Freefall

By Codey

Editing, web page design, and graphics by Blue

Chapter 10b – Jason’s Story

“You were fourteen then and twenty-one now? You and your mom haven’t spoken in seven years?” Tim asked in shock. “I can’t imagine that.”

“No,” Jason replied. “You misunderstood. My mom did speak to me, but never in a civil way. She’s never once told me she loves me since that day and, more than once, has told me how much she hates me. I became the reason for everything that had gone wrong in her life, even for things that happened before I was born.”

“I found out she’d trapped my dad into marriage by doing everything she could to become pregnant. My dad was popular in school and was very smart. My mom always had big dreams and my dad had a bright future. I think my mom saw in him a way out of what she saw as a dead-end future in a small town. I’d always known my birthday was three months after their wedding anniversary but had never made the connection that they were in the same year. What kid could tell you the year his parents were married?”

“For the next two weeks, after I told my mom I was gay, she never said one word to me. We were like two strangers sharing a space and, neither trusting the other enough to break the silence. I, stupidly, thought she was just getting used to having a gay son. I ignored the angry looks she gave me and waited for her anger to go away so we could once again be a loving family. Those looks did finally change. Unfortunately, they changed to looks of hatred.”

“It had been almost two weeks since our talk, and we were running out of food in the house. Mom had stopped cooking, but I fixed us whatever I knew how to fix every afternoon. Mom never ate anything I cooked, and just emptied the plate I’d fixed for her in the trash. She had been coming home later from work and I decided she was probably eating out. I told her one morning, as I was leaving for school and she was getting ready to go to work, she needed to go shopping on her way home from work. She just glared at me.”

“When I got home from school that afternoon, I looked around for something to snack on and there was nothing. I went into the back yard and sat in a lawn chair. Gladys was out on her patio starting up her grill.”

“ ‘Hi, Jay,’ she yelled over. ‘I’m getting ready to grill some burgers. Would you like a couple?’ ”

“No, thanks,” I told her. “I better wait until Mom gets home for dinner. She might not like it if I ruined my appetite.”

“Gladys laughed, ‘I’ve never seen a teen boy let a couple of hamburgers ruin his appetite. Usually, that’s just enough to make him hungry. If you change your mind later, come on over, I’ll have plenty.’ ”

“Okay, thanks, Gladys,” I said with a wave as I stood up to go back into the house. There was no way I could stay out there while she was grilling. Just the smell of the charcoal getting hot enough to grill with was enough to make my mouth water and to start my stomach growling.” Jason stopped and looked into space for a bit. “I don’t know why, but I felt ashamed that we had no food in the house and I didn’t want Gladys to know.”

“I went back into the house and started hunting for change. I found twenty-seven cents under the sofa cushions and seventy-five cents in the recliner. I found a dollar and a quarter in my desk drawer. Two dollars and twenty-seven cents wouldn’t buy much, so I went into Mom’s room. On her dresser, there were several dollars in change. I started to take it, but something stopped me. I left it where it was and walked down to the convenience store a couple blocks from home. I had enough money for a soda and a candy bar and even had four cents left over. It wasn’t much to eat but it would tide me over until Mom got home with groceries.”

“When I got back to our block, I saw Mom’s car backing out of the driveway. I knew she hadn’t had time to put the groceries away, so I hurried home to do it. When I walked into the kitchen, there were no bags of groceries. I decided she’d forgotten until she got home and had just gone to the store. I went upstairs and started my homework while I was waiting for her to return. I finished my whole weekend’s homework and she still hadn’t returned. I went to bed hungry that night, but swore I never would again, unless it was by choice.”

“I woke up early the next day. It was Saturday and I had six lawns to mow that day. It was near the end of the season, so this would be one of the last weekends I’d have to mow. Mom still wasn’t home. I was worried but angry too. After collecting my pay from the first lawn I’d mowed, I pushed my mower to McDonald’s and gorged.”

“When I finished the last lawn and collected, I headed home with nearly a hundred and twenty dollars in my pocket. Mom still wasn’t home but I was no longer worried, I was just angry. I made out a shopping list and decided to do the shopping myself.”

