Your Average Birthday Party Part 2 - January 16, 2007

by j. parkerRead Part 1 of "Your Average Birthday Party here.

When I reached the porch and sat down with my dad, he was drinking a beer and laughing at the neighbors, drunk and stoned on those funny little pills (most likely Valium and "Reds").

I was crying out of sheer abject fear. The man across the street was going to kill my father.

"Daddy, Eddie's going to kill you."

Laughing, my father said, "what? Are you kidding?"

"No. Brenda said that she was going to send him over hear to kill you 'cause you punched her."

"That guy is a fucking pussy. I'll kick his ass. Don't worry about him. Hell, son. You could kick his ass right now."

I looked at Eddie lying face down in his own front yard, completely motionless, and what my father said started to make sense.

"But, but...what if he gets a gun?"

"J., he wouldn't know what to do with a gun if I gave him lessons. And look at him. He can't even fucking walk. What's he going to do?"

It was becoming clear. As fucked up as my parents were, our family was pretty far up the food chain in this neighborhood.

If I'd have asked Eddie, he might have agreed. That is, if could he have formed a coherent sentence in the following 12 hours.

I sat and talked with my dad for awhile. Oddly when my father was drunk, he was, more often than not, very kind to me. This was (or so it seemed to me as a child), the only time we talked, heart-to-heart.

My mother, on the other hand, was a different story. When she was drunk, she brought with her the fury of hell, looking to unleash it upon whatever was near her, either through outright aggression, or some complex manipulative passive-aggressive scheme she'd concoct. This night, she was sloppy drunk and salty...looking for a fight.

As my father sat and talked, she approached the porch screaming, "J., get your ass to bed! You need to get to sleep, now!"

"But, I don't want to. Dad?"

"Come on, he doesn't have to go to bed."

"Yeah, he dosh, you muthafucker! J., getsh to bed! Now!"

My hope was a simple thing. As long as I was there, I didn't think they'd fight, at least physically. They wouldn't hit each other if they knew I was watching, or at least so I thought.

My mother grabbed me and shoved me through the door, "get your ass to bed, NOW!"

She followed me upstairs towards my bedroom. I could hear my heart pounding in my ears. I was not going to allow anything bad to happen. This was getting out of hand and I was afraid of what would happen if I went to bed.

I ran ahead of my mother towards my bedroom, and at the last second, I turned into the bathroom and locked the door behind myself. She pounded on the door, and my father soon joined in the fray.

"Just leave him alone. He doesn't want to go to bed. It's the weekend."

"Shut up. Yeww don' know wass good for these kidzz. Yer never home. He hash ta go to bed."

This diverted her attention to him and they moved to their bedroom to argue. I darted out of the bedroom and downstairs to find my brother, who'd been sitting and blissfully watching TV as this transpired.

I could hear my parents arguing as I sat with my brother. They were moving back downstairs and had made their way to the landing where the open staircase made a 90 degree left turn before descending to the first floor. My mother was ahead of my father, and turned to throw a punch at him in response to one of his insults. I remember the next part as clearly as if it had happened fifteen minutes ago.

As she did, he threw up his hands to block her punch; she lost her balance and fell backwards down the staircase. It was a scene out of a movie: she tumbled headfirst down the stairs, tossed each and every way, bouncing from side to side with a sickening, "thump, thump, thump" as she hit every stair on her way down.

The house had steam heat, and at the bottom of the staircase was a large, cast-iron radiator. Her head hit it with a "thonnnng" and she lie at the bottom of the staircase, motionless.

I sat there stunned with my brother for a moment, and walked to the lifeless body on the floor. My father rushed down the staircase and looked at her, calling her name.

"Oh my God. Whaa...what have I done?"

My father began to cry. My brother began to cry.

I was filled with fear. What would happen to us now? If my mother was dead, who would care for my brother and me? If my father was arrested for her murder, who would pay the bills? Where would I live? It seemed, at that second, that any semblance of normalcy I had in my life was gone.

I got angry. Really angry.

I ran upstairs and grabbed my father's alarm clock. This to me was one of the signs of his parental authority. This is what woke the adult in the morning to go to work in the adult world. I wanted to destroy it.

