Alone In His Chair

Alone In His Chair

June 1, 2009

By Stephen Ray

He stood at his dresser staring at his reflection in the mirror and saw the face of a man who was once more than he is now. He was a baseball player, a patent lawyer, an Apostolic minister, and he thought he was a good father. Now, he had a hard time seeing himself as anything more than a drug addict. He searched through the empty bottles of pills on his dresser as he tried to find one that still had some of his medicine left in it. He's tried, no doubt, to remove these things from his life, but despite every effort he's made, something always seems to push him back towards the drugs that simply make life less painful to deal with. He was alone tonight. His son told him he wanted to “sleep in my own bed tonight, Dad.”

“Can't blame him,” he says quietly to himself. “It's probably more comfortable than the couch.”

He opened up the bottle and prepared to spend the night in his chair, letting the medicine stave off the loneliness that seemed to have become a nightly problem he was having to take more and more drugs to get rid of. As the mix of painkillers and psyche medicine slowly took hold of his mind, he slumped over in his chair, barely able to keep his eyelids open.

Miraculous Child

Twice his eyelids closed completely and, after a tremendous effort to open them the second time, he saw something that simply couldn't be there, his son, but as he had looked as a baby. His small hands were clutching at his pant leg as he asked his father to pick him up and hold him like he had done before he was old enough to know what his father was doing to himself.

He stared down at this child, who stared back with big brown eyes and a full head of brown curly hair. He was beautiful, his first son, he was his daddy's boy. The front two teeth in his mouth are missing from an accident that had happened with his uncle. He smiled that smile with a big gaping hole in his teeth as he reached his hands towards his father, trying to convince him to reach down and lift him up to play. The look of excitement on his face showed innocence that one would have a hard time seeing fade away.

He smiled a little but only a little because he couldn't make his mouth move enough to form a full smile. He let his arms slide out from under him as he tried to lift the small child up, but as his hands touched the sides of the baby, he found that he couldn't grasp him tight enough and instead his hands slipped limply up the sides of the tiny body.

The baby wanted to be picked up. The smile he'd worn on his face a moment ago faded slowly as his father tried and failed multiple times to lift him up from the ground. As his father's failed attempts to lift him rose in number, the mood of the baby slowly faded to a soft crying, and then to a wail that would break the heart of any that heard it. A mix of confusion and anger on his face, the baby's eyes streamed tears. All he had wanted was to be picked up, why couldn't his father pick him up?

His continued attempts to lift the child grew more pathetic with every try, his hands now simply resting against the child as his arms applied barely any pressure to try and lift the boy up. With the failure of his dad evident, the child began to crawl away, towards the door behind his chair. The man forced himself to sit up in his chair and throw his arm over the side of his seat in an effort to reach the boy, but by the time he found the strength to do this, the baby had already made its way out of the room. The innocence it had once known now gone forever.

With his arm hanging at his side and his head turned slightly to try and catch a glimpse of his baby boy again, he slowly closed his eyes, not sure if he wanted to open them again tonight.

The Little Baseball Player

Then he heard the crying again, surprised at his own ability to open his eyes again, he looked towards the sound of the crying and saw his son again, this time older, closer to 4 or 5 years old. The gap in his teeth gone, replaced by two large front teeth that seemed far too large for his mouth. He was big for his age, taller than most other kids. He played baseball, his father's sport. It was his first year doing it. Before he had left him for rehab he had taught him how to swing, catch, field, and all the things he'd need to know to play. He had missed his first baseball game, though he'd heard the stories of how he was the only kid on the team that was coordinated enough to hit the ball, if only he could've remembered which base he was supposed to run towards.

The child standing there speaking to a woman he could not see, but the unknown woman was quickly revealed as the boy's mother.

“Where's Daddy?” the child choked through his sobs.

The man in the chair wanted to hold his son. He wanted to apologize for the time he'd spent “away” from him as a child. He and his wife had lied to him, told him he was working when he was really making an effort to quit the drugs in rehab. The child wouldn't have understood, but this particular moment, he wanted nothing more than to kiss his dad goodnight.

