Thank you very much for your comments and your commitment to reading the whole story. I greatly appreciate it and I’m glad you enjoyed the story so much. By the way, Petey was a female. Do you have any suggestions as to where this story might be published? It will be difficult since it so long.
Short Story / Waiting on the Boatman - Part 4 (Analysis)
As my worries about Brett began to escalate, a remembrance came to mind of the years I spent working overseas. In those days, I would be gone for a month at a time every other month. The whole time I was gone I would pine away for my boys. I couldn’t do anything but think about them and dream about the great times we would have when I got home. I missed them terribly.
The work I was doing was stressful and mentally exhausting. Chevron had imposed huge expectations on me as the project manager, but the cultural differences associated with the nationals who served as my resources for accomplishing my objectives were almost impossible to endure. I came home from every rotation frustrated and mentally worn out.
It took two full days to travel from the Chevron locations, either Kazakhstan or Angola or Nigeria, to San Diego. The endless hours of standing in interminable security lines, dragging my carryon bags from terminal to terminal, waiting for flights, and sitting on airplanes for ten to twelve hours at a stretch was physically exhausting and mind-numbing. By the time I finally arrived at home, I was typically completely worn out, and my behavior usually showed it, and it began to take a heavy toll on my relationship with the boys, especially Brett.
Eventually, after having spent ten years working overseas, being gone from my family for half of that time, I decided it was time for me to come home. Brett was entering high school and I felt it was more important for me to be home with him, providing him with fatherly direction and guidance as he entered the dangerous waters of high school. He had been a good boy up to that point and I wanted to make sure he stayed that way. So, I made a life choice to give up my international consulting business, which had served me exceedingly well financially, but which had cost me dearly in terms of my relationship with my family. I bought a franchise consulting business and began working from home. This would be ideal I thought. I would be home every day and could pay much more attention to my boys and be much more involved with their lives than I had been able to for the past ten years, which had encompassed the entirety of Taylor’s life at that point and most of Brett’s.
That was my plan anyway. The fact of the matter is that the whole thing backfired on me and resulted in an incredible disaster.
Brett and I began to experience an endless series of conflicts. They began to increase in frequency and escalate in intensity. All the while the seriousness of Brett’s defiance of me grew geometrically with each incident. I attributed it to the fact that he had turned sixteen and began to overflow with testosterone. He said it was because I was home all the time now and in his face constantly. I’m sure we were both right to a degree. In any case, our relationship simply was not working. We grew further apart and the hurt grew deeper on a daily basis. It seemed our relationship was totally destroyed. My son was now alienated from me and in a state of perpetual defiance. We were lost to each other.
And yet I still loved him intensely and wanted to have our relationship restored more than anything in the world. But, Brett remained unapproachable. After one particularly heated conflict I had managed to get him to sit down and talk calmly with me. After much discussion and explanation of my position and the reasons for my behavior I asked him straight out, “Brett, do you love me?”
He sat quietly for some long time, his head in his hands, and then he said, “No. I don’t.”
<<<>>>
Thinking about my struggles with Brett left me feeling sad and low and like I had been run over by a steam roller. As the day drew to a close and the sun edged closer still to the hilltop I also began to feel a little lonesome. A familiar and much beloved song floated through my mind and brought back memories of more pleasant times.
Suddenly, I saw a brief flash of light coming from behind me and then it was gone. A moment later, also from behind me, I felt a warm and gentle touch on my shoulders and then a soft kiss on my ear. “Hi, Honey,” she whispered in my ear. When I turned my head in the direction of the whisper she kissed me full on the lips.
“Oh, I needed to hear that voice,” I said. “I was just thinking about you.”
“You were?” she said. “What were you thinking?” Connie kneeled in the sand behind me and wrapped her arms around me, holding me tightly.
“I was thinking about our song.”
“Were you?”
“Yes,” I said. I stood and then turned around to face her. I took her by the hand and helped her to a standing position. I placed one hand on her waist and clasped her hand with my other hand and then began to dance with my wife as I sang softly in her ear.
“At last
My love has come along.
My lonely days are over
And life is like a song.
I held her close to me as we danced in the sand, the scent of her perfume intoxicating me, the shape of her body and the softness of her skin so familiar.
“Etta James never sang it so beautifully,” she whispered in my ear.
“But, Danielle did,” I answered. “Remember? At our wedding? It was our first dance as husband and wife.”
“How could I forget?”
“I found a dream
That I could speak to,
A dream that I can call my own.
I found a thrill
To press my cheek to,
A thrill that I have never known.”
We stopped dancing and just stood there in the sand, holding each other tightly. Connie kissed me, long and sweet and tender. “I love you,” she whispered.
“And I love you.” We gazed into each other’s eyes for a long moment. “Come sit with me.” I motioned to a spot next to where I had been sitting.