I spiked it into the ground, shattering the face.

I then ran back downstairs, grabbed the Kool Aid Man pitcher of pink lemonade and dumped it on my father as he sat sobbing over my motionless mother. He turned to me.

"J., this is serious. I...I...I don't know what to do."

Calling 911 might have been a good idea, but somehow that idea never occurred to him. My family has not been known for its response in pressure situations.

I sat on the floor with my father, who was on his knees, and my brother who was crying uncontrollably and trying to wake my mother. I didn't know what to do. There was nothing to do. So, I just cried.

At that moment, my mother opened her eyes, shook her head, and slowly sat up with a dazed expression on her face. My brother, father, and I cried tears of joy. My mother grabbed her children, and glared at my father. With the exception of a headache (and being very drunk), she was fine.

And things were back to normal in the Parker household.

Posted by J. Parker at 12:03 AM

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Emotional honesty in spades.

Posted by: HalfNelson at January 16, 2007 12:16 AM

That was great.

Posted by: Josh Tilson at January 16, 2007 01:38 AM

Holy crap! Very interesting story. You might want to fix this typo to "sat", though. Keep it up.

Posted by: NiteShok at January 16, 2007 02:10 AM

Like you, I always thought that as long as I stayed awake, the arguments wouldn't get physical. I would refuse to leave the room, because I'd assumed that my being there, they'd have to calm down.

It never really worked.

Good luck with your site, i'll be back to read more.

Posted by: Nicole at January 16, 2007 08:36 AM

You said that as if your father merely blocked your mothers punch and this made your mother lose her balance.

Yet you seemed to blame your father.

Are you saying he should have just taken a punch? What?

Posted by: Liam at January 16, 2007 08:47 AM

"You said that as if your father merely blocked your mothers punch and this made your mother lose her balance.

"Yet you seemed to blame your father.

"Are you saying he should have just taken a punch? What?"

Was my dad to blame? The situation had escalated to "total clusterfuck" status hours before this happened. The notion of objective blame pretty much went out the window that night somewhere around 8 PM.

This story is told as I remember it, and how I remember feeling in the moment. At the time, I thought my father was responsible. I mean, for fuck's sake, I saw my mother take a header down the stairs and lying motionless on the floor. Yeah, I was pissed off and wanted to blame someone...God, my father, my second grade teacher...anyone. Wouldn't you? So, yeah, I blamed my father, but as I replayed it over the years, I realized that my mother was a clumsy, angry drunk and my father was just trying to protect himself.

Posted by: J. Parker at January 16, 2007 09:04 AM

Hell yeah! Great story, J. Parker. It was definitely worth the wait for the finish. That was hilarious about how you made a beeline for the alarm clock, to destroy it due to what it represented, and the little scene of the dad & two boys all crying hysterically over the prone body of their drunk, knocked-out mother was very funny, excellent dark humour. Great stuff, and fun to read.

Posted by: Snowblood at January 16, 2007 01:35 PM

thats fucking hilarious. my parents are in their 40's now and still going at it like they were young....

ahhhh love & white trash...

i dont talk to any of that side anymore :)

Posted by: Anonymous at January 16, 2007 10:56 PM

Whoa, this is awesome. Really immersive.

Posted by: Franco at January 21, 2007 04:47 PM

Fantastic story; enthralling and highly entertaining. I agree with snowblood about the fantastic dark humor associated with your mother laying seemingly dead, and mostly enjoyed the kool aid bit. It adds a lot to the picture, and pushes the situation over the boundary and into the downright surreal.

As for constructive criticism:

I think you may have concluded the story a bit too hastily. You dedicate several paragraphs building tension, and then resolve it in 5 quick sentences. You may just want to expand a bit more on what you felt when she came to, or more about the tension no doubt took place between your parents before she grabbed you.

Anyway, just something to take into account.

P.S.
[I]The house had steam heat, and at the bottom of the staircase was a large, cast-iron radiator. Her head hit it with a "thonnnng" and she lie at the bottom of the staircase, motionless.[/I]

I think you meant "laid" or "lay".

Posted by: tacolmb3 at January 21, 2007 09:24 PM