Patricia Drake
written by: Allison Gilliam
I was a tornado that Friday morning, jerking shirts off their hangers, pants out of drawers and into a duffel bag. I grabbed the framed picture of my twin sister Pauline from the top of the bureau, shoving it underneath clothes in the bag to cushion it. I was going to get out of Trenton and head to Columbia. I knew John would be home any minute from the nursery, where he was buying more supplies for that ridiculous months-long garden water trench project. It was the continuance of one of his endless impulses, a waste of time he could have spent looking for a job.
My income from working as a server at the Maple Valley Golf Club fully supported us and paid for our mobile home. John hadn’t worked in about 18 months and didn’t seem to be in a hurry to upgrade his status. He filled his days any way he pleased: going bow hunting, strolling through pawn shops, planting a garden where nothing grew. He was also doing quite a bit of eating and drinking which was reflected in a nice new spare tire around his middle. Most troubling was that lately he would not back off my place of employment, would not stop telling me to get him a job there. A couple of weeks prior, John convinced me to talk to my manager about considering him for a caddy position. The manager had agreed to interview him toward the end of a weekday. Around 2:00pm on the day of the interview, John showed up to the club bar saying he’d have a drink while waiting for the manager. After about an hour and a half, he proceeded to get himself blind drunk and fell off the bar stool. I watched the whole scene from the dining room, where I was in the middle of taking a table’s order, my hands shaking as I held my pen and pad. Not only had this happened at my place of business, in front of members, he had blown all chances of working there. There I was on the clock with hours left in my shift, I couldn’t take care of him. The bartender, a sweet kid in his mid-twenties, took pity on me. He walked over to me saying softly “Don’t worry Miss Patricia, I’ll get one of the caddies to drive him home.” I nodded and gave a wide-eyed, frozen smile to the guests at the table. “So, I’m sorry where was I – oh yes! Our soup today is northern quahog clam chowder.”
Would you believe that over those next few days, John kept asking me to talk to the manager about rescheduling the interview? As the saying goes, when they were handing out brains, he thought they said trains and missed his. I was terrified John would show up again at the club bar. I was respected there and I needed that job, plus I was trying to upgrade my own status. The patrons would come in and ask for me by name. There was this one wealthy gentleman that golfed and dined there every Sunday, who had mentioned he was looking for someone to serve as a household manager for him and his wife. They owned several properties: a big home in Columbia, another in Charleston and another one up in Sunset Beach, North Carolina. Imagine that – I hoped they would offer to let me use one of their homes someday, while they were away. I dreamed of taking Pauline with me to Sunset Beach. I wanted to walk out on that wide swath of sand at low tide, go the entire length of the island from Ocean Isle all the way to the old wrecked fishing boat on Bird Island, catch a glimpse of the wild goats that still lived in the dunes. We still finished each other’s sentences, we could understand each other while speaking few words. After a lonely childhood we both went on to face even more difficult days as adults: broken marriages, long-lost pregnancies, addiction, bills that went into collection. I didn’t know where I would be without Pauline. She was the only consistent part of my life, someone who had never let me down. I wanted to give her the gift of putting our days of struggle and heartbreak behind us for a brief while; a little time to pretend we were children again.
The last straw happened late last night, after John went to bed. I received a text from Pauline with an image and a link: John had gone and put himself on Tinder. A sorrier selfie I had never seen – that lazy 60-year-old unemployed man with zero retirement savings. He just embarrassed me to no end, but that selfie helped me make up my mind pretty quickly.
As I zipped up my duffel bag I heard a truck door slam, and jerked my head up to look out the window. John had arrived home and was already in a fast stride toward the front door, with this shit-eating grin on his face for reasons unknown. At that moment, so help me God, I wished for him to be struck down by lighting, for him just to drop dead. I should have been long gone; why even bother to pack? I stand frozen with my bag in hand, hating him and hating myself, as he opens the door.
- Patricia Drake - January 10, 2025
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