“Gladys was watering her flowers when I left to walk to the market. ‘Hi, Jason. Where are you off to this afternoon?’ she asked.”

“Mom’s gone out for the evening and left me with a list of shopping for her,” I lied.

“ ‘Really? I need a few small things too. Could you pick them up for me while you’re there?’ ”

“Sure,” I said and walked up to her door with her.

“She sat at her desk and started a short list. I laid my list down and was fidgeting from lying to her. ‘For goodness sake, Jason! Will you go to the bathroom before you make me wet my pants?’ I tried convincing her I really didn’t have to go, but she insisted. When I returned, she was reading my list. ‘Jason, you can’t get most of this stuff at the convenience store.’ I told her I was going to Dino’s Market. ‘And you’re going to walk?’ she asked with a raised eyebrow. ‘Just how were you planning to carry all of this home?’ ”

“I hadn’t thought that far ahead, but the lie just came out. ‘I was going to call a taxi to get home.’ I said, without even thinking. I couldn’t look her in the eye. The lying was getting easier, but living with the lie was getting harder.”

“ ‘Uh-huh,’ she said, giving me one of those looks that showed she didn’t believe me, but would let it slide this time. ‘Let me get my keys and I’ll drive you to the market.’ ”

“ ‘You don’t have to do that. I’ll be fine,’ I told her.”

“She looked at me and sighed. ‘I know I don’t and that you’ll be fine, but I told you I needed a few things too. I’d have to go sooner or later, so it might as well be now.’ I knew there would be no sense arguing with her once she made up her mind, so I agreed.”

“In the car, she asked if I’d been mowing all day and I told her I had. She said she’d been working in her yard all day and didn’t feel like cooking, so we would stop to get something to eat before we went shopping. ‘Never shop on an empty stomach,’ she laughed. ‘You end up buying a lot of things you don’t need.’ ”

“Even though I’d had nothing since my feeding frenzy at McDonald’s that morning and was really hungry, I told her I was planning on fixing something when I got home from shopping. ‘Nonsense! You’re tired and I’m tired; we’re both hungry, so we’ll stop and eat.’ ”

“During dinner, Gladys did most of the talking. It was mostly just about nothing important, but I could tell she was fishing for information. At one point, she commented on how late Mom had been working lately and asked if we were having money problems. I told her we were fine but that Mom had been working more because she was up for a promotion and was trying to impress her boss. She only nodded and we went back to talking about nothing in particular.”

“It was a lot of fun, shopping with Gladys. As soon as I’d put a bag of greasy, salty chips in my cart, she’d take it out and replace it with bland baked chips. I’d protest and we’d end up compromising on a bag of cheesy popcorn. Candy was replaced with grapes and other fruit, sugary cereal with corn flakes. It became a game as I tried sneaking junk food into my cart and she’d take it out and replace it with healthier food. When we got to the checkout, I smirked as I placed a single bag of candy that I’d managed to hide under a box of cereal on the conveyor. ‘I knew you had that, young man. I decided to let you win, once, just to boost your ego!’ she laughed.’ ”

“She pulled into our driveway and helped me carry my groceries into the house. She came over and hugged me before she left to go to her own house. ‘Jason,’ she said, ‘you know where I live. If there’s ever anything wrong or if you just need someone to listen, I’ll be there. You’re the closest to a grandson I’ll ever have and I love you and worry about you.’ She kissed me on the forehead as I fought back tears and the urge to be truthful with her. As she walked out the door, I wondered if she’d still love me if she found out I was gay or if she’d turn on me like my mom had. I turned around and looked around the kitchen. I couldn’t hold back my tears any longer, as I stood in the middle of this big, lonely old house. I had never felt so alone in my life.”

“Mom still wasn’t home as I got ready for school the next morning. I wondered if she’d just left and abandoned me. I didn’t know what I’d do if things didn’t get better soon. I made an effort to shrug my fears off and fix my lunch, to take to school. I had to smile to myself as I packed my ‘healthy’ lunch.”

