Bill looked at Megan’s petite hands on his large paw, and old sadness started misting back upon him. He did have one secret, one so lost no one remembered it except himself. It had tortured him for over twenty years; one that only two police officers had even known about.
“What did you find out on the internet about my parents, Megan?”
“That they were deceased. When I read that part, I did not feel comfortable trying to find out anything else about them.”
Bill nodded, sat back in his chair, and rolled his neck. The vertebra gave a little pop, but he did not derive any satisfaction from that release. He took another breath and wanted to get out of the chair and do anything else, anything at all, instead of talk about his parents, and his past. But the memories were flooding back, along with the ignored advice of a few therapists.
He had been encouraged to explore his past and his anger, but he had known better than to do so at the time. Anger is what had driven him, got him through the crap with Natalie’s grandfather and being an orphan in in school. It was anger that had driven him to hit more than one batter with a baseball when they showed him disrespect.
The anger had helped drive him onto the training fields before six AM every morning, for years, until he had become one of the best pitchers in the world.
Now I need anger for my rehabilitation! Because of an asshole drunk driver.
Megan studied Bill’s face which was slowly turning red, having no idea of what was going through his head. But she was losing him. He was going to bury whatever had started to come up.
“Bill? Earth to Bill.”
His eyes began to focus again as he studied her face, and made a decision.
“They were addicts, Megan and they died from overdoses.”
“Oh…I’m so sorry, Bill. That’s terrible.”
He nodded acknowledgement.
“It was a long time ago. Anyway, they must have struggled with drugs for years, but normally one of them would try and stay coherent enough to take care of me. My Dad could build and repair recreational vehicles. Back then he could always get a job somewhere, at an RV shop or a trailer factory, and make a little money.
“But they were afraid of the police and especially afraid of Health and Welfare. They told me never to open the door when those people came around because they would take me away from them.”
Bill fell silent.
“Neighbors must have turned them in sometimes because we had a few visits from the agency. We always moved the next day. Sometimes they could hide or control their addiction for a little while. I remember moving at least seven times.”
Megan got out of her chair and moved behind Bill to hug his back as he talked.
“I would find them passed out occasionally when I came home from school. I began to realize it must have been when they went on a binge, usually when Dad cashed a big paycheck, or had repaired someone’s trailer to earn side money. Then we would have good food for a while, maybe a week, until drugs got the rest.”
Bill gave a small smile. “He loved his fried chicken. He always got a bucket of it from a small place in Meridian. We really ate well when he could afford fried chicken.”
Tears were streaming down Megan’s face. Bill didn’t notice. He was almost in a trance, reciting facts from a book report.
“I had a great uncle that lived in the area. He was an alcoholic but at least held a job in a parts store until his liver gave out. He would make sure we had something to eat when he checked on us. He tried to check on us twice a week. He always brought Oscar Meyer chicken sandwiches on white bread, so everyone had something to eat. He was a kind man.”
Bills face clouded and he shuddered, his stone façade showing a little crack.
“He had a little place off Grover Street. It was a small house with a one car garage and a big back yard. He had cherry, apple, and apricot trees. The apples were really good.”
Bill face was wrinkled, concentrating on the memory.
Megan wiped her face and let a ghost of a smile show. She started to say something when Bill began speaking.
“If things got bad, we would stay in his garage. We had cots and sleeping bags that he kept there for us. I remember boxes along one wall, tools, and the smell of old oil.”
Bill was lost in the past.
“My uncles car leaked oil and Dad would clean it up when we had to sleep out there.”
“Oh, Bill, I am so sorry!” She tried to turn him to face her. He resisted but she gently persisted.
He looked at her without really seeing, then continued.
“Then my uncle got sick and died. Things got desperate without his help, without his garage for us to stay in between houses. We kept moving around, more often after that.
“Then one day I came home from school and the house was quiet, too quiet. I found my mom passed out in the kitchen with foam around her mouth. We didn’t have a phone and my dad was at work.
“She was breathing, and I tried to wake her up. I couldn’t.
“I went next door and called 911.”
Megan was hugging him fiercely, her face buried in his back, crying openly.
“I am so sorry, Bill, so sorry.”
“She went to the hospital, and I was put in the foster system.
“They told me not to call the cops.
“They promised they would clean up and get me back.
“They lied to me. They died instead.”