| r.kv.r.y quarterly literary journal summer 2006 shorts on substances |
The Ninth Step by Jen Conley
8. Made a list of all persons we have harmed,
and became willing to make amends to them
all.
9. Made direct amends to such people
wherever possible, except when to do so would
injure them or others.
2 Suggested Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous
8. Made a list of all persons we have harmed,
and became willing to make amends to them
all.
9. Made direct amends to such people
wherever possible, except when to do so would
injure them or others.
2 Suggested Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous
Jeff was dreaming of the accident again. His eyes popped open and he saw the ceiling fan
swirl slowly above his head, around and around, just like the car did when it hit the tree and
flipped over. In the dream the rolling didn’t stop; he felt the flopping and flopping of the car
until he woke up in his bed, the ceiling fan gently spinning above.
His wife was already gone. Her job started at six. She worked at a nearby nursing home,
running the front desk, a recent job promotion from housekeeping. He could hear his boys,
shouting and slamming the kitchen cabinets. They were in middle school, just about
teenagers, almost the same age as Jeff was when his mother left home for good.
He got out of bed, took a shower, and eventually found the boys sitting in front of the
television, staring at television cartoons, slurping cereal out of their bowls. He told them
they had ten minutes before the bus came. Trent, the older one, nodded but the little one,
TJ, shrugged. “School sucks,” TJ said.
Jeff went outside for a cigarette. Tracey’s new rule was that all cigarettes should be smoked
outside. He followed the rule even though Tracy sometimes, on a cold day, lit her cigarettes
in the kitchen before going out. Jeff stared out into the woods of dry scrub pines. The
needles moved gently in the soft morning wind. His backyard was green. “Green as a
shamrock from Ireland,” his buddy Jesse had said when he came to check on the sprinkler
system two weeks earlier. Suddenly this morning the lawn’s lush greenness looked out of
place against the dry, dusty Pine Barrens of New Jersey. It was so fake.
“You look like shit, Dad,” TJ said when Jeff walked back into the house. Jeff swiped him
gently across his head and told them to go get on the bus. They were both back within
minutes. “We missed it,” TJ shrugged. “I guess we’ll just stay home and bond, right Dad?”
Jeff sighed. “Get in the goddamn truck.”
They stopped at the local convenience store. Trent and TJ jumped out of the truck and
shuffled into the store, Trent moving slower, more bored with the adventure than TJ. Inside,
TJ raced to the candy aisle and Trent to the magazine rack to check out a car magazine. Jeff
poured himself a cup of coffee at the center station.
“How old are those boys now?” Kay called from over the deli counter. She was slicing hard
rolls in half.
“Trent is thirteen and TJ is eleven,” he said.
“Jesus, hon,” Kay snickered. “I bet you’re not even thirty-five.”
Jeff capped up his coffee and walked to the register counter. The boys noticed quickly
enough to add a candy bar and a car magazine to Jeff’s order. Kay followed them to the
register to ring up their purchases. “We’re short this morning,” she explained. “And the new
girl is out for a cigarette break.” Jeff nodded and then told her he needed a pack of Camel
Filters. The boys grabbed their stuff and wandered outside while Jeff waited for his change.
Kay leaned in closer to Jeff as she handed him his money. “Diane came in yesterday. She
looked good.”
It had been fifteen years since he’d seen Diane. Two weeks earlier, Jesse’s wife Lori
mentioned Diane’s name. Within seconds, Tracey and Lori were poking fun at the Diane they
knew in high school, the way women sometimes do, no matter how many years have
passed. Last month, his cousin Tim had seen Diane in the post office.
“I told her I’ve been sober for over seven years,” Kay said, tapping her red nails on the
counter. “I told her I see you all the time.”
Jeff grabbed the pack of cigarettes and pulled off the plastic. Then he looked through the
glass and saw TJ doing flips around a protection bar in front of the store.
“She said she’s at her mom’s old place. Her mom passed away last summer. So I said she
could always come back here to work. She didn’t seem too interested.” Kay slapped the
counter and chuckled at her own joke.
Jeff pulled a cigarette out of his pack and stuck it in his mouth.
“She ain’t married,” Kay said grimly. “I got the feeling she’s had the same luck as me when it
comes to men.”
Jeff nodded and tapped the counter. “I’ll see ya,” he muttered, walking through the glass
doors, lighting his cigarette when he got outside. “Off that!” he yelled to TJ.
When they reached the middle school, Jeff told the boys that he had a job up north and
would not be able to pick them up if they missed the bus after school. TJ told him not to
worry because he was always the first one on his bus at the end of the day.
The traffic was difficult. An accident had closed a lane and slowed the road in general. When
Jeff finally did pass the cracked up cars, he saw one victim covered in a white blanket on the
stretcher. The EMT workers huddled around the man but they seemed to be smiling and Jeff
guessed he wasn’t in serious danger. Once, when Jeff first learned to drive, he let a young
girl in an old Chevy Nova pull out in front of him across a double lane to get to the opposite
side. Jeff thought she would wait and look before driving through the oncoming traffic, but
she didn’t. She slammed into the passenger side of a Lincoln Continental. Jeff remembered
the old man getting out of the Lincoln and yelling to her that she was stupid. Jeff drove
away, not wanting to be a witness for the old man and not wanting to be late to pick up
Diane from her job at the convenience store.
