I have a list of “firsts” stored in my memory; age three, my first slice of pizza, (I threw up,) age seven, my first bicycle, (a beat-up hand-me-down my mom picked up at a police auction for five bucks,) and age thirteen, my first French kiss with one of the “A” list girls at Hosler Junior High, when she cornered me under the mistletoe, (definitely one of my prouder moments.) But right up there at the top of the list, I have to include the one time I came close enough to reach out and touch the white powder my father injected into his arms. I was only four years old.
He pulled the car into the driveway, already regretting not shooting up in the garage where he had purchased the heroin. When he sat down and pulled out his kit, the guy who sold it to him said he had some business to attend to, and he would have to go somewhere else. Now, he would have to shoot up at the house. Smoking a joint in the comfort of his backyard or the privacy of his bedroom was one thing. Closing the door, locking it, preparing a syringe and sticking it into his vein, while his wife and kids were in the next room watching TV, was another matter. The thought of it made him uncomfortable.
The smell of carne cooked in red chile, rice, fresh beans, and homemade flour tortillas greeted him as he walked through the door, but the aching chill in his bones was getting worse, growing into a desperate and more demanding appetite he could not put off for much longer.
“My daddy’s a cowboy,” I used to proclaim to my classmates in kindergarten. Watching him roll his own cigarettes with the pungent tobacco he kept in a shoebox is one of my favorite childhood memories. How he would sprinkle the dried weed into the coarse, yellowed paper, roll it between his fingers, and then with one fluid motion swipe the tip of his tongue along the glued edge. I had watched John Wayne do the same thing a hundred times in the movies, but he had nothing over my father.
Another ritual was the washing of the car, every Saturday morning. The chrome was polished until it sparkled in the warm, midmorning sun, and I could see my reflection in the Chevy’s glossy, customized, baby-blue paint job. Then I would climb in on the passenger side and in a time before seat belts, stand up and hold on as we took the car for a cruise, my slick low-rider father and his mijito driving slowly through the streets of downtown Compton. He rolled up the windows and lit one of his cigarettes. The cloud of secondhand smoke didn’t smell harsh like regular cigarette smoke, but was sweet and pleasurable as it filled my little lungs. Everything slowed to a crawl and the shop windows displaying women’s shoes and the latest fashions drifted by like a hazy summer dream. Ray Charles or Bobby Darin sang on the radio as my father’s friends pulled up alongside us at the red light, their dark hair combed back slick and shiny from greasy gobs of Tres Flores pomade. They passed information back and forth about the weekend’s parties and dances, where the prettiest babes would most likely show up and who scored what. Then they always nodded in my direction, “Shit, Richard. He looks just like you, ese. Hey, little man! You doin’ all right? You keeping your old man in line?” They would laugh as the light changed and pull ahead to the next familiar car on the road, collecting and disseminating news about the neighborhood like a switchboard on wheels.
His son and his two daughters were playing in the backyard. They came running when they heard his car pull up. He knelt down to hug his babies, opening his lunchbox and pulling out three Tootsie Rolls. They kissed their father on the cheek and heard their mother call out from the kitchen, telling them the candy was for after dinner. He sank down into the secondhand easy chair with the tattered upholstery in the sparsely furnished living room. His children started untying his work boots, tugging and pulling until they finally came off his sweaty feet. All the time, he kept thinking about the balloon of white powder in his pocket calling out his name: “Richard! Richard! I’m right here, baby, what you waiting for?”
After dinner, he locked himself in the bathroom, unpacked his kit, and focused on what he had to do. The plan was to get high in the bathroom, then retreat to the bedroom for the rest of the night. They could forget about havingfamily time tonight--, no “Bugs Bunny Show,” no bowl of popcorn drenched in melted butter as they all huddled around on the floor, crunching the kernels in unison and laughing at the antics of Bugs, Yosemite Sam, and Daffy Duck.
Tonight was his to spend in his other world, alone.
I can remember the Friday night our mother loaded us up in the car and took us to the drive-in, without him. I was a month shy of starting the first grade. It was payday. They had groceries to buy. Mouths to feed. Where in the hell was he? I knew she was upset when I heard her say aloud to no one in particular as she backed the car into the street, “Let him come home to a dark and empty house, goddamnit…”
When we returned home, the headlights of the car swept across the front yard as it turned into the driveway, lighting up the figure of my father face down and passed out on the cold, wet lawn. Our mother jumped out of the car, knelt down at his side, lifted his head, leaned in close to make sure he was breathing and slapped him hard to wake him up.
We were still in the car looking out the windows, wondering why our father was sleeping outside. We watched our mother try to lift him up. She called out to tell me to go next door to get help. I ran to our neighbor’s house and knocked on the door. He answered, took one look, realized our dilemma, and ran over to give us a hand. Without saying a word, he helped Mom lift our father off the ground and carry him into the house. They sat him down at the kitchen table. We were rushed off to bed, as our mother stayed up the rest of the night, nursing her husband back from the brink.