Connie sat down on the log and Petey immediately jumped in her lap and offered her belly. “Well now, this certainly is a familiar sight,” she said. “How are you doing little girl? It’s good to see you.”
“How many times did you hold Petey in your lap while we talked on my patio when we were still dating?” I asked.
“I can’t even begin to count,” she answered.
“So, what do you think of the place?”
“Oh, it’s magnificent!” she said. “This is surely your dream place. I can remember you describing a place on the lake that you had dreamed of that must have been very much like this.”
“I think it may well have been this very place, Connie. I feel so very much at home here. It’s as if it were my destiny to be here.”
“Look at this,” she said, pulling a small digital camera from the bag she had set in the sand at her feet. “I took a photo of you from up there by the house.”
“So that’s what that flash of light was,” I said. I turned the camera on and switched it to display the photo. What I saw sent chills down my spine. The photo Connie had taken was the very one I had found on the internet – the one of me sitting on this log playing my guitar as the sun set on the lake. “You took this photo just now?” I asked.
“Yes, just before I came down to see you.”
“Connie, I have seen this photo before. It has been the screen saver on my computer for a long time now.”
She took the camera from me and studied the photo. She looked back at me with a quizzical look on her face. “So it is,” she noted, as if there were no significance to the fact that she had just now taken a photo that had been on my computer for months before this time.
“You don’t find that strange?” I asked.
“Well, this is something of a strange place, don’t you think?”
“I suppose. You should have heard me play the guitar for Danielle earlier. I played a flamenco song perfectly, as if I had been doing it all my life.”
“I’m sure. And Petey is here too,” she added.
“Yes, Petey is here too,” I conceded. “I get your point.”
“It’s not so bad, is it?” she whispered hopefully.
“In the words of the immortal Etta James, ‘I found a dream that I can speak to, a dream that I can call my own.”
“Well, now that we’ve got that settled, I brought you something.” She reached into her bag and retrieved two cocktail glasses, a plastic bag filled with ice, and a pint of Jack Daniels.
“God bless you, woman!” I laughed. “Connie, you are the best. Of that there can be no doubt.”
“I’m glad you feel that way,” she smiled. “I feel the same about you.”
“Well, it only gets better. Check this out,” I said picking up the two Cuban cigars I had carefully placed on the sand next to my guitar. “Look what the boatman gave me when he dropped me off this morning.”
“Mmm… those are big cigars,” she observed. “Do we have enough time for those?”
“We’ve got nothing but time, Lover.”
I found a cigar cutter in my pocket that I didn’t remember putting there. I removed the plastic wrapping from the cigars and snipped the tip off of each one as Connie poured us each a glass of Jack rocks. I put the cutter back in my pocket and pulled out a lighter, the presence of which was equally mysterious. “Do you remember this?” I said, referring to the silver lighter.
“I do,” she said. “It was my wedding present to you.”
“Look what it says on it.”
“I know what it says.”
“’At last…’ You had it engraved as a memory of our song.”
I lit one of the cigars and then handed it to Connie and then lit the other for myself. She exchanged the cigar for one of the cocktail glasses. It was, after all, she who had first taught me to enjoy cigars. I had, in turn, taught her to enjoy Jack Daniels. Perhaps we had done a disservice to each other, but it didn’t feel that way to either of us. I raised my glass in a toast.
“At last!” I sang. “My love has come along. My lonely days are over and life is like a song.”
She tapped her glass to mine and sang, “And here we are in heaven, for you are mine at last.”
I took a drink. “Isn’t that the most perfect song in the world?”
“It is for us.”
I took a double puff on the cigar and said, “It has true meaning for me, you know, that phrase – ‘at last.’” I puffed the cigar again. “I waited a long, long time for you, Connie, for someone special to come along. I took me a long time to find you and then another long time to realize that I had found you.”
“Yes, I know,” she said. “I tried to tell you, but you wouldn’t listen.”
“Yes, I believe you have said that to me before.”
“I have, but then who could tell you anything?”
“I believe I heard that earlier today,” I said. “I just wanted to be sure. I knew I would get only one choice and I wanted to be sure I made the right one.”
Connie puffed her cigar and then asked, “And did you?”
“Without a doubt, Lover, without a doubt.” I took a sip of Jack. “There are few things of which I am certain, but that is one of them.”
I held the cigar up in front of my face and examined it for a moment, rolling it in my fingers, sniffing the wrapper, noting the color and texture of the leaf. “This is a fine cigar; of that I am certain.” I took another sip of Jack. “And this is a fine glass of whiskey; of that too I am certain.” I paused a moment and then said, “And you are the finest, most wonderful woman I could ever find in all the world. I am as absolutely certain of that as I am that I will see the sweet face of the Lord Jesus Christ this very night.”
At that Connie clasped her hand to her mouth and began to cry.
“Oh, Connie, I’m sorry,” I said, seeing that I had upset her.