“Mom pulled into the driveway as I left for school. I stopped to tell her I’d done the shopping, but she just walked by me without a word. I could smell the alcohol as she walked by, completely ignoring me as I stood there. She may not have physically abandoned me, but I felt emotionally abandoned. I steeled myself for another day at school. It was hard, pretending nothing was wrong when I was around my friends. I knew I’d been withdrawing from them, over the last couple weeks, and knew if I didn’t pretend nothing was wrong, they’d soon be asking questions. I just couldn’t bear the thought of people knowing what was going on at home, right now. – Huh!” Jason snorted with a flash of anger. “I shouldn’t have been worried about my friends finding out what was going on. Mom made sure everyone knew.”

“Things seemed pretty normal when I got to school that day. Everyone was running around and filling each other in on what they’d been doing over the weekend. I looked around the entrance area for my best friend, Eric. He usually got to school before I did and would wait for me there. He wasn’t there, but this wasn’t too unusual, as he had asthma pretty bad and missed a lot of school. I waited a few minutes and then decided he wasn’t going to be there today.”

“I went on to my locker, and when I opened it, a note fell out onto the floor. Someone had stuffed it through one of the ventilation slots on the door. The note was from Eric and just said to meet him at the bleachers on the baseball diamond at lunch. That was strange, but only the first strange thing that morning.”

“My first class seemed pretty normal, but after class, I noticed people I would normally walk to my next class with leaving without me. Walking to my next class, people who would normally say hi as we passed each other didn’t seem to even notice me. I just assumed that since I’d been so down and quiet the last couple weeks, the others were just tired of the constant depressed mood and were moving on. They were just getting back to a normal way of life. On my way to meet Eric, I was thinking about all this and it suddenly hit me that not one kid had said a single word to me that morning.”

“I saw Eric at the far end of the bleachers and went over to where he was sitting. ‘Hey,’ I said.”

“He looked up at me and said, ‘Hey, Jase’.”

“ ‘Where’ve you been?’ I asked him. ‘I haven’t seen you all morning.’ ”

“ ‘I’ve been around,’ he answered, without looking at me.”

“ ‘Why’d you want me to meet you out here?’ ”

“He did look up at me then, and I could see tears in his eyes. ‘What’s wrong, Eric?’ ”

“He looked away and his voice broke when he answered. ‘Give me a minute, okay Jay?’ ”

“I didn’t even nod; I just waited until he was ready to tell me what was wrong. Finally, he spoke and I could tell he was having a hard time trying to decide how to say whatever it was. ‘Your mom was at the bowling alley Friday night.’ ”

“ ‘I know, she goes bowling every Friday night.’ ”

“ ‘She wasn’t bowling, though. She was with some guy and they were drinking in the bar. They were drunk and she said some things about you.’ ”

“It was like an icy hand reached into my chest and was squeezing my heart. I was almost afraid to ask, but I had to know. ‘What kinds of things?’ ”

“ ‘She was telling him how glad she was that he was all man and not like that faggot son of hers. And about how you’d destroyed her life and she had to start all over now. They were pretty loud and everyone in the bar heard them talking – including my dad.’ ”

“I was at a complete loss for words. My mom must have really hated me to say things like that in public. ‘So that’s why I didn’t see you around all morning and none of the other kids will speak to me?’ I asked him. I could see the answer in his eyes even before he spoke.”

“ ‘I have no choice, Jase. Dad came home pissed and didn’t even wait for me to wake up Saturday morning. He came into my room that night, screaming and demanding to know what we’d done together. I couldn’t figure out what he was talking about until he told me what your mom had said. He said he wasn’t going to have a queer son and no son of his was going to be hanging out with one. He told me if he ever heard about me hanging out with you, or even speaking to you, he was going to send me to my uncle’s in Peoria to live.’ ”

“ ‘Things will get better, Jase. A lot of the kids will start talking to you again, but some either won’t or can’t.’ ”

“ ‘Like you?’ I asked.”

