactly he chooses to call. You think it could be that you remind him of your mother, or maybe it’s out of guilt for the accident, which it is…in part. He thinks you blame him for the broken body, for the broken home, for it all. In reality, these tear filled nights are when he stumbles out of the titty bar that he’s known to frequent. He talks to no one, just sits in the dark corner on an overstuffed chair that doesn’t have arms. The low, moving lights hide stains on the seats and imperfections on the girls’ bodies. He sits, sipping Jack from his silver hip flask with an engraved BD on the front, a birthday present from another life, peering at just one girl. He slumps down, eyes barely open and watches as she spins and writhes on the stage, wearing nothing but high black heels that always make her back hurt. “Jesus,” he thinks, “she could be Lorna’s twin.” His late night phone calls are riddled guilt that stems from more than one place. She hasn’t spoken to him since the accident, aside from her groggy voice on the other end of the pay phone outside the club. The payphone with the Yellow Pages hanging off the bottom and the clear plastic side paneling, it almost feels like a confession booth and he wants nothing more than for his priestess to grant him grace.
Both seeking redemption of a different sort, you and he turn onto the old gravel road that still holds flecks of your blood and broken glass, not realizing who the other is, not realizing your destination will be the same. You approach a rusted out trailer at the end of a cul-de-sac, and your headlights fall on the face of a man stepping out of his truck. He lifts is left hand to shield the blinding light as he turns to inspect the intruder through squinted eyes. Your car is now parked behind his and the ignition keys turned to off. You roll down your manual window to allow the weathered face of a man you used to know to examine yours. His voice catches in his throat and a confused exasperation over takes him.
“Lorna?”
“Hi, daddy.”
You stare at each other, and he begins to think of his payphone confessional. Only neither of you can really be sure of who’s the sinner, and who’s the redeemer.