2004

There are certain life events that etch themselves so keenly into the mind that it can recall every important detail of the revelation. I was walking across the parking lot at work after having bought a bottled water at the major grocery store that was part of the strip mall where my business was located.  My cell phone was in my pocket, and I was fiddling with the change the cashier had just given to me.  Early evening coolness was refreshing the California desert and the smell of orange blossoms from the nearby groves was wafting on the breeze.  I still had two hours of work to accomplish before heading home to make dinner, and my mind was organizing those one hundred twenty minutes into a mangeable rubric.  Cars were treacherously maneuvering around the varied businesses at the shopping center, and I remember thinking I should pick up the clothes as I passed by the dry cleaning establishment a few doors from my business; but, I did not have the ticket or the money on me to rescue my apparel.  Almost to my office, I walked past a gentleman who greeted me. I smiled and acknowledged him; then my phone began to sing its familiar song to me.  I recognized the number scrolling across the screen to be from Texas, but did not yet know to dread the message.

"Hi, Kay." I was surprised to hear from my older sister.

I greeted her and then she said: "Well, he did it again."

"What?"  I did not understand her.

"Daddy.  He did it again."

"Oh, no!"  Stomach turning inside out with a familiar rhythm.  "What happened?"

"Some kids form his church.  Happened there a few years ago; but, they have just now told their mother and she pressed charges."

"So, is he in jail?"  Deja vu.

"They arrested him.  He posted bail.  He's at home now but will go to trial."

Deep, deep breath.  Don't know what to say.  Neither does my sister. A little small talk.  A promise to keep me apprised.  She is back to her life in Texas and I to the job before me.

I had told Daddy about this a few years prior.  Bill and I took a trip to Dallas on business and made plans to attend church with Daddy on Sunday then take him to lunch.  Arthritis had handicapped Daddy's hip and knees and the extra hundred pounds he carried around on his body had forced him into a motorized wheelchair.  His van was equipped with a lift, so he was able, with the help of a walker, to go pretty much wherever he wanted.

As we drove to his church with Daddy that morning, I remember thinking that I had not seen him for a while, so I did not really know what to expect.  Never had I watched him in a wheelchair, but he drove it the same way he did his car - lots of honking and running into things.  One young congregant actually told him he was annoying that morning; she had become irate at his expectation of the "Red Sea" parting every time he tooted into a crowd of churchgoers spilling out onto the concrete directly in his path.

I sat through Sunday school and the subsequent sermon with great difficulty and agitation of spirit because of what had taken place when we pulled into the parking lot.  As soon as the ignition in Daddy's van was turned off, two young boys came running across the church parking lot to help Daddy out of the driver's side.  What transpired next was clearly a routine with which man and boys were very familiar.  One child opened the back door and got Daddy's walker while the other went to the back and  opened up the door latch.  Daddy clump-clumped back to the rear of the van while the boys operated the wheelchair lift and practically cheered as the wheelchair touched the asphalt and was ready for bumper car races in the parking lot.  The older of the two boys grabbed the key from Daddy, and off they went burning up the pavement in Daddy's dandy hot rod!

There was that tingle-face blushing, a need to ask questions that I already knew the answers to, the antisness of recognition defined.  I knew he had molested these kids.  Their mother came up to me in the midst of my processing what was playing out before me.

"Your father is such a nice man."  She was grinning from ear to ear, watching her boys speeding past my father and waving to  him as if they were winning the Indy 500.  "My boys just love him."
She was a single mother, probably in her mid-forties. Her long brown hair was tied back, but loose strands hanging around her face from the hasty hair-do belied a frazzled life of keeping things together.  Her admiration for my father was based on trusting that this older Christian man was good for her kids.

"He took them on a trip with him to the Midwest." She was smiling. "They had such a great time."

"Really?"  Oh, my God....Oh, my God! "How long were they gone?"

