9. Make amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
Sitting on the passenger side of The Sandwiches beat up pickup truck I was struck dumbfounded as usual at his casual demeanor as he drove, the way he had of owning everything around him. It awoke my anger and the siren warning that always rang in my ears when I was in his presence dulled. For gawds sake, what was he going on about, why did he think he could small talk me at all? Manners forced me to turn and look at him as he spoke. I hated to see my daughter's eyes in his head, hated the warmth in his smile, the "I'm an open book" routine, hated him.
My body was as close to the door as it could get, my seat belt an irony, meant to protect me from the unlikely event of a car accident when I was willingly strapped in next to the biggest wreck I had encountered in my life. I thought of Tim's face when I told him I was going to do a walk-thru of Isabelle's dad's house, before her first unsupervised visit, the way his eyes traveled up and down my body checking to see that I was still all there, still all his. The muscles in his body had rippled with desire, they said 'say the word and I'll kill him, give me one tiny excuse and he'll regret it'. I had laughed at him, and told him it was fine, assured him with my shoulders thrown back and my head held high, lied to both of us.
It was a terrible neighborhood. The sort of area that welcomes the dredges of society, the place you go when you can't go anywhere else. The perfect place for a house shared by recovering drug addicts with prison records. One of the roommates was on the large porch as we came up the steps. His smile was wide and welcoming and when he said hello he had the tone idiots use with children. I realized his mistake. He figured I was The Sandwiches oldest daughter. I held my tongue and made The Sandwich explain it before laughing out loud, earning myself a wicked glare. Then he had his revenge when he invited me to sit in on their house meeting before taking a look around.
We stood staring at one another, he wanted me to sit first and I wanted to see where he would sit, hoping I might find a place to sit that was far from him but also no where near the roomies. In the end he went to the bathroom and since there was no way any of the roomies were going to risk breaking the man code the spot next to me was open when he returned. He had the gall to take it, sitting much closer than he had to. The meeting proceeded around us and other than being sharply aware of his proximity through the entire thing it was fairly mundane and felt a bit like a show put on for visitors. Afterward, the walk through the rambling house, past the piles of laundry and down along dusty hallways wasn't anything I didn't expect. I already knew a scheduled walk through wasn't going to reveal any secrets he didn't want it to I certainly couldn't tell he was high when I was fucking him, this awkward peering in at his life wasn't going to tell me anything to make me feel better about how he would care for the little girl who mended my broken heart.
Back in the truck, I was relieved to be heading back home. The end of this visit was an item to be check off on the list for the lawyer, something to point to and know I did all I could to make a working parental relationship the way the courts wanted. I was marveling that I had ever shared air with this man, let alone created a child when he suddenly shifted the conversation dangerously.
"You know I'm in NA…." He led off
"Yeah."
"You know about the twelve steps?"
"…yeeeaaah" I decided not to tell him I had read The Big Book when I was twelve, during one of my dad's dry spells when he had left it around. I avoided sharing even the slightest information with him, keeping him from the opportunity to twist it and throw it back at me.
"The step I'm working on now… it's not easy and you're one of the last people I've been putting off doing this with. Well, I just want to tell you I know what I did. I know I did wrong by you….."
*ten blocks of silence*
"You don't have to say anything."
"No. I don't." I was breathing carefully, aware that my anger could easily put me in tears, could swell up and choke me.
"I'm trying to make amends. If there's ever anything I can do for you, you tell me."
*five blocks of silence*
"Dew(ed), the least you can do is say something, not just sit there like a block of stone." He was getting angry, angry at me and then more angry that he wasn't in control, that I wasn't grateful for his half-assed apology with the meaningless IOU attached. "Say something!"
I took a deep breath, thinking I could doggy paddle my way through the rising tide of anger and hurt. "I can't believe you think you can number nine me." Sucking more air in I managed to continue, "What you did to me, what happened… there is nothing you could ever do to take that back, to make it better. Nothing."
"The steps aren't about you passing me or giving me the go ahead, Dew(ed). You don't get to decide if I made amends or not."
"That's convenient. I mean so long as everything turns up sunny for The Sandwich we should all be happy."
"Fuck you." He laughed at me from the other side of the bench seat. "One of these days you're going to realize nobody will ever live up to your standards and you're going to have to loosen up and take a chance Miss. Dew." He pulled the truck in alongside my front yard and before my door slammed he added "in the meantime have fun playing house with Tim."
Don't mind if I do.
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