Memory Lane
I spoze the ghosts of the past are always waiting in the closet of the present for an opportunity to jump out of the dark and say Boo! in a voice that’s creepily familiar. Post Traumatic Spook Syndrome: finding a former self you thought you’d buried come knocking one midnight dreary. Sometimes, though, you’ll get a different doorbell.
My old buddy Ralph got one awhile back. Knock knock … who’s there? And lo and behold, there was a woman he’d ‘known” back when we all lived in the ‘hood. She was underage then, what the law would define as statutory rape then and now, but here she was 10 years later with a curly headed boy in tow, claiming, she said, the child was his. Whoo hoo…. The sins of the past do come stalking occasionally, the stuff of tragic novels.
Ralph, of course, was shell shocked. “Mine?” he asked. “Yours,” Desiree informed him matter of factly. Of course Ralph realized the implications after a quick deduction of the kid’s age versus the time since he and Desiree had made whoopee in her mom’s ghetto apartment while she was away working to support her dysfunctional family now that her boyfriend had disappeared after providing her with 3 children. And here was one of them, in the same sorry boat, looking for dear old dad.
Ralph, hard as it is to believe, was prepared to do the Right Thing by her. Child support, PTA, college tuition, wedding expenses, etc. At least that’s what he told me one confessional — and I believe he would have. But Ralph is nobody’s fool either, unless you count Ralph, so he asked Desiree if she’d mind having a paternity test. After all, the kid didn’t really look much like Ralph at age 10. Desiree balked, called him a few names, then ultimately admitted to friendly extortion. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, and Ralph figured okay, he’d had his fun, now it was hers. He gave her a little money, guilt money I guess. And he fears she’ll be back for more. I think maybe she never left….
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