Flannel
This morning after she dropped Timmy off at daycare, she had gone to the sentencing, 7-10 was the verdict. Sharon put the key in the lock turned it, and opened the door. She laid her purse and coat on a nearby chair, and shut the door. It was 12:30 now and she had just enough time to take a nice, warm, soothing bath before she had to pick up Timmy.
She put her hand on the banister and began to ascend the stairs. Slowly she climbed the stairs, letting her hand caress the railing on the way up, tracing the length of it with her fingertips. She paused when her hand passed over a cleft in the wood. Feeling the indentation, she looked down at the railing to Christmas three years ago.
There had been a fresh blanket of snow on the ground when they awoke. The morning had gone well, everyone seemed happy with the gifts. She kept Bill’s finest gift for last. A beautiful set of custom golf clubs.
Excusing herself from the gift exchange for a moment she went and placed the clubs at the bottom of the stairs. Returning, she suggested they all get dressed and go enjoy the fresh snow. Bill was ecstatic when he saw them, but it quickly faded when he pulled the first club from the bag. The four-iron had barely missed her head when it crashed into the banister. She forgot to get graphite shafts.
He did not miss the second time when he brought the blunt end of the club across her face. It broke a tooth and pierced her cheek. She quickly grabbed her face and ran for the car, leaving a bloody trail through the freshly fallen snow. She pulled herself from the memory and continued up the stairs to draw her bath.
After starting her water she went to the bedroom to get undressed. Pulling her stockings off, she looked down at the mark on her thigh. Bill had asked her countless times to get a tattoo of his name, but she had always managed to get out of the conversation.
The year the patriots lost to the packers in the super bowl, she had cooked and waited on him and his friends for half of the game. By the end of the third quarter his friends had all left. By the end of the super bowl he had drank nearly an entire bottle of whisky.
His anger climaxed at the end of the game when the announcer’s commentary bashed the Patriot’s preparation for the game. In his drunken state he tied her down and tried to carve his name into her leg.
She looked down at it, running her fingers over the marred flesh; it had never looked much like his name and had required thirty stitches. She finished undressing and walked to the closet.
Pulling out a flannel robe she put it around her body and buried her thoughts in it. She was eleven and at J.C penny’s picking out a Father’s Day present. She walked around for what seemed like hours until she saw the perfect gift. A large mannequin, resembling her father, wore a deep burgundy flannel robe.
The clerk had taken it down for her at her mom’s request. She did not want the ones in the packages. She picked out the wrapping paper and had a difficult time waiting until Father’s Day to give it to him.
On that Sunday morning she sat nervously as he opened it. She almost burst when he had said he loved it and put it on, scooping her up in the same motion. She looked up at him as he smiled down at her.
His hair was beginning to gray at the temples, but to her he was still the most handsome man in the world. She hugged him and sighed deeply. She could smell the old spice he always wore. His facial hair tickled her face as she hugged him. Standing in her room her arms wrapped around herself, she could still smell her Father on the robe.
She turned off the water and added some bath beads. It had been years since she had felt this at ease and she planned on taking full advantage of it. She decided to treat herself to a glass of wine.
She walked out of the bathroom and glided down the stairs, she couldn’t remember the last time she had felt this safe; as safe as she had felt as a little girl with her father, not fearing anything, as she held his hand.
As she made her way into the kitchen she noticed the bag she had put together for the goodwill was open. Timmy must have been playing around with it this morning; he was still too young to understand what was going on. The nine months she had carried him had been the best months of her recent life.
Bill was as nice as could be. He waited on her hand and foot while she was pregnant. She had hoped the pregnancy would change things, and it did, for about nine months. He had slapped her in the face in the hospital room over a fight about the name. That was the first time she realized he would never change.
She searched the cupboards for a glass for the wine. Most of their dishes had been lost to Bill’s fits of anger. After a few minutes she managed to pull out one of the wineglasses from a set they had received on their honeymoon, compliments of the hotel.
She filled the glass and took a sip, she brought the glass down and starred into the dark liquid. Deep into the liquid at the hotel sink, as she spit the blood from her mouth.
Bill welcomed her early into his style of husbandry. She looked down at the tooth, as it lay in a puddle of blood in the sink.
She took another drink rolling her tongue around in her mouth and feeling the artificial tooth it had been replaced with. Sharon leaned her head back and rolled it around as the wine started to relax her muscles.
Breathing deep to help them relax, a familiar smell caressed her nose, the kind of smell that stands in the woods at the edge of your memory taunting you to come and find it. She took a few more deep breaths as she searched the forest. Wandering through her deeply under-brushed mind she stumbled over the bag for the goodwill. She was almost sure Timmy hadn’t been playing with it.
She kept searching, remembering her entire day. She slowed as she came to a clearing in her thoughts. She used her key to get in the house but she didn’t remember hearing that familiar click as she turned the key.
She quickly opened her eyes as the smell jumped from the woods into the clearing with her. Bill had worn the same $5 Stetson the entire time she had known him.
She turned on her heels quickly running for the front door. As she turned the corner out of the kitchen into the living room, she ran headlong into a flannel-covered chest. She fell back hard on her backside. She didn’t have to look up. She knew who it was.
That red flannel was on the top of the bag she had put together to send to the goodwill. She slowly raised her head, her amber locks falling in her face. She stared up at him through tear filled eyes. She stared to sob thinking of Timmy at school all alone, and no one being there to pick him up.