Read Online Sleeping Tigers by Holly Robinson - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Holly Robinson
Tags: Fiction, Contemporary Women
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time the nurses told my father he had a new son, he’d already passed out on a plastic chair. When he came to, he tried to belt one of the doctors, rushed past the orderly who tried to restrain him, and fell to his knees beside Mom’s hospital bed, weeping.
“He called me his Madonna,” Mom sighed, telling me this story. “It was difficult to stay angry with your father, because he was always so sorry for the things he did.”
Dad’s drinking escalated slowly. I mostly remembered him being like the other fathers in our neighborhood who came home and had a couple of highballs. His real drunken, raging fits didn’t begin until I was in high school, after Dad was laid off from the lumber sales job he’d held for fifteen years.
I remembered one of those early rants clearly: I was a sophomore in high school, talking to Karin on the phone one Saturday when Dad told me to hang up. Typically, my father would have called me more than once; I counted on those warnings, eking out every moment of phone time. But this time Dad stormed into the kitchen, his face scarlet, the veins on his neck bulging.
“It’ll never be `wait a minute’ again. Not from you, Missy!” he bellowed, and slapped me so hard across the face that I dropped the telephone receiver and fell to the floor, my knees buckling beneath me like a doll’s.
My mother and Cam ran into the kitchen, Cam with his hands balled into fists. I was sixteen, so my brother must have been thirteen then. Mom knelt down and held me in her arms until she realized that I refused to cry. Then, as if on cue, we both stood up, brushed ourselves off and walked into the dining room with Cam silently dogging our heels, turning our backs on the volcano behind us.
Lucky for me, my mother had taught me how to mostly dodge or sweet talk my father, how to be all smiles and tiptoes whenever the man was in a mood. That was the only time my father ever struck me.
Cam, though, had it much worse. His adolescence coincided with the peak of Dad’s melancholy drinking, and he spent his teen years ducking my father’s noisy, sloppy moments of affection as fervently as he dodged the blows when Dad started careening towards him, shouting at Cam to cut his hair or bring up his grades. Dad didn’t sober up completely until Cam left home for college. Cam had never been able to forgive him.
We’d come to the end of the Bay Bridge. “So, do you have a job?” I asked.
Cam laughed. “You sound like Dad. Sure I have a job. Not a career. Just a job that lets me come and go.”
“A job doing what?”
“I’m a falafel man.”
“Well, thank goodness your college classes prepared you for something.”
“College taught me that I wanted to avoid the ol’ nine-to-five ball and chain. What about you? Still wiping snotty noses for a living?”
“Funny. Fourth graders wipe their own noses, thank you very much. It’s one of the first things we teach them.”
“Suppose somebody has to.”
I thought back, trying to remember what Cam might have been like in fourth grade, but failing. “It’s really good to see you. I’m sorry we’ve been so out of touch.”
Cam was leaning against the seat, his eyes closed, occasionally reaching up to scratch his scalp. His damp hair hung to his shoulders, and every time he scratched his head, another handful of sand tumbled onto his shirt. He wore a tattered flannel shirt over sweat pants cut into a pair of shorts. Blue plastic thongs dangled from his bony feet. It occurred to me for the first time that Cam might be broke. He might really need Jon, not just to tell him what to do, but to help keep a roof over his head. How much money could a falafel man make?
Now Cam tugged his beard. “Huh. I always thought we still were in touch.” He caught my look of disbelief and grinned. “Missed me, huh? Well, now you’ve got to kiss me.” He leaned over and gave me a wet, salty smack on the cheek. “There. Feel closer now?”
I smiled. “Remember that
“He called me his Madonna,” Mom sighed, telling me this story. “It was difficult to stay angry with your father, because he was always so sorry for the things he did.”
Dad’s drinking escalated slowly. I mostly remembered him being like the other fathers in our neighborhood who came home and had a couple of highballs. His real drunken, raging fits didn’t begin until I was in high school, after Dad was laid off from the lumber sales job he’d held for fifteen years.
I remembered one of those early rants clearly: I was a sophomore in high school, talking to Karin on the phone one Saturday when Dad told me to hang up. Typically, my father would have called me more than once; I counted on those warnings, eking out every moment of phone time. But this time Dad stormed into the kitchen, his face scarlet, the veins on his neck bulging.
“It’ll never be `wait a minute’ again. Not from you, Missy!” he bellowed, and slapped me so hard across the face that I dropped the telephone receiver and fell to the floor, my knees buckling beneath me like a doll’s.
My mother and Cam ran into the kitchen, Cam with his hands balled into fists. I was sixteen, so my brother must have been thirteen then. Mom knelt down and held me in her arms until she realized that I refused to cry. Then, as if on cue, we both stood up, brushed ourselves off and walked into the dining room with Cam silently dogging our heels, turning our backs on the volcano behind us.
Lucky for me, my mother had taught me how to mostly dodge or sweet talk my father, how to be all smiles and tiptoes whenever the man was in a mood. That was the only time my father ever struck me.
Cam, though, had it much worse. His adolescence coincided with the peak of Dad’s melancholy drinking, and he spent his teen years ducking my father’s noisy, sloppy moments of affection as fervently as he dodged the blows when Dad started careening towards him, shouting at Cam to cut his hair or bring up his grades. Dad didn’t sober up completely until Cam left home for college. Cam had never been able to forgive him.
We’d come to the end of the Bay Bridge. “So, do you have a job?” I asked.
Cam laughed. “You sound like Dad. Sure I have a job. Not a career. Just a job that lets me come and go.”
“A job doing what?”
“I’m a falafel man.”
“Well, thank goodness your college classes prepared you for something.”
“College taught me that I wanted to avoid the ol’ nine-to-five ball and chain. What about you? Still wiping snotty noses for a living?”
“Funny. Fourth graders wipe their own noses, thank you very much. It’s one of the first things we teach them.”
“Suppose somebody has to.”
I thought back, trying to remember what Cam might have been like in fourth grade, but failing. “It’s really good to see you. I’m sorry we’ve been so out of touch.”
Cam was leaning against the seat, his eyes closed, occasionally reaching up to scratch his scalp. His damp hair hung to his shoulders, and every time he scratched his head, another handful of sand tumbled onto his shirt. He wore a tattered flannel shirt over sweat pants cut into a pair of shorts. Blue plastic thongs dangled from his bony feet. It occurred to me for the first time that Cam might be broke. He might really need Jon, not just to tell him what to do, but to help keep a roof over his head. How much money could a falafel man make?
Now Cam tugged his beard. “Huh. I always thought we still were in touch.” He caught my look of disbelief and grinned. “Missed me, huh? Well, now you’ve got to kiss me.” He leaned over and gave me a wet, salty smack on the cheek. “There. Feel closer now?”
I smiled. “Remember that
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