He had poured the contents of the balloon into the measuring spoon and was going to add drops of water, when he heard the sounds of feet dancing on the other side of the door. The hunger inside was gnawing at him and the only thing he needed was so close. “Daddy, I have to pee!” Through the sharp pain wracking his brain, he heard the urgency in the boy’s plea. His five-year-old son had no idea what he was going through. The only thing that mattered was his son had to pee, now. He heard the doorknob as the child jiggled it back and forth. The dancing noises were getting frantic. He took off the leather belt around his arm’s bulging vein, picked up the implements of his habit and stashed them behind the shower curtain in the corner of the tub. He unlocked the door, let his son in, closed the door and waited in the hallway. His son ran in, pulled his pants down around his ankles, aimed his penis for the center of the bowl, and let out an “Ahhhhh...”
I once witnessed my father being arrested. It must have been the summer before I turned five because I wasn’t in school yet. I was home watching my favorite afternoon cartoon, “Tom and Jerry.” The front door was open, but the screen door was closed. I heard a knock, and although I knew better than to talk to strangers, I went to see who it was. Standing on our porch were two white men. I stared at this odd couple. The one at the door was trying to peer in from the other side of the screen as his partner was scanning the outside of our house, as if he was looking for something. White people didn’t live where we lived. We didn’t know any, except for the man whose car was parked in my aunt’s driveway every Friday and Saturday night. (His name was Mike, and the grownups in the family did not like to talk about him.)
The men at my door were dressed funny. One was wearing a denim jacket and jeans. The other was dressed in a black jacket, white T-shirt, and blue jeans. The white men I saw on TV always wore shirts and ties, and when they got home from work, they slipped on cardigan sweaters and slippers before they smoked pipes in the “study” and read the newspaper. Their wives wore clean, crisp housedresses, and they called each other “dear.” The white men always wore pajamas at bedtime. They and their wives always slept in separate beds. The fact that my parents slept in one bed, not two, was one more way I thought white people were better than we were.
“Hi, sonny. Is your dad home?”
Snapped from my spell, I turned around to look for my mother. There she was standing behind me. She directed me back to my cartoons, and then told the men at our door she didn’t know where my father was, or when he would be home. She closed the door, and less than a minute later, we heard noises coming from the backyard. We went to the kitchen and opened the backdoor. He was between them, his arms handcuffed behind his back. They had found him hiding in the garage. Neighbors were peering over the fence from all sides of our backyard. He saw me and told my mother to take me back inside. For a brief moment, our eyes met, as if we were saying goodbye, and then he was gone.
My childhood transformed into a blur of memories: weekend visits to various jails or the men’s state prison in Chino, and always remembering to reply that my father was in the Navy and out to sea whenever asked of his whereabouts.
His release brought unannounced nighttime visits by tired-looking parole officers, who asked a lot of questions and took notes as my parents smiled a lot. They tried to look so happy it was scary. As they introduced me, my sisters, and a recent arrival, my baby brother, I have to think we must have looked like props, pieces on a set arranged to convince the parole officer we were a normal American family.
On Fridays, after the family trip to the market to stock up on groceries, we all took a ride to the methadone clinic. We sat in a dark parking lot waiting for half an hour. My mother told us our father had an appointment to see a doctor, and he was getting better. He always came back to us a more mellowed and subdued man.
Eventually, it got better for us. My father was hired on as an apprentice welder. He was learning a trade and making decent money. The parole officers faded away. The clinic appointments finally ended.
I knew we were turning a corner the day I got a brand new bike. My police-auction special was on its last legs, but I had never complained. Then, one day my father came home from work and said, “Let’s go for a ride. Just you and me.” He took me to a bicycle shop and once inside, asked me which one I liked. I knew the minute we walked in that it was the one with the banana seat, biker handlebars and sparkly gold, metal -flaked finish. It wasn’t a Schwinn Stingray, but I didn’t care. It had taken me nine years, but I finally had my first, brand new bicycle.
Christmas that year was the best. We had a real tree, flocked with fake snow. I would sit and stare at the colored lights flashing in the dark. I never tired of looking at my distorted reflection peering back at me from the globe-shaped red and green glass ornaments. The smell of pine filled my nostrils, and I knew this was a real Christmas, at last. And the presents! They were stacked higher than I could ever hope or dream. Christmas morning was one continuous shout of glee as we ripped the wrapping paper off G.I. Joes and toy tanks and skates and puzzles and board games and plastic models of my favorite monsters (Frankenstein and the Wolfman) and even a small airplane with a real gas motor to propel it through the air. My sisters also got Barbies and dollhouses.
Everything was better and new. It was only a matter of time before we would take our place alongside the other families who had the latest model of station wagons and houses with white picket fences, who took summer vacations and did things together. The struggle was over, gone like a bad dream. Only good times were ahead. Or so it seemed.
A few weeks later, on January 16, 1965, I woke up to my mother shaking me, telling me to get up and get dressed. It was a Saturday, and I pulled the covers over my head. It was a game we often played. Then she would sing to me, belting out some god-awful song she made up on the spot. Since she could not carry a tune to save her life, (a trait I’ve unfortunately inherited,) I would stick my fingers in my ears and plead for her to stop. This time, she wasn’t singing as she went from one bunk bed to the next, shaking my sisters and brother, yelling for all of us to wake up.