“I miss him. I want him to come home from work. Just for a little bit if he has to go back,” the boy's words were almost not understandable through the chokes and sobs in his throat.

The mother must have said something to him at this moment. His tears slowed slightly as he spoke the next words.

“How soon? Tomorrow?” he asked, still trying to stop the hiccups in his throat.

He may not have liked the answer he got from his mother, but he may have been appeased for tonight--at least because he now saw his son holding a phone and smiling again as he heard his father's voice through the earpiece.

“Hey Dad. Good. I miss you. Baseball is good. I'm really good at it. Yeah they said you did a good job teaching me. School is good too. Mom says I need to go to bed though. I love you too daddy. Goodnight.”

The conversation brought tears to his eyes. Being unable to wipe them away allowed them to run freely down his cheek as he smiled that half smile at his son again. The boy hung up the phone and crawled into bed, slipping under the covers as he slowly closed his eyes with a childlike smile on his face.

The Arrest

The chair-bound man found it difficult to keep his eyes open again. He fought them like his life depended on it, trying to keep his eyes open to allow him to see his sleeping son a little longer. Eventually they became too heavy again, and they slammed shut. With renewed strength he forces them open, hoping he could still see his sleeping boy, but that boy had been replaced again. In his space was a 14-year-old boy. Tall, big, out of shape with glasses so thick he could set ants on fire with them on a sunny day. His hair cut short to make the curls in it less noticeable. This son was different though. Just days from now, this son would watch his father get arrested in front of him. He was walking somewhere. No, now he was sitting. This was his son as he was the day he was taken from him.

They were sitting on the couch watching TV. He sat staring intently at the television, occasionally saying something to his father about how terrible the movie was. He couldn't tell you now what movie it was, his son didn't know or didn't choose to know, but that day he had been high. He couldn't remember anything but the look he now saw on his son's face now. His son had stood up, a puzzled look on his face which quickly transformed into a look of pure fear. He moved quickly, his face contorting in a yell, begging the police he must be seeing not to hurt his dad.

Tears streaming down his face, he followed the police outside as they pushed his father into the back of their car. The policeman had wrapped his arm around him and forced him to watch as his father was driven away in a police car. It would be 18 months before he saw his father's face again. He watched as his son slouched and stared at the ground as he made his way back into the house. His face bore a look of such anger that he looked as if he could have broken the thick wooden door to the house down with nothing more than a look.

As he watched his son, he started striding towards the door of his bedroom. He was leaving. The man, still bound to his chair tried to reach for him, but his arm wouldn't move. His limbs seemed so heavy he couldn't lift it up to even reach for his boy. All he wanted was to apologize, to beg his forgiveness, try to make him feel better and promise that things would change, but even as these thoughts entered his mind, he realized that after his time in prison, things hadn't changed. As much as he loved his son, he loved his drugs more. He had tried to be a good father, but that's impossible when every bit of time spent at his dad's house would be spent with his father slumped over on the couch and fallen into a sleep that nothing could wake him from, not even his son.

This realization brought even more tears to his eyes, seeing how badly he had failed his son as a father, having spent more time away from him than with him, causing him pain more than he'd helped him, and broken more promises to him than he'd kept. He wanted to wipe the tears from his eyes, but his hands were like one ton weights attached to the ends of his arms, his feet seemingly nailed to the ground beneath them. How could he have been so foolish? His son didn't want to sleep in his own bed; he just didn't want to see his father. He had fooled himself into believing his son still loved him after all he'd done, or rather, hadn't done. He suddenly realized with incredible clarity, just how much his son must hate him, how much he would have enjoyed seeing him as he was right now. So weak that he couldn't even raise his arms to wipe the tears streaming down his cheeks.

Final Visit

Before it had seemed impossible to keep his eyes open, now it seemed he couldn't force them closed. He watched as his son appeared again, this time older. He had never seen him in this form. He was older than he is now. He looked to be closer to 18.

