Spirits
This story will be short and was triggered by two small occurrences in the last 12 hours. One was a text in response to my own from an old love. The second was hearing the song 'Hotel California' as I worked in my garden as the sun rose on a beautiful Saturday morning in coastal Central California.
***
"UM...Friend can I get you some help?" The bartender asked.
"Can I see the wine list?" Drew asked sort of looking around the bar. It was very upscale and had nice wood trim work and the remake of the old tin ceilings. The large mirror behind the bar gave a nice double reflection of the rear plaster cornice. It was a nice touch.
The list was slid in front of him, and he had to smile. The name of the bar was embossed on the beautiful wine list "Spirits." Drew chose a nice deep red syrah.
"Spirits" was why he came here. The name of the restaurant seemed to call him from across the street.
'Spirits' was why he was here. 'Spirits'...hauntings of life, past, present and future.
Drew looked at himself in the mirror. Looked into the eyes of the man he was.
'God...I look like shit," Drew stated openly and then gave his Mona Lisa smile.
"Barkeep, do you have a pair of scissors behind the bar?" Drew asked.
***
Drew still could not fathom why he had gotten off the freeway, at this particular off ramp He was supposed to be on his way home. Its not like the neighborhood held any draw to him anymore. The house and neighborhood where he had spent his Highschool years. The house had been repainted. It had a new family. They kept it up better than his family ever did. He had driven past it many years ago when his sister had visited CA and it held little to no intrinsic value to him.
The house sat in one of the many subdivisions of the LA basin, one indistinguishable from the next. At least from the freeway. No clear breaks, no bands of trees to separate neighborhoods, just rooftop after rooftop. Tall boxes, short boxes, styled boxes, and warren boxes set in scattered rows for mile after mile after mile.
A box for people to live in and toil the daily grind.
Admittedly, it was the last 'childhood home' he had before venturing off to go to university. A home before his father suddenly past at much to early an age. He had come back for the funeral but never ever returned. Even now he would scoot down to work on his mom's mobile home and then run back up north the next morning after taking her to breakfast.
He did not even understand how he had made the decision to get off the damn freeway. But here he was, driving up the same damn street he spent all those years residing. There was not a plethora of happy memories as one would see on the Hallmark Channel. Most were painful reminders of loss or teenage angst.
But here he was, parking in front of the house. He was sort of saddened. It had not been kept up and had that very worn look as when he lived there. In his case it was too many narcissistic teenagers living under one roof. A dad and stepmom that worked too much trying to feed, clothe and house the narcissistic teenagers. This left no time or money to fix up the house.
The house again had that look of his younger years.
He got out of the car and walked up the pathway leading to the front door. The door was open, and he called in.
"Hello! Hi...Is anyone there? Hello?" he yelled as he edged farther into the house. There to the left was the 'formal' living room. Sectioned off to make another bedroom for his oldest stepbrother. The crappy bi-fold door was still there in the opening. Something his dad did, which meant it was crooked and never closed right.
To his right, farther along, was the hallway to the 'kids' 3 bedrooms. His would be at the far end and to the left, next to the 'kids' bathroom.
Infront of him was the 'Great Room,' before it became trendy to have a 'Great Room'. Wood paneled, open wood beams and a massive clinker brick fireplace. This was the place of his fondest memories. A large cheap dinning table surrounded by chairs where Friday pizza night was held. Family night dinners and breakfasts for a multitude, depending how many teenagers had landed at the house after a night of carousing and partying. This was always the safe house for hundreds of cousins and family friends.
Mom and Dad made it that way, welcoming.
He remembered Dad and later the two of them doing 'homework' on that same table.
But his mind then did that Hitchcockian thing by expanding back out and in, while he stood at the edge of the Great Room.
'This can't be right,' he thought. There were the two sofas from his youth. There sat the mahogany coffee table he made in shop class. The one that now sat in his own den, up north, in his own house.
His eyes swept the room, the old TV, the old-style cable TV controller that you had to twist the dial on. He looked at the doorway to the kitchen and saw the portable phone in its cradle on the kitchen countertop.
He heard a toilet flush and spun his body a quarter turn so his spinning head could look down the corridor at the 'kids' bathroom door. He watched the handle turn, the door crack and then slowly open.
Out stepped a vision from long ago, HER. His heart almost stopped beating for that moment in time. She was dressed in her song leader uniform for the local Community College. She had the two sets of panties in her hand, soft cotton, and the synthetic cover.
Her eyes...he could never look away from her eyes. They held so much magic for him. When they were full of lust, they almost glowed. And they had a duel look now, lust and confusion.
"Dee, what's wrong?" she stood there looking like the vision of loveliness that he always remembered. Only two people in his life could use the 'child' version of his name and make him smile, his stepmom and HER.
"Dee, it looks like you just saw a ghost! Come on, we only have an hour to play, and I must be back to class. You do too if I remember." And she turned grabbing the bottom of her song sweater and pulling it over her head. He saw her thin muscular back and bra straps as she passed the corner.
There she was...his dream girl. Taller than he, with a beautiful athletic body and legs that never seemed to end.
In a daze, he turned his body slowly and walked past his sister's bedroom, then past the door to the room two of the stepbrothers shared. He made the left turn past the doorway to the bathroom and could smell HER perfume freshly applied.
He had gotten together with her over the years. They had an amazing short affair just before his 50