“No, it’s all right. I know it’s true. It’s both beautiful and terrible at the same time.” She clasped my hand in hers and cried for a time. I let her cry, knowing she must. There would be more of that to come, much more.
“Would you like to take a walk?” I asked.
“Yes,” she sniffled then wiped her eyes. “I would.”
I helped her up and then took her hand in mine. We walked down toward the beach with Petey following close behind. I told her about the events of the day, of my talk with Greg, of the boat ride with Taylor, of Danielle singing to me.
“And what about Brett?” she asked.
“Brett has not come. I’m terribly afraid he is not going to come.”
“Oh, Honey. He’ll be here, I’m sure of it.”
“I don’t know, Connie. I’m not so sure.”
She squeezed my hand, knowing the pain in my heart at not seeing Brett. She knew the story, we had discussed it many times, and she had seen much of it first-hand.
“He does love you, you know.”
“I wish I knew that to be true, Connie. With all my heart and soul and mind, I wish I knew that to be true.”
“That is one thing of which I am certain,” she said. “A son loves his father, no matter what. Brett knows what you have done for him. He will not forget.”
“I truly hope you’re right.”
We walked on for some ways. The sun crept closer to the hilltop. “Do you remember when I first asked you to marry me? And I gave you that cigar ring for your finger until I could replace it with a real one?”
“And you did just that,” she said, holding her ring finger up to the light, allowing the diamond to glisten in what little sunlight remained.
“A promise and a dream fulfilled.”
Connie smiled and nodded her head in agreement.
“We had some good times, didn’t we, Connie.”
“Indeed we did.”
“And we suffered through some hard times together.”
“How could I forget?”
“And we had some beautiful dreams.”
“Yes, we did.”
“I’m sorry, but it looks like I won’t be able to see all those dreams through to completion with you. I feel as if I’ve broken a promise to you.”
Connie clasped my hand tightly. She exhaled a deep breath. “We had our time together, Honey. You touched my heart and you blessed my life. For that I am thankful.”
“And we loved the Lord together.”
“We did.”
“I’m sure He will honor that. Don’t you think?”
“Without a doubt. He will honor that.”
Suddenly I dropped to my knees and put my head in my hands and began to cry. “I don’t think Brett’s going to come, Connie. I just don’t think he’s going to come.”
Connie knelt and put her arms around me and held me. “He’ll be here, Honey. I know he’ll come.”
She held me for some time while I cried, grieving for my lost son.
“I was so hard on him. I don’t know that he will ever forgive me.”
Connie pulled me to my feet and said, “We should head back. It’s getting late. Look, the sun is almost gone.”
When we arrived back at my spot I asked her to sit with me a while longer, but she remained standing.
“I think I should go now, Honey. I’ll leave time for Brett to see you. I’m sure he will come. And you’ll want to have time to talk to him too.”
She embraced me and held me tightly, kissing my neck and face. “I’ll miss you,” she said, her tears flowing now. “I love you very much.”
I kissed her lips and held her face in my hands. “I could not have asked God for a greater blessing than you, Connie. You are the best. I love you more than I could possibly express.”
She kissed me again and I said, “We’ll meet here again someday.”
She clasped my hands in hers and gave them a squeeze, then turned and walked on down the beach. I watched her until I could see her no longer.
“There goes a good woman, Petey,” I whispered under my breath.
I sat back down on my log and picked up my guitar. I picked at it for a little while until I found the tune.
“You smile, you smile,
Oh, and then the spell was cast.
And here we are in heaven,
For you are mine at last.”
(Please continue with the conclusion in Part 5)
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Sage reviewed Version 1 -
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Just reading this part of the whole work, it’s hard to judge the overall plot and character arcs, but the sudden religious references in this one part seemed to come out of left field. The reader needs to be prepared from the beginning of the story if that is the type of story you’re telling—inspirational/religious. Overall, an enjoyable piece, but needs a few fixes—The story needs to be less cerebral. It’s too much TELLING, and the general rule is SHOW, don’t TELL. This is the major factor detracting from the work. It reads like a first-person synopsis or a report, with too many references—songs and quotes. The main song needs to be used sparsely, spread out over more than one chapter. This story needs stuff going on “real time” to balance out all the internal soul searching. SHOW the interaction where the father tries to be a father but it doesn’t go over. Put in argument, dialog, the description of the house, the people, paint loving and angry faces, make the scenes live. Memories are always faded. On the plus side, the voice of the father is convincing and does pull the reader into the story, there just needs to be more to the story we’re pulled into, more texture, more action, more reality.
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Sweettouch reviewed Version 1 -
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What can I say besides Thank you for sharing this it was beautiful beginning to end. The story progresses steadily and smoothly and manages to share a life experience and touch the emotions too. I enjoyed each part of it and I am sure others will too. When Petey jumps into Connie’s lap should that be offered her his instead of offered her belly? This is a very uplifting piece, it shows the challenges we face and that in the end maybe just maybe it will all turn out OK!
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