"I want you. I don' t want to leave you behind like I did that day in Dallas over twenty years ago."The words came out fast and they felt like a hurricane blowing through his throat. "I want you and I' m not leaving without you."
Ken' s heart beats one rev below red line. Debbie' s is not far behind. She steadies herself by putting a hand on the handrail.
"Ken…" She tries to speak. "Don' t be a fool. You' re a married man with a family."
"Was, the lawyers are already taking care of it. The ex gets the house and I get my life back, and I want you in it."
"You moron! You fucking idiot!" shouts Debbie and stars crying. "You don' t know what you' re talking about!"
Ken smiles disappears but he' s telling himself that he is not turning back alone unless Debbie' s kicks him in the ass and sends him on his miserable way. Debbie steps over the guardrail, stops and starts unzipping her pants. They come down to her knees. Ken' s jaw has dropped down to his chest, what the hell? He cannot avoid gawking at her tiny panties and the curves underneath.
"Look, you dumb ass!" says Debbie while pulling her pants down to her ankles. For a moment Ken doesn’ t understand what Debbie is trying to show him, that one of her socks is longer than the other one?
"Look!" says Debbie. "I' m a one legged bitch!"The prosthesis now registers in Ken' s mind.
"And these teeth?" Debbie points to her mouth. "The yain' t real either. I got no teeth!"
Ken says nothing. The sight of Debbie with her pants down to her ankles in a parking lot makes him feel like he is having a bizarre dream, and the cat sitting next to her looking at him with fixed and expressionless eyes adds to that feeling.
"And you know why I lost one leg and my teeth? You know why?"shouts Debbie. Ken shakes his head.
"Cause I ran my car into a mother of two and killed her! That' s why!" Debbie cries hard and starts to pull her pants up but She is having a difficult time doing so. She wobbles and Ken rushes forward but Debbie manages to stand up again, holding her pants with her hands.
They are facing each other now. Ken can see the fat tears on her face and Debbie can not see Ken too well because her eyes are watery.
"Go away," says Debbie almost in a whisper. "Don' t get involved in my messed up life." She turns her face away from him, buttons her pants and wipes her face with the back of her hand.
"Too late for that." Ken speaks in a normal tone of voice. For once, he knows what he wants to say, and how to say it. "We got involved over twenty years ago and have always been involved, and there is nothing that you or I can do about it."
Debbie sobs and turns to look at him.
"I' m sorry," she says.
"There is nothing to be sorry about. I have never stopped thinking about you. Have you stopped thinking about me?"
Debbie shakes her head and her face turns into pure embarrassment.
"Listen," says Ken. "You have done fucked up things, and I have done my share of fucked up things too. All I ask for is for a chance to try to get our lives together. I make no promises and I know we are taking our chances, but that' s what we have always being doing anyway. Let' s do it together and see how far we can go."
"You' re nuts."
"Am I? So what? We have nothing to lose and everything to win. I say, let' s take the chance of our lives and run with it."
Ken places his hand on Debbie' s shoulder and the touch makes him shiver. There is a tumultuous rush of memories, of sensations reincarnated and feelings resuscitated that comes through his fingertips and jolts him from the inside. He thinks he' s going to faint. Debbie feels Ken' s strong hand on her shoulder and for once in her life she doesn' t feel alone. It is just not the mere presence of a body next to her, but of a sincere strength that comes from knowing that somebody cares, no matter how flawed she may be.
"Come back with me, to the Springs," asks Ken. "We can start a life together. We have waited long enough"
Debbie nods, and why not? She has nowhere to go, nobody she can calla friend, and Ken has been in her mind for the last twenty years. Call it fate, destiny or plain luck but now they are standing facing each other and their lives crossing paths to become one seems as natural as the sun rising every morning. Ken pulls her towards him and embraces her. Her legs turn to rubber and a sudden tiredness of over twenty years catches up with her and makes her hang onto Ken like if she were a boneless creature, weakened by years of walking paths that lead nowhere but now she has found something worth hanging on to and she won' t let go. Her tears soak Ken' s shoulder and he just holds her like a delicate thing he is afraid to crush.
Mé jico Lindo
The cliché says that everybody deserves a second chance. Debbie and I went to the Humane Society to get her a new kitten. I offered to buy her a new one, a pretty one from a pet store but she said she wanted a thrown away mutt who needed its second chance. I don' t have a problem with that, but I still don' t understand why she had to pick the ugliest cat in the joint.
"How do you like him?" she asked, holding up a scrawny black cat with terrorized yellow eyes. His fur looked like steel wool.
"Is that a cat or a wet possum?"
"Stop it! I think he' s cute."
"We can name him Double Ugly."
Debbie pierced me with her you-smart-ass look, turned to the Humane Society lady and told her," we are taking this one."
We named him Felix, like Felix the Cat character, another black cat with big eyes. I have to admit that the ugly critter has fattened up and is looking a lot better than when we brought him home, and he has shown to be a smart and loyal pet. I cannot say that everybody who gets a second chance will turn out OK, but it is nice to know that there are cases where the second chance bit works.
Our life together has been challenging, rewarding and has had its up sand downs like anybody else' s but dull is not an adjective that I can use to describe it. We had to readjust to each other and our quirks. I think Debbie is a tight wad and a cheapskate. Her idea of dining out is going to Wendy' s. She is the coupon queen of the Springs. Somehow she knows who has the best deals and she always carries a wad of coupons in a fat envelope in her purse. I' m embarrassed when we goto the grocery store and she pulls out that fat thing and starts passing out coupons for everything in the shopping basket. She reminds me of those old ladies who pay with pennies out of a jar.
"Can' t you, you know, like just pay for the damned groceries and be done with?" I told her once. She looked at me with thats quint of hers that I have come to dread.
"I' m saving money," she said and had sounded like Clint Eastwood ready to pull a gun on some scumbag.
"Yeah, I know, but sometimes it' s just easier to pay and go."
"Money doesn' t grow on trees," she said. "At least not where I came from." And she had been pissed at me all day after that so I have learn to keep my mouth shut when it comes to her coupons and the jars of pennies and lose change she treats like they were full of gold coins. Even that piece of shit Geo she drives, she won' t let go of it.
"Honey, let me get you something better."
"What' s wrong with my car?" and there goes that squint again.
"It' s a piece of junk."
"It' s paid for and it runs. I don' t need another car."
I took me days to convince her to at least let me buy her new tires and a two hundred dollar paint job. Now the clunker is all blue with new threads, but she was as happy as if I had bought her a brand new Lexus.
I' m sure that she sees me as reckless with my money but I' m sure that we will either come to a common ground or learn to live with each other' s idiosyncrasies. It is fun to watch her getting used to her new life with me. We live in a small old house on the foothills of Cheyenne Canyon. She thinks it is some sort of palace and cannot believe how big the rooms are. I myself think the rooms are kind of smallish and that the house is cute but not much to look at. But that is the first house she can call home and I imagine that for that reason alone it looks far better to her than anywhere else she has ever lived before.