I threw the covers back and saw my father’s only brother. My uncle stood in the doorway, head down, as tears rolled down his cheeks. My mother’s eyes were red, and she looked as ifshe had been crying for a long time. Then, she announced in a low, but calm voice, “Your father is dead.” I wish I could say she held me and gave me comfort as I burst into tears, but I cannot.
Later, I found out he had been hanging out with his old friends, slipping back into his old habits. On this particular night, he had scored some heroin that had not been cut right. It was more pure than the usual drug on the streets. He immediately overdosed. A lot of time was wasted because almost everyone involved was on probation or on parole, and an incident like this could send people back to jail. Someone dropped him off at the home of friends from the old neighborhood, who in turn drove him home. My mother had left us alone, asleep in the house, as she rushed him to the emergency room in the early morning hours.
While my mother sat next to my father in the ER and waited for medical attention, a doctor passing by stopped, took one look at my father slumped over in the chair, took his pulse, and said casually, “This man is dead.”
The week that followed was another series of blurs. I vaguely remember sitting in my grandmother’s kitchen, as my father’s brother talked about going across town and confronting some people, and my grandfather telling him how foolish and dangerous that would be. I remember that the funeral home had some really good donuts. I remember the matching dark-green sweaters that made me itch and the black slacks my brother and I had to wear to the funeral. I remember the thick, nauseous smell of too many flower arrangements in one room. I remember the new lie we were coached to tell whenever someone asked how our father died, “My dad had a heart attack.”
And I remember another time as if it were yesterday: I was five years old, jumping up and down in the hallway, begging my father to open the bathroom door and let me use the toilet. He unlocked the door and let me in. I made a beeline for the bowl, pulling my pants down around my ankles, standing on my tiptoes, and taking aim. He stepped out and closed the door as the splash of my pee sounded like music to my ears. I began to take note of my surroundings, when I saw the needle on the corner of the tub, partially hidden behind the shower curtain. The needle could only mean one thing, my father was sick. I had been to the doctor often enough to know that. What I didn’t understand was why my mother’s measuring spoon was in the bathroom with white powder in it. Even more confusing was the blue balloon. Did the doctor run out of candy suckers? I finished my business, pulled up my pants, and opened the door. My father was standing outside the bathroom waiting.
Why I never said a word to anyone, I’ll never know.
I didn’t know it at the time, but my childhood was taken from me that day. I know some will read this and roll their eyes. Christ! Another writer whining about his tragic and pitiful life. Can’t these people find anything else to write about? I have, and I do. But what I’ve come to realize is no one has the perfect childhood. We spend a lifetime trying to unfuck ourselves, recover from the sins of our mothers and fathers, and then turn around and hope we don’t do the same to our own kids.
I grew up hating my father. The choice was simple, heroin or me. He chose heroin. The bitterness poisoned my heart. The sense of rejection tainted my relationships. I pushed people away or left them before they could leave me. Some people have a hard time with it, but I never had a problem saying, “I love you.” It’s easy when you don’t really know what it means. I knew from the time I was a teen that I did not want to have children, a promise I’ve kept to myself all these years.
It wasn’t until thirty years after his death, during the mandatory midlife crisis and the ensuing sessions of therapy, that I revisited my past looking for answers. Catching up with strangers who cut me off on the road for the simple satisfaction of giving them the finger, confronting coworkers over the most insignificant thing and hoping someone would throw a punch, family gatherings that always fell apart once my sisters found something to scream and argue about, a brother who casually left his wife and one-year-old daughter when he got his best friend’s wife pregnant, and an insecure mother (who didn’t care what her current husband sold to pay for their comfortable lifestyle) were all too much. I was looking for the source, and all arrows pointed at my father.
My therapist asked and probed, and I recalled most of the memories I’ve already written about. But she kept pushing me, helping me remember things I had blocked out over the years. One memory stood out from the rest: I’m shivering in the dark, under the covers of my bed, shaking uncontrollably as the chills overtake my small, eight-year-old body. My teeth chatter. I am waiting for my mother to return from the store with urgently needed over-the-counter medicine. We cannot afford a doctor. I turn my head and see him standing in the doorway. The light from the hallway behind him creates a dark silhouette. I cannot see his face. He walks into the room, bends over me, and tucks the blankets around me, snug and tight. He puts his rough hand on my forehead and my cheek, trying to gauge my fever. He doesn’t say a word. Then he lies down next to me, holding me close. He is taking deep, deliberate breaths. I can hear and feel his heartbeat. His body heat begins to wrap around me, heating up the blankets, until I am in a warm cocoon and the shivering has stopped. My breathing naturally synchronizes with his, and my eyes begin to close. The last thing I remember before I doze off is feeling safe and loved.
This is how I finally came to realize my father loved me, and never stopped loving me. The demon he battled had nothing to do with me. But it could have. That night while I stood in the bathroom, peeing, it had made its presence known to me, smiled and winked as if we were destined to become close friends.
My father was a heroin addict. It was his curse to bear and had nothing to do with me. I like to think, somehow, he knew his early exit would make sure it stayed that way.
And in my mind, that’s the only truth that matters.