“He looked at me and sighed sadly, ‘No, Jase, not like me. Not ever like me. I’m your friend and always will be. We may not be able to meet where people in town can see us, but we can in the woods. Just stick a note in my locker if you want to meet to talk and I’ll be there. If I want to see you, I’ll leave a note in your locker like this morning.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Damn,’ he said, looking around nervously. ‘It’s almost time for the bell; we better get back to school.’ ”

“I knew why he was nervous and told him he should go first and I’d wait awhile, so no one would see us together. He looked at me gratefully and nodded. ‘See you soon,’ he said as he left, but I knew I wouldn’t. I wasn’t going to leave him any notes and if he left me any, I’d ignore them. He was already in enough trouble because of me, and there was no way I wanted to risk my best friend getting into any more.”

“Over the next few weeks, he did leave notes for me, but I never went to meet him. After awhile, the notes stopped, but I did catch him looking at me sadly the rest of the school year.”

“It wasn’t long after that day that Mom started bringing men home with her. Almost every weekend, it would be a different man. Most were older but occasionally they were younger. She always had to be sure and tell them all about her queer son and how he’d ruined her life. Usually, it was right in front of me. I tried to be gone as much as I could on the weekends, to keep out of their way, but there’s not many places you can go in a small town if you have no friends.”

“If it hadn’t been so sad, it would have been funny. All those fat, hairy, old men would watch me like a hawk. A few of them actually told me they’d put me in the hospital if I tried anything funny with them. Most of them had wedding rings and were so slobby they probably weren’t getting any at home but they thought they were hot. Hell, I bet even Mom wouldn’t have given them a second look if she weren’t drinking, but they thought a fifteen year old gay kid would want their bodies? That’s just too sad.”

“One night, I woke up and had to piss really bad. I walked into the bathroom and there was this old hairy dude, standing there pissing. His mouth dropped open and he started yelling at me to knock before I came into the bathroom. I told him the door was open. He was backing up and when his legs hit the edge of the tub, he almost fell backwards into it. I swear to God, I thought he was going to make the sign of the cross to drive me away like a vampire. I started laughing and left the room. I forgot completely about needing to piss, and had to go back in fifteen minutes or so...the door was still open, but I knocked anyway before I went in and pissed.”

“Then, one weekend, she brought Ted home. Ted was a few years younger than Mom and not bad looking at all. I was sitting on the sofa watching television when they came in. I started to get up to leave the room when he looked at me and smiled. Mom told him to not pay any mind to me, that I was just her faggot son. She told me to go to my room and stay there and give them some privacy. I walked around the sofa but Ted stepped forward and blocked my path. He held out his hand to shake mine, introduced himself and then asked my name. I told him it was Jason and he said that it was a cool name and he was happy to meet me. I was pretty confused. After all the pigs Mom had been bringing home, this guy actually seemed nice and treated me like I was someone besides just the faggot son.”

“Over the next few weeks, I saw Ted more and more often. I would come home from school and he’d be there. We’d sit and talk until Mom would get home from work, and then I’d go up to my room. During this time, Ted and Gladys were the only ones who treated me like I was someone. Except for the two of them, I was completely isolated.”

“I never really had any trouble at school. I was basically ignored and a lot of that was my fault. I had pretty much become so withdrawn that I had isolated myself. A few of the bully types would call me names, but there was never any threat of physical attack. I learned later that Eric and a few other of my friends had put out the word that any attack on me would be answered by them.”

“By the first week in December, Ted had pretty much moved in with us. I didn’t know what he did for a living, only that he was in sales. He’d get a call and have to leave for a couple hours to see a customer. He was impressed with my lawn mowing and odd-job business. He asked me to show him my records and was shocked when I told him I didn’t have any, that I kept it all in my head. He told me that was no way to run a business, and records were one of the most reliable ways to keep track of your business. He sat down with me, one evening, and we made a list of all my customers and what their charges were. He’d given me a ledger book and told me, when mowing season started again, to keep it up to date daily.”