"About a week."  She had no clue; and I just wanted to take my father by his throat and make him tell me what he had done!  Daddy was, by then, in his wheelchair beckoning us toward the church building.  For me, there was no closure for the conversation I had just had with the trusting mother.  I wanted to scream at him as I caught up to the chugging motor of his chair: "Did you hurt those boys, Daddy?  Did you touch them?"  Had to wait for the festering questions until we were alone.

For the two and a half hours of church, I could barely look at my father.  My stomach felt like the spin cycle of a washing machine as the questions, unanswered, whirled faster and louder in my mind.  Thought I might implode.  Little boys retrieved the chair and hoisted it to its resting place when at last the final chorus had been sung and the congregation wandered lazily to their cars.  I had taken Bill aside to forewarn him of my impending eruption.  "Please wait until after lunch, Kay.  You don't know that he has done anything wrong."

Texans tend toward cafeterias after church, so we waited in line behind the Sunday crowd in their heels, hats, suits and ties piling fried chicken, fried okra, fried potatoes, greens, sweet iced tea and pie onto trays they pushed along in front of them to the weary cashier.  Stewing in me was a storm and eating a pile of mashed potatoes was not going to ease my rage.  I managed to ask a few questions about the children and their mother, and Daddy gave me some details of the trip.  He said the boys had been a great help to him.  I shook my  head appropriately, but I was phrasing in my mind just what I would say when at last we were back at his house and he was safely ensconced in his large plush recliner, out of earshot of the rest of the world.

When the moment finally came to confront my father about his relationship with the boys, I seemed to have finally found my voice.  Perhaps it was because I was just so outraged this time and had kept my anger so pent up for those several hours that I did not care whether he raged back at me.  All I cared about were the boys and their mother who trusted this "nice old man" from the church.  As Daddy cranked up the footrest of his chair, I sat down across from him on a rocking chair. Bill was to my right on the couch, and I could tell he was nervous.  Hyper-ventilation is not pretty and he did not want to see it again.  I was coming from a different place this time, however.  I was done!

"Daddy, I want to talk to you about the kids you took on the trip with you."

He did not respond but sat looking at me with an expression that I can only describe as child-like fear.  Like I was about to spank him.

"Do you think it is fair of you to take these boys on a trip with you when you are a homosexual pedophile?"  It seemed t me that he had to be constantly reminded of the fact.

Still silence from my father.

"Do you think their mother would have allowed her precious sons to go on a vacation with you if she knew you are a convicted felon?"  I stared him down waiting for some response.  "Do I need to call your pastor right now and tell him about your criminal record, Daddy?"

"No, Kay."

"Did you hurt those boys, Daddy?"

"No, Kay."

"If you EVER, EVER are arrested again for child molesting, I  WILL NOT be there for you!  Do you  understand, Daddy?"

"You have never forgiven me, have you, Kay?  You still hate me for what happened in 1985, don't you?"

I recognized the shift in focus of the conversation, making it suddenly about my unforgiveness and not his activities with the boys.  I had not expected a confession - secretly hoped there was not one to be made.  I had said what I needed to say.

"You have never asked me to forgive you, Daddy."

"Will  you forgive me for hurting you and your mother and sisters by my actions?"  He looked relieved and sincere.  I would, of course, understand the relief more fully later; his desire to be forgiven was a true one, in the moment.

"I forgive you, Daddy."

He was crying.  I was not.  Something in the scene was incomplete and disingenuous, and I felt emotionally distant, merely observing the moment as if it were a televison drama.  I had purchased snake oil from this salesman before.

Bill rose from his seat and put his hand on Daddy's shoulder, comforting him.  I could not.  I knew he was guilty still; so, though I could forgive him for the past, he was unrepentant of his present.

I rose from the rocker so quickly it heaved back and forth as if some playful child had pushed it into motion from behind.  "It's time for us to go, Daddy."  I walked over to stand in front of him. "I do forgive you of the past, but just remember, if you are arrested again, do not call me.  I will not be there."

"I heard you, Kay."  His voiced tinged with irritation. I patted his knee, kissed his cheek, and hurried out the door behind Bill.