He stood there staring at his father through those same brown eyes he'd seen before, long hair hanging down in front of his eyes. His mother would hate that. He was even taller now, close to 6 ' 4 ". As he stood there staring, it seemed as if he was waiting for his father to say something to him. He smiled, but it wasn't a friendly smile. It was an angry, sarcastic, “I-told-you-so” smile. When he finally decided to speak, it seemed every word out of his mouth was dripping with a biting sarcasm that cut his father to the bone.

“Wow Dad,” he spoke the word “Dad” with such a look on his face that it appeared to make him sick even referring to him as his father. “Should've seen this coming, huh? I mean, how else could you end up? When was the last night you spent sober? Was I even born yet when that miracle happened? Oh wait, I guess I should have realized that I shouldn't be asking so many questions when you can't even open your freaking mouth!” he said, his voice growing angrier and louder with each insulting question, and finally rising to its highest level with the last statement.

The man in his chair tried to speak, tried to apologize, but all the noise he made was a low, pathetic moan that sounded like a small child crying for help. He wanted so badly to see his son happy and he only now realized that he simply was not going to be able to do that for him.

“What was that? Couldn't hear you. Speak up dad. Give me a reason. Explain yourself to me. Tell me one freaking excuse for how terrible of a father you've been. Tell me one reason why I should give you one more chance.”

The words cut his father worse than any knife ever could. He understood though, he wanted to tell his son he didn't deserve to be his dad. He just couldn't form the words in his mouth. He thought of what he could do for his son to make things better. Tried to come up with one thing he could do to make his son happy again. The final conclusion was hard to swallow. His terrible parenting had left him without a way to redeem himself. He knew now that the only way he could fail his son more, was to continue being his father.

“You don't have one, do you? You're pathetic. Look at you, you can't even move! I mean, I'm your son, and, let's say I want a hug. What could you do about it? You can sit there and drool on yourself. Good job, Dad. I'm so proud,” he said with that same angry smile on his face. This was the son he had raised; the ultimate result of all his misguided efforts.

The man in the chair wanted to get up. Wanted to tell his son he was sorry and hug him one last time before he stopped disappointing him. Finally finding the strength to move his legs, he prepared to try to stand, pulling his hands up to the sides of the chair to steady him as he tried to stand.

“Oh? Now you can move? Oh I see. Just needed some motivation? Well then let's motivate you, you sick, sick old man. Come on. Get up! Come give me a hug,” he said, smiling as he taunted his tortured father.

The words rang in his ears as his son said them with such force that it made him nearly give up trying to get up. He wanted to prove to his boy that he would stop disappointing him though. With more effort than he'd ever put into anything else in his life, he sat up straighter as he started putting more weight onto his legs.

Unexpected Response

His son laughed at him, but it was a hollow laugh; his son smiled, but it was a fake smile; and behind those eyes, the ones that had stared at his father for 16-and-a-half years and watched him kill himself slowly, was a steady stream of tears that he had become well-practiced in holding back.

His father finally found the motivation he'd needed, he stood, only for a moment, but he stood. He stared at his son, and his son stared back, and as he finally tried to take a step towards him, his legs gave way underneath him and he came crashing to the ground.

“Dad . . ?” his son asked, for the first time in years sounding genuinely concerned about his father. He knelt down beside his dad, worried about what he'd done to his father. Words stuck like glue in his throat as he tried to force back tears. The son stood and took the seat his father had spent this night in and watched his father struggle, now unable to help, and unable to hold back the tears.

He had to get up. He needed to try at least, but with all the effort he had left in him, he was only able to pull one leg up to stand before that slid out from under him and he was left lying on the floor, finally losing the strength to even keep his heart pumping. As he lay there, having failed his son one last time, he closed his eyes, content to know that he would never be able to disappoint him again.

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Stephen Ray was recently accepted in the Theater program at Seton Hill University.