“I showed the book to Gladys and she thought it was a good idea too. Sometimes, in the evening, I’d sit and leaf through that ledger, even though there was nothing to enter into it yet.”

“At Christmas that year, Mom got me nothing. I hadn’t expected anything from her, so that was no surprise. I’d bought her a bottle of perfume and a necklace but she never even bothered to open them. I gave Gladys a new coffee maker and a book she’d told me she wanted but couldn’t find. The coffee maker was sort of a joke, but even after getting the new one, she still used the old one. She’d been complaining for years about her old one, but said it was a contest between her and it, to see who could outlast the other.”

“I wasn’t expecting anything from Ted either, but I’d bought him a new toiletry kit. He came into my room on Christmas eve and told me he wouldn’t be able to be here on Christmas day because he had some business that would keep him busy. I gave him his gift and he surprised me by giving me a small, wrapped gift. He told me to wait until Christmas to open it and left. I stood there looking at that gift and couldn’t help crying. It showed he did like me and wasn’t just being nice. I sat on my bed, watching the clock, and at a couple minutes after midnight, I opened it. It was an iPod and a note. When I read the note, I smiled and then cried again. Merry Christmas, Stud. If you insist on going deaf, it should be from rock and roll, not from the roar of a lawnmower. I’m sorry I can’t be there with you, today, but I’ll make it up to you. I promise. Ted. I knew then, I wanted him to stay and be in my life.”

“Spring came, and when the weather had warmed up, I made the round of my mowing customers and about a third of them had decided they didn’t need me to mow for them anymore. They all had different reasons, but I knew there was just one real reason. They didn’t want a gay kid around them.”

“I was pretty down by the time I got home, and Ted asked what was wrong. After I told him, he looked like he was thinking, and then asked if I really needed that many customers. I told him I didn’t, but I wanted them. He laughed and told me I had just enough greed in me to become a great businessman. He said I should look at this as an opportunity. Now I could work to replace the customers I’d lost and maybe fit them into the days where I had a light mowing load and free up a day just for me. I wasn’t sure that I wanted a day with no work, but he convinced me that I did need a free day to keep from burning myself out. I decided to take his advice and reworked my schedule so I had Sundays free. Within a month, I’d replaced all the customers I’d lost and not only did I have Sundays free, but by spreading the others out, I no longer had days where I mowed until dark. I had nearly all my afternoons free.”

“Ted spent a lot of his free time with me. He took me fishing and even to Six Flags one day. This caused some trouble between him and Mom. I heard them arguing one day, and Mom was complaining about him spending time with me. He told her, if she wanted to be a family, I was part of the deal too. She said she wished I wasn’t, but he said that he didn’t care how she felt. He liked me and if she managed to force me out, he’d not stay around either. Besides, he told her, without me, she’d have no income other than the little minimum wage job she had. She accused him of only being with her because of the money but he just laughed at her. He told her he made more in a week than she did in a month, even counting my annuity, social security, and her job. Money had nothing to do with him staying around but I did, and if she wanted him to stay, she’d better back off and accept his relationship with me. He stormed out of the house and didn’t come back for two days.”

“Mom glared at me for those two days but never said anything to me. She went out on the second evening and when she came home that night, Ted was with her. I was glad Ted was back and thought it was great that he stood up to Mom for me.”

“When school was out, Ted and I spent even more time together. There were several hours every day, except Saturdays and Sundays, when I’d finish mowing but Mom wasn’t home from work yet. We’d just hang out or do things around the house. Ted had a Corvette and he washed it several times a week. I loved helping and we’d almost always end up in a water fight. Gradually, we began talking about important things, like my relationship with Mom. He asked me, once, what I expected in my relationship with her. I told him that all I wanted was for things to be like they used to be between us. He gave a funny laugh and told me I better not count on that.”

“About three weeks after school was out, He told me not to make any plans for the following Sunday. Like I had any one except him that I ever went anywhere or did anything with. He told me we were going to Rend Lake early Sunday morning. He’d made arrangements to rent a boat and we’d be on the lake until dark. We’d take a cooler with food and drinks and stop somewhere on the lake for a shore lunch.”

“I’d never gotten to fish from a boat, and I was really excited and could hardly wait for Sunday. It was still dark when he came to wake me, Sunday morning, but I was already awake. I had hardly slept the night before. He told me to wear shorts under my jeans because it’d be cool in the morning, but would be too hot for jeans later in the day.”

We took everything out and put it in his trunk. I asked him where we were going to buy bait this early, and he said we weren’t buying bait. He told me it was time for me to learn to fish with artificial bait. When I told him I didn’t have any, he told me I did now and had me look in the passenger seat of his car. There was a huge, new tackle box there and it was full of lures.”

“He’d followed me around the car, and when I saw this tackle box, I asked him if he was going to share his lures with me. He told me no, that this was my tackle box. His was in the trunk but he thought I’d want mine up front so I could check it all out on the way to the lake. Without thinking about it, I hugged him and told him thank you. He hugged me back.”

“That day at the lake was one of the best of my life. We never caught a single fish but it was still one of my best days. We laughed and joked about everything. Around noon, we pulled into the bank and dragged the cooler out to have lunch. While he was getting the sandwiches and sodas out, I pulled my jeans off since it was really sunny and hot. I was already pretty well tanned, since I mowed shirtless and in shorts, but he told me I needed sunscreen anyway. He went back to the boat and came back with a bottle of sunscreen, and told me to turn around so he could put it on my back.”

“He rubbed it on his hands and then started smearing it on my back. He put it on my neck and shoulders and gave them a short massage while he was at it. After he finished my back, he told me to turn back around and he’d do my front. I told him I could do it, but he said he already had it all over his hands and there was no reason I should get it all over mine too. I did as he said and he put it on my chest and stomach area. I was a little embarrassed when he told my I had a pretty good looking body. He said all the mowing I did kept me in good shape. Then he squatted in front of me, and starting at my ankles, did my legs. When he got to my upper thighs, he actually went up the legs on my shorts. If he’d gone an inch higher, he’d have touched my balls.”

“Now I was really getting embarrassed. All that rubbing on my body, and especially my upper legs, was causing me to get an erection. I knew he could see the tent forming, but he kept putting the screen on my legs. When he finished and stood back up, he told me it looked like I enjoyed getting the sunscreen put on. He looked down at my tent, then back up at me and winked. I felt like melting and sinking into the loose dirt. He told me not to worry about it, that it happens when it wants to, and there’s no way to stop it. He looked back down at my tent and kind of half snorted and half laughed, ‘It looks like I may need to change your nickname to Big Stud. Come on, let’s eat. The fish may not be hungry, today but I am.’ The rest of the day went really well. We finally gave up fishing about 5:30 and spent the rest of the day just riding around in the boat and sightseeing.”

“It was almost dark when we got back to the marina to turn the boat back in. I carried everything over to the car, while Ted was inside settling up for the boat rental. He came back out and helped me pack everything back into the car. He asked if I wanted something to drink before we headed home. When I said sure, he got the two last beers out of the cooler and we sat on the end of the dock and watched the sun go down. I felt like a real man with that beer in my hand, and even though I thought it tasted terrible, I drank every drop.”

“I fell asleep on the way home and dreamed that Ted was my new dad, and Mom was back to normal and would be waiting for us at home. When we got home, Ted put his hand on my thigh and gently shook it to wake me up. He said we’d unpack in the morning, but he was tired and ready for bed. I was tired too.”

“I stopped Ted when we got to the front door. I gave him a hug and told him thanks. He told me I didn’t have to thank him, he’d had a fun day too. I told him I didn’t mean just for today but for everything he’d done for me since he moved in with us. I told him he’d saved me from going crazy, and I didn’t know how I’d ever pay him back, but that I’d think of a way. He smiled down at me and told me that was good, and if I couldn’t think of any way, he’d think of something himself. Then he gave me another wink and said we better get inside and hit the sack. Little did I know then, but he already had a way to pay him back in mind, and I learned all about it the